d kind of groans.

"'Lem,' says he, 'we been friends for seven years. Would you mind not
kissing Mrs. Jessup quite so loud? I'd do the same for you.'

"'All right,' says I. 'The other kind will do as well.'

"'This Chinaman,' goes on Paisley, 'was the one that shot a man named
Mullins in the spring of '97, and that was--'

"Paisley interrupted himself again.

"'Lem,' says he, 'if you was a true friend you wouldn't hug Mrs.
Jessup quite so hard. I felt the bench shake all over just then. You
know you told me you would give me an even chance as long as there was
any.'

"'Mr. Man,' says Mrs. Jessup, turning around to Paisley, 'if you was
to drop in to the celebration of mine and Mr. Hicks's silver wedding,
twenty-five years from now, do you think you could get it into that
Hubbard squash you call your head that you are /nix cum rous/ in this
business? I've put up with you a long time because you was Mr. Hicks's
friend; but it seems to me it's time for you to wear the willow and
trot off down the hill.'

"'Mrs. Jessup,' says I, without losing my grasp on the situation as
fiance, 'Mr. Paisley is my friend, and I offered him a square deal and
a equal opportunity as long as there was a chance.'

"'A chance!' says she. 'Well, he may think he has a chance; but I hope
he won't think he's got a cinch, after what he's been next to all the
evening.'

"Well, a month afterwards me and Mrs. Jessup was married in the Los
Pinos Methodist Church; and the whole town closed up to see the
performance.

"When we lined up in front and the preacher was beginning to sing out
his rituals and observances, I looks around and misses Paisley. I
calls time on the preacher. 'Paisley ain't here,' says I. 'We've got
to wait for Paisley. A friend once, a friend always--that's Telemachus
Hicks,' says I. Mrs. Jessup's eyes snapped some; but the preacher
holds up the incantations according to instructions.

"In a few minutes Paisley gallops up the aisle, putting on a cuff as
he comes. He explains that the only dry-goods store in town was closed
for the wedding, and he couldn't get the kind of a boiled shirt that
his taste called for until he had broke open the back window of the
store and helped himself. Then he ranges up on the other side of the
bride, and the wedding goes on. I always imagined that Paisley
calculated as a last chance that the preacher might marry him to the
widow by mistake.

"After the proceedings was over we had tea and j