manifest hostility and had ostentatiously locked a suit-case
upon his appearance.

So much for his whereabouts. How had he come there? Laboriously, he went
over the events of the afternoon. They were hazy, but certain peaks
jutted above the haze. They were "tagged," as the flapper had surmised
they were going to be. Aboard the little old steamer had appeared Breede
and Julia and the Demon. They had called the flapper aside and
apparently told her something for her own good, though the flapper had
not liked it, and had told them with much spirit that they were to
perfectly mind their own affairs.

Bean had fled into the throng on deck. His hat had received many dents,
and when he emerged to a clear space at the far end of the boat he had
discovered that his perfectly new watch was gone. He was being put upon,
and meekly submitting to it as in that other time when he had not
believed himself to be somebody. He stared moodily over the rail as the
little old steamer moved out. Thousands of people on the dock were
waving handkerchiefs and hats. They seemed to be waving directly at him
and yelling. Above it all, he was back in the bird-and-animal store,
hearing the parrot shriek over and over, "Oh, what a fool! Oh, what a
fool!"

He made an adventurous way through all kinds of hurried people, back to
that group of queerly behaving Breedes. The flapper was showing traces
of tears, but also a considerable acrimony. She was threatening to tell
the captain to just perfectly turn the little old steamer back. But it
came to nothing. At least to nothing more than Bean's sharing the
stateroom of the Hartford man, who had covered the lower berth with his
belongings so that there might be no foolish mistake.

And that was because there had been no provision made on the little old
steamer for this invasion of casual Breedes. Pops and Moms had secured
an officer's room; the Demon, rather than sit up in the smoking-room of
nights, had consented to share the flapper's suite; and Bean had been
taken in charge by a cold-blooded steward who left him in the narrow
quarters of the Hartford person.

And there, in the far night, he was wishing he might be back in the
steam-heated apartment with Nap. He had a violent headache, and he had
awakened from a dream of falling into a well of cool, clear water of
which he thirstily drank. His narrow bed behaved abominably, rolling him
from side to side, then letting his head sink to some far-off ter