"Fine! Never thought of that." Bob welcomed the suggestion with a
delight that drowned Lorelei's frightened protest; then, as the
idea grew in his mind, he joyously appropriated it as his own. A
mere proposal of marriage and an acceptance were more or less
hackneyed; the event contained no elements of the spectacular; but
to follow it promptly with a midnight ceremony impressed him as a
grandiose achievement and one calculated to shed luster upon his
adventurous career. "That's my idea of romance--that's the way I
like to do things," he declared. "We'll be married soon's I pay
this check." Fumbling through his pockets, he remembered that his
last dollar had gone across Melcher's gaming-table earlier in the
evening, and cried in dismay, "Hold on! Nothing doing in the
marriage line, after all. I'm bust. Isn't that a burglar's luck?
And right on the altar steps, too."

"I'll settle everything--all the way through," Jim offered,
eagerly.

Bob feebly demurred, asserting that his temporary financial
condition ruined the whole joke, and that he never married without
a pocket full of money; but as Jim insisted, and seeing that Miss
Lynn was becoming tearful at the thought of a disappointment, he
yielded grudgingly.

"But--I say--where do they keep these weddings?" he inquired.
"Everything's closed now, and there's nobody dancing at the City
Hall, is there?" He appealed helplessly to Jim.

Jim rose to the occasion with the same promptitude he had
displayed throughout. "Leave it to Jimmy the Fixer," he cried,