he demanded. "I bet yer that the
least he tells you is I got Bright's Disease!"

Babette shook her head slowly.

"So you know it yourself all the time," she commented bitterly; "and
yet you want to eat _gedaempftes Kalbfleisch_, when you know as well as
I do it would pretty near kill you."

"Kill me!" Sam shouted. "What d'ye mean, kill me? I eat some _Rinderbrust_
for my lunch yet; and that's all what ails me. I ain't got no more Bright's
Disease as you got it."

"If you think that lying is going to help you, you're mistaken,"
Babette replied calmly. "To a man in your condition _gedaempftes
Kalbfleisch_ is poison."

"I ain't lying to you," Sam insisted. "I am eating too much lunch, I am
telling you."

"And you're not going to eat too much dinner!" Babette said as she
tiptoed from the room.

Thus Sam drank a glass of buttermilk and ate some dry toast for his
supper; and, in consequence, he slept so soundly that he did not waken
until Dr. Sigmund Eichendorfer entered his room at eight o'clock the
following morning. Under the bullying frown of his daughter Sam
submitted to a physical examination that lasted for more than an hour;
and when Doctor Eichendorfer departed he left behind him four varieties
of tablets and a general interdiction against eating solid food,
getting up, going downtown, or any of the other dozen things that Sam
insisted upon doing.

It was only under the combined persuasion of Max, Babette, and Lester
that he consented to stay in bed that forenoon; and when lunchtime
arrived he was so weakened by a twenty-four-hour fast and Doctor
Eichendorfer's tablets, that he was glad to remain undisturbed for the
remainder of the day.

At length, after one bedridden week, accompanied by a liquid diet and
more tablets, Sam was allowed to sit up in a chair and to partake of a
slice of chicken.

"Well, popper, how do you feel to-day?" asked Max, who had just arrived
from the office.

"I feel pretty sick, Max," Sam replied; "but I guess I could get
downtown to-morrow, all right."

Babette sat nearby and nodded her head slowly.

"Guess some more, popper," she said. "Before you would go downtown yet,
you are going to Lakewood."

"Lakewood!" Sam exclaimed. "What d'ye mean, Lakewood? If you want to go
to Lakewood, go ahead. I am going downtown to-morrow. What, d'ye think
a business could run itself?"

"So far as business is concerned," Max said, "you shouldn't trouble
yourself at all. We are hustling