"It appears," reported the Little Red Doctor, "that every man in his own
company has licked our young friend and now the other companies of the
regiment are beginning to show interest, and he doesn't like it. I
believe he'd desert if it weren't that he's afraid of what Mayme
would think."

"Still on his mind, is she?" I asked.

The Little Red Doctor produced a letter with a camp postmark from the
South and read a passage:

"You were right when you guessed that I never wanted anything very much
before, without having it handed to me. Perhaps you are right about its
being good for me. But it comes hard. The promise goes, of course. I'm
going to show you and her that I'm not yellow. [So that was still
rankling; salutary, if bitter dose!] But if this war ever finishes, all
bets are off and I'm coming back to find her. And don't you forget your
part of the bargain, to write and let me know how she is getting on."
The Little Red Doctor was able to send progressively encouraging news.
When the cold weather came, Mayme moved westward to Southern California,
and found herself on the edge of one of the strange, tumultuous,
semi-insane moving-picture colonies of that region. Thence issued,
presently, stirring tidings.

"What do you think?" wrote our exile. "They've got my funny little
monkey mug in the movies. Five per and steady work. The director likes
me and says he will give me a real chance one of these days. But, as the
Dominie would say, this is a hell of a place. [Graceless imp!] I would
not say it myself, because I am a perfect lady. You have to be, out