Page:Earl Derr Biggers - Seven Keys to Baldpate (1913).djvu/232

212 Broadway every evening, and I can sit here and listen to the latest comic opera tunes come drifting up from the casino, and go down and mingle with the muslin brigade any time I want, and see the sympathetic look in their eyes as they buy my postals. It ain't then I want to go back. It's when fall comes, and the trees on the mountain ire bare, and Quimby locks up the inn, and there's only the wind and me on the mountain—then I get the fever. I haven't the post-card trade to think of—so I think of Ellen, and New York. She s—my wife. New York—it's my town.

"That's why I can't come among you to cook. It'd be leading me into temptation greater than I could stand. I'd hear your talk, and like as not when you went away I'd shave off this beard, and burn the manuscript of Woman, and go down into the marts of trade. Last night I walked the floor till two. I can't stand such temptation."

Mr. Peters auditors regarded him in silence. He rose and moved toward the kitchen door.

"Now you understand how it is," he said.