"Joe Louden all right," he said, reassuringly.
"Ain' nuffum happen to him! Nigh as I kin mek
out f'm de TALK, dat Happy Fear gone on de ramPAGE
ag'in, an' dey hatta sent fer Mist' Louden to
come in a hurry."



XIV

WHITE ROSES IN A LAW-OFFICE

As upon a world canopied with storm,
hung with mourning purple and habited
in black, did Mr. Flitcroft turn
his morning face at eight o'clock
antemeridian Monday, as he hied
himself to his daily duty at the Washington
National Bank. Yet more than the merely funereal
gloomed out from the hillocky area of his
countenance. Was there not, i'faith, a glow, a Vesuvian
shimmer, beneath the murk of that darkling eye?
Was here one, think you, to turn the other cheek?
Little has he learned of Norbert Flitcroft who
conceives that this fiery spirit was easily to be
quenched! Look upon the jowl of him, and let him who
dares maintain that people--even the very Pikes
themselves--were to grind beneath their brougham
wheels a prostrate Norbert and ride on scatheless!