"Isn't it barbarous of you not to answer when I speak to you?"
"Possibly; at least it has that appearance, but there are mitigating circumstances, my dear. I was asleep."
Two weeks later the colonel brought his wife to call upon me. She was a showy, loud-voiced blonde, resplendently over-dressed. At the first opportunity her husband motioned me aside.
"Isn't she about the gayest piece of calico you ever saw?" he asked, with proud confidence. "Doesn't she lay over anything around here by a large majority?"
"She is certainly a very striking woman," I said gravely, "and one who does you great credit. But I am a little surprised, Colonel. No doubt it was a mistake, but I got the impression in some way that the lady was a brunette."
The colonel's countenance fell. "Now, look here," he said, after a little reflection; "I don't mind telling you, because you're up to the city ways and you'll understand. The fact is, this _isn't the one_. You see, I went on to 'Frisco as you advised, and planked down a check for five hundred dollars the minute I got there. 'Now,' said I, 'Bob Jarvis don't do things by halves; just you take that money, my girl, and get yourself a ring that's equal to the occasion. I don't care if it's a cluster of solitary diamonds as big as a section of well-pipe.' Now, I call that square, don't you? Well, God bless your soul, madam, if she didn't take that money and skip out with another fellow! Some white-livered city sneak--beggin' your husband's pardon--who'd been hangin' around for a year or more. Of course I was stuck when I heard of it. It was this one told me. She's her sister. I could see that she felt bad about it. 'It was a nasty, dirty trick,' she said; and I'll be--demoralized if I don't think so myself, and said so at the time. But, after all, it turned out a lucky thing for me. Now look at that, will you?"
I followed his gaze of admiring fondness to where Mrs. Jarvis was, bridling and simpering under Esculapius's compliments.
"Isn't she a nosegay? But don't you be jealous, madam; she's just wrapped up in me, and constant," he added, shaking his head reflectively; "why, bless your soul, she's as constant as sin."
When I told Esculapius of this he sighed deeply.