got back.  By George!  If folks thought he was going to commit suicide, they were fooled.  Never broke his heart about a woman yet.  Not much, by George!  But when he set his heart on a thing, he generally got it.  He! he!  And he had set his heart on that little girl.  As for jumping into the lake, any man was a fool to jump into the drink on account of a woman.  When there were plenty of them.  Large assortment constantly on hand.  Pays yer money and takes yer ch’ice!  Suicide?  Not much, by George! he! he!

Hung his coat on a hickory limb,
Then like a wise man he jumped in,
    My ole dad!  My ole dad!

Wondered what tune Charlton would sing when he found himself beat?  Guess ’twould be: 

Can’t stay in de wilderness. 
  In a few days, in a few days,
Can’t stay in de wilderness,
  A few days ago.

Goin’ to pre-empt my claim, too.  I’ve got a month’s leave, and I’ll follow him and marry that girl before he gets far.  Bruddern and sistern, sing de ole six hundredth toon.  Ahem!

I wish I was a married man,
  A married man I’d be! 
An’ ketch the grub fer both of us
  A-fishin’ in the sea. 
            Big fish,
            Little fish,
  It’s all the same to me!

I got a organ stop in my throat.  Can’t sing below my breath to save my life.  He! he!

After three days had elapsed, Westcott sent a still more melancholy note to Katy.  It made her weep from the first line to the last.  It was full of heartbreak, and Katy was too unobserving to notice how round and steady and commercial the penmanship was, and how large and fine were the flourishes.  Westcott himself considered it his masterpiece.  He punched his crony with his elbow as he deposited it in the office, and assured him that it was the techin’est note ever written.  It would come the sympathies over her.  There was nothing like the sympathies to fetch a woman to terms.  He knew.  Had lots of experience.  By George!  You could turn a woman round yer finger if you could only keep on the tender side.  Tears was what done it.  Love wouldn’ keep sweet without it was pickled in brine.  He! he! he!  By George!

CHAPTER XX.

SAWNEY AND WESTCOTT.

David Sawney was delighted with the news that Albert Charlton and Smith Westcott had quarreled.  “Westcott’s run of luck in that quarter’s broke.  When a feller has a run of luck right along, and they comes a break, ’ts all up with him.  Broke luck can’t be spliced.  It’s David Sawney’s turn now.  Poor wind that blows no whar.  I’ll bet a right smart pile I’ll pack the little gal off yet.”

But if an inscrutable Providence had omitted to make any Smith Westcotts, Dave Sawney wouldn’t have stood the ghost of a chance with Katy.  His supreme self-complacency gave her no occasion to pity him.  Her love was close of kin to her tender-heartedness, and all pity was wasted on Dave.  He couldn’t have been more entirely happy than he was if he had owned the universe in fee simple.