"No; he was drinking whiskey with a judge and a livery-stable keeper, and they were all spitting on a red-hot stove." "What did he do about the melon?" "He told me to can the melon and have a drink. I had already canned the melon as well as I could (I wasn't educated along scientific lines) and my grandmother had promised me any watch I wanted if I didn't drink till I was twenty-one." "Did you?" "I did not." "Did you get the watch?" "I did not." "Why not?" "Grandma reneged. She said she didn't remember making any such promise." They pushed open a swinging door and entered the back room. Here, in a revolving chair, sat a stout young man with a red face. Upon his knees sat a stout young woman with a red face. And with something of the consistency with which a stamp adheres to an envelope so the one red face appeared glued to the other red face. The red face of the stout young man had one free eye which detected the presence of intruders. And the stout young man said: "Caught with the goods! Jump up, Minnie, and behave yourself!" Minnie's upspring was almost a record-breaker. Renier began to stammer: "I b-b-beg your pardon," he said, "but I thought you might b-b-be able to tell me how to g-g-get married in New York State." The stout young man rose from his revolving chair; he was embarrassed almost to the point of paralysis, but his mind and mouth continued to work. "You've come to just the right man," he said, "at just the right time, for information of that sort. First, you hire a stenographer; then you get a mash on her. Then she sits in your lap--she _will_ do it--and then you kiss her. And then you get a license, and then you curse laws and red tape for a while, and then you wed. Now, what you want is a license?" "Exactly," said Renier. "It--it's for another fellow." "Friend of yours?" queried the stout young man. "Yes." "And you want a license for him, not for yourself?" Renier nodded. "At this moment," said the stout young man, "there are assembled on the long wharf, chewin' tobacco and cursin', some twenty-five or thirty marines. Would you mind just stepping down and telling that to them?" "I am quite serious," said Renier. "It is my friend who wants to get married." "And _you_ don't?" Renier stammered ineffectually. "Then," said the stout young man, with a glance at Lee (of the highest admiration), "you're a gol-darn fool." And forthwith he was so vulgar as to burst into a sudden snatch of song: "Old man Rule was a gol-darn fool, For he couldn't see the water in the gol-darn pool!" At the finish of this improvisation the dreadfully confused Minnie went, "Tee-hee!" And, horror of horrors, that charming boylike companion, Lee Darling, behind whom were well-bred generations, also went suddenly, "Tee-hee." "Licenses," said the stout young man, "are applied for in room Five. After you, sir; after you, miss." And, with a waggish expression, he turned to Minnie.