for the love of Mike don't blab it to the other women folks in the
buildin', or I'll have the whole works of 'em usin' the roof for a
general sun, massage, an' beauty parlor. Come on."

"I'll never breathe it to a soul," promised Mary Louise, solemnly. "Oh,
wait a minute."

She turned back into her room, appearing again in a moment with something
green in her hand.

"What's that?" asked Charlie, suspiciously.

Mary Louise, speeding down the narrow hallway after Charlie, blushed a
little. "It--it's parsley," she faltered.

"Parsley!" exploded Charlie. "Well, what the----"

"Well, you see. I'm from the country," explained Mary Louise, "and in
the country, at this time of year, when you dry your hair in the back
yard, you get the most wonderful scent of green and growing things--not
only of flowers, you know, but of the new things just coming up in the
vegetable garden, and--and--well, this parsley happens to be the only
really gardeny thing I have, so I thought I'd bring it along and sniff it
once in a while, and make believe it's the country, up there on the roof."

Half-way up the perilous little flight of stairs that led to the roof,
Charlie, the janitor, turned to gaze down at Mary Louise, who was just
behind, and keeping fearfully out of the way of Charlie's heels.

"Wimmin," observed Charlie, the janitor, "is nothin' but little girls in
long skirts, and their hair done up."

"I know it," giggled Mary Louise, and sprang up on the roof, looking,
with her towel-swathed head, like a lady Aladdin leaping from her
underground grotto.

The two stood there a moment, looking up at the blue sky, and all about
at the June sunshine.

"If you go up high enough," observed Mary Louise, "the sunshine is almost
the same as it is in the country, isn't it?"

"I shouldn't wonder," said Charlie, "though Calvary cemetery is about as
near's I'll ever get to the country. Say, you can set here on this soap
box and let your feet hang down. The last janitor's wife used to hang
her washin' up here, I guess. I'll leave this door open, see?"

"You're so kind," smiled Mary Louise.

"Kin you blame me?" retorted the gallant Charles. And vanished.

Mary Louise, perched on the soap box, unwound her turban, draped the damp
towel over her shoulders, and shook out the wet masses of her hair. Now
the average girl shaking out the wet masses of her hair looks like a
drowned rat. But Nature had been kind to Mary Louise. She had