McAllister and His Double

by Edward P. Hendrick

  McAllister's Marriage

  I

  The Bar Harbor train slowly came to a stop beside a little woodenstation. From over the marshes crept a breath of salty freshness thattried vainly to steal in through the open windows of the Pullman, onlyintensifying the stifling heat inside.

  McAllister arose and made his way to the platform in search of air. Aspare, wrinkled octogenarian was in the difficult act of lifting a smallgirl in a calico dress to the platform of the day coach, the childclinging obstinately to the old gentleman's neck and refusing todisentangle herself.

  "Mercy, Abby! Do leggo!" he remonstrated. "Thar, ef ye don't, I'll askthat man thar to hoist ye!"

  The little girl reluctantly let go her hold and allowed herself to beplaced on the lowest step.

  "That's a good girl," continued her guardian; then addressingMcAllister, he inquired conversationally:

  "Be ye goin' to Bangor?"

  "How's that? Ye-es, I believe I am. At least the train passes through,"responded McAllister doubtfully, apprehensive of undesirablecomplications.

  The old fellow produced from his waistcoat-pocket a ticket which heplaced in the child's hand. Then he turned her around and gave her alittle push up the steps.

  "Wall, jest keep an eye on Abby, will ye?"

  "Good-by, Uncle!" cried the little girl, climbing laboriously up towhere the clubman stood and making a little bow, which he gravelyreturned.

  "I don't know . . ." he began.

  "That's all right," explained the farmer. "Her aunt'll meet her. Jestsee she don't bother no one. Lemme pass ye her duds."

  The octogenarian forthwith handed up to McAllister a cloth valise, apasteboard box, and a large paper bag.

  "Her lunch is in the bag," said he. "Don't let her drink none o' thatice-water. My wife says it hez germs into it."

  "But I don't . . ." gasped our friend.

  "Be keerful o' that box," interrupted her uncle. "There's two dozenhen's eggs in it. If she's good, you might buy her a cent's worth o'peppermints to Portland." He fumbled uncertainly in his breeches'pocket.

  "Do you expect me . . ." ejaculated McAllister.

  "Give my love to yer aunt," added the other as the train started."Good-by!" And pulling a large red pocket-handkerchief from hiscoat-tails he fanned the air vaguely as they moved slowly away from him.

  "Oh, isn't it nice!" cried the little girl, who appeared quite at easewith her new acquaintance.

  "Ye-es--certainly--of course," he replied, wondering what he should dowith his charge. "I suppose we had better go in and sit down, don't youthink?"

  He stood aside waiting for her to precede him into the parlor car.

  "What a lovely place!" she exclaimed as her eyes rested upon therosewood and the velvet chairs. "Am I really to ride in this?"

  "Why, where should you ride, to be sure?" he inquired, beginning toregain his self-possession.

  "The car had iron seats before," she informed him.

  "How extraordinary!"

  "This is an ever so much prettier train," she added. "I'm afraid I'llhurt the plush." She took out a diminutive handkerchief and spread itout to sit upon. The clubman with an amused expression swung roundanother chair and sat down opposite.

  "My name's Abigail Martha Higgins," she said, taking off her littlestraw hat. "I live in Bangor with my aunt. That old man was Uncle MosesHiggins. Aunt doesn't love his wife."

  "Dear me!" sympathized McAllister.

  "My father and mother are in heaven," she continued in matter-of-facttones. "Up there. Wouldn't you hate to live up in the sky and donothin'?"

  "I certainly should," he answered with gravity.

  "We all came down from there, you know. Do you think we were born all inone piece, or put together afterward?"

  McAllister pondered.

  "What's your name?"

  "McAllister," he replied.

  "That's a funny name!" she commented. "It sounds like McCafferty--that'sDeacon Brewer's hired man's name."

  "Do you think so?" asked the clubman apologetically, feeling that hisparents had done him an irreparable injury.

  "I'll call you Mister Mac," added the child, "and you may call me Abby,'cause I'm only eight. Do you live to Boston?"

  "No; New York. An awful way off."

  "Have they got a Free-Will Meetin'-house there?" she inquired knowingly.

  "I'm sure I don't know," he answered, feeling wofully ignorant of allmatters of real importance.

  "Then it must be a very small place," she decided. "All big places havea Free-Will Meetin'-house, Uncle Moses says."

  At this moment Wilkins approached to inquire if his master wantedanything.

  "Is there a Free-Will Meetin'-house in New York?" inquired the clubman.

  "Yes, sir; I believe so, sir. That is to say, a Baptist place ofworship, sir," he answered solemnly.

  "Is that your brother?" inquired Abby.

  "No--" hesitated McAllister, doubtful as to what the valet's equivalentwould be in his little friend's world.

  "What's your name?" inquired Abby.

  "Wilkins, miss," answered the valet.

  "What a lovely name!" cried Abby. "It's much nicer than his'n."

  Wilkins stepped back a few paces aghast.

  "That box is chuck full of eggs," announced Abby. "I wonder where thehens get them."

  "I give it up," said the clubman.

  "We have a black horse on our farm," she continued. "It used to be agirl, but now it's a boy."

  "Indeed!" exclaimed McAllister.

  "Yes, aunt had her tail cut off. Boys have short hair, you know--that'show you tell."

  At this Wilkins disappeared rapidly into the background.

  "Uncle Moses' wife don't love children," the child continued. "She hasthe rheumatiz in her thigh."

  "But she must like _you_, Abby," urged her new friend.

  "No, she don't. She don't love me 'cause I love Aunt Abby, an' Aunt Abbydon't love her."

  "I see," said McAllister.

  The clubman soon became acquainted with Abby's entire family history,and rapidly realized that the mind of a child was a thing undreamed ofin his philosophy. As she pattered on he conversed gravely with her,trying to answer her multitudinous questions. All her world was goodsave Uncle Moses' wife, and her confidence in the clubman was entire.She admired his clothes, his watch-chain, and his scarf-pin, and endedby directing him to read to her, which McAllister obediently did. Noneof the magazines seemed to contain suitable articles, so with somemisgivings he purchased various colored weeklies, remembering vaguelyhis own delight in the misadventures of certain chubby ladies and stoutgentlemen upon rear pages, perused furtively when waiting at thebarber's to get his hair cut as a child. For half an hour her interestremained tense, but then she wearied of using her eyes, and, pattingMcAllister's fat chin, ordered him to tell her a story. Here was a newdifficulty. He had never told a story in his life, but there was no helpfor it, no escape, as she climbed into his lap.

  "Begin with once onup-a-time," she ordered.

  "Well," he obeyed "Once 'onup' a time there was a man who lived in aclub----"

  "A what?" sharply interrupted Abby.

  "A big white house with heaps of rooms," he corrected. "And as he hadnobody dependent on him, all he had to do was to eat and sleep and lookat the sky."

  "Didn't he have any children?"

  "Nobody in the world," answered McAllister.

  "Poor man!" sighed Abby. "Didn't he keep any hens?"

  "Not even a hen!"

  "I know a big house just like that," said Abby. "Old Captain Barnardused to live in it. Wasn't he lonely?"

  "Sometimes."

  "Did anyone live with him?"

  "His hired man," answered the clubman with a smile, looking down the carto where Wilkins sat in solitary grandeur. "And by and by he got so oldand so fat that nobody would marry him, while the wives of other men heknew forgot to ask him to dinner."

  "Poor dear man!" murmured Abby, "I should think he'd ha
ve wished hehadn't been born."

  "Sometimes he did," answered the story-teller. "And he longed for somepeople to really care for him, and for some little children to keep himcompany."

  "Did he have a cow?"

  "No, not even a cow."

  Abby laughed sleepily.

  "But didn't he ever have any fun?"

  "He thought he did, but he didn't, really."

  "I'm awful sorry for him!" said Abby. "If I met him I would give him mywhite hen."

  "He used to pay for dinners for people, and send them flowers and candyand go to see them----"

  "Sunday afternoons?"

  "Yes; Sunday afternoons."

  "He was really very nice," said Abby.

  "Do you think so?" asked McAllister eagerly.

  "Why, of course. Don't you think so?"

  "So-so," said the clubman.

  "But he never hurt anyone?"

  "No, never."

  "And gave the hired man plenty of victuals?"

  "Much more than was good for him," said McAllister with conviction.

  "I like that man," said Abby. "He was a good man."

  "But some people said he was an idle fellow," insisted McAllister.

  "But that didn't do anybody any harm," said Abby.

  "No, certainly not."

  "And he wasn't cross?"

  "No, almost never."

  "Then," said Abby, "he was a good man, and I will marry him if he asksme."

  And with that she dropped her head on his arm and fell fast asleep.

  "Can't I hold the young--person, for you, sir?" inquired the valet in awhisper.

  "Certainly _not_," responded McAllister.

  Over the flitting pines circled the crows, black dots against the deepblue; lazy cows stood knee-deep in fields frosted with daisies andwatched seemingly without interest the passing train; little puffs ofwhite in serried ranks moved slowly out of the north, never approachingnearer, dissolving at the meridian; on the near horizon a line of indigomountains tumbled southward; white farm-houses swept slowly by; atdusty crossings gray-whiskered farmers sat loosely holding the reins inamiable conformity with the injunction painted upon weather-worn signsto "Look out for the engine"; at times the train passed over rockybedded streams dammed for milling, and once or twice across rivers halfchoked with logs upon which men ran like water-bugs; then through redbrick towns, and towns with square granite stores and offices, and townsof white and green, marking the three disconnected periods of thearchitectural development of Maine; and everywhere the pines.

  In the midst of a stretch of thick woods the engine began to whistlefrantically. A brakeman, followed closely by a conductor, hurriedthrough the car. The wheels ground harshly and the train graduallyceased to move. Ahead could be heard the loud pounding of the engine andthe roar of escaping steam. Volumes of smoke, white and black, rolledover the pines and cast rapidly changing shadows upon the ground.Wilkins, who had gone forth to seek information, now returned.

  "There's a freight wreck just a'ead, sir. The conductor says as how weshall be delayed 'ere at least nine hours."

  McAllister glanced down at the little form in his arms. It had notmoved. Gently he carried her along the aisle, out upon the platform,and down the steps to the ground. Still she did not awake. Up the trackhe could see groups of excited passengers gesticulating around grotesquepiles of wreckage upon which a locomotive lay with its wheels in theair. Beside the track stretched a pine grove, its soft carpet of needlesflecked with sunlight. At the foot of one giant tree, on a bed of graymoss, the clubman laid his little charge and threw himself at her feet.An irritable family of nervous crows flapped noisily away to the otherside of the track, assembled in angry consultation in a hemlock, deputeda spy, who cautiously reconnoitred, and, on the latter's report,returned. At a safe distance Wilkins sat upon a windfall, and with oneeye upon his sleeping master smoked rapidly one of McAllister's cigars.

  II

  "Yes, Miss Higgins got yer telegram," answered Deacon Brewer, as theydrove slowly along the river in the dusty heat of the early Julymorning. "Ef she hadn't I reckon she'd 'a' gone nigh crazy."

  They were in an open two-seated buck-board. McAllister, holding Abby inhis lap, occupied the front seat with the Deacon, while Wilkins satbehind with the valise and the pasteboard box.

  "It was a tiresome delay and really a very fortunate escape," respondedMcAllister. "Abby behaved beautifully."

  "She's a good child," said the Deacon. "Her mother was a fine woman, andshe's goin' to be just like her."

  "Are we nearly home?" asked the little girl, rubbing her eyes.

  "'Most," answered the Deacon. "Are ye hungry?"

  "I got her some bread and milk at a farm-house," explained McAllister,"but none of us have had any breakfast yet."

  "Wall, I reckon Miss Higgins'll be prepared for ye," said the Deacon."She's a liberal woman an' a smart woman, but all the same, the farm'sgoing to be sold for taxes next week."

  Abby had fallen asleep, but the clubman started and looked anxiously ather at this piece of intelligence.

  "She don't know nuthin' about it," said the farmer. "Miss Higgins can'trun a hard-scrabble farm, nor no one can and make a livin' out'n it. Itain't worth five dollars an acre."

  "What will she do?" asked the clubman.

  "Darn ef I know," responded the other. "She kin help around some, Iguess. Deacon Giddings has a powerful lot of company. 'N any woman kinsew. She kin make out, I reckon."

  "But the child?" whispered McAllister.

  "Her Uncle Moses'll hev to take her," answered the Deacon.

  "Jiminy!" ejaculated the clubman, recalling the little girl'sdescription of her uncle's wife. "She won't like that."

  "Beggars can't be choosers," said the Deacon dryly.

  A turn in the road brought them within view of a small, low farm-house,with good-sized barn, lying in a field between the woods and the river,here about a quarter of a mile in width. The pines grew close to theroad upon the left, but upon the other side the land had been wellcleared to the Penobscot's bank. Huge piles of stones, ten or twelvefeet long, five or so broad, and four or five feet high, were monumentsto the energy and industry of some former owner.

  "Gosh, how Henery worked to clear this farm!" remarked the Deacon. "Hehove stone for twenty years, an' then died. Look at them trees!"

  He pointed dramatically to a large orchard containing row upon row ofyoung apple-trees.

  At the sound of the wheels a woman came slowly out of the side door andwatched their approach. She had the pale, sickly countenance of the wifeof the inland Maine farmer, and her limp dress ill concealed theangularity of her form. Her eyes showed that she had passed a sleeplessnight. McAllister leaped out and lifted Abby down. The woman neitherspoke to nor kissed the child, but clutched her tightly in her arms.Then she nodded to the new-comers.

  "I'm obliged to ye, Deacon Brewer," she said. "Is this the man who sentthe telegram? Won't ye come in and set down?"

  "Oh, yes," cried Abby ecstatically. "Get out, Mr. Wilkins! I want toshow you the black horse, and all the hens."

  "I must be gettin' back," muttered the Deacon.

  "Could you let us have a bite of breakfast?" inquired McAllister. "Mytrain doesn't go until twelve o'clock." To return to Bangor at thisparticular time did not suit him.

  "Such as it is," replied Miss Higgins.

  "Could you arrange to call out for me in an hour or so?" askedMcAllister.

  "I reckon I kin," said the Deacon with some reluctance. "I'll hev tercharge ye fifty cents."

  "Of course," said McAllister.

  Wilkins took down the parcels, and the Deacon drove slowly away.

  "I'll scrape somethin' together in a few minutes," said Miss Higgins."How much was that telegram?"

  "Oh, that's all right!" said the abashed clubman.

  "No, it ain't. Money's money. Was it ez much ez a quarter?"

  McAllister acknowledged the amount.

  "I thought so," commented Miss Higgins
. "It was wuth it." She had themoney all ready and handed it to McAllister.

  Etiquette seemed to demand its acceptance.

  "Did you say your name was McAllister? Who's this man?"

  "His name is Wilkins."

  "Well," said Aunt Abby, "one of ye might split up that log, if ye don'tmind, while I get the breakfast."

  She turned into the house.

  McAllister looked doubtfully at the wood-pile.

  "Let Mr. Wilkins chop the wood!" shouted Abby; "I want to show you theba-an."

  "Wilkins," said McAllister, "wood-chopping is an art sanctified in thiscountry by tradition."

  "Very good, sir," answered Wilkins.

  Abby grasped McAllister's hand and tugged him joyfully over thepoverty-stricken farm. They visited the orchard, the pig-sty, thehen-house, admired the horse that had been a girl, and ended at thewater's edge.

  "We ketch salmon here in the spring," explained Abby; "and smelts."

  Across the eddying river quiet farms slept in the hot sunshine. Two menin a dory swung slowly up-stream. At their feet the clear water rippledagainst the stones. In his mind the clubman pictured the stifling cityand the squalor of relative existence there.

  "It's beautiful, Abby," he said.

  "It's the loveliest place in the whole world," she answered, holding hishand tightly. "And I shall never, never go away."

  Behind them came the shrill tones of Aunt Abby's voice bidding them tobreakfast. Wilkins, coatless, was bearing some mangled fragments of logtoward the kitchen. His beaded face spoke unutterable dejection.

  "Well, set daown; it's all there is," said Miss Higgins.

  McAllister sat, and Abby climbed into a high chair. Wilkins remainedstanding.

  "Ain't ye goin' to set?" inquired Miss Higgins.

  Wilkins reddened.

  "Well, ye be the most bashful man I ever met," remarked the lady. "Setdaown and eat yer victuals."

  "Sit down," said McAllister, and for the second time master and manshared a meal.

  The little room was bare of decoration except for some coloredlithographs and wood-cuts, which for the most part represented thefuneral corteges of distinguished Americans, with a few hospital scenesand the sinking of a steamship. A rug soiled to a dull drab made a sortof mud spot before the fireplace; a knitted tidy, suggestive of theantimacassar, ornamented the only rocker; at one end stood the stove,and hard by two fixed tubs. Everything except the carpet wasscrupulously clean.

  Miss Higgins brought to the table a dish of steaming boiled eggs, half aloaf of white bread, and a vegetable dish with a large piece of butter.

  "I'll have some coffee for ye in a minute," she remarked as she placedthe dishes before them.

  McAllister broke some of the eggs into a tumbler and cut the bread.

  "What might be your business?" inquired Miss Higgins.

  "Er--well--" hesitated McAllister. "I've travelled quite a bit."

  "I had a cousin in the hardware line," remarked the hostessreminiscently. "He travelled everywheres. Has it ever taken you ez furas St. Louis?"

  "No," said McAllister. "My line never took me so far."

  "Andrew died there--of the water. What's your business?" continued MissHiggins to Wilkins.

  "I'm with Mr. McAllister, ma'am."

  "Oh! same firm?"

  Wilkins coughed violently and evaded the interrogation.

  "Mr. Wilkins handles gents' clothing, underwear, haberdashery, andnotions," interposed McAllister gravely.

  Wilkins swayed in his seat and grew purple around the gills.

  "Oh, Mr. Wilkins!" cried Abby, "what's the matter? You will burst! Takea drink of water."

  The valet obediently tried to do as she bade him.

  "How much is land worth around here?" asked the clubman. "And what doyou raise?"

  Miss Higgins looked at him suspiciously.

  "We raise pertaters, some corn and oats, and get a purty fair apple cropin the autumn."

  "Must have been hard work clearing the farm," added McAllister, "if onecan judge by the piles of stones."

  "Work? I guess 'twas work!" sniffed Miss Higgins. "You travellin' menhain't got no idee of what real work is. There ain't a stone in thenineteen acres of farm land. Henery picked 'em all up by hand."

  "Are you Abby's guardian?" asked McAllister.

  "Yes," said Miss Higgins. "I'm all the folks she's got, except Moses,down to Portsmouth, and a lot of good he is with that wife he's got!"

  Wilkins now asked awkwardly to be excused.

  "That friend of yourn seems to be a dummy!" remarked Miss Higgins afterthe valet had disappeared.

  "He isn't much in the social line," admitted his master. "But he knowshis business."

  "I'm goin' out to show Mr. Wilkins the beehive," cried Abby, slippingdown from her chair. "Come right along, won't you?"

  "I'll be there in just a minute," said McAllister.

  Abby grabbed up her sunbonnet and ran skipping out of the kitchen.

  "She's a dear little girl," said McAllister. "I hope she'll have achance to get a good education."

  "Education behind a counter in Bangor is all she'll get," answered heraunt.

  They sat in silence for a moment, and then McAllister, feeling thecraving induced by habit, drew an Obsequio from his pocket, and asked:

  "Do you object to smoking?"

  Miss Abby bristled.

  "I don't want none o' them se-gars in this house, so long's I'm in it!"she exclaimed. "Ain't out-doors good enough for you, without stinkin' upthe kitchen?"

  "I didn't mean any offence," apologized McAllister. "I'll wait till I goout, of course."

  "One of the devil's tricks!" sniffed Miss Abby.

  McAllister, terribly embarrassed, got up and stepped to the window. Thecoffee had been execrable, but a benign influence animated him. Down theslope toward the gently flowing Penobscot little Abby was leadingWilkins by the hand. The boy-horse kicked his heels in a daisy-fleckedpasture beyond the barn.

  "What did you say the farm was worth?" asked the clubman.

  "There's a hundred and eighty-one acres o' woodland, and the clearedland just makes two hundred. It ought to be worth eighteen hundreddollars."

  "I know a man who wants a farm. He says some day all this river frontwill be valuable for a summer resort. I'm authorized to buy for him.I'll give you sixteen hundred and fifty. Is it a bargain?"

  Miss Abby turned pale.

  "Oh, I don't know! It seems dreadful to sell it, after all the yearsHenery put into cleanin' of it up. I was hopin' somehow that maybe Icould get work on the farm from them as bought it and keep Abby herefor a while longer."

  "That's all right," said McAllister. "My principal is buying it on aspeculation. You can stay indefinitely."

  "How about rent?" asked Miss Abby.

  "You can take care of the farm, and he won't charge you any rent."

  The terms having been finally arranged to Miss Abby's satisfaction,McAllister drew a small check-book from his pocket and filled out avoucher for the amount.

  "We can sign the papers later," said he with a smile.

  Miss Abby took the slip of paper doubtfully.

  "How do I know I ain't gettin' cheated?" she asked. "Suppose this shouldturn out to be no good?"

  "Then you'd have the farm," said McAllister.

  He fumbled in his pocket until he found a clean letter-back and with hisstylographic pen rapidly wrote the following:

  "I hereby give and convey the Henry Higgins farm, heretofore purchasedby me, to my friend Abigail Martha Higgins, in consideration for much ofvalue of which no one knows but myself. In witness whereof I sign myname and affix a seal."

  He found a used postage-stamp that still had a trifle of gum on its backand made use of it as a fragmentary seal.

  While in some doubt as to the legal sufficiency of this instrument,McAllister felt that its intendment was unmistakable. Having replacedhis pen, he carefully folded the document and thrust it into his pocket.Just at this moment Miss H
iggins announced the return of Deacon Brewer,who was wheeling slowly into the gate. Toward the orchard McAllistercould see, as he stepped to the door, little Abby still tugging alongWilkins, whose massive and emotionless face was glistening with theheat.

  "Hit's very 'ot, sir!" he remarked tentatively to his master. "I've beento see the 'ives."

  "How funny Mr. Wilkins talks!" said Abby. "He told me he knew a boy oncewho got stung, and said the bee _bit 'im in 'is 'ead_! Do all drummerstalk like that?"

  "Drummers!" exclaimed Wilkins.

  "Aunt said you were both drummers; I s'pose you left your drumssomewhere. I don't like 'em; they make too much music. They have them inthe circus parade in Bangor every year."

  "Be you folks ready to start?" inquired Deacon Brewer. "Purty nice viewof the water from here, ain't they? There's a good well on the place,too, and a few boat-loads of manure would give you crops to beat--all.Don't know enybody thet wants to speckalate a little in farmin' land, doye? This here is a good, likely place. Reckon you kin buy it cheap."

  "Sh-h!" said McAllister, laying his finger on his lips.

  "No one sha'n't ever buy this farm," said Abby; "I'm goin' to live herealways."

  "Wall," said the Deacon, "better be movin'. I don't like to keep themare standin' in the sun."

  "Are you goin' away?" cried Abby in agonized tones. "You'll come backsoon, won't you?"

  "I hope so, very soon," said McAllister. "Don't you want to show me theboy-horse before I start?"

  "Oh, yes, yes!" she cried, seizing his hand.

  The stout clubman and the little girl walked slowly across thegrass-grown drive to the daisy field beside the barn, talking busily.

  "Your friend's bought this farm," announced Miss Abby to Wilkins.

  "'Oly Moses!" ejaculated the valet.

  "By gum!" exclaimed the Deacon. "What did he give?"

  "Sixteen hundred and fifty dollars."

  "Gee!" said the Deacon.

  "An' we're to stay on rent-free 's long 's we want!"

  "I swan!" commented the pillar of the local Baptist Church. "Some folksdoos hev luck!"

  He went over to adjust a bit of harness.

  "It'll keep 'em out o' the poor farm," he muttered. "But, by gosh, thetfeller must be a fool!"

  Over in the daisy field, McAllister, to the wonder of the boy-horse,pulled the despised cigar from his pocket, cut off the end, and began tosmoke with infinite satisfaction.

  "What a beautiful, beautiful, lovely ring!" exclaimed Abby joyfully,examining with delight the embossed paper of red and gold.

  "Do you remember about the lonely man who lived in the big white house Itold you of?" asked McAllister.

  "Of course I do," sighed Abby. "Poor man! he was so good, and nobodyloved him."

  "Do you love him?" asked McAllister.

  "Dear man! I love him, all my heart!" cried the child.

  "Then the man is very, very happy," said McAllister softly.

  Overhead a single black crow, wheeling out of a stumpy pine, circled toinvestigate this strange love-scene. Satisfied of its propriety, hecawed loudly and resettled himself upon the shaking topmost bough.

  McAllister drew the golden band from his cigar and took the folded paperfrom his pocket.

  "Here's a love-letter," said he. "Your aunt will read it for you whenI've gone."

  Abby took it sadly.

  "Now hold up your left hand," said McAllister, smiling. As he slippedthe paper circle over her fourth finger he said gravely:

  "'With this ring I thee wed, and with all my worldly goods I theeendow.' Give me a kiss."

  She did so, in wonder.

  "Now we are married," said he.