Green Fancy

"I'll do it with the greatest pleasure," he declared.

The next afternoon in the town of Bittler the Countess Mara-Dafanda, daughter of royalty, and Thomas Kingsbury Barnes "stood up" with the happy couple during a lull in the hastily called rehearsal on the stage of Fisher's Imperial Theatre, and Lyndon Rushcroft gave the bride away. There was $107 in the house that night, but no one was down-hearted.

"You could do worse, dear heart, than to marry one of us care-free Americans," whispered Barnes to the girl who clung to his arm so tightly as they entered the wings in the wake of the bride and groom.

And she said something in reply that brought a flush of mortification to his cheek.

"Oh, it would be wonderful to marry a man who will never have to go to war. A brave man who will not have to be a soldier."

The unintentional reflection on the fighting integrity of his country struck a raw spot in Barnes's pride. He knew what all Europe was saying about the pussy-willow attitude of the United States, and he squirmed inwardly despite the tribute she tendered him as an individual. He was not a "peace at any price" citizen.

He gave the wedding breakfast at one o'clock that night.

Three days later he and "Miss Jones" said farewell to the strollers and boarded a day train for New York City. They left the company in a condition of prosperity. The show was averaging two hundred dollars nightly, and Mr. Rushcroft was already booking return engagements for the early fall. He was looking forward to a tour of Europe at the close of the war.

"My boy," he said to Barnes on the platform of the railway station, "I trust you will forgive me for not finding a place in our remarkably well-balanced cast for your friend. I have been thinking a great deal about her in the past few days, and it has occurred to me that she might find it greatly to her advantage to accept a brief New York engagement before tackling the real proposition. It won't take her long to find out whether she really likes it, and whether she thinks it worth while to go on with it. Let me give you one bit of advice, my dear Miss Jones. This is very important. The name of Jones will not get you anywhere. It is a nice old family, fireside name, but it lacks romance. Chuck it. Start your new life with another name, my dear. God bless you! Good luck and--good-bye till we meet on the Rialto."

"I wonder how he could possibly have known," she mused aloud, the pink still in her cheeks as the train pulled out.