"We might take in a show or two," suggested the colonel, for, despite the frivolity of the gold-headed cane, he had conceived an instantaneous liking for the stranger. "Minstrel show only two blocks down."

"Capital idea, suh. It will lessen the time we'll spend on the parlor floor. I was used to roughing it in army life, but that was in my younger days," said the stranger, who was equally ttracted by the colonel's frank eyes and jovial manner.

fore.

It had all been arranged. The colonel was to look at the flats in the morning; the other knew quite well the Missouri land; the deal, if minor matters could be disposed of, was to be consummated the next day. The room had grown quiet; the roar of the cable cars less frequent. The snores of the sleepers had resolved themselves into a Wagnerian chorus which kept them awake, and excitedly their minds rushed over the points of the trade.

"Oh, by the way, Conkle," began

"The lost cause, suh," returned the stranger, sadly.

"But we're all one now," comforted the other, heartily, holding out a cordial hand, which the southerner warmly grasped.

The two men disappeared down the hall in a cloud of cigar smoke.

Carefully they picked their way by the dim light of a gas jet over the crowd of sleepers, and, finding a large, thick rug not yet appropriated, they joyfully removed it to a choice site by a front window.

"Better than it was in the army," declared the stranger, softly.

"You're blamed right," returned the colonel, sotto voce.

This recalled a comic story of camp life, and they paused in their disrobing to laugh to the point of explosion, to which came a vehement protest from some cowboy encamped far across the room. He remarked, in choice cowboy vernacular, that he regretted from the bottom of his heart that he was within the bounds of civilization and could not deal with them as the occasion justified.

At this outburst, met with grunts of approval from all over the room, they tried to quiet down; placed their pillow's socially side by side, and rolled themselves in their blankets on the soft, thick rug. Each thought in the meantime what a jolly good fellow the other was, and how much each had

"Yo' haven't got my name right," whispered the southerner, a trifle annoyed. "It's Concannon-C-o-n-c-a-nn-o-n.”

"Eh?" ejaculated the colonel aloud, as he suddenly rolled over.

"Concannon, suh; Bert Concannon of St. Joseph."

"Concannon? Old Bert Concannon?" vociferated the jayhawker, aghast, as he rose to a sitting position. "Old Governor Bert Concannon?"

"Yes, Bert Concannon, governor of my state two terms," exclaimed that worthy, with insulted dignity, as he also rose to a sitting position.

"What in his the matter with you blankety blank, blank idiots now?" howled the cowboy, digging energetically under his pillow, presumably for the omnipresent six-shooter, while on all sides the snores had ended in one magnificent chord, and the irate sleepers began an indignant chorus of pro

test.

Colonel Glasen was bracing himself against the window-sill, his iron-gray hair dishevelled and erect, his portly form silhouetted by the glare of the electric lights.

"What did I understand your name to be?" loudly demanded the insulted Missourian, fortifying himself against his satchel and the back of the next hotel guest, oblivious of all surroundings.

"William Glasen, sir; Colonel Wil

liam Glasen of Osawatomie Home guards, Kansas Sixth," roared the pioneer of the border war days.

"And who in the deuce is he?" inquired a Chicago drummer from a fardistant corner.

"Say, ef you fellers want to fight, why 'n Sam Hill don't you go out in the road?" complained a Medicine Lodge ranchman from choice quarters under the grand piano.

"It's my opinion they've both got a jag on," volunteered a voice from the vicinity of the steam radiator, while the other disturbed cocoons began to threaten violent measures toward restoring peace.

The insulted ex-governor sat only a moment more upon the parlor floor, facing his antagonist of twenty years before. His blanket fell away from his stately form like that of some Indian war chief as he rose to grasp his worldly belongings.

"I do remember yo', now that yo' mention it, Colonel Glasen," he said, bowing with all the grace of the southern gentleman, as to the now standing figure outlined plainly against the parlor curtains, "and I have the honor to bid yo' good evening," and, turning, he took up a dignified march over the recumbent figures upon the floor, dropping a shoe in the face of one, and stepping directly upon the cowboy's stomach, before he reached the haven of the hall door.

"Good evening, sir" shouted the irate jayhawker after him, as he also began plowing his way toward another door, distributing his collar, vest and watch with his usual generosity. When his raiment and shoes had been shot after him, with epithets to match, by his outraged bed-fellows, he tramped up the hall and spent the remainder of the night on the elevator seat.

Here his daughter's soft eyes and drooping, disappointed face came to remind him of her motherless girlhood; of the young wife sleeping away the years in the village cemetery which

might have been spent at his side but for the frights and exposures_incidental to the early border wars. Soon not only he, but the white-haired ex-governor would also sleep, and death would end all feuds and bitterness. If through these sad reflections there percolated any regrets that the Missouri land was upon his hands, be it remembered that the colonel was ever a busi

ness man.

By morning his wrath had cooled considerably, and two good cups of coffee and hot waffles, with bogus Vermont maple syrup, put him in fine humor, despite his sleepless night. It was soon after breakfast that he unexpectedly confronted the ex-governor in the rotunda. Involuntarily both. men dropped their eyes like two small boys after a fight, attempting to pass on in dignified silence.

"Governor, it is up to me to apologize," exclaimed the colonel with true western frankness, as he turned to hold out his hand.

"It's all right, all right, suh. Pray, don't mention it," returned the Missourian, who had meditated all night in the clerk's office chair, and he grasped the extended hand heartily.

"Yo' see, suh, I've met yo'r charming daughter, and my sonThe ex-governor paused in embarrassment, for the colonel's face flamed up instantly.

"Eh? Oh," he sputtered, suddenly brought face to face with the final struggle that was to bury all animosity between them forever, while the Missourian watched him sympathetically.

"That reminds me," he continued, regaining his self-control, "I must telegraph Bertha permission to go somewhere. Now, where was it?" and the colonel scratched his head thoughtfully.

"Gertrude Flannery's wedding, was it not?" prompted the other, gently.

"And now to business, governor," said he, briskly, as the two men turned away from the telegraph desk.

I'

F the cook hadn't forgotten to order bread I shouldn't have been sent to the bakeshop, and if the bakeshop hadn't been closed I shouldn't have dropped in to gossip in Captain Jim's yard, and, to this day, I should have been ignorant of the pleasures of "drudgin'," as the winter. dredging of flounders is called.

Of course, the bakeshop was closed, all shops are closed when you want to buy anything in Provincetown, but across the street Captain Jim was daydreaming on a dilapidated settle before his door. The Captain is a man of deeds and not of words, and conversation with him is apt to be one-sided.

We shall be pleased to render acknowledgement

He has an aversion to being pumped, and a supreme contempt for summer boarders. The best way to enjoy the Captain is to drop into the vacant seat beside him, light a pipe, and let Nature take its course. Then occasionally one is rewarded with a running fire of observations and anecdotes. Usually our conversation consisted of my monosyllabic accompaniment to the Captain's bass solo, only interrupted by his hearty "Set daown! Set daown!" every time I started to leave.

On this day Captain Jim was more communicative than usual. "There goes a school of them New York atists," he rumbled, pointing to a sloop

far out on the horizon. "I suppose Lew Boggs likes goin' pleasurin', Gofrey! Ye ship a dack load of them. wimmen atists en they're all sick fore ever ye kin round Long Point. They hain't nawthin' to ketch but a mess of pollock en whitin' sence them Portegees started setting trawl lines. Gofrey, I've seen when ye could beach a dory on House Point en fill her plumb full o' clams fore ever the tide come back. But now if ever a clam sticks

enough fer me in winter an' spring, an' goin' out to the traps in the summer. Gofrey, I don't want to watch no atist woman heavin' up her everlastin' boot heels, en squallin' like one of these here ma'k'rel gulls every time she gits. her line kadged to a dog fish. Wimmen's all right in their place, but their place ain't aboard no ma'k'rel catcher." Remembering the bread at this instant, I started to leave, and escaped, followed by Captain Jim's order to

his head out to breathe every Portegee in town knows it, an' here they come, in their dories; from the east'ard, and from the west'ard; from the north'ard, and from the south'ard; two by two,-two by two-tell they hain't a clam on the flats nor a fish in the bay. An' then look at all the fuss an' bother of makin' a chowder. I don't keer nawthin' fer this pleasurin'. Ma'krelin' an' sand eelin' an drudgin's good

"Set daown!" but his talk of winter dredging had started an idea, which was later put into effect; and after several letters back and forth, I packed my bag, and, dressed in my oldest and warmest clothes, I took the train to the end of the Cape for a winter fishing trip with Captain Jim, and his crew of two; Manuel, the big, jolly, red-faced Portegee, and Ben, the little leatherskinned Truro man, who had walked