r her, remarks puzzled, "Now just
precisely what can she mean by that?"

"Bein' only a crude and simple soul, J. B.," says I, "I got to give it
up. Anyhow, Mabel's entirely too thick a girl for me to see through."

Besides, not knowin' her tastes or little fads, how was I to guess her
notion of happy days? Then again, I didn't have to. All that's clear is
that Pyramid had wanted us to do some good turn for this old goat, to
sort of even up for that spill of years gone by, and we'd done our best.
Whether the money was to be used wise or not accordin' to our view was a
problem that don't worry me at all. Might have once, when I was dead
sure my dope on things in gen'ral was the only true dope. But I'm
getting over that, I hope, and allowin' other folks to have theirs now
and then. In fact, I proceeded to forget this pair as quick as possible,
like you try to shake a bad dream when you wake up in the night. And I
warned J. Bayard that if he didn't quit luggin' his punk philanthropy
specimens into my studio I'd bar him out entirely.

Let's see, that was early in the summer, and it must have been just
before Labor Day that I broke away for a week or so to run up into the
White Mountains and bring back Sadie and little Sully. First off Sadie
was plannin' to come by train; but by the time I got there she'd
changed her mind and wanted to tour back in the machine.

"It's such gorgeous weather," says she, "and the leaves are turning so
nicely! We'll take three days for it, making short runs and stopping at
night wherever we like."

"You mean," says I, "stoppin' wherever you can find an imitation
Waldorf-Castoria."

"Not at all," says she. "And you know some of these little automobile
inns are perfectly charming."

Well, that's what brought us to this Sunset Lake joint the first night
out. Somewhere in New Hampshire it was, or maybe Vermont. Anyway, it was
right in the heart of the summer boarder belt, and it had all the usual
vacation apparatus cluttered around,--tennis courts, bowling alleys,
bathing floats, dancing pavilion, and a five-piece Hungarian orchestra,
four parts kosher, that helped the crockery jugglers put the din in
dinner.

It was a clean, well-kept place, though, and by the quality of the
tomato bisque and the steamed clams that we started with I judged we was
actually goin' to be surprised with some real food. We'd watched the
last of the sunset glow fade out from the little toy lake, and while we
was