"Well, well, well," he at length began, soothingly, "go lie down; take something; take _something_; well, send over t' White Plains f'r s'more.

Putcha t' sleep. What can _I_ do?" Again the throttling hand.

He ruefully surveyed his littered desk, then drew the long sigh of the baffled.

"Take telegram m' wife. Sorry can't be home late, 'port'n board meet'n'.

May be called out of town."

The telephone rang, but was ignored.

"Send it off," he directed Bean above the bell's clear call. "Then c'mon; go ball game. G'wup 'n subway."

"Got car downstairs," suggested Bean.

"You got your work cut out f'r you; 'sall I got t' say," growled Breede.

"'S little old last year's car," said Bean modestly.

XIII

As the little old last year's car bore them to the north, some long sleeping-image seemed to stir in Breede's mind.

"Got car like this m'self somewheres," he remarked.

Bean was relieved. He didn't want the name of a woman to be brought into the matter just then.

"'S all right for town work," he said. "Good enough for all I want of a car."

"'S awful!" said Breede, obviously forgetting the car for another subject.

"What can I do? She says she's got the right," suggested Bean.

"She'd take it anyway. _I_ know her. Pack a suit-case. Had times with her already. Takes it from her mother."

"Can't be too rough at the start," declared Bean. "Manage 'em of course, but 'thout their finding it out--velvet glove." He looked quietly confident and Breede glanced at him almost respectfully.

"When?" he asked.

"Haven't made up my mind yet," said Bean firmly. "I may consult her, then again I may not; don't believe in long engagements."

Breede's glance this time was wholly respectful.

"You're a puzzle to me," he conceded.

Bean's shrug eloquently seemed to retort, "that's what they all say, sooner or later."

They were silent upon this. Bean wondered if Julia was still fussing back there. Or had she sent to White Plains for some more? And what was the flapper just perfectly doing at that moment? Life was wonderful!

Here he was to witness a ball game on Friday!

They were in the grandstand, each willing and glad to forget, for the moment, just how weirdly wonderful life was. A bell clanged twice, the plate was swept with a stubby broom, the home team scurried to their places.

"There he is!" exclaimed Breede; "that's him!" Breede leaned out over the railing and pointed to the Greatest Pitcher the World Has Ever Seen.

Bean sat coolly back.

The Pitcher scanned the first rows of faces in the grandstand. His glance came to rest on a slight, becomingly attired young man, who betrayed no emotion, and, in the presence of twenty thousand people, the Pitcher unmistakably saluted Bunker Bean. Bean gracefully acknowledged the attention.

"He know _you_?" queried Breede with animation.

"_Know_ me!" He looked at Breede almost pityingly, then turned away.

The Pitcher sent the ball fairly over the plate.

"Stur-r-r-r-ike one!" bellowed the umpire.

"With him all morning," said Bean condescendingly to his admiring companion. "Get shirts same place," he added.

His cup had run over. He was on the point of confiding to his companion the supreme felicity in store for Breede as a grandfather. But the batter struck out and the moment was only for raw rejoicing. They forgot. Bean ceased to be a puzzle to any one, and Breede lapsed into unconsciousness of Julia.

The game held them for eleven innings. The Greatest Pitcher saved it to the home team.

"He was saying to me only this morning--" began Bean, as the Pitcher fielded the last bunt. But the prized quotation was lost in the uproar.

Pandemonium truly reigned and the scene was unquestionably one of indescribable confusion.

Outside the gate they were again Breede and Bean; or, rather, Bean and Breede. The latter could not so quickly forget that public recognition by the Greatest Pitcher.

"You're a puzzle t'me," said Breede. "Lord! I can't g'ome yet. Have't take me club."

"Can't make y'out," admitted Breede once more, as they parted before the sanctuary he had indicated.

"Often puzzle myself," confessed the inscrutable one, as the little old last year's car started on. Breede stood on the pavement looking after it. For some reason the car puzzled him, too.

Bean was wondering if Julia herself wouldn't have been a little appeased if she could have seen the Pitcher single him out of that throng. Some day he might crush the woman by actually taking the Pitcher to call.

At his door he dismissed the car. He wanted quiet. He wanted to think it all out. That morning it had seemed probable that by this time he would have been occupying a felon's cell, inspecting the magazines and fruit sent to him. Instead, he was not only free, but he was keeping a man worth many millions from his own home, and perhaps he had caused that man's wife to send over to White Plains for some more. It was Ram-tah.

All Ram-tah. If only every one could find his Ram-tah--

Ca.s.sidy was reading his favourite evening paper, the one that shrieked to the extreme limits of its first page in scarlet headlines and mammoth type. It was a paper that Bean never bought, because the red ink rubbed off to the peril of one's eighteen-dollar suit.

Ca.s.sidy, who for thirty years had voted as the ward-boss directed, was for the moment believing himself to be a rabid socialist.

"Wall Street crooks!" he began, in a fine orative frenzy. "Dur-r-rinkin'

their champagne whilst th' honest poor's lucky t' git a sh.e.l.l av hops!

Ruh-hobbin' th' tax-pay'r f'r' t' buy floozie gowns an' joold bresslets f'r their fancy wives an' such. I know th' kind well; not wan cud do a day's bakin' or windy-washin'!"

He held the noisy sheet before Bean and accusingly pointed a blunt forefinger. "Burly Blonde Divorcee, Routed Society Burglar," across the first two columns, but the proceeding was rather tamely typed and the Burly Blonde's portrait in evening dress was inconspicuous beside the headlines "Flurry in Federal Express! Wild Scenes on Stock Exchange.