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 look at the rooms offered to him, and decide against them. Then he could return to the hotel, have his baggage brought to Mrs. Dart’s next day, and move, that evening, into her charming apartment.

He paid her fifty dollars, in advance, for two weeks’ rent. She patted Barney on the back, as they went to the door, and babied him, ingratiatingly; he remained stolid without any effort. She even shook hands with him on the threshold; and she had a large-wristed, bony, cold hand that made him think of pickled pig’s feet.

“You are fond of children, m’am,” Babbing said.

She had to admit it; and Babbing took his leave in the subduedly grateful manner of a widower who has been rescued from perplexities by a woman’s instinctive sympathy for the unmanaged male.

He put Barney in the cab and left him there while he went to present his letter to Mrs. Andrews. And, of course, he did not present