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Jim Pierce found himself left alone with Lee Tyndal, whom he now knew was the one girl who really counted.
Human Stuff
JAMES PIERCE. SR., was hard as nails and twice as practical. He had a one-track mind hea\ il>' freighted with business. By keeping e\'erlastingly at that business he had amassed a fortune of vast proportions from a product of
extreme humility, to wit the lowly washboard. The Pierce washboard works covered more land than lots of farms and the dividend crops were exceedingly regular. '"Old Washboard" Pierce knew the business backwards and he kept it going forward with a farsighted efficiency.
So the Pierce residence was a place of efficient grandeur, with its servants and motors and money. Mary, daughter of " Washboard" Pierce, was a creature of delicate grace and culture. Also there was little probability she would ever see a washboard other than the gilded model that graced her father's study.
Somewhere off on the other side of the world was James Pierce, Jr., her brother, busy polishing off his college career with a five-year travel tour. James. Jr., was scheduled to step into his father's place at the head of the business and the young man was making it his business to postpone the solemn day as long as possible.
Reflecting on that fact and weighted with a newly discovered problem of the washboard industry, the old man rolled home early in the afternoon. He paused in the hallway to address the butler grumpily.
"I will not be disturbed — by anyone. Understand?"
"Old Washboard" stood a moment appraising the new butler, with evident doubts, then turned into his sacredly impenetrable study.
A romance of the East and West with excitement at both ends.
By GENE SHERIDAN
Hardly an hour had elapsed when a ta.xi-cab came snorting down the avenue and paused before the Pierce mansion. The old man in his study heard it and frowned, but liid not look up. Then came a violent and continued ringing of the doorbell, broken now and then by staccato jabs at the button.
The butler, running on silent tiptoes, opened the door narrowly. He beheld a jaunty young man with an air of great self possession, his hat on the back of his head and a wide smile across his face.
'Ts "Old Washboard' in?"
The frigid butler chilled down a couple of degrees more. ''Mr. Pierce is not in, sir."'
The genial young caller started to enter anyway, while the butler pushed him back with protesting hands. "Mr. Pierce is not in."
In a flash the butler felt and saw a large revolver pushed into the pit of his stomach. .\s he wilted in a heap, the visitor strode over him into the house.
Quaking with fear, the butler followed, protesting in a high pitched voice. "Old Washboard " heard the commotion and growled — without', of course, interrupting his work.
The butler a moment later burst into the study, trembling and voiceless. He drew very close to Pierce and huskily whispered: .
"He's in the drawing room, sir! He's in the drawing room, sir!"
The old man scowled into the butler's face— ''Well— well !" — theii' started out to seek the cause of the excitement. The butler threw himself before Pierce with a gesture of caution.
.V