tory that he read.

The girl lay still, as if in a faint. Rudolf looked around the room
excitedly for a barrel. People must be rolled upon a barrel who--no, no;
that was for drowned persons. He began to fan her with his hat. That was
successful, for he struck her nose with the brim of his derby and she
opened her eyes. And then the young man saw that hers, indeed, was the
one missing face from his heart's gallery of intimate portraits. The
frank, grey eyes, the little nose, turning pertly outward; the chestnut
hair, curling like the tendrils of a pea vine, seemed the right end and
reward of all his wonderful adventures. But the face was wofully thin
and pale.

The girl looked at him calmly, and then smiled.

"Fainted, didn't I?" she asked, weakly. "Well, who wouldn't? You try
going without anything to eat for three days and see!"

"Himmel!" exclaimed Rudolf, jumping up. "Wait till I come back."

He dashed out the green door and down the stairs. In twenty minutes he
was back again, kicking at the door with his toe for her to open it.
With both arms he hugged an array of wares from the grocery and the
restaurant. On the table he laid them--bread and butter, cold meats,
cakes, pies, pickles, oysters, a roasted chicken, a bottle of milk and
one of red-hot tea.

"This is ridiculous," said Rudolf, blusteringly, "to go without eating.
You must quit making election bets of this kind. Supper is ready." He
helped her to a chair at the table and asked: "Is there a cup for the
tea?" "On the shelf by the window," she answered. When he turned again
with the cup he saw her, with eyes shining rapturously, beginning upon
a huge Dill pickle that she had rooted out from the paper bags with a
woman's unerring instinct. He took it from her, laughingly, and poured
the cup full of milk. "Drink that first" he ordered, "and then you shall
have some tea, and then a chicken wing. If you are very good you shall
have a pickle to-morrow. And now, if you'll allow me to be your guest
we'll have supper."

He drew up the other chair. The tea brightened the girl's eyes and
brought back some of her colour. She began to eat with a sort of dainty
ferocity like some starved wild animal. She seemed to regard the young
man's presence and the aid he had rendered her as a natural thing--not
as though she undervalued the conventions; but as one whose great stress
gave her the right to put aside the artificial for the human. But
gradually, with the return