WHICH?

JEAN BAPTISTE returned to the West after two months' travel through the East, and the spring following, sowed a large crop of small grain and reaped a bountiful yield that fall. About this time the county just west of where he lived was opened to settlement, and a still larger crowd than had registered for the land in the county he lived came hither and sought a quarter section.

The opening passed to the day of the drawing, and when all the lucky numbers had secured their filings, contracts for the purchases of relinquishments began. By this time the lands had reached great values, and that which he had purchased a short time before for twenty dollars the acre, had by this time reached the value of fifty dollars the acre. And now he had an opportunity of increasing his possessions to the number coveted, one thousand acres.

He had paid a visit to his parents that winter, and found his sisters, who were mere children when he had left home, grown to womanhood, and old enough to take claims. So with them he had discussed the matter. Inspired by his great success, they were all heart and soul to follow his bidding; so thereupon it was agreed that he would try to secure three relinquishments on good quarters, and upon one or more of these they would make filings.

His grandmother, who had raised a family in the days of slavery agreed and was anxious to file on one; one sister on another, and the third place,—was to be his bride's.

By doing this, he could have her use her homestead right, providing she filed on the claim before marrying him. So it was planned. But Jean Baptiste knew no girl that he could ask to become his wife, therefore this was yet to be. When he had given up his real love to be loyal to his race, he had determined on one thing: that marriage was a business, even if it was supposed to be inspired by love. But when Agnes was left out, he loved no one. Therefore it must be resolved into a business proposition—and the love to come after.

So, resigned to the fact, he set himself to choose a wife.

On his trip East the winter before he met two persons with whom he had since corresponded. One, the first, was a young man not long out of an agricultural college whose father was a great success as a potato grower. He and Jean became intimate friends. It now so happened that the one mentioned had a sister, and through him Jean Baptiste was introduced to her by mail.

Correspondence followed and by this time it had become very agreeable. She proved to be a very logical young woman, and Jean Baptiste was favorably impressed. She was, moreover, industrious, ambitious, and well educated. Her age was about the same as his, so on the surface he thought that they should make a very good match. So be it.

In the meantime, however, he had opened a correspondence with another whom he had met on his trip the winter before where she had been teaching in a coal mining town south of Chicago. The same had developed mutually, and he had found her agreeable and obviously eligible. Her father was a minister, a dispenser of the gospel, and while for reasons we will become acquainted with in due time, he had cultivated small acquaintance with preachers, he took only such slight consideration of the girl's father's profession that he had good cause to recall some time later.

About the time he was deeply engrossed in his correspondence with both the farmer's daughter and the young school teacher, he received a letter from a friend in Chicago introducing him to a lady friend of hers through mail. This one happened to be a maid on the Twentieth Century Limited, running between New York and Chicago. Well, Jean Baptiste was looking for a wife. Sentiment was in order, but it was with him, first of all, a business proposition. So be it. He would give her too a chance.

He was somewhat ashamed of himself when he addressed three letters when perhaps, he should have been addressing but one. It was not fair to either of the three, he guiltily felt; but, business was business with him.

From his friend's sister he received most delightful epistles, not altogether frivolous, with a great amount of common sense between the lines. But what was more to the point, her father was wealthy, and she must have some conception of what was required to accumulate and to hold. He rather liked her, it now seemed.

Now from the preacher's daughter he received also pleasing letters. Encouraging, but not to say unconventionally forward. He appreciated the fact that she was a preacher's child, and naturally expected to conform to a certain custom.

But from New York he received the most encouragement. The position the maid held rather thrilled him. He loved the road—and she wrote such letters! It was plain to be seen here what the answer would be.

Which?

He borrowed ten thousand dollars, giving a mortgage upon his land in security therefor. He purchased relinquishments upon three beautiful quarter sections of land in the county lying just to the west. The same, having to be homesteaded before title was acquired, had all ready been in part arranged for. His grandmother and sister were waiting to file on a place each—the third was for the bride-to-be. There remained a few weeks yet in which to make said selection; but, notwithstanding, all must be ready to make filing not later than the first day of October—and September at last arrived.

He became serious, then uneasy. Which? He wrote all three letters that would give either or all a right to hear the words from him, but did not say sufficient to any to give grounds for a possible breach of promise suit later.

He rather liked the girl whose father had made money. Yes, it so seemed—more than either of the other two. A match with her on the surface seemed more practical. But for some reason she did not reply within the time to the letter he had written her. Oh, if he could only have courted her; could have been in the position to have seen her of a warm night; to have said to her: "——." Poor Jean Baptiste your life might not have later come to what it did....

He waited—but in vain. October was drawing dangerously near when at last he left for somewhere. Indeed he had not a complete idea where, but of one thing he had concluded, when he returned he would bring the bride-to-be.

At Omaha he made up his mind. The girl whose father had made money had had her chance and failed. He regretted it very much, but this was a business proposition, and he had two thousand dollars at stake that he would lose if he failed to get some one to file on that quarter section he had provided, on October first.

He was rather disturbed over the idea. He really would have preferred a little more sentiment—but time had become the expedient. "Of course," he argued, as he sped toward Chicago, "I'll be awfully good to the one I choose, so if it is a little out of the ordinary—why, I'll try to make up for it when she is mine."

With this consolation he arrived in Chicago, wishing that the girl who lived two hundred miles south of Omaha and whose father was well-to-do had replied to his letter. He really had chosen her out of the three. However, he resigned himself to the inevitable—one of the other two.

He left the train and boarded the South Side L. He got off again at Thirty-first Street, and found what he had always found before, State Street and Negroes. He was not interested in either this time. He had sent a telegram to New York from Omaha to the effect that he was headed for Chicago. It was to the maid, for she had drawn second choice. He planned to meet her at the number her dear friend—and the match maker, lived.

So it was to this number he now hurried.

"Oh, Mr. Baptiste," cried this little woman, whose name happened to be Rankin, and she was an old maid. She gave him her little hand, and was "delighted" to see him.

"And you've come! Miss Pitt will be so glad! She has talked of nobody but Mr. Baptiste this summer. Oh, I'm so glad you have come!" and she shook his hand again.

"I sent her a telegram that I was coming, and I trust she will let me know...."

"She is due in tomorrow," cried their little friend, and her voice was like delicate music.

"I expect a telegram," he said evenly. "I am somewhat rushed."

"Indeed! But of course, you are a business man, Mr. Baptiste," chimed Miss Rankin with much admiration in her little voice. "How Miss Pitt will like you!"

Jean Baptiste smiled a smile of vanity. He was getting anxious to meet Miss Pitt himself—inasmuch as he expected to ask her to become his wife on the morrow.

"Ting-aling-aling!" went the bell on the street door, and little Miss Rankin rushed forth to open it.

"Special for Mr. Jean Baptiste," he heard and went to get it. After signing, he broke the seal a little nervously, and drawing the contents forth, read the enclosed message.

He sighed when it was over. Miss Pitt had been taken with a severe attack of neuralgia in New York, was indisposed and under the care of a physician, but would be in Chicago in six days. He studied the calendar on the wall. Six days would mean October second!

Too late, Miss Pitt, your chance is gone. And now we turn to the party of the third part who will follow us through our story.

From a painting by W.M. Farrow.

"MISS PITT WAS SO ANXIOUS TO MEET YOU AND I WAS, TOO, BECAUSE I THINK YOU AND HER WOULD LIKE EACH OTHER. SHE'S AN AWFULLY GOOD GIRL AND WILLING TO HELP A FELLOW."