itch. The company that bought it has
platted it into fruit tracts. Think-of that! Trees growing all over that
piece of desert. Water running to waste, where mother and I carried it in
buckets through the sand, in the sweltering heat, up that miserable
slope."

The Society Editor drew a full breath and settled back in her chair. Her
glance fell to her glass, and she laid her fingers on the thin stem.
Jimmie refreshed himself again with the ice-water. "I didn't mean to go
into the story so deep," he said, "but you are a good listener."

"It was worth listening to," she answered earnestly. "I've always wondered
about your mother; I knew she must have been nice. But you must simply
hate the sight of cards now. I am sorry I said what I did. And I don't
care how it happened, here is to that 'Little Streak of Luck.' May it lead
to the great pay-streak."

She reached her glass out for Jimmie to touch with his, then raised it to
her lips. Daniels drank and held his glass off to examine the remaining
liquor, like a connoisseur. "I play cards a little sometimes," he
confessed; "on boats and places where I have to kill time. But," and he
brightened, "it was this way about that streak of luck. I was detailed to
write up the new Yacht Club quarters at West Seattle, with illustrations
to show the finer boats at the anchorage and, while I was on the landing
making an exposure of the Morganstein yacht, a tender put off with a
message for me to come aboard. Mr. Morganstein had seen me from the deck,
where he was nursing his injured leg. He was lonesome, I suppose. There
was no one else in sight, though as I stepped over the side, I heard a
victrola playing down below. 'How are you?' he said. 'Have a seat.' Then
he scowled down the companionway and called: 'Elizabeth, stop that
infernal machine, will you?'

"The music was turned off, and pretty soon Miss Morganstein came up the
stairs. She was stunning, in a white sailor suit with red fixings, eyes
black as midnight; piles of raven hair. But as soon as he had introduced
us, and she had settled his pillows to suit him--he was lying in one of
those invalid chairs--he sent her off to mix a julep or something. Then he
said he presumed we were going to have a fine cut of the _Aquila_ in the
Sunday paper, if I was the reporter who made that exposure at the time of
the accident to his car. I told him yes, I was Daniels, representing the
_Press_, and had the good fortune to be in Snoqualmie Pa