I heard it above the clink of the teacups.  It was in the swish of every silk petticoat.  If I went to the theater, church or concert, the call of that germ-ridden spot of the unholy name beat into my brain with the persistency of a tom-tom on a Chinese holiday.

Say what you will, Mate, it once took all my courage to leave those I loved best and go to far-away Japan.  Now it required more than I could dig up to stay—­with the best on the other side of the Pacific.

The struggle was easy and swift.  The tom-tom won and I am on my way to be next-door neighbor to Jack.  Those whom it concerned here were away from home, so I told no one good-by, thus saving everybody so much wasted advice.  If there were a tax on advice the necessities of life would not come so high.  Charity followed me to the train, protesting to the last that “Marse Jack gwine doubt her velocity when she tell him de truf bout her lady going a-gaddin’ off by herse’f and payin’ no mind to her ole mammy’s prosterations.”  I asked her to come with me as maid.  She refused; said her church was to have an ice-cream sociable and she had “to fry de fish.”  This letter will find you joyfully busy with the babies and the “only man.”  Blest woman that you are.

But I know you.  I have a feeling that you have a few remarks to make.  So hurry up.  Let us get it off our minds.  Then I can better tell you what I am doing.  Something is going to happen.  It usually does when I am around.  I have been asked to chaperone a young girl whose face and name spell romance.  If I were seeking occupation here is the opportunity knocking my door into splinters.

Still at sea.  June, 1911.

Any time you are out of a job and want to overwork all your faculties and a few emotions, try chaperoning a young room-mate answering to the name of Sada San, who is one-half American dash, and the other half the unnamable witchery of a Japanese woman; a girl with the notes of a lark in her voice when she sings to the soft twang of an old guitar.

If, too, you are seeking to study psychological effect of such a combination on people, good, middlin’ and otherwise, I would suggest a Pacific liner as offering fifty-seven varieties, and then some.

The last twinge of conscience I had over coming, died a cheerful death.  I ’d do it again.  For not only is romance surcharging the air, but fate gives promise of weaving an intricate pattern in the story of this maid whose life is just fairly begun and whom the luck of the road has given me as traveling mate.  Now, remembering a few biffs fate has given me, I have no burning desire to meddle with her business.  Neither am I hungering for responsibility.  But what are you going to say to yourself, when a young girl with a look in her eyes you would wish your daughter to have, unhesitatingly gives you a letter addressed at large to some “Christian Sister”!  You read it to find it’s