"Hope she'll be on time," says I, as we turns the corner. There was more or less folks goin' and comin' from the ladies' entrance; but no girl like the one we was lookin' for. So we fetches up in a bunch opposite the door and prepares to wait. We hadn't stood there a minute, before there comes a squeal from behind, and some one says: "Why, Wilbur Cobb! Is that you?" And what do you guess shows up? There at the curb is a big, open tourin' car,--one of the opulent, shiny kind,--with a slick looking shuffer in front, and, standin' up in the tonneau, a tart little lady wearin' Broadway clothes that was right up to the minute, hair done into breakfast rolls behind, and a long pink veil streamin' down her back. Only by the pug nose and the mouth could I guess that it might be Zylphina. And it was. There wa'n't any gettin' away from the fact that she was a little jarred at seein' Wilbur lookin' so cute; but that was nothin' to the jolt she handed us. Mr. Cobb, he just opens his mouth and gazes at her like she was some sort of an exhibit. And Pinckney, who'd been expectin' something in a dollar-thirty-nine shirtwaist and a sagged skirt, is down and out. It didn't take me more'n a minute to see that if Zylphina has got to the stage where she wears pony jackets and rides in expensive bubbles, our little pie counter romance is headed for the ash can. "Stung in both eyes!" says I under my breath, and falls back. "Well, well!" says Zylphina, holdin' out three fingers. "When did you hit Broadway, Wilbur?" It was all up to Cobb then. He drifts up to the tonneau and gathers in the fingers dazed like, as if he was walkin' in his sleep; but he gets out somethin' about bein' mighty glad to see her again. Zylphina sizes him up kind of curious, and smiles. "You must let me introduce you to my friend," says she. "Roland, this is Mr. Cobb, from Kansas." Mr. Shuffer grins too, as he swaps grips with Wilbur. It was a great joke. "He's awfully nice to me, Roland is," says Zylphina, with a giggle. "And ain't this a swell car, though? Roland takes me to my boardin' house in it 'most every night. But how are the corn and hogs doin', Wilbur?" Say, there was a topic Wilbur was up on. He throws her a grateful grin and proceeds to unlimber his conversation works. He tells Zylphina how many acres he put into corn last spring, how much it shucked to the acre, and how many head of hogs he has just sent to the ham and lard lab'ratory. That brand of talk sounds kind of foolish there under the arc lights; but Zylphina pricks up her ears. "Ten carloads of hogs!" says she. "Is that a kid, or are you just havin' a dream?" "I cal'late it'll be twenty next fall," says he, fishin' for somethin' in his pocket. "Here's the packing house receipts for the ten, anyway." "Let's see," says she, and by the way she skins her eye over them documents you could tell that Zylphina'd seen the like before. Also she was somethin' of a ready reckoner.