I says.

"'I don't believe Lizzie cares for me.'

"'How's that?' I says.

"'Last Sunday she was out riding with Tom Bryson, an' every Sunday
afternoon I find half-a-dozen young fellows up there.'

"'Well, ye know, Lizzie is attractive, an' she ain't our'n yit--not
just yit,' I says. 'If young men come to see her she's got to be
polite to 'em. You wouldn't expect her to take a broom an' shoo
'em off?'

"'But I don't have anything to do with other girls.'

"'An' you're jealous as a hornet,' I says. 'Lizzie wants you to
meet other girls. When Lizzie marries it will be for life. She'll
want to know that you love her an' only her. You keep right on
tryin' to catch up with Lizzie, an' don't be worried.'

"He stopped strappin' the razor of his discontent, but left me with
unhappy looks. That very week I saw him ridin' about with Marie
Benson in his father's motor-car.

"Soon a beautiful thing happened. I have told you of the
melancholy end of the cashier of one of our local banks. Well, in
time his wife followed him to the cemetery. She was a distant
relative of Sam's wife, an' a friend of Lizzie. We found easy
employment for the older children, an' Lizzie induced her parents
to adopt two that were just out of their mother's arms--a girl of
one an' a boy of three years. I suggested to Lizzie that it seemed
to me a serious undertaking, but she felt that she ought to be
awfully good by way of atonement for the folly of her past life.
It was near the end of the year, an' I happen to know that when
Christmas came a little sack containing five hundred dollars in
gold was delivered at Sam Henshaw's door for Lizzie from a source
unknown to her. That paid for the nurse, an' eased the situation."

V

IN WHICH LIZZIE EXERTS AN INFLUENCE ON THE AFFAIRS OF THE RICH AND
GREAT

A year after Socrates Potter had told of the descent of Lizzie, and
the successful beginning of her new life, I called again at his
office.

"How is Pointview?" I asked.

"Did ye ever learn how it happened to be called Pointview?" he
inquired.

"No."

"Well, it began with a little tavern with a tap-room called the
Pointview House, a great many years ago. Travellers used to stop
an' look around for the Point, an', of course, they couldn't see
it, for there's none here; at least, no point of land. They'd go
in an' order drinks an' say:

"'Landlord, where's the point?'

"An' the landlord would say: 'Well, boys, if you ain't