Arthur hesitated awkwardly. It had been his intention to confess to Pert all the circumstances of his last misadventure; but her few words in praise of Checkers now suddenly emphasized in his mind the thought that everything he had to tell was as clearly discreditable to himself as it was favorable to Checkers, and he had n't the generosity of nature to put the matter upon that footing. Still, when upon several former occasions, he had confessed to Pert his weaknesses and sins, there had been a kindness in her ready sympathy, her gentle chiding and disapproval, which seemed to bring her nearer to him than she ever was during good behavior. He had found a certain desperate pleasure at times in telling her of his misdoings. It roused her, at least temporarily, out of her usual placid indifference toward him--an attitude to which he sometimes felt that her hatred would have been preferable. As a school-girl of sixteen, with romantic tendencies, Pert had entered upon the task of reforming Arthur, with a childish belief that the love he professed for her, and which she, in a measure, returned, might be made a means to an earnest and successful endeavor upon his part to become worthy of her. But lapse after lapse had shaken this faith, and three years of experience found her with simply a sisterly pity for this weak young man, whose devotion was so abject that he ceased to interest her, and whose spasmodic vices were not of the kind which make some men so darkly fascinating. And so Arthur hesitated, debating rapidly in his mind what to say, what to leave unsaid. "Well, it's a rather peculiar story, Pert, although it all happened naturally enough," he answered, after a little time. "I went up to Little Rock a few weeks ago to see a party on business. I found when I got there that he had gone to Hot Springs, and so I followed him over there. I wound up the business in a couple of days, but, as long as I was there, I thought I 'd stay a week or so and take a few baths. "Well, one day in the cooling-room I struck up a conversation with the man lying next to me, and I 'll pledge you my word I never laughed so much in all my life as I did that morning at our little friend here, who told me a lot of his hard-luck stories.