"You can attend to your ah—business a little closer, for one thing, Mr. ah—Brockway," quavered the aggrieved one, taking a yard-long coupon ticket from his breast-pocket; "and for another, you can give me the sixty days going limit on this ticket that I ah—stipulated for when I bought it, sir."

Brockway glanced at the ticket and called attention to the conditions in the contract. "The going limit of thirty days is plainly stated here, Mr. Jordan. Didn't you read the contract before signing it?"

"Don't make any difference, sir; I ah—stipulated for sixty days, and I require you to make the stipulation ah—good, sir."

"But, my dear sir, I can't. No representative of any one of the lines interested is authorized to change these conditions."

"Very well, sir; v-e-r-y well." The irascible one folded the ticket with tremulous fingers and sought to replace it in his pocket-book. "I shall know what road to ah—patronize next time, and it won't be yours, Mr. ah—Brockway; you may depend upon that, sir."

The passenger agent's forte was placability. "Don't worry about your ticket, Mr. Jordan," he said. "We'll take good care of you, and if you should happen to be more than thirty days in reaching Los Angeles——"

"Thirty days!" gasped the objector. "Great ah—heavens, sir, you told us you could put us there in ah—four days and a half!"

"So I did, and so we shall, barring the stop-overs the party may wish to make; but in that case I don't see why you should require a sixty-day limit," said Brockway, with an affable smile.

By this time quite a little group had gathered around them, and anxious queries began to beat thick and fast upon Brockway's ears.

"What's that about our tickets?"

"Thirty days, did you say?"

"Can't have stop-overs?"

Brockway got upon his feet. "One moment, if you please," he protested. "There is nothing wrong—nothing different. Mr. Jordan and I were merely discussing the question of an extra limit on his own ticket; that was all."

"Oh."

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