ngers.

"There," she said, when she had coated his face a second time. "You're
ready to begin. Only remember, I'm not always going to do this for you.
I'm just breaking you in, you see."

With great outward show of rebellion, half genuine, half facetious, he
made several tentative scrapes with the razor. He winced violently, and
violently exclaimed:

"Holy jumping Jehosaphat!"

He examined his face in the glass, and a streak of blood showed in the
midst of the lather.

"Cut!--by a safety razor, by God! Sure, men swear by it. Can't blame
'em. Cut! By a safety!"

"But wait a second," Saxon pleaded. "They have to be regulated. The
clerk told me. See those little screws. There.... That's it... turn them
around."

Again Billy applied the blade to his face. After a couple of scrapes, he
looked at himself closely in the mirror, grinned, and went on shaving.
With swiftness and dexterity he scraped his face clean of lather. Saxon
clapped her hands.

"Fine," Billy approved. "Great! Here. Give me your hand. See what a good
job it made."

He started to rub her hand against his cheek. Saxon jerked away with a
little cry of disappointment, then examined him closely.

"It hasn't shaved at all," she said.

"It's a fake, that's what it is. It cuts the hide, but not the hair. Me
for the barber."

But Saxon was persistent.

"You haven't given it a fair trial yet. It was regulated too much. Let
me try my hand at it. There, that's it, betwixt and between. Now, lather
again and try it."

This time the unmistakable sand-papery sound of hair-severing could be
heard.

"How is it?" she fluttered anxiously.

"It gets the--ouch!--hair," Billy grunted, frowning and making faces.
"But it--gee!--say!--ouch!--pulls like Sam Hill."

"Stay with it," she encouraged. "Don't give up the ship, big Injun with
a scalplock. Remember what Bert says and be the last of the Mohegans."

At the end of fifteen minutes he rinsed his face and dried it, sighing
with relief.

"It's a shave, in a fashion, Saxon, but I can't say I'm stuck on it. It
takes out the nerve. I'm as weak as a cat."

He groaned with sudden discovery of fresh misfortune.

"What's the matter now?" she asked.

"The back of my neck--how can I shave the back of my neck? I'll have to
pay a barber to do it."

Saxon's consternation was tragic, but it only lasted a moment. She took
the brush in her hand.

"Sit down, Billy."

"What?--you?" he demanded indignantly.

"Yes