He can't go to the games as often as he used to, because
he's looney about his wife and little Tommy too. So, when I go and he
doesn't I have to tell the whole story of the game to him, and--say,
excuse me, I'll just have time to get to the grounds to see the last
four innings,' and away he went.

"Once I asked Whimple if William had a girl, and he told me the boy was
too busy. That's the kind of a fool answer a man makes when he either
doesn't know, or does know and won't tell. Then he told me about a
trick that Tommy Watson and himself played on William, only it didn't
work out in the way they expected. It puzzles me to know how men find
time to go into such silliness. Between them they wrote a letter, in a
disguised hand, of course, and supposedly from a girl to William. He
had been taking part in one of the amateur performances that Epstein
arranged for the Children's Hospital, and the letter declared that the
writer had been so touched by the wonderful ability displayed by
William that she felt she might be forgiven if she did so unmaidenly a
thing as to ask for a personal interview. William got the letter--the
over-grown boys saw to that--read it through carefully, stowed it away
in one of his pockets, and--well, as Tommy Watson says, he just sat
tight.

"A few days afterwards they wrote another, to which William was to send
a reply to a certain post-office box. But there was no sign of an
answer. A third letter was written, imploring the recipient to have
mercy, or words to that effect, and two days afterwards a detective
called on Whimple and Tommy Watson. He found them together in Tommy's
store and opened the conversation with the hope that they were not
writing any more love letters. They were dumbfounded. Before they
could even think of an explanation the detective warned them in his
most official manner that the gentleman whom they were annoying by
their devotion to the art of letter-writing had decided that on receipt
of further epistles he would institute proceedings, and start with a
full statement to the press on the matter, including the names of the
letter writers.

"They had sense enough to take the hint, anyway, and enough sense left
over to keep from talking to William about it. I asked Whimple if
William had ever referred to the subject, and he said not directly.
But one afternoon he found one of the letters lying on his desk. He
took it to Tommy Watson, who told him he had found