That afternoon Hedrick met Handy sailing down Main Street in his old manner. His head was erect, his eyes were sparkling, his big, rough, statesman's voice was bellowing abroad, and his thumbs were in the armholes of his vest. He walked straight to Hedrick and led him by the coat lapel into a dark stairway. There was an air of deep mystery about Handy and when he put his arm on Hedrick to whisper in his ear, Hedrick, smelling the statesman's breath heavy with whiskey and onions and cloves and cardamon seeds and pungent gum, heard this: "Say, Charley, I'm fooling 'em--I've got 'em all fooled. They think I'm poor. They think I ain't got any money. But old Ab's too smart for them. I've got lots of money--all I want--all anyone could want--wealth beyond the dreams of avar--of av--avar--avar'ce, as John Ingalls used to say. Just look at this!" And with that Handy pulled from his inside coat pocket a roll of one and two-dollar bills, that seemed to Hedrick to represent fifty dollars less the price of about ten drinks. "Look a-here," continued Handy, "ol' Ab's got 'em all fooled. Don't you say anything about it; but ol' Ab's goin' to make his mark." And he shook Hedrick's hand and took him down to the street, and shook it again and again before prancing grandly down the sidewalk. For three years Mrs. Handy's boarding-house has been one of the most exclusive in our town. They say that she pays Mr. Handy for mowing the lawn and helping about the rough work in the kitchen, and that he sleeps in the barn and pays her for such meals as he eats. Sometimes a new boarder makes the mistake of paying the board money to Handy, and he appears on Main Street ostentatiously jingling his silver and toward evening has ideas about the railroad situation. On election days and when there is a primary Handy drives a carriage and gathers up his cronies in the fifth ward, who, like him, are not so much in evidence as they were ten years ago. It was only last week that Hedrick was in our office telling us of Handy's "wealth beyond the dreams of avarice." He paused when he had finished the story, cocked his head on one side, and squinted at the ceiling as he said: "For three long, weary, fruitless years I've searched the drug-stores of this town for the brand of liquor Ab had that day. I believe if I had two drinks of that I could write better poetry than old Browning himself." Whereupon Hedrick shook himself out of the office in a gentle wheesy laugh. XVII The Tremolo Stop