m.

"I'm glad it's on our way. Pops is in an awful state. He swore right out
at his own mother this morning, and he wants you there in a hurry. Maybe
we'll be arrested for speeding."

Bean earnestly hoped they would. Pops in health was ordeal enough. But
he remained silent, trusting to the vigilance of an excellent
constabulary. The car reached the steam-heated apartment without
adventure, however, and he quickly secured his suit-case and consigned
the dog for an uncertain period to a Cassidy, who was brazenly taking
more than a friendly interest in him. Cassidy talked bluntly of how "we"
ought to feed him, as if he were already a part owner of the animal.

The car flew on, increasing a speed that had been unlawful almost from
the start. He wondered what the police were about. He might write a
sharp letter to the newspapers, signed, "Indignant Pedestrian," only it
would be too late. He was being volleyed at the rate of thirty-five
miles an hour into the presence of a man who had that morning sworn at
his mother. He wished he could, say for one day, have Breede back there
on the banks of the Nile--set him to work building a pyramid, or weeding
the lotus patch, foot or _no_ foot! He'd show him!

He switched this resentment to the young female at his side. He wanted
her to quit looking at him that way. It made him nervous. But a muffled
glance or two at her disarmed this feeling. She was all right to look
at, he thought, had pretty hands and "all that"--she had stripped off
her gloves when they reached the open country--and she didn't talk,
which was what he most feared in her sex. He recalled that she had said
hardly a word since the start. He might have supposed himself forgotten
had it not been for that look of veiled determination which he
encountered as often as he dared.

A young dog dashed from a gateway ahead of them and threatened the car
furiously. They both applied imaginary brakes to the car with feet and
hands and taut nerves. The puppy escaping death by an inch, trotted back
to his saved home with an air that comes from duty well performed. They
looked from the dog to each other.

"I'd make them against the law," said Bean.

"How could you? The idea!"

"I mean motors, not dogs."

"Oh! Of course!"

They had been brought a little together.

"You go in for dogs?" asked the flapper.

He hesitated. "Going in" for dogs seemed to mean more. "I've got only
one just now," he confessed.

Wooded hills f