s Association would like to see his Honor about the annual dinner of
the association, of which his Honor had been duly informed.

One of the Mayor's secretaries came out, a tall young man who, as a
reporter on a sensational newspaper, had acquired a habit of dodging
curses and kicks. Now, as Mayor's secretary, he didn't quite know how to
dodge soft soap and glad hands.

"Good afternoon," said Hendrik, with what might be called a
business-like amiability. "Will the Mayor accept?"

"The Mayor," said the secretary with an amazing mixture of condescension
and uneasiness, as of a man calling on a poor friend in whose parlor
there is shabby furniture but in whose cellar there is a ton of
dynamite--"the Mayor knows nothing about your asso--of the _dinner_ of
your association." The secretary looked pleased at having caught himself
in time.

"Why, I wrote," began H. Rutgers, with annoyance, "over a week--" He
silenced himself while he opened his frock-coat, tilted back his high
hat from a corrugated brow, and felt in his pocket. It is the delivery,
not the speech, that distinguishes the great artist. Otherwise writers
would be considered intelligent people.

"Hell!" exclaimed Hendrik, looking at the secretary so fixedly and
angrily that the ex-reporter flinched. "It's in the other coat. I mean
the copy of the letter I sent the Mayor exactly a week ago to-day. I
wondered why he hadn't answered."

"He never got it," the secretary hastened to say.

Hendrik laughed. "You must excuse my language; but you know what it is
to arrange all the details of an annual meeting and banquet--menu,
decorations, music, _and_ speeches. Well, here is the situation: the
annual dinner of the National Street Advertising Men's Association will
be held at Weinpusslacher's. Reception at six; dinner at eight; speeches
begin about ten.

"What day?" asked the secretary.

"My head is in a whirl, and I don't-- Let me see-- Oh yes. Next
Saturday, April twenty-ninth. I'll send you tickets. Do you think the
Mayor will come?"

"I don't know. Saturdays he goes to his farm in Hartsdale."

"Yes, I know; but couldn't _you_ induce him to come? By George! there is
nothing our association wouldn't do for you in return."

"I'll see," promised the secretary, with a far-away look in his eyes as
if he were devising ways and means. Oh, he earned his salary, even if he
was a Celt.

"Thank you. And-- Oh yes, by the way, some of our members will arrive at
the Gr