suit real well; it's a fine piece of
goods; the kind to stand the desert dust. But I would have liked to see
you in white, with a blaze of lights and decorations and a crowd."

Geraldine laughed. "We had a nice little wedding, and the young men from
the office made up for their noise. They gave the porter a handsome case
of silver at the last moment, to bring to me."

"And," supplemented Jimmie, "there was a handsome silver tea service from
the chief. He told her she had been a credit to the staff, and he would
find it hard to replace her. Think of that coming from the head of a big
daily. It makes me feel guilty. But she is to have full latitude in the
new paper; society, clubs, equal suffrage if she says so; anything she
writes goes with the _Weatherbee Record_."

"If I were you, I'd have that down in writing." Annabel looked from
Daniels to the bride, and her lip curled whimsically. "They all talk that
way at first, as though the earth turned round for one woman, and the
whole crowd ought to stop to watch her go by. He pretends, so far as he is
concerned, she can stump the county for prohibition or lead the
suffragette parade, but, afterwards, he gets to taking the other view.
Instead of thanking his lucky stars the nicest girl in the world picked
him out of the bunch, he begins to think she naturally was proud that the
best one wanted her. Then, before they've been married two years, he
starts trying to make her over into some other kind of a woman. Why, I
know one man right here in Hesperides Vale who set to making a Garden of
Eden out of a sandhole in the mountains, just because it belonged to a
certain girl." She paused an instant, while her glance moved to Banks, and
the irony went out of her voice. "He could have bought the finest fruit
ranch in the valley, all under irrigation and coming into bearing, for he
had the money, but he went to wasting it on that piece of unreclaimed sage
desert. And now that he has got it all in shape, he's talking of opening a
big farm in Alaska."

Banks laughed uneasily. "The boys need it up there," he said in his high
key. "Besides, I always get more fun out of making new ground over. It's
such mighty good soil here in Hesperides Vale things grow themselves
soon's the water is turned on. It don't leave a man enough to do. And we
could take a little run down to the ranch, any time; we could count on
always wintering here, my, yes."

Annabel smiled. "He thinks by mid-summer he