He seemed some fussed at gettin’ it out; so I catches the cue quick.  “That’s easy,” says I.  “Count me out until another time.”

“Oh, not at all,” says he.  “In fact, you’re expected.  I merely wished to suggest, you know, that—­er—­well, if you cared to do so, you might bring along a suit of dark clothes.”

“I get you,” says I.  “Swell comp’ny.  Trust me.”

I winks mysterious, and chuckles to myself, “Here’s where I slip one on J. Meredith.”  And when I packs my suitcase I puts in that full evenin’ regalia that I wins off’m Son-in-Law Ferdy, you remember, in that real estate deal.  Some Cinderella act, I judged that would be, when Merry discovers the meek and lowly office boy arrayed like a night-bloomin’ head waiter.  “That ought to hold him for a spell,” thinks I.

But, say, you should see the joint we fetches up at out on the south shore of Long Island that afternoon.  Figurin’ on a basis of seventy-five per, I was expectin’ some private boardin’ house where Merry has the second floor front, maybe, with use of the bath.  But listen,—­a clipped privet hedge, bluestone drive, flower gardens, and a perfectly good double-breasted mansion standin’ back among the trees.  It’s a little out of date so far as the lines go,—­slate roof, jigsaw work on the dormers, and a cupola,—­but it’s more or less of a plute shack, after all.  Then there’s a real live butler standin’ at the carriage entrance to open the hack door and take my bag.

“Gee!” says I.  “Say, Merry, who belongs to all this?”

“Oh!  Hadn’t I told you?” says he.  “You see, I live with my aunt.  She is—­er—­somewhat peculiar; but——­”

“I should worry!” I breaks in.  “Believe me, with a joint like this in her own name, I wouldn’t kick if she had her loft full of hummin’ birds.  Who’s next in line for it?”

“Why, I suppose I am,” says J. Meredith, “under certain conditions.”

“Z-z-zin’!” says I.  “And you hangin’ onto a cheap skate job at the Corrugated!”

Well, while he’s showin’ me around the grounds I pumps out the rest of the sketch.  Seems butlers and all that was no new thing to Merry.  He’d been brought up on ’em.  He’d lived abroad too.  Studied music there.  Not that he ever meant to work at it, but just because he liked it.  You see, about that time the fam’ly income was rollin’ in reg’lar every month from the mills back in Pawtucket, or Fall River, or somewhere.

Then all of a sudden things begin to happen,—­strikes, panics, stock grabbin’ by the trusts.  Father’s weak heart couldn’t stand the strain.  Meredith’s mother followed soon after.  And one rainy mornin’ he wakes up in Baden Baden, or Monte Carlo, or wherever it was, to find that he’s a double orphan at the age of twenty-two, with no home, no cash, and no trade.  All he could do was to write an S. O. S. message back to Aunt Emma Jane.  If she hadn’t produced, he’d been there yet.