"True—quite true—for there's no doubt I'm a wonderful man, Flo," answered Tommy, solemnly: "so inscrutable and impassive—is that the way to say it—so adept at hiding my inmost thoughts, so——"
"But you needn't squeeze my hand so hard, Tommy, while you pronounce your eulogy; it isn't an auctioneer's gavel."
"It's a very pretty hand, though," Tommy said with a smile, "a very pretty hand."
"Are you an impartial judge, Tommy?"
"Well, I can't say I have much experience in regard to the hands of the fair sex, but I'm willing to bet there are none like yours in the wide world."
"And you have travelled so much of it."
"Not lately, perhaps, but I once spent four hours in Montreal, 330 miles away; think of it! and half a day in Hamilton—that's all of forty miles off—and Toronto never looked so sweet to me as it did when I got back to it. Good old Toronto; it's been kind to me. It has given me the dearest of all women, and a good business, and—and——" he kissed her hand and a few minutes later departed.
At a down town corner he ran into William, who was studying with great interest the baseball bulletins displayed outside of a newspaper office. William was one of a pretty large crowd that was doing the same thing. News bulletins seemingly had little attraction for the majority of them. As Tommy neared him, William remarked to a man in the crowd, "Gee! wouldn't that jar you?"
"I don't see why: that's a very important piece of news. It isn't every day the city council decides to spend so much——"
"City council my neck," broke in William, rudely, "what's that got to do with the score?"