nt of the Sacred
Heart. Philip told of her flirtations at the old Long Beach Hotel.

The names of New York people whom they had always known; the names of
country clubs--Baltusrol and Meadow Brook and Peace Waters; the names
of streets, with a sharp differentiation between Seventy-fourth Street
and Seventy-fifth Street; Durland's Riding Academy, the Rink of a
Monday morning, and other souvenirs of a New York childhood; the score
of the last American polo team and the coming dances--these things
shut Carl out as definitely as though he were a foreigner. He was
lonely. He disliked Phil Dunleavy's sarcastic references. He wanted to
run away.

Ruth seemed to realize that Carl was shut out. Said she to Phil
Dunleavy: "I wish you could have seen Mr. Ericson save my life last
Sunday. I had an experience."

"What was that?" asked the man whom Olive called "Georgie," joining
the tea-table set.

The whole room listened as Ruth recounted the trip to Chinatown, Mrs.
Salisbury's party, and the hero who had once been a passenger in an
aeroplane.

Throughout she kept turning toward Carl. It seemed to reunite him to
the company. As she closed, he said:

"The thing that amused me about the parlor aviator was his laying down
the law that the Atlantic will be crossed before the end of 1913, and
his assumption that we'll all have aeroplanes in five years. I know
from my own business, the automobile business, about how much such
prophecies are worth."

"Don't you think the Atlantic will be crossed soon?" asked the
keen-looking man with the tortoise-shell spectacles.

Phil Dunleavy broke in with an air of amused sophistication: "I think
the parlor aviator was right. Really, you know, aviation is too
difficult a subject for the layman to make any predictions
about--either what it can or can't do."

"Oh yes," admitted Carl; and the whole room breathed. "Oh yes."

Dunleavy went on in his thin, overbred, insolent voice, "Now I have it
on good authority, from a man who's a member of the Aero Club, that
next year will be the greatest year aviation has ever known, and that
the Wrights have an aeroplane up their sleeve with which they'll cross
the Atlantic without a stop, during the spring of 1914 at the very
latest."

"That's unfortunate, because the aviation game has gone up completely
in this country, except for hydro-aeroplaning and military aviation,
and possibly it never will come back," said Carl, a hint of pique in
his voice.