ourite among Reg Gap's hoot mondy in less than a
week after he unpacked his trunk. But it was very soon discovered by the
bright-eyed little gangsters of the best circles that he wasn't going to
be an easy one to disable. Naturally when a man has fought 'em off to
his age he has learned much of woodcraft and the hunter's cunning wiles,
and this one had sure developed timber sense. He beat 'em at their own
game for three months by the simple old device of not playing any
favourite for one single minute, and very, very seldom getting alone
with one where the foul stroke can be dealt by the frailest hand with
muscular precision. If he took Daisy Estelle Maybury to the chicken pie
supper to get a new carpet for the Presbyterian parsonage, he'd up and
take Beryl Mae and her aunt, or Gussie Himebaugh, or Luella Stultz, to
the lawn feet at Judge Ballard's for new uniforms for the band boys. At
the Bazaar of All Nations he bought as many chances of one girl as he
did of another, and if he hadn't any more luck than a rabbit and won
something--a hanging lamp or a celluloid manicure set in a plush-lined
box--he'd simply put it up to be raffled off again for the good of the
cause. And none of that moonlight loitering along shaded streets for
him, where the dirk is so often drove stealthily between a man's ribs,
and him thinking all the time he's only indulging in a little playful
nonsense. Often as not he'd take two girls at once, where all could be
merry without danger of anything happening.

"It was no time at all till this was found out on him. It was seen that
under a pleasing exterior, looking all too easy to overcome by any girl
in her right mind, he had powers of resistance and evasion that was like
steel. Of course this only stirred the proud beauties on to renewed and
crookeder efforts. Every darned one of 'em felt that her innocent young
girlhood was challenged, and would she let it go at that? Not so. My
lands! What snares and deadfalls was set for this wise old timber wolf
that didn't look it, with his smiling ways and seemingly careless
response to merry banter, and so forth!

"And of course every one of these shrinking little scoundrels thought at
once of her new riding costume, so no time at all was lost in organizing
the North Side Riding and Sports Club, which Mr. Burchell Daggett gladly
joined, having, as he said, an eye for a horse and liking to get out
after banking hours to where all Nature seems to smile and y