tell you how much I
hate to; but I've got to follow the ball. I'm looking for a fellow."

"If he--if he doesn't love you," sobbed the stricken witch, "then you'll
come back to me--won't you? I love a liar!"

"To the very stake!" vowed Jeff. Such heroic, if conditional, constancy
was not to go unrewarded. A couple detached themselves from the dancers,
threaded their way to a corner of the long hall and stood there in deep
converse. Jeff quickened pulse and pace--for one was a Red Devil and the
other wore the soft gray costume of a Friend. She was tall, this
Quakeress, and the hobnobbing devil was of Jeff's own height. Jeff began
to hope for a goal.

Briskly limping, he came to this engrossed couple and laid a friendly
hand on the devil's shoulder.

"Brother," he said cordially, "will you please go to--home?"

The devil recoiled an astonished step.

"What? What!! Show me your license!"

"Twenty-three!--Please!--there's a good devil--23! I'm the right guard
for this lady, I hope. Oh, please to go home!"

The devil took this request in very bad part.

"Go back fifteen yards for offside play and take a drop kick at
yourself!" he suggested sourly.

A burly policeman, plainly conscious of fitting his uniform, paused for
warning.

"No scrappin' now! Don't start nothin' or I'll run in the t'ree av
yees!" he said, and sauntered on, twirling a graceful nightstick.

"Thee is a local man, judging from thy letters," said the Quaker lady,
to relieve the somewhat strained situation. "What do they stand for? E.
P.? Oh, yes--El Paso, of course!"

"I saw you first!" said the Red Devil. "And with your disposition you
would naturally find me more suitable. Make your choice of gridirons!
Send him back to the side lines! Disqualify him for interference!"

"Don't be hurried into a decision," said Jeff. "Eternity is a good
while. Before it's over I'm going to be a--well, something more than a
footballer. Golf, maybe--or tiddledywinks."

The Quakeress glanced attentively from one to the other.

"Doubtless he will do his best to forward Thy Majesty's interests," she
interposed. "Why not give him a chance?"

The devil shrugged his shoulders. "I always prefer to give this branch
of work my personal attention," he said stiffly.

"A specialty of thine?" mocked the girl.

The devil bowed sulkily.

"My heart is in it. Of course, if you prefer the bungling of a novice,
there is no more to be said."

"Thy Majesty's manners have