his great relief found it a very excellent instrument.

Checkers was not a conversationalist, where conversation had to be
made; but he was a very good amateur banjoist, and he sang an excellent
comic song; and he was glad of the opportunity offered to show himself
in perhaps his best role.

While, with the banjo on his knee, he deftly adjusted the strings, Miss
Martin sat beside him, an interested spectator, and talked to him in an
undertone.

"I thought we had better come in here and give Arthur a little chance,"
she said--"poor fellow." This with a long drawn sigh, which seemed to
demand an explanation.

Checkers looked up, inquiringly. This was his first legitimate
opportunity of taking a comprehensive look at her. The casual glance
had proclaimed her plain, but now in the bright light of a hanging-lamp
she seemed to him hopelessly unattractive. He felt chagrined and
disappointed. He was angry with Arthur for not having prepared him for
such a cruel disillusion. For somehow since his jesting words of the
previous Sabbath morning, he had allowed his fancy to run the gamut of
many glittering possibilities.

He had started forth that evening, feeling a pleasurable excitement in
the vague presentiment that he was going to meet his destiny. But now
it simply "would n't do." He decided quickly and became resigned.

"It was n't that she was really so ugly," he afterwards explained to
me, "but there was n't anything about her that you could tie to, and
sort of forget the rest"--except her "stuff," and he wasn't sure but
that was one of Arthur's "pipe-dreams." She had no style, no face, no
figure. Nothing at all for a little starter. She was just a girl,
that was all--just a girl. A fact which put her beyond the pale.

"Why do you say 'poor fellow?'" said Checkers, after several moments
silence. "It seems to me he's mighty lucky to have such a tidy little
friend."

"Yes, but I fear she is only a friend, and that's why I 'm so sorry for
him. I like Arthur; I think he is simply a dear. He has always been
perfectly lovely to me. But Pert--well, Pert is very peculiar, and
Arthur, you know, is awfully fast."

Checkers put on an incredulous look. "Arthur fast!" he exclaimed with
a laugh. "Why, if he was in a city, I 'd expect him to get run over by
a hearse inside of a week."

"Oh, you men always stand up for each other; but I know all about it.
You can't fool me."

Mrs. Barlow looked up from her s