e never was anybody I liked but you--and that's
all."

But instead of being pushed away she found Andy's arm folding her
closely. She looked up and saw his face cleared and smiling.

"Could you--could you forgive me, Andy?"

"Sure," said Andy. "It's all right about that. Back to the cemetery
for the Count. You've straightened everything out, Maggie. I was in
hopes you would before the wedding-day. Bully girl!"

"Andy," said Maggie with a somewhat shy smile, after she had been
thoroughly assured of forgiveness, "did you believe all that story
about the Count?"

"Well, not to any large extent," said Andy, reaching for his
cigar-case; "because it's Big Mike Sullivan's picture you've got in
that locket of yours."

MISS TOOKER'S WEDDING GIFT

By JOHN KENDRICK BANGS

Copyright 1909 by J. B. Lippincott Company.

I

Van Buren tossed his gloves impatiently on the table, removed his
overcoat, and sat down before the fire. He was apparently deeply
concerned about something, for when Niki, his Japanese valet, entered
the room and placed the whisky and soda on the little table at his
side, Van Buren paid no more attention to him than he would to a
vagrant sunmote that crossed his path. Long and steadily he gazed into
the broad fireplace, watching the dancing flames at play, pausing only
to light his pipe, upon which he pulled fiercely. Finally he spoke,
leaning forward and to all intents and purposes addressing the andirons.

"Confound the money!" he said impatiently. "I wish to thunder the
Governor had left it to some orphan asylum or to found a Chair in
Choctaw at some New England university, instead of to me--then I might
have made something of myself. Here am I twenty-seven years old and
all the fame I ever got came from leading cotillions at Newport, and my
sole contribution to the common weal has consisted of the fines I've
paid into the public treasury for exceeding the speed limit. Life!
I've seen a lot of it--haven't I, in this empty social shell I've been
born into!"

He paused for a moment and poured a stiff four fingers of whisky into a
glass at his side.

"Bah!" he shuddered as the odor of it greeted his nostrils. "You're a
poor kind of fuel for such an engine as I might have been if I'd been
started on the right track. By Jove! Ethel is right. What good am I?
What have I ever done to make myself worth while or to show that I have
any character in me that is a jot better than th