POOR FISHING
"Have a drink, Colonel?" "Eh?"
"I said - Here, boy!A Scotch high and a mint julep."Colonel Ashley, roused from his reverie as he sat in his club, gazing out on the busy, fashionable, hurrying, jostling, worried, happy, sad, and otherwise throngs that swept past the big Fifth avenue windows, shifted himself in the comfortable leather chair, and looked at his cigar.It had gone out, and he decided that it was not worth relighting.
"Cigars, too!" ordered Bruce Garrigan.
"Oh, were you speaking to me?" and the colonel seemed wholly awake now.
"Not only to you, but in your interests," went on Garrigan, with a smile."Hope I didn't disturb your nap, but - ""Oh, no," the colonel hastened to assure his companion with his usual affability."I had finished sleeping.""So I inferred.Do you know how many hours, minutes and seconds the average human being has passed in sleep when he reacnes tne age of forty-five years?" and Garrigan smiled quizzically.
"No, sir," answered Colonel Ashley, "I do not.""Neither do I," confessed Mr.Garrigan as he sank down in a chair beside the colonel and accepted the glass from a tray which the much- buttoned club attendant held out to him."I don't know, and I don't much care."Then, when cigars were glowing and the smoke arose in graceful clouds, an aroma as of incense shrouding the two as they gazed out on the afternoon throngs, Garrigan remarked:
"I didn't know you were here.In fact, I didn't know you were a member of this club.""You wouldn't know it if my attendance here were needed to prove it," said the colonel with a smile."I don't get here very often, but I had torun up on some business, and I found this the most convenient stopping place.""Are you going back to Lakeside?"