On the evening of the next day a delightful little party was enjoyed by the well-to-do inhabitants of Smithton. New as was the town, the parlors of Mrs. General Wader (her husband was something for the railway company) were handsomely furnished, the ladies were elaborately dressed, the gentlemen lacked not one of the funereal garments which men elsewhere wear to evening parties, and stupid people were noticeably rarer than, in similar social gatherings, in older communities. Mabel Fewne was there, and as human nature is the same at Smithton as in the East, she was the belle of the evening. She entered the room on the arm of her brother-in-law, and that warrior's height, breadth, bronzed countenance and severe uniform, made all the more striking the figure which, clad apparently in a pale blue cloud, edged with silver and crowned with gold, floated beside him. Men crowded about her at once, and the other ladies present had almost undisturbed opportunity in which to converse with each other.
At the End there was likewise a social gathering. The place was Drake's saloon, and the guests were self-invited. Their toilets, though unusual, scarcely require description, and a list of their diversions would not interest people of taste Refreshments were as plentiful as at Mrs. Wader's, and, after the manner of refreshments everywhere, they caused a general unbending of spirits. Not all the effects were pleasing to contemplate. One of them was a pistol-shot, which, missing the man for whom it was intended, struck a person called Baggs, and remarkable only for general worthlessness. Baggs had a physical system of the conventional type, however, and the bullet caused some disarrangement so radical in its nature, that Baggs was soon stretched upon the floor of the saloon, with a face much whiter than he usually wore. The barkeeper poured out a glass of brandy, and passed it over the bar, but the wounded man declined it; he also rejected a box of pills which was proffered. An Ender, who claimed to have been a physician, stooped over the victim, felt his pulse, and remarked:
"I know it," said Baggs; "and I want to be prayed for."
The barkeeper looked puzzled. He was a public-spirited man, whose heart and pocket were open to people in real trouble, but for prayers he had never been asked before, and, was entirely destitute of them. He felt relieved when one of his customers--a leaden-visaged man, with bulbous nose and a bad temper--advanced toward the wounded man, raised one hand, threw his head back a trifle, and exclaimed: