Ruby was standing in the door, her hands held out to me. I had not seen her for years. Her husband had not returned yet from their school, but she expected him every minute. "And dear old Jim?" I asked. "What has become of him?" "Look," she said, pointing to a shambling, awkward figure stooping under the apple-trees, which were in full bloom. "There he is, picking blossoms with little Ruby. He never leaves her for a minute." COMPARTMENT NUMBER FOUR--COLOGNE TO PARIS He was looking through a hole--a square hole, framed about with mahogany and ground glass. His face was red, his eyes were black, his mustache--waxed to two needle-points--was a yellowish brown; his necktie blue and his uniform dark chocolate seamed with little threads of vermilion and incrusted with silver poker-chip buttons emblazoned with the initials of the corporation which he served. I knew I was all right when I read the initials. I had found the place and the man. The place was the ticket-office of the International Sleeping-Car Company. The man was its agent. So I said, very politely and in my best French--it is a little frayed and worn at the edges, but it arrives--sometimes---- "A lower for Paris." The man in chocolate, with touches of the three primary colors distributed over his person, half-closed his eyes, lifted his shoulders in a tired way, loosened his fingers, and, without changing the lay-figure expression of his face, replied: "There is nothing." "Not a berth?" "Not a berth." "Are they all _paid_ for?" and I accented the word _paid_. I spend countless nights on Pullmans in my own country and am familiar with many uncanny devices. "All but one." "Why can't I have it? It is within an hour of train-time. Who ordered it?" "The Director of the great circus. He is here now waiting for his troupe, which arrives from Berlin in a special car belonging to our company. The other car--the one that starts from here--is full. We have only two cars on this train--Monsieur the Director has the last berth." He said this, of course, in his native language. I am merely translating it. I would give it to you in the original, but it might embarrass you; it certainly would me. "What's the matter with putting the Circus Director in the special car? Your regulations say berths must be paid for one hour before train-time. It is now fifty-five minutes of eight. Your train goes at eight, doesn't it? Here is a twenty-franc gold piece--never mind the change"--and I flung a napoleon on the desk before him. The bunch of fingers disentangled themselves, the shoulders sank an inch, the waxed ends of the taffy-colored mustache vibrated slightly, and a smile widened in circles across the flat dulness of his face until it engulfed his eyebrows, ears, and chin. The effect of the dropping of the coin had been like the dropping of a stone into the still smoothness of a pool--the wrinkling wavelets had reached the uttermost shore-line.