"Well, then, be informed that it was in Miss Damer's behalf that you knocked down Friend Tarbox, and so got your skates for saving her property. It's quite a romance already, Richard, my boy! and I suppose you feel immensely bored that you had to come down and meet us old chaps, instead of tumbling at her feet on the ice again to-day." "A tumble in this wet day would be a cold bath to romance." The Gulf Stream had sent up a warm spoil-sport rain that morning. It did not stop, but poured furiously the whole day. From Cohoes to Spuyten Duyvil, on both sides of the river, all the skaters swore at the weather, as profane persons no doubt did when the windows of heaven were opened in Noah's time. The skateresses did not swear, but savagely said, "It is too bad,"--and so it was. Wade, loaded with the blessings of his Directors, took the train next morning for Dunderbunk. The weather was still mild and drizzly, but promised to clear. As the train rattled along by the river, Wade could see that the thin ice was breaking up everywhere. In mid-stream a procession of blocks was steadily drifting along. Unless Zero came sliding down again pretty soon from Boreal regions, the sheets that filled the coves and clung to the shores would also sail away southward, and the whole Hudson be left clear as in midsummer. At Yonkers a down train ranged by the side of Wade's train, and, looking out, he saw Mr. and Mrs. Skerrett alighting. He jumped down, rather surprised, to speak to them. "We have just been telegraphed here," said Peter, gravely. "The son of a widow, a friend of ours, was drowned this morning in the soft ice of the river. He was a pet of mine, poor fellow! and the mother depends upon me for advice. We have come down to say a kind word. Why won't you report us to the ladies at my house, and say we shall not be at home until the evening train? They do not know the cause of our journey, except that it is a sad one." "Perhaps Mr. Wade will carve their turkey for them at dinner, Peter," Fanny suggested. "Do, Wade! and keep their spirits up. Dinner's at six." Here the engine whistled. Wade promised to "shine substitute" at his friend's board, and took his place again. The train galloped away. Peter and his wife exchanged a bright look over the fortunate incident of this meeting, and went on their kind way to carry sympathy and such consolation as might be to the widow. The train galloped northward. Until now, the beat of its wheels, like the click of an enormous metronome, had kept time to jubilant measures singing in Wade's brain. He was hurrying back, exhilarated with success, to the presence of a woman whose smile was finer exhilaration than any number of votes of confidence, passed unanimously by any number of conclaves of overjoyed Directors, and signed by Brummage after Brummage, with the signature of a capitalist in a flurry of delight at a ten per cent dividend.