Page:Top-Notch Magazine, May 1 1915 (IA tn 1915 05 01).pdf/115

 press my appreciation of whut you done to induce Ephraim Glover to take back and give me a clear field. With a clear start, I reckon I can carry this deestrict, and help you to carry the county. Anyhow, I'm going to lay myself out to do it."

"That sounds good to me," laughed the governor.

"Furthermore," pursued the host, "I've decided to abolish the trapping of automobile drivers in this here town. Mebbe," he admitted, "this may appear a leetle dite selfish on my part as, havin' got my dander up by the pranks played on me by that there gas go-cart of yourn, governor, I'm contemplating buying one myself and running the consarned cantraption until I git it tamed. If there was traps hereabouts, mebbe I'd git took up and have to fine myself for busting the speed limit. Therefore, henceforth there ain't going to be no speed limit in Greenbush."

Beneath the edge of the table, old Shep, attempting to lick Bessie's hand with his tongue, licked also the hand of the young man who sat beside her. And before sitting down, the young people had found an opportunity, quite unobserved, to exchange a few words in private. Somehow neither of them had evinced any great desire for food, but while George was still unnaturally pale, the roses continued to bloom in Bessie's cheeks.

Now George spoke up boldly: "As long as you have abolished the speed limit, Judge Wiggin, I am going to improve the occasion to ask you for your daughter's hand in marriage. Doubtless it will seem rather hasty to you, but everything has moved with a rush this afternoon. I have put the question to Bessie, and won her consent."

The governor stared. Miss Nancy nearly fainted. Bessie Wiggin trembled visibly. Nathan P. Wiggin gazed hard at the young man for about thirty seconds, and then scratched his chin, a queer pucker screwing up his face.

"Wull, I declare!" said the judge at last. "That is going some! Never quite reckoned on my darter hookin' up with a shuffer, but, having saved me from drownding, yu've took me at a disadvantage. If Bessie has said yes, and you kin furnish the proper creedenshuls I'll have to take your proposition under consideration, I guess."

The governor looked Bessie Wiggin over appraisingly, and decided that he had made no mistake in thinking her an unusually pretty and charming young lady.

"It is sudden," he said, laughing softly, "and it would not have happened if George had not offered to drive for me to-day, my regular chauffeur being ill. In the way of credentials, judge, let me state that he is my son."

The judge's sister sat bolt upright in a jiffy. The judge coughed behind his hand, the pucker crinkling the corners of his eyes.

"Them creedenshuls, governor," he stated, "are wholly satisfactory to me." His whole body seemed to shake oddly. "I'm afraid I'm going to have a chill, after all," he added. "I think the governor and me had better take a little walk in the moonlight."

S that clock right?" asked the visitor, who had already outstayed his welcome.

His hostess yawned. "Oh, no!" she said. "That's the clock we always call 'The Visitor.'"

The obdurate one sat down again.

"'The Visitor!'" he remarked. "What a curious name to give a clock!"

"The hostess ventured to explain.

"You see," she cooed sweetly, "we call it that because we can never make it go!"

And then he went.