e9 ft H4EDING Tmnr WHEN Ainsley first moved to Lone Lake Farm all of his friends asked him the same question. They wanted to know if the farmer who sold it to him had abandoned it as worthless; how one of the Idle rich, who could not distinguish a plow from a harrow, hoped to make it pay? His answer was that he had not purchased the farm as a means of getting richer by honest toil, but as a retreat from the world and as a test of true friend ship. He argued that the people he knew accepted his hospitality at Sherry's because, in any event, they themselves would be dining within a taxlcab fare of the same place. But if to see him they traveled all the way to Lone Lake Farm, he might feel as sured that they were friends. Indeed. Lone Lake Farm was spread over many acres of rocky ravine and forest, at a point where Connecticut approaches New York, and between it and the near est railroad station stretched six miles of an execrable wood road. In this wil derness, directly upon the lonely lake, and at a Bpot equally distant from eacn of his boundary lines. Ainsley built himself a red brick house. Here, in solitude, he exiled himself, ostensibly to become a gentleman farmer; In reality to wait until Tolly Klrkland had made up her mind to marry him. Lone Lake, which grave the farm its name, was a pond hardly larger than a city block. It was fed by hidden springs and fringed about with reeds and cattails, stunted willows and shiv ering birch. From its surface jutted pointB of the same rock that had made farming unremunerative, and to these miniature promontories and Islands Ainsley, in keeping with a fancied re semblance, gave such names as the Needles, St. Helena and the Isle of Tines. From the edge of the pond that was farther from the house rose a high hill, hjavily wooded. At its base oak and chestnut trees spread their branches over the water, and when the air was still were so clearly reflected In the pond that the leaves seemed to float upon the surface. To the smiling; expanse of the farm the lake was what the eye is to the human countenance. The oaks were Its eyebrows, the fringe of its reeds its lashes, and. in changing mood. It flashed with happiness or orooaea in somDer melancholy. For Ainsley it held a deep attraction. Through the Summer evenings, as the Bun set, he would sit on the brick ter race and watch the fish leaping and ltsten to the venerable bullfrogs croak ing false alarms of rain. Indeed, after he met Polly Klrkland, staring mood ily at the lake, became his favorite form of exercise. With a number of other men. Ainsley was very much in love with Miss Klrkland. and unpreju diced friends thought that if she were to choose any of her devotees, Ainsley should be that one. Ainsley heartily agreed in this opinion, but in persuad ing Miss Klrkland to share it he had not been successful. This was partly his own fault, for when he dared to compare what she meant to him with what he had to offer her he became a mass of sodden humility. Could he have known how much Polly Klrkland envied and admired his depth of feel- ing, entirely apart from the fact that she herself inspired that feeling, how greatly she wished to care for him in the way he cared for her, life, even alone in the silences of Lone Lake, would have been a beautiful and blessed thing. But he was so sure she was the most charming and most won derful girl in the world, and he an un worthy and despicable being, that when the lady demurred he faltered, and his ' pleading, at least to his own ears, car ried no conviction. 'When one thinks of being mar. Terse Tales From SLAVERY "Here is a story of a Chicago woman who says that present marriage laws make woman the slave of man," said the square-jawed matron as she lpoked up from the newspaper. Why don't they enforce the law, then?" meekly asked Mr. Henpecke. Buffalo Express. SYSTEM. A commercial traveler was bragging about the magnitude of the firm he represented. "I suppose your house is a pretty big establishment?" said the customer. "Big? You can't have any idea of its dimensions. Last week we took an in ventory of the employes and found out for the first time that three cashiers and four bookkeepers were missing. That will give you some idea of the magnitude of our business." Llppin cott's. THE BRAIN WORK. In the lobby of a Washington hotel the other evening they were talking i j 1 1 ,i, - ' . . . mm Among IIieHjnnyMen TW 1 I . . ! k Clerk I'm to be married tomorrow, sir Employer Glad to hear It. You tie In such a hurry to get home this. won't after ried." said Polly Kirkland gently, "it isn't a question of the maa you can live with, the man you can't live with out. And I am sorry, but I've found that man." "I suppose." returned Ainsley gloom ily, "that my not being able to live without you doesn't affect the ques tion in the least?" "You have lived without me," Miss Klrkland pointed out reproachfully, "for 30 years." 'Lived!" almost shouted Ainslev. "Do you call that living? What was I be fore I met you? I was an ignorant beast of the field. I knew as much about living as one of the cows on my farm. I couid sleep 12 hours at a stretch, or. if I was in New York, I never slept. I was a day and night bank of health and happiness, a great, big, useless puppy. And now I can't sleep, can't eat, can't think except of you. I dream about you all night, think about you all day, go through the wodds calling your name cutting your Initials in tree trunks, loing all the fool things a man does when's he's in love, and I am the most miserable man in the world and the happiest!" He finally succeeded in making Miss Klrkland so miserable also that she decided to run away. Friends had planned to spend the early Spring on the Nile and were eager that she should accompany them. To her the separation seemed to offer an excellent method of discovering whether or not Ainsley was the man she could not "live without." Ainsley saw In it only an act of tor. tuf!e'.devised wlth devilish cruelty. "What will happpen to me," he an nounced firmly, "is that I will plain die! As long as I can see you. as long as I iiave the chance to try and make you understand that no one can pos sibly love you as I do, and as long as I know I am worrying you to death and no one else is, I still hope. I've no right to hope, still I do. And that one little chance keeps me alive. But Egypt! If you escape to Egypt, what hold will I have on you? You might as well be in the moon. Can you imagine me writing love letters to a woman in the moon? Can I send American Beauty roses to the ruins of Karnak? Here I can telephone you; not that I ever have anything to say that you want to hear, but because I want to listen to your voice and to have you ask, 'Oh! is that you?' as though you were glad it was me. But Egypt! Can I call up Egypt on the long-distance? If you leave me now you'll leave me forever, for I'll drown myself in Lone Lake." The day she sailed away he went to the steamer and. separating her from her friends and family drew her in ih. side of the ship farther from the wharf and which for the moment was de serted. Directly below a pile-driver with rattling of chains and shrieks from her donkey engine, was smashing great logs; on the deck above the ship's band was braying forth fictitious gayetey and from every side they were assailed by the raucous whistles of ferryboats. The surroundings were not conducive to sentiment, but for the first time Polly Klrkland seemed a lit tle uncertain, a little frightened; al most on the verge of tears, almost per suaded to surrender. For the first time she laid her hand on Ainsley's arm and the shock Bent the blood to his heart and held him breathless When the girl looked at him there was something In her eyes that neither he nor any other man had ever seen there. "The last thing I tell you," she Bald, the thing I want you to remember. Is this that, though I do not care, I want to care." Ainsley caught at her hand and, to the delight of the crew of a passing tugboat, kissed it rapturously. His face was radiant. The fact of parting from her had caused him real suf fering, had marked his face with hard lines. Now hope and happiness smoothed them away and his eyes shone with his love for her. He was trembling laughing. Jubilant. "And if you should!" he begged. "How Humorous Pens j about big legal fees when Represents nvcuig uiiea a case. Some time since, according to the representative, a man fell Into an open coa! hole, sued for damages and was awarded a substantial amount. When he received a hill from his lawyer, however, he was stunned again, and as soon as he could get into hustling shape he hastened to see him. "Y'our bill Is outrageous!" exclaimed the client to the legal one. "It is more than three-fourths of the amount that I recovered." "Quite true." was the calm response of the lawyer, "but you musn't forget that I furnished the skill and legal learning for the case." "Yes." excitedly cried the client." but I furnished the easel" "Oh, as far as that goes," was the scornful reply of the lawyer, "anybody can fall down a coal hole." Phila delphia Telegraph. UNLIKE THE LAWYER MEN. The Moberly Monitor is telling this nine pujry on a lawyer tfiere. It hap "One of your gloves is on the floor, dear." "That isn't a glove, silly: it's my 191 bathing suit." . soon will I know? You will cable," he commanded. "You will cable Come,' and the same hour I'll start toward you. I'll go home now," he cried, "and pack." The girl drew away. Already she regretted the admission she had made. In fairness and in kindness to him she tried to regain the position she had abandoned. "But a change like that." she plead ed, "might not come for years may never come." To recover herself, to make the words she had uttered seem less serious, she spoke quickly and lightly. "And how could I cable such a thing?" s!a protested. "It would be far too sacred, too precious. You should be able to feel that the change has come." "I suppose I should," assented Ains ley, doubtfully, "but it's a long way across two oceans. It would be safer if you'd promise to use the cable. Just one word: 'Come.' " The girl shook her head and frowned. "If you can't feel that the woman you love loves you, even across the world, you cannot love her very deeply." "I don't have to answer that," said Ainsley. "I will send you a sign," continued the girl, hastily "a secret wireless message. It shall be a test. If you love me you will read it at once. You will know the Instant you see it that it comes from me. No one else will be able to read it: but if you love me you will know that I love you." Whether she spoke in metaphor or in fact, whether she was "playing for time." or whether in her heart she al ready intended to soon reward him with a message of glad tidings, Ainsley could not decide. And even as he begged her to enlighten him the last whistle blew, and a determined officer ordered him to the ship's side. "Just as in everything that is beau tiful," he whispered eagerly, "I always see something of you: so now in every thing wonderful I will read your mes sage. But." he persisted, "how shall I be sure?" The last bag of mail had shot into the hold, the most reluctant of the vis icors were being hustled down the last remaining gangplank. Ainsley's state was desperate. "Will it be in symbol or in cipher?" he demanded. "Must I read It In the sky, or will you hide it In a letter, or where? Help me. Give me just a hint." The giil shook her head. "You will read it in your heart," she said. From the end of the wharf Ainsley watched the funnels of the ship disap pear in the haze of the lower bay. His heart was sore and heavy, but in it there was still room for righteous in dignation. "Read it in my heart!" he protested. "How the devil can I read it in my heart? I want to read it printed in a cablegram." Because he had always understood that young men in love found solace for their misery in solitude and In communion with nature, he at once drove his car to Lone Lake. But his misery was quite genuine, and the emptiness of the brick house only served to increase his loneliness. He had built the house for her, though she had never visited it, and wa asso ciated with it only through the some what indefinite medium of the tele phone box. But in New York they had been much together. And Ainsley quickly decided that in revisiting those places where he had been happy in her company he would derive from the recollection some melancholy consola tion. He accordingly raced back through the night to the city; nor did he halt until he was at the door of her house. She had left it only that morn ing, and though it was locked in dark ness, it still spoke of Jier. At least, it seemed to bring her nearer to him than when he was listening to the frogs in the lake, and crushing his way through the pines. He was not hungry, but he went to a restaurant where, when he was host. pened in Judge Tedford's court and the witness was a negro woman, whose re ply to every query was, "I think so." Finally the opposing lawyer rose and pounded on the desk. "Now. you look here!" he roared, "you cut that think ing -business and answer my questions Now talk." "Mr. Lawyer Man," said the witness. "Mr. Lawyer Man, you will have to 'scuse me. I ain't like you 'terneys. I can't talk without thlnkinV Kansas City Times. TABLE D'HOTE. A young Buffalo bookkeeper, on a recent visit to New York, thought to Impress his New York friends by put ting up at a fashionable hotel. Of course he couldn't afford it and had to economize in various ways to make ends meet. He happened on one occasion to be taking his evening meal on a bench in the park when a young man and his sister, friends of his, passed in an automobile. The Buffalo youth bent his head over his sandwich, but the New Yorker saw him and shouted: "Hello. George. rininr you gay dog, eh!" Young's Mairazin.. - " '"unJaaazlue. I "So you've bought a new painting for "What did you learn at college, mv son?" "Can't tell; it's a secret, sir." "What!" "Yesslr, the baseball signals." she had often been the honored guest iie preienoea tney were at supper together and without a chaperon. Either the illusion or the supper cheered him, for he was encouraged to go on to his club. There in the library with the aid of an atlas he worked out where, after 13 hours of moving at the rate of 22 knots an hour, she should be at that moment. Having determined that fact to his own satis faction, he sent a wireless after the ship. It read: "It is now midnight and you are in latitude 40 degrees north, longitude 68 degrees west and i nave grown old and for the sign." gray waiting The next morning, and for many days after, he was surprised to find that the city went on as though she still were in it. With unfeeling regu larity the sun rose out of the East River. On Broadway electric-light signs flashed, street cars pursued each other, taxicabs bumped and skidded, women, and even men. dared to look happy, and had apparently taken some thought to "their attire. They did not respect even his widowerhood. They smiled upon him, and asked him jocu larly about the farm and his "crops, and what he was doing in New York. He pitied them, for obviously they wre ignorant of the fact that in New York there were art galleries, shops, res taurants of great interest, owiirg to the fact that Polly Klrkland had visited them. They did not know that on upper Fifth avenue were houses of which she had deigned to approve, or which she had destroyed with ridicule and that to walk that avenue and halt before each of these houses was an in estimable privilege. Each day, with pathetic vigilance, Ainsley examined his heart for the promised sign. But so far from telling him that the change he longed for had taken place, his heart grew heavier, and as weeks went by and no sign appeared, what little confidence he had once enjoyed passed with them. But before hope entirely died, sev eral false alarms had thrilled him with happiness. One was a cablegram from Gibraltar in which the only words that were intelligible were "congratu late" and "engagement." This lifted him Into an ecstasy of Joy and ex citement, until, on having the cable company repeat the message he learned it was a request from Miss Klrkland to congratulate two mutual friends who had Just announced their engagement and of whose address she was uncer tain. He had hardly recovered from this disappointment than he was again thrown into a tumult by the receipt of a mysterious package from the custom-house containing an intaglio ring The ring came from Italy, and her ship had touched at Genoa. The fact that it was addressed in an unknown handwriting did not disconcert him. for he argued that to make the test more difficult she might disguise the hand writing. He at once carried the in taglio to an expert at the Metropolitan Museum, and when he was told that It represented Cupid feeding a fire upon an altar, he reserved a stateroom on the first steamer bound for the Med iterranean. But before his ship sailed a letter, also from Italy, from his Aunt Maria, who was spending the Winter in Rome, informed him that the ring was a Christmas gift from her. in his rage he unjustly condemned Aunt Maria as a meddling old busybody and gave her ring to the cook. After two months of pilgrimages 'o places sacred to the memory of Folly Klrkland. Ainsley found that feeding his love on post-mortemB was poor fare, and, in surrender, determined to evacuate New York. Since her depart ure he had received from Miss Kirk land several letters, but they contained no hint of a change in her affections, and search them as he might, he could find no cipher or hidden message They were merely frank, friendly notes of travel; at first filled with gossip of the steamer, and later telling of ex cursions around Cairo. If they held any touch of feeling they seemed to show that she was sorry for him, and as she could not regard him in any way more calculated to increase his Quips and Flings "Mr. and Mrs. Whlffer never have any arguments." "How does that happen?" "Mr. Whiffer won't argue.' 1 "The poor woman!" Birmingham Age-Herald. "I'm tired of life'.' "That being the case, go out to Cal ifornia and shout 'Banzai.' Birming ham Age-Herald. ... Poser for a butcher who gives short weight: If 16 ounces go to a pound, where do you expect to go to? Sacred Heart Review. . Cub Reporter I guess I'll have all my work copyrighted. City Editor Never mind that. Just have the copy right. Judge. "I wonder why Bob doesn't marry?" "He hasn't met the wrong girl yet, probably!" Puck. "Don't you remember me I am the young man that ran away with your daughter several years ago." "Well, what do you want after hav ing taken my daughter from me?" "I want to congratulate you." utter hopeless solitude of the he left behind him two trunks filled with such gar ments as a man would need on board a steamer and in the early Spring in Egypt. They had been packed awav, when she had told him of the possible sign. But there had been no sign. Nor did he longer believe in one. So In the baggage-room of an hotel the trunks were abandoned, accumulating layers of dust and charges for storage. At the farm the snow still lay in the crevices of the rocks and beneath the branches of the evergreens, but under the wet, dead leavs little flowers had begun to show their faces. The "back bone of the Winter was broken" and "Spring was in the air. But as Ainsley was certain that his heart also was broken, the signs of Spring did not console him. At each week-end he filled the house with people, but they found him gloomy and he found them dull. He liked better the solitude of the midweek: days. Then for hours he would tramp through the woods, pre tending she was at his side, pretending he was helping her across the streams swollen with Winter rains and melted snow. On these excursions he cut down trees that hid a view he thought she would have liked, he cut paths over which she might have walked. Or he sat idly in a flat-bottomed scow in the lake and made a pretence of fish ing. The loneliness of the lake and the isolation of the boat suited his hu mor. He did not find it true that misery loves company. At least to hu man being he preferred his compan ions of Lone Lake the beaver build ing his home among the reeds, the kingfisher, the blue heron, the wild fowl that In their flight north rested for an hour or a day upon the peace ful waters. He looked upon them as his guests and when they spread their wings and left him again alone he felt he had been hardly used. It was while he was sunk in this state of melancholy, and some months after Miss Kirkland had sailed to Egypt, that hope returned. For a week-end he had invited Hol den and Lowell. two former class mates, and Nelson Mortimer and his bride. They were all old friends of their host and well acquainted with the cause of his discouragement. So they did not ask to be entertained, but, disregarding him, amused themselves after their own fashion. It was late Friday afternoon. The members of the house party had Just returned from a tramp through the woods and had joined Ainsley on the terrace, where he stood watching the last rays of the sun leave the lake in darkness. All through the day there had been sharp splashes of rain, with the clouds dull and forbidding, but now the sun was sinking in a sky of crimson, and for the morrow a faint moon held out a promise of fair weather. Elsie Mortimer gave a sudden ex clamation and pointed to the east. "Look!" she said. The men turned and followed the di rection of her hand. In the fading light, against a background of somber clouds that the sun could not reach, they saw, moving slowly toward them and descending as they moved, six great whjte birds. When they were above the tops of the trees that edged the lake the birds halted and hovered uncertainly, their wings lifting and falling, their bodies slanting and sweeping slowly, in short circles. The suddenness of their approach, their presence so far inland, something unfamiliar and foreign in the way they had winged their progress, for a mo ment held the group upon the terrace silent. "They are gulls from the Sound," said Lowell. "They are too large for gulls," re turned Mortimer. "They might be wild geese, but," he answered himself, in a puzzled voice, "it is too late; and wild geese follow a leader." As though they feared the birds might hear them and take alarm, the men, unconsciously, had spoken in low tones. your hall? Is it by some artist with a well-known name?" "Yes; his name is Smith." Boston Transcript. "So you proposed last night and got your answer in two letters." "In two letters? No, I didn't." "But you told me she refused you." "That's all right, but the girl is Dutch." m The teacher was explaining the tenses. "Now, Willie," she said, "sup pose I should say: 'I have a million dol lars.' What tense would that be?" "That'd be pretense." answered Wil lie. Bix I have a dog that's nearly thirty inches high. DIx That's nothing. I have one that stands over four feet. Bacon Huxley said that an oyster Is as complicated as a watch. Egbert Well, I know both of them run down easily. Yonkers Statesman r Young Mr. Gurley My foot's asleep. Gazzam Nonsense! Not while you are wearing those loud trousers. B., -o. s jiontniy. "Ah. fer a "What on Willie?" "So's I reachln' fer discouragement, he. in ness, retreated to the farm. In New Yordk "They move as though they were very tired." whispered Elsie Mortimer. "I think." said Ainsley, "they have lost their way." But even as he spoke, the birds, as though they had reached their goal, spread their wings to the full length and sank to the shallow water at the farthest margin of the lake. As they fell the sun struck full upon them, turning their great pinions into flashing white and silver. "Oh." cried the girl, "but they are beautiful!" Between the house and the lake there was a ridgo of rock higher than the head of a man. and to this Ainsley and his guests ran for cover. On hands and knees, like hunters stalking game, they scrambled up the face of the rock and peered cautiously into the pond. Below them, less than 100 yards away, on a tiny promontory, the six white birds stood motionless. They showed no sign of fear. They could not but know that beyond the lonely circle of the pound were the haunts of men. From the farm came the tinkle of a cowbell, the bark of a dog, and In the valley, six miles distant, rose faintly upon the stillness of the sunset hour the rumble of a passing train. But If these sounds carried, the birds gave no heed. In each drooping head and dragging wing, in the forward stoop of each white body, weighing heavily on the slim black legs, was written utter weariness, abject fatigue. To each even to lower his bill and sip from the cool waters was a supreme effort. And In their exhaustion so complete was something humanly helpless and pathetic To Ainsley the mysterious visitors made a direct appeal. He felt as though they had thrown themselves upon his hospitality. That they showed such confidence that the sanctuary would be kept sacred touched him. And while his friends spoke eagerly, he remained silent, watching the drooping, ghost like figures, his eyes filled with pity. "I have seen birds like those in Florida," Mortimer, was whispering, "but they were not migratory birds." "And I've seen white cranes in the Adlrondacks," Bald Lowell, "but never six at one time." "They're like no bird I ever saw out of a zoo," declared Elsie Mortimer. "Maybe they are from the zoo. Maybe they escaped from the Bronx." "The Bronx is too near," objected Lowell. "These birds have come a great distance. They move as though they had been flying for many days." As though the absurdity of his own thought amused him, Mortimer laughed softly. "I'll tell you what they do look like." he said. "They look like that bird you see on the Nile the sacred Ibis they " Something between a gasp and a cry startled him into silence. He found his host staring wildly, his lips parted, his eyes open wide. "Where?" demanded Ainsley. "Where did you Bay?" His voice was so hoarse, bo strafige, that they all turned and looked. "On the Nile," repeated Mortimer. "All over Egypt. Why?" Ainsley made no answer. Unclasping his hold he suddenly slid down the face of the rock and with a bump lit on his hands and knees. With one bound he had cleared a flowerbed. In two more he had mounted the steps to the terrace and in another Instant had disappeared into the house. "What happened, to him?" demanded Elsie Mortimer. "He's gone to get a gun," exclaimed Mortimer. "But he musn't How can he think of shooting them?" he cried in dignantly. "I'll put a stop to that." In the hall he found Ainsley sur rounded by a group of startled ser vants. "You get that car at the door in five minutes!" he was shouting, "and you telephone the hotel to have my trunks out of the cellar and on board the Kron Prinz Albert by midnight. Then you telephone Hoboken that I want a cabin, and If they haven't got a cabin I want the captain's. And tell them, anyway. Among tne Poets I N SPIKATIO N The bard was melancholy he Sat on the ocean's strand. "Would that I could describe the sea," He sighed, and waved his hand. "Would that I could describe its hue With soul and truth and skill. The way some other fellows do And did and, darn it, will! Would that I could, in throbbing staves Describe its mystery The sea that sleeps that sea that raves These are the themes for me. Would that" a wave broke over him. He, so to speak, imbibed it. It felled him flat upon the strand. It bumped his head to beat the band. It ebbed he rose, ohockful of sand. Took one look at the ocean and Described it. New York Times. APPRECIATION. How dear to our heart is the steady subscriber. Who pays in advance at the birth of little rain." earth do yon want rain fer kin get a drink widout It - I'm coming on board tonight, and I'm going with them if I have to sleep oti deck. And you," he cried, turning to Mortimer, "take a shotgun and guard that lake, and if anybody tries to mo lest those birds shoot him! They'vo come from Egypt. From Tolly Klrk land. She sent them. They're a sign." "Are you going mad?" cried Mor timer. "No," roared Ainsley. "I'm going t Egypt, and I'm going now." Tolly Kirkland and her friends were traveling slowly up the Nile, and had reached Luxor. A few hundred yards below the village their dahabiyeh was moored to the bank, and on the deck Miss Kirkland was watching a scarlet sun sink behind two palm trees. By the grace of that special providence that cares for drunken men, citizens of the United States and lovers, her friends were on shore, and she was alone. For this she was grateful, for her thoughts were of a melancholy and tender nature and she had no wish for any com pansion save one. In consequence, when a steam launch, approaching at full speed with the rattle of a quick firing gun, broke upon her meditations, she was distinctly annoyed. But when with much ringing of bells and shouting of orders, the steam launch rammed the paint off her daha biyeh, and a young man tlung himself over the rail and ran toward her, her annoyance passed, and with a sigh she sank into his outstretched, eager arms. Half an hour later Ainsley laughed proudly and happily. "Well!" he exclaimed, "you can never say I kept you waiting., I didn't lose much time, did I? Ten'minutes after I got your C. Q. D. signal I was going down, the Boston Tost Road at 70 miles an hour." "My what?" said the girl. "The sign!" explained Ainsley. "The sign you were to send me to tell me" he bent over her hand and added gently "that you cared for me." "Oh, I remember," laughed Polly Kirkland. "I was to send you a sign, wasn't I? You were to 'read it in your heart," she quoted. "And I did," returned Ainsley, com placently. "There were several false alarms, and I'd almost lost hope, but when the messengers came 1 knew them." With puzzled eyes the girl frowned, and raised her head. "Messengers?" she repeated. "I sent no message. Of course," she went on, "when I said you would 'read it in your heart' I meant that if you really loved me you would not wait for a sign, but you would Just come!" She sighed proudly and contentedly. "And you came. You understood that, didn't you?" she asked anxiously. For an instant Ainsley stared blank ly, and then to hide his guilty counte nance drew her toward him and kissed her. , "Of course," he stammered "of course I understood. That was why I came. I Just couldn't stand it any longer." Breathing heavily at the thought of the blunder he had so narrowly avoid ed, Ainsley turned his head toward the great red disk that was disappearing Into the sands of the desert. He was so long silent that the girl lifted her eyes, and found that already he haci forgotten her presence and, transfixed was staring at the sky. On his face was bewilderment and wonder and a touch of awe. The girl followed the direction of his eyes, and In the swiftly gathering darkness saw comfng slowly toward them, and descending as they came, six great white birds. They moved with the last effort of complete exhaustion. In the drooping head and dragging wings of each was written utter weariness, abject fatigue. For a moment they hovered over the dahabiyeh and above the two young lovers, and then, like tired travelers who had reached their journey's end, they spread their wings and sank to the muddy waters of .Jhe Nile and into the enveloping night. "Some day," said Ainsley, "I have a confession to make to you." (Copyright by Charles Scrlbner's Sons.) of the Daily Press Who lays down the money and does it quite gladly. And casts round the office a halo of cheer. He never says. "Stop it; I cannot afford it. I'm getting more magazines now than I read"; But always says "Send it; our people all like it In fact, we think it a help and a need." How welcome his check when it reaches our sanctum; How it makes our pulse throb; how It makes our heart dance! We outwardly thank him; we inwardly bless him The steady subscriber who pays in advance. - Montreal Gazette. NEVER AGAIN. She smoked Just one No more, you bet! She calls it now A "sickarette." "It was a case of love at first sight." "How do you account for it?" "She saw him in Bradstreet's and he aw her in the Blue Book."