folded check, made out in
blank to Calvin Gray and signed by Gus Briskow.

"So! I assume that I'm to pay the bills. Very well. The sky is the
limit, eh?"

"That's it. Of course, I don't need anything for myself--this dress and
bunnit are good enough--but Allie's got to have new fixin's, from the
inside out. I s'pose her things'll eat up the best part of a hundred
dollars, won't they?" The speaker's look of worried inquiry bespoke a
lifetime of habitual economy.

"We're not going to buy what you _need_, but what you want. You're
going to have just as many pretty things as Allie."

Ma was panic-stricken at this suggestion. When Gray insisted she
demurred; when he told her that one nice dress would cost at least a
hundred dollars, she confessed:

"Why, I don't s'pose all the clo's I've had since I was married cost
much more 'n that."

"I'll spend at least a thousand on you before noon," he laughed.

Mrs. Briskow gasped, she rolled her eyes and fanned herself; she
appealed to Allegheny, but it was evident that the latter had kept her
eyes open and had done some thinking, for she broke out, passionately:
"You make me sick, Ma! It'll take all Pa can afford, and then some, to
make us look like other people. I never knew how plumb ridic'lous we
are till--"

"Not that," Gray protested.

"You _know_ we're ridic'lous," she cried, fiercely. "We're a couple of
sow's ears and all Pa's royalties can't make us into silk purses.
But--mebbe we can manage to look like silk, if we spend enough."

Gray determined that the girl should not be disappointed if he could
help it, so he went directly to the head saleswoman of the first store,
and asked her to assume the role of counselor where circumstance
compelled him to relinquish it, explaining that in addition to hats,
gowns, shoes, and the like, both Ma and Allie needed a variety of
confidential apparel with which he had only the vaguest acquaintance.
Although the woman agreed to his request, he found before long that his
trust in her had been misplaced. Not only did she threaten to take
advantage of her customers' ignorance, but also, to Gray's anger, she
displayed a poorly veiled contempt for and amusement at his charges.

Allegheny was not long in feeling this. She had entered the
establishment aquiver with hope and anticipation. This was her great
adventure. She was like a timid child, enraptured at sight of its first
tinseled Christmas tree; to have that ecstacy spoiled,