Then he sees the hat, and a light breaks. He grabs the lid and makes a dash for the door. "Isn't he odd?" says Cornelia. Well say, I didn't know whether I'd get word that night that Swifty had jumped off the bridge, or had gone back to the fusel oil. He didn't do either one, though; but when he shows up at the Studio next mornin' he was wearin' his old clothes, and his face looks like he was foreman of a lemon grove. "Ah, brace up, Swifty," says I. "There's others." He just shakes his head and sighs, and goes off into a corner as if he wanted to die slow and lingerin'. Then Saturday afternoon, when it turns off so warm and we begins the noon shut down, I thinks I'll take a little run down to Coney and hear the frankfurters bark. I was watchin' 'em load the boys and girls into a roller coaster, when along comes a car that has something familiar in it. Here's Swifty, wearin' his brass band suit, a cigar stickin' out of one corner of his mouth, and an arm around a fluffy haired Flossie girl that was chewin' gum and wearin' a fruit basket hat. They was lookin' happy. "Say, Swifty," I sings out, "don't forget about Cornie." "Ahr, chee!" says he, and off they goes down the chute for another ten-cent ride. But say, I'm glad all them South Brooklyn art clothes ain't goin' to be wasted. XVIII PLAYING WILBUR TO SHOW It's all right. You can put the Teddy sign on anything you read in the papers about matrimony's bein' a lost art, and collectin' affinities bein' the latest fad; for the plain, straight, old, love-honour-and-cherish business is still in the ring. I have Pinckney's word for it, and Pinckney ought to know. Oh, yes, he's an authority now. Sure, it was Miss Gerty, the twin tamer. And say, what do you suppose they did with that gift pair of terrors, Jack and Jill, while they was makin' the weddin' tour? Took 'em along. Honest, they travels for ten weeks with two kids, five trunks, and a couple of maids. "You don't look like no honeymoon couple," says I, when I meets 'em in Jersey City. "I'd take you for an explorin' party." "We are," says Pinckney, grinnin'. "We've been explorin' the western part of the United States. We have discovered Colorado Springs, the Yosemite, and a lot more very interesting places, all over again." "You'll be makin' a new map, I expect," says I. "It would be new to most New Yorkers," says he. And I've been tryin' ever since to figure out whether or no that's a knock. Now and then I has a suspicion that Pinckney's acquired some new bug since he's been out through the alfalfa belt; but maybe his idea of the West's bein' such a great place only comes from the fact that Gerty was produced there. Perhaps it's all he says too; but I notice he seems mighty glad to get back to Main-st., N. Y. You'd thought so if you'd seen the way he trails me around over town the first day after he lands. We was on the go from noon until one A. M., and his cab bill must have split a twenty up fine.