"H'm. 'New York is hotter than Claybanks'--rank heresy, Caleb--'according to the thermometer, and the way the heat sizzles out of the sidewalks, and meanders upward, ought to be a warning to hardened sinners, and there are plenty of them here. Why, I asked a policeman on Broadway where was a first-class eating-house, and he pointed to one that he said was the best in town, and I had fried ham, and they charged me seventy-five cents for it, though it wouldn't have weighed half a pound raw. I don't harbor bad feelings, but the owner of that eating-house had better shy clear of me on Judgment Day. Miss Truett says it was extortionate, and I wish he could have seen her eyes when she said it.'" "I wish I too could have seen them, for they are superb," Grace said. "I must write her for a full report on Caleb. But I'm interrupting." "'That seaside boarding-place you engaged for me,'" continued Philip from the letter, "'is knocking my malaria endwise, which it ought to, seeing the price of board that is tacked up on the door, but anyhow, I feel like a giant every morning when I start for the city; that is, I think I do, though I never was a giant to find out for sure. I take a walk morning and evening, looking at the ocean, and trying to tell myself what I think of it, but not a word can I get hold of. Miss Truett says it's just so with her.' H'm--there's that woman again!" "Bless her!" "I shouldn't say so. I'm afraid Caleb has lost his head over her." "He'll find it again. Any good man will be bettered by meeting her. Is there anything more about her?" "Yes, and at once. Here it is: 'Miss Truett is all interest about your wife, and I like to get her going on the subject, for she thinks that Mrs. Somerton is everything that is nice and good and splendid; and when Miss Truett thinks anything, she knows how to say it in a style that beats any lawyer or preacher I ever heard. It ain't a pretty thing to say about a woman, maybe, but I mean only what's right when I say that when she talks it always seems to me that sometime or other she swallowed a big dictionary, colored pictures and all, and not a scrap of it disagreed with her. She says she wishes she had a job just like Mrs. Somerton's, and I told her that there was only one way to get it, and that if ever I saw an unmarried Western merchant of about your age and general style, I'd give him her name and some pointed advice. "'Most of the goods you wanted are bought and shipped, and when the corn-meal gets here I'll get out for England. "'With hearty regards to Mrs. Somerton, I am "'Yours always, "'CALEB WRIGHT.'" "Oh, Mary Truett!" exclaimed Grace, when the reading ended. "What fun you've had!" "As she seems to be the spirit of the letter," said Philip, "tell me something more about her."