The ogre strode up and down the room, filled with agitation. He had thought to trick the boy out of his wonderful possession--in fact, to swallow him whole and then appropriate his treasure, but Jack's explanation put an entirely new phase on the matter. "I suppose you wouldn't part with that book?" he finally asked. "Yes," said Jack. "I'll let you have it if you will transfer all your property irrevocably to your stepdaughter, Beanhilda, and give me her hand in marriage." "It's a bargain!" gulped the ogre, whereupon he summoned his lawyers and his secretaries, and by noon all his possessions had passed beyond recall into the hands of Beanhilda. A special messenger was sent down the bean-stalk to fetch Jack's mother, and that afternoon the happy lad and the fair Princess of Ogreville were married with much pomp and ceremony. [Illustration: "BLESS YOU, MY CHILDREN!"] "Bless you, my children!" murmured the ogre, as the irrevocable words were spoken by the priest, and Jack passed the magic check-book over to its new owner. "May you live long and happily. As for me, I'm off for a week's vacation in little old New York." [Illustration: "A WEEK'S VACATION IN LITTLE OLD NEW YORK"] * * * * * "How did you manage it, sweetheart?" whispered Beanhilda in her husband's ear a few weeks later. "Step-papa had such a penchant for hard-boiled boys that I feared you were lost the moment he appeared." Jack explained the whole history of the magic check-book to her, but when he had done, his bride grew white. "But what if he comes back?" she cried, shuddering with fear. "His vengeance will be terrible." "Have no fear, Beanhilda," Jack answered. "He will not return. Read that." And he handed her an evening paper in which, with rapidly drying eyes, she read the following: SEVENTY-FIVE YEARS FOR PASSING BAD CHECKS William J. Ogre, claiming to be a prominent resident of Ogreville, who was arrested at the St. Gotham Hotel last Thursday afternoon on a charge of having passed a dozen bogus checks for amounts ranging from ten to fifteen thousand dollars apiece, was found guilty yesterday by a jury in the criminal branch of the United States Circuit Court. He was sentenced to fifteen years' imprisonment at hard labor in the Federal Prison at Thomasville, Georgia, on each of the five different counts, making his prison term in all not less than seventy-five years. Other indictments are still pending against him for forgery on the complaint of Major Bilkins, president of the Suburban Trust Company, of whose name he was found availing himself in his criminal transactions. Major Bilkins, when seen last night by a reporter of this paper, stated his intention of keeping the shameless operator in jail for the rest of his natural life.