service, but the wood supply was limited, and Phelan saw that he must take immediate advantage of the heat. How to dry the underwear which he wore was the question which puzzled him, and he wrestled with it for several moments before an inspiration came.

"I'll borrow some duds from the scarecrow!"  he said half aloud, and went forth immediately to execute his idea.

The rain had ceased, but the fields were still afloat, and Phelan waded ankle deep through the slush grass, to where the scarecrow raised his threatening arms against the twilight sky.

"Beggars and borrowers shouldn't be choosers," said Phelan, as he divested the figure of its ragged trousers and coat, "but I have a strong feeling in my mind that these habiliments ain't going to become me. Who's your tailor, friend?"

The scarecrow, reduced now to an old straw hat and a necktie, maintained a dignified and oppressive silence.

"Well, he ain't on to the latest cut," continued Phelan, wringing the water out of the coat. "But maybe these here is your pajamas? Don't tell me I disturbed you after you'd retired for the night? Very well then, aurevoy."

With the clothes under his arm he made his way back to the shed, and divesting himself of his own raiment he got into his borrowed property.

By this time the fire had died down, and the place was in semi-darkness. Phelan threw on a handful of sticks and, as the blaze flared up, he caught his first clear sight of his newly acquired clothes. They were ragged and weather-stained, and circled about with broad, unmistakable stripes.

"Well, I'll be spiked!" said Phelan, vastly amused. "I wouldn't 'a' thought it of a nice, friendly scarecrow like that! Buncoed me, didn't he? Well, feathers don't always make the jail-bird. Wonder what poor devil wore  'em last? Peeled out of 'em in this very shed, like as not. Well, they'll serve my purpose all right, all right."

He took off his shoes, placed them under his head for a pillow, lit a short cob pipe, threw on fresh wood, and prepared to wait for his clothes to dry.

Meanwhile the question of the banquet revolved itself continually in his mind. This time to-morrow night, the preparations would be in full swing. Instead of being hungry, half naked, and chilled, he might be in a luxurious club-house dallying with caviar, stuffed olives, and Benedictine. 

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