"She was a beauty, boys, and no mistake, and I envied the old lady who sat with her. When the old lady left the train I sauntered out upon the platform and stayed there till the train slowed down for the next stop. Then I wandered in again and, stopping beside the young Hebe, I inquired in my most dulcet tones, 'Is this seat engaged, miss?'
"She looked up straight into my face, and her baby-blue eyes seemed to be making a bill of lading of me. Then she spoke up in a sweet, clear, distinct voice, that must have been heard in every part of the car. 'No,' she said, 'this seat isn't engaged, but I am, and he is just getting aboard the train.'
"And he was, six feet seven of him, with hands like friend Piggy's hams. I tell you, boys," concluded Job, "I felt about as cheap as the man who raised a warranted watch-dog from a pup, taught him to fetch and carry things, and, when burglars broke into the house, discovered their presence without his dog's assistance, and found that the faithful brute was doing credit to his training by trotting about after the burglars with their lantern in his mouth."
I got quite a shock to-day by the receipt of a letter, forwarded from Chicago, from one Silas Pettingill, attorney at Doolittle's Mills, Ind., informing me that Miss Verbena Philpot had decided to sue for breach of promise in the sum of $10,000. The only way in which this calamity could be staved off, according to Mr. Pettingill, was by my going to Doolittle's Mills and making "other arrangements," which I firmly decline to do. Verbena is all right on her native heath, but I fear that transplanting her to Chicago wouldn't be healthful for her or me. Talk about your simple, confiding farmers and all that sort of rubbish! I believe that if old "Vebe" Philpot should come to Chicago and walk up and down State street a couple of times, he would have the biggest bunco artist in town skinned to his last nickel before sundown. As it is, however, the thing looks rather ugly, and I don't know but I had better be absent from home for a year or so. Why couldn't I be made manager of your London branch instead of monkeying with the lard department?
Your threatened son, P.
P.S. In some roundabout way you may hear of the train escapade with the engineer's daughter. The boys on the road are no respecters of persons and are likely to make most any one the hero of a story. Should some hint connecting me with the affair reach you, it will be only necessary to recall that you heard the story first from me.
LETTER NO. XVI.