The Readjustment

een cent feed at the Marseillaise or a four b

ping a silver dollar as he spoke. "Heads th

ke it the Nevada to show

qui

esumed, then, his languid occupation which this parley had interrupted, and cont

t because it was the fashion in their circles so to dress and paint and display. Women of Greek perfection in body and feature, free-stepping Western women who met the gaze of men directly and fearlessly, their costumes ran through all the exaggerations of Parisian mode and tint. Toilettes whose brilliancy would cause heads to turn and necks to crane on the streets of an Eastern city, drew here no tribute of comment. It had gone on all the afternoon. From the Columbia Th

anities-Bertram and Mark drifted with the current up Kearney street toward the Hotel Marseillaise. In their blood, a little whipped already by the two cocktails which they had felt able to afford even while they debated over the price of dinner, ran all the

Judge Tiffany a year or so longer-until I get admitted anyway

gh in journalism to have recovered somewhat from his first enchantment with

ss. Do they think any the worse of my old man because he played politics to be sheriff of Tulare? If I should go into

an Francisco instead of Tacoma. Through his four years at the University, Mark had shared his crusts with Bertram Chester, yelled for him from the bleachers, played his fag at class elections. Now Mark was out in the world, practising the

siness," Bertram went on. "Judge Tiffany never grabb

the turns of fate which had almost-and ever not quite-made the old Judge a

at office is a great place to pick things up. Look at those tidewater cases of ours over in Richmond. I know, from the inside, that we're going to lose our case, and lots will go whooping up. I've written to Bob for a thousa

ly bring himself to speak of his own deeper motives and ambitions. Least of all could he reveal them in this moment of disillusion. He had never told Bertram about the four-ac

with the trade winds, and the semi-tropic growth of old ivies and rose-bushes, had given to these houses the seasoning of two centuries. Unpretentious hovels beside the structures of stone turrets and mill-work fronts by which later millionaires shamed California Street and Van Ness Avenue, they had the simple dignity of a mission, a colonial farm-house, 77 or any other structure wherein

the dining room; or he might enter that dining room directly from the street, such was the slope of the hill. A row of benches parked the front door. On the fine, out-of-doors evenings which came too seldom in the City of Fogs, Fre

on the cash register and bargained with the Chinamen for vegetables at the back door, seemed hardly even sister to the Madame Loisel of Saturday afternoon on "the line" or Sunday morning at the French Church. By what process man may not imagine, this second Madame Loisel took six inches from her girth, fifty pounds from her weight, fifteen years fro

es, empty the window-seats. The old drawing-rooms, music-room, dining-room, had become one apartment of a sanded floor and many long tables. Throug

those September days when the Latin quarter ran purple-and all for fifteen cents! Thither, too, came young apprentices of the professions, working at wages to shame a laborer, who had learned how much more one got for his money at Louis's th

h waist, 80 a ribbon at her throat, a slimness of her waist and an artificial

la la la-la-la!"

with coquetry, her

eted her more soberly. Her eyes followed Chester's big, squa

ure of a man in his clothes; and those clothes were so woven and cut as to be in contrast with his surroundings. A tailor of San Francisco, building toward fashionable patronage, had made him suits free during his last year in college. Varsity man and public charac

path with an air of possession, in the mobility of his rather thick-lipped mouth. For the rest, the face was all solidity and strength. His neck rose big and straight from his collar, a sign of the power which infused the figure below; his squa

his young, ravenous satisfaction, sank the ladle deep and stopped, his hand poised, his 82 eyes fixed. Mark followed the direct

. A habitué of the place, he had alrea

French cabmen, the Barbary Coast flotsam and jetsam, ga

his native speech. Heath flashed a gl

thought she was in Europe-didn't she sta

me. The Mrs. Boss isn't so sweet on me as she use

ath recognized him of the pointed beard as Masters, the landscape painter. The little, brown woman who sat 83 with her back to

reciative word or two about the quaintness and difference of the Marseillaise, when her eyes clutched at the two young men in the corner, whose dress made t

starting, or do any of us know the two me

and bow effusively. She slipped a sidling glance at Eleanor Gray. Something curious, an intent look which

hen they were in college. I believe that the darker one-Mr. Chester-is in Uncl

Mr. Chester fancied yo

es every girl that he se

leanor, and noted it in memory. Mrs. Masters, an eager little w

e fun to ask them over. Sydney used to dine here a great deal when he was

toward Bertram, who was talking rapid

she mu

lf cast the die. This had been

to speak to he

n," said Mark. "It'

along?" He did not wait to see

ngs on the ranch, and passed him about the circle for introductions. Noticing, then, that Mark had n

?" asked Mrs. Masters. Mark hesitated; but Bertram

aid. "Mr. Heath and I dine here every night

he needed in order to live with Mr

old 86 scenes for the night. I haven't tasted real cabbage soup since the last ti

said those two escorts who do not figure in this story. E

responde

little as possible. Masters smiled when the two unconscious youths went back to their table, picked

lay, women who were nice about their nails and hair. A kind of pleasant shyness crept over Mark Heath; the spirit came into the face of Bertram Chester. Masters, tactician that he was, put the conversation into their hands. Presently, they were telling freely about the fare at Coffee John's, about their familiars and companions in the little Eddy-Street lodging house, about the drifters of the Latin quarter. They quite eclipsed the pale youth who was p

on of him. The episode of that night under the bay tree had gone with her clear across the Atlantic. Even the influence of the wholly new environment, in which she had grown from a girl recluse to a woman, had not served for a long time to erase that ugly stain on her memory. Here and now wa

ruin in Paris. We dined for thirty centimes, I remember, but it was no better than this. I've had to go away to know my native ci

cross her ins

Mr. Chester," she said. "I know the joy that Eleanor is having. I

ng for seeing Paris." He turned back to Elean

arest little village on the Coast of Brittany last summer-and three weeks in incomparable London at the end. I haven't thought of the ranch for a ye

fter a storm in the kitchen, whose French thunders had reached the dining room now and then. Louis, the conservative, hated slummers and dreaded being "discovered." He ran a restaurant as a social institution as well as a business venture. Madame Loisel, with her eye on the cash register, longed ardently for slummers who would give large tips to Lo

mers the compliment of a

per, plait-il v

ards which Madame Loisel had known in her youth and which Eleanor had 91 visited. Bertram, his mouth open, followed that talk as though summon

m Europe, but I'm out of practice. Please excuse me, Mad

say so, Mademoiselle

ed Mark Heat

n't get guides to the Latin quarter for nothing. Take u

th. "I'm off to-night as a testimonial of es

e a bill of fare. Mrs. Masters, casting her vote as chaperone, chose t

rietary air. She turned toward her appointed escort. It happened that he was walking ahead with Heath just then, holding an argument about the drift of Montgomer

be," he said caressingly; "you've bully

d him full in the fa

't mind my saying that they'

ifferent from the artificial coyness of the girls he knew b

oshing me

u are good to look

his opening, Bert

h is just as go

o his face, and the sam

well formed, but it becomes delicious when you smile

lk sense," gru

egular tour; she came back ignorant of all the show places from Cologne Cathedral to the Tower. But it had been her privilege to see and meet wonderful people. They would not do for regular companionship, such people. They struck one,

from her uncle, who said that he was doing well and gave promise of a future in the law. How lon

to say good-bye," he complained. "I never

e ran awa

, though,"

he

her manner, as though something had been drawn between them. Then her escort fell in o

stering about Masters and Mark Heath. An Italian baby of three, too late out of bed, stood by a cellar rail surveying 95 them with the liquid fire which was his eyes. Kate Waddington stooped to p

rl, isn't she

sur

re wit than any other woman in S

erited that at any rate,

erward they drank beer at Norman's; and when they broke up,

ussian Hill. While they sat before the fireplace, in the half-hour of loosen

ry, she would have given gold to recall it. And if she had any hope that Kate Waddi

to me to be a li