Howsoever, the lady, all of a sudden, came to a stop; two ribs of her umbrella snapped with a loud click, one side flapping down over her shoulders; her hat flew off as if it had been kicked by an athlete, and rolled across the swimming pavement into the gutter. She uttered a little cry of distress, and was in the act of turning around, and repairing to the store whence she came, when she beheld a young man performing an ungraceful act in attempting the recovery of her hat. He was fleeing after it, with upspread umbrella over him, and running and stopping and reaching for the piece of headgear that seemed determined to evade his efforts to secure it. Seeing him thus, in his ludicrous movements, she half smiled, and then decided to await further developments. Securing the hat, finally, after it had started to float away on the tide of the gutter, John (for that is whom the young man was) returned with it to her, he himself showing some moiling, like the hat, as a result of his gallant endeavors. When he approached her, with it in his hand, she exhibited such an air of respectability and unfeigned independence that John was fairly startled. "Beg your pardon, lady," he said, handing her the hat, bowing as he did so; "it was an unavoidable accident--or rather the result of my heedlessness. I beg your pardon." The lady stood a short moment confused, hesitating as to whether she should deign to answer a stranger in the street, any more than to say "thank you," and acknowledge, lady-like, that she was partly in the blame, and ask his pardon also; or accept his blunder in good nature, as he seemed to take it, and go her way. But John's voice was so mild, and his manner so gentlemanly, that she felt as soon as he had spoken that she need have no fear of him. "Oh, sir," she said, pleasantly, with a laugh; "as much my fault as yours. Thank you." "May I hold your umbrella while you adjust your hat?" he asked, seeing her dilapidated rain shade, with water streaming off of it on her shoulders, falling about her head. "If you wish, you may," she replied, shyly. "I fear it is about done for." "You may have mine," he returned. "May I take yours?" "You may hold it," she answered, as she began to lower it, having her hat now also in her hand. "My, what a predicament I am in!" "Pardon me," he said; "but you will be left in the rain, if I take yours and you do not accept mine." "Why, yes, indeed, I forgot it was raining," she responded, with a laugh that indicated her confusion. "Give it me," he said, as her umbrella shut up tightly. "Will you accept the protection of mine? The rain is falling hard," he continued, as he took hers; and then reached as far as possible, without going closer, holding his over her, and standing himself in the rain. "Oh, my, this hat is so soiled and nasty from the street," she said, as she held it before her in the light of a fog enshrouded street lamp.