seem to make up my mouth to speak to folks first; and then you can't
tell whether a man ain't a gambler, or on for the horse-races
anyway. So we've been here a week now, and you're the first ones
we've spoken to besides the waiters since we came."

I couldn't help laughing, their experience was so exactly as I had
imagined it when I first saw this disconsolate party. In my triumph
at my own penetration, I would not have had their suffering in the
past one pang the less; but the simple frankness of his confession
fixed me in the wish that the future might be brighter for them. I
thought myself warranted by my wife's imprudence in taking a step
toward their further intimacy on my own account, and I said:

"Well, perhaps I ought to tell you that I haven't been inside the
Saratoga Club or bet on the races since I've been here. That's my
name in full,"--and I gave him my card,--"and I'm in the literary
line; that is, I'm the editor of a magazine in New York--the Every
Other Week."

"Oh yes; I know who you are," said my companion, with my card in his
hand. "Fact is, I was round at your place this morning trying to
get rooms, and the clerk told me all about you from my description.
I felt as mean as pu'sley goin'; seemed to be takin' kind of an
advantage of you."

"Not at all; it's a public house," I interrupted; but I thought I
should be stronger with Mrs. March if I did not give the fact away
to her, and I resolved to keep it.

"But they couldn't rest easy till I tried, and I was more than half