y. Sculpture was a part of life in the old days, and we don't want to
make it a thing too 'precious' now. I want to get close to the business
men, not to avoid them. I like the roar of trade."

The Haneys, therefore, led by the sagacious Lucius, soon found
themselves in the Wisconsin Block, and shooting aloft in a bronze
elevator that seemed fired from a cannon ("express to the 10th floor"),
with nothing to suggest art in the men or in the signs about them. On
the thirteenth story they alighted, and, walking up one flight of
stairs, found themselves at the end of a bright hall, before a door
which bore, in simple gold letters, "Jos. Moss, Sculptor." Bertha heard
laughter within, and her heart misgave her. It was not easy for her to
meet these artist folk. Of business men, miners, railway managers she
was unafraid, but these people who joke and bully-rag each other and
talk high philosophy one minute and gossip the next, like the Congdons,
were "pretty swift" for her. After a moment's pause she said to the
Captain, "They can't kill us; here goes!" and knocked gently.

Moss himself opened the door, and his cordial, "How de do, Mrs. Haney,"
established him in her mind at once as a good fellow. He was quite as
direct as Congdon. "I'm glad to see you," he said to the Captain. "Come
in." He looked keenly at Lucius, who composedly explained himself. "The
Captain is a little lame, and I just came along to see that he got here
all right. I'll be back at 5.30."

The door opened into a big room, which was darkened at the windows and
lighted by shaded electric globes. It was cool and bare in effect.
Around a small table in a far corner a half-dozen people were sitting.
Mrs. Moss, who was pouring tea, rose in her place at the tea-urn as her
husband approached, and cordially shook hands with her guests. "I'm very
glad you came. Please tell me how you'll have your tea," she said.

Bertha was accustomed to take her tea "any old way," and said so, being
influenced by Mrs. Moss' candid eyes and merry smile. Haney, with a
queer feeling of being on the stage as a character in a play, sank
heavily into the chair at his hostess' right hand and said: "I never
took tea in my life, but I'm not dodgin' anything you mix."

Joe earnestly protested. "Don't do it, Captain, there's some Scotch down
cellar."

Mrs. Moss indicated one or two other dimly seen faces about her and
introduced their owners in a most casual manner while she compounded a