sat up and ran his fingers with musing regret through the coarse stubble on cheeks and chin. "I was three, I remember, a cute little cuss. My hair was yellow and ma curled it—you know how—all fuzzy—and I had a little white dress on. It was a county fair. I got the first prize for the best lookin' kid and was mugged for the papers. If I was shaved now and had on some glad rags, I'd be a lady killer, all right, all right."

"'Longside of me," said the Watermelon, "you'd look like a blear-eyed son of a toad."

"You! Why, you'd make a balky horse run, you would."

"When me hair's cut, I'm a bloomin' Adonis, not Venus;" and the Watermelon drew languidly at an old brown pipe, warm and comfortable in the pleasant shade, where soft breezes wandered fitfully by, laden with the odors of the fields in June.

James was skeptical. "Did y' ever take a prize in a beauty show?" he demanded, still musing upon those bygone honors.

"No," admitted the Watermelon. "My old man was a parson, and parsons' kids never have any chance. Besides, I wouldn't care to. Too much like the finest bull in a county fair, or the best laying hen."

"Huh," sneered James. "My folks was of the bon-ton."

"The bon-tons never broke any records in the beauty line," replied the Watermelon. "And the bon-tonnier they are, the uglier."

"Beauty," said James with charming naiveté, "runs in my family."

"It went so fast in the beginning then, yer family never had a chance to catch up," returned the Watermelon. "We'll have a beauty show, just us two."

Inspired by the thought, he sat up to explain, and Mike opened his eyes long enough to look each over with slow scornful derision and a mocking grunt.

James fondled the short stiff hair on his cheeks and chin and waited for developments.

The Watermelon went on. "We will meet this afternoon, here, see? Shaved and with decent duds on. And Mike can pick the winner."

"Mike! He can't tell a sick cat from a well one."

"That's all right. He knows enough to tell the best lookin' one between you and me. A blind mug could do that."

"But—"

"We haven't any one else, you mutt. We can't have too much publicity in this show. I dislike publicity any way, at any time, and especially when I have on clothes, borrowed, as you might say, for the occasion. If the gang was here, we could take a vote, but seein' that they ain't, we got to do with what we got."

"I ain't goin' to get in no trouble wid this here burg," declared Mike. "I want a quiet Sunday, some place where I can throw me feet for a bite of grub and not run no fear of the dog's taking one first. See? Besides, it's a decent, law-abidin' burg, God-fearin' and pious; too small to be made unhappy. You want to take somethin' yer own size."

"Aw, who's goin' to hurt the jerkwater town?" demanded the Watermelon with indignation.

"The cost of livin' is goin' up so these days, it's gettin' hard even to batter a handout," groaned Mike, whose idea of true beauty consisted of a full stomach and a shady place to sleep on a long quiet Sunday afternoon. "I ain't goin' to get every place soured on me. If the public gets any more stingy, I'll have to give up de turf for a livin', that's all. To throw a gag will be harder den hod-carryin'."

"We ain't goin' to hurt the burg none," said James.

He rose languidly and stretched. "You be here this afternoon, Mike, about three, see, or I'll knock yer block off. It's a nice quiet hangout and far enough from the village to be safe. I'm goin' to get a shave and borrow some duds from the bloomin' hostelry up yonder to do honor to de occasion." He knocked the ashes from his pipe and slipped it into his pocket. "If you don't get the clothes and de shave, Watermillion, you'll be counted down and out, see?"

"Sure," agreed the Watermelon.

He lay at length on the ground beneath the butternut tree and James paused a moment to run his eye critically over him, from his lean face with its two-weeks' growth of beard to his ragged clumsy shoes. James smiled grimly and drew himself up to his full height with just pride. He was six feet two in shoes that might as well have been stockings for all they added to his height. His shoulders were broad and muscular, with the gentle play of great muscles in perfect condition. His neck, though short, was well shaped and sinewy, not the short thick neck of a prize-fighter or a bull. His hips were narrow and his limbs long and straight. Beneath his open shirt, one saw his bronze throat and huge chest. A splendid specimen of the genus homo, for all the rags and tatters that served as clothes.

The Watermelon was a bit shorter, with narrower shoulders, but long-legged, slim, graceful, and under his satiny skin, his muscles slid and rippled with marvelous symmetry. Where James was strong, slow, heavy, he was quick, lithe, supple. Dissipation had not left its mark, and the hard life of the "road" had so far merely made him fit, an athlete in perfect condition. His features were clean-cut and symmetrical, with a narrow, humorous, good-natured mouth and eyes soft and gray and gentle, the eyes of a dreamer and an idler.

James looked at the slight graceful youth, sprawled in the shade of the butternut tree, and grinned, doubling his huge arms with slow, luxurious pleasure in the mere physical action and watching the rhythmic rise and fall of the great muscles.

"You might get honorable mention in one of these county fairs for the best yoke of oxen," admitted the Watermelon from where he lay at ease.

"There ain't going to be no show," said Mike firmly. "Not if yer have to swipe the duds. I ain't going—"

James showed that he was a true member of the bon-ton. He waved the other to silence with the airy grace of a master dismissing an impudent servant. "There is goin' to be a contest for the just reward of beauty and yer goin' to be here, Mike, and be the judge or y' will have that red-headed block of yours knocked into kindlin' wood."

Mike was fat and red-headed and dirty. His soul loathed trouble and longed for quiet with the ardor of an elderly spinster. "No, I ain't," said he, in a vain struggle for peace. "I ain't goin' to hang around here until you blokes swipe the rags and come back wid de cops after yer."

"There ain't no cops around this place, you mutt," contradicted the Watermelon with the delicate courtesy of the road.

"There's a sheriff—"

"Sheriffs," interrupted James coldly, "ain't never around until the job's done."

"Sunday," added the Watermelon, from knowledge gained by past experience, "is the best time to swipe anything. No one is lookin' for trouble that day and so they don't find it, see?"

"Sure," agreed James. "Every one's feelin' warm and good and stuffed, and when yer feel good yerself, yer won't believe any one is bad. You know how it is, Mike. When yer feelin' comfortable, yer can't understand why the devil we ain't comfortable."

"Well, why the