"I am going to put you to the proof," said she. "Could you, for my sake, come down from ten cigars a day to five?"
The Colonel was dismayed. "To five cigars a day! Impossible!" He caught himself. That scarcely was the way to answer the request of the woman he adored so fervently. "I mean," he hastily corrected, "is—is that all?" He made a motion as if to throw away the weed he had just lighted, but thought better of it. "I will make the descent to-morrow," he said earnestly.
"Could you restrict yourself to three mint-julips, daily?"
"Three! A man couldn't live on three! He'd have to—have to take such poisons as—as cold water into his system."
"Remember, Colonel, I would mix them."
"That settles it! Three goes!" He fervently reached toward her, plainly planning to embrace her.
"Wait, Colonel," she exclaimed, "there is one more condition. Could you, for my sake, promise never to enter another race-track?"
He started back from her in horror. "Never enter another race-tack! I, Colonel Sandusky Doolittle, known everywhere, from Maine to California, as a plunger, give up the absorbing passion of my life!"
"Remember what you said to Frank," said she. "'It's a delusion and a snare.' But, of course, if you think more of a delusion than you do of me—"
"No; hang it!" cried the Colonel, "I think more of you. Twenty years—the longest race on record and a win in sight! I'll not lose by a balk at the finish! I promise you, Miss 'Lethe, on the honor of a Kentuckian."