ht as far up as his Adam's
apple, and has been clerking in the Owl Cigar Store ever since he can
remember. He tells her she is certainly a wonder and she calls him a
silly boy; says it's just a power she has developed through
concentration, and now she must claim from the all-good a dear little
home of seven rooms and bath, to be built on this lot; and she knows it
will come if she goes into the silence and demands it. Say! People with
any valuables on 'em begun to edge off, not knowing just how this
strange power of hers might work.

Then I look round and see the other booths ain't creating near the
excitement they had ought to be, only a few here and there taking
two-bit chances on things if Mrs. Wales ain't going in on 'em, too;
several of the most attractive booths was plumb deserted, with the girls
in charge looking mad or chagrined, as you might say. So I remember this
hidden evil of Egbert Floud's and that the crowd has gone there; and
while I'm deciding to give in and gratify my morbid curiosity, here
comes Cousin Egbert himself, romping along in his dinner-jacket suit and
tan shoes, like a wild mustang.

"What was I telling you?" he demands. "Didn't I tell you the rest of
this show was going to die standing up? Yes, sir; she's going to pass
out on her feet." And he waved a sneering arm round at the deserted
booths. "What does parties want of this truck when they can come down to
my joint and get real entertainment for their money? Why, they're
breaking their ankles now to get in there!"

It sure looked like he was right for once in his life; so I says:

"What is it you've done?"

"Simple enough," says he, "to a thinking man. It comes to me like a
flash or inspiration, or something, from being down to that fair in San
Francisco, California. Yes, sir; they had a deadfall there, with every
kind of vice rampant that has ever been legalized any place, and several
kinds that ain't ever been; they done everything, from strong-arm work
to short changing, and they was getting by with it by reason of calling
it Ye Olde Tyme Mining Camp of '49, or something poetical like that.
That was where I got nicked for my roll, in addition to about fifty I
lost at a crooked wheel. I think the workers was mostly ex-convicts, and
not so darned ex- at that. Anyway, their stuff got too raw even for the
managers of an exposition, so they had to close down in spite of their
name. That's where I get my idee when these ladies said thin