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been hanged by Judge Parker.”
    Lanie reached over and tapped Lobo playfully on the arm. She was one of the most beautiful women Phil had ever seen. Her figure was stately, and even at the age of forty, she still hadmost of her youthful grace. Her rich auburn hair and brilliant green eyes came from her mother, as did the high coloring of her cheeks. “Phil, have you heard from your brother John?” Lanie asked. “He’s doing well at Yale with his law studies. I expect he’ll eventually become a politician.”
    “That would be bad,” Zach glowered. “A lawyer and a politician in the family at the same time. Don’t know how it could be much worse.”
    “You stop that foolishness right now, Pa!” Lanie frowned at him. “Your youngest just might be President someday. I’m right proud of my little brother.”
    “Uncle Phil,” Logan piped up, his bright eyes sparkling, “tell us all about what it’s like over where you went to.”
    They all wanted to hear about his travels, but Phil was reluctant to say too much. He ate slowly, savoring his mother’s home-cooked food, and waved his fork around as he described some of his adventures. “I came back on a ship called the Lancaster, ” he murmured. “We sailed from Cobh, Ireland, to New York in five days and forty-five minutes.”
    “My, that’s something!” his mother said. “When I came over in steerage, it took a month and a half. I thought we’d never get here.”
    “Neither did I! I was waitin’ for ya.” Zach winked at her.
    Bronwen sniffed at this. “Waiting! I had to run you down and make you propose! I felt sorry for you!”
    Everyone laughed, then suddenly Logan jumped from his chair and ran across the room, despite the warnings from his mother. Coming back, he held the paper up and said, “Look at this, Uncle Phil! I bet they ain’t got nothin’ like this in Paris or London.”
    Taking the paper, Phil saw that it was a copy of the San Francisco Chronicle. “What’s in here you like so much?”
    “Look here,” Logan said eagerly as he helped Phil turn the pages. “Look at this. It’s pictures and a story.”
    “Why, sure it is! I never saw anything like this in a paper.”
    “They call it a comic strip, I think,” Logan said. “Thisone’s called Mr. A. Mutt. My cousin Cass sends it to me every week. After you finish eatin’ I’ll show ’em all to ya.”
    “Now, don’t bother your uncle,” Bronwen scolded. “He’s had a long trip and is all tired out. He doesn’t want to read any silly things like that!”
    “I guess I do, Ma,” Phil grinned. “It makes more sense than most of the things in the paper.” He studied the comic strip and shook his head. “What will they think of next?”
    Suddenly Lanie spoke up. “I saw Lois Gardner last Thursday.” She tried to appear nonchalant, making the idle remark.
    Instantly alarms went off in Phil’s head, for he and Lois Gardner had been seeing each other before he had left for Europe. He had fancied himself in love with her for a time, but she had not felt the same way toward him. “Is she married?” he asked.
    “No,” Lanie said quickly. “She always asks about you every time I see her, though.”
    “She had her chance at Phil,” Bronwen said firmly. She had never liked Lois Gardner, seeing nothing in her to admire, and now she said, “You stay away from that woman. She’s just out to snare a man, Phil.”
    “I doubt if her father would want her to marry an impoverished artist with no future,” Phil laughed.
    “Don’t say that,” Lobo spoke up. He was buttering a biscuit and bit off half of it before he nodded. “Some of them artist fellows make lots of money, I understand. Might as well be you.”
    “That’s kind of you to say, Lobo,” Phil shrugged, “but there are about a hundred thousand starving artists all over Europe who can’t sell a thing they paint. I don’t think it will be much better in the States.”
    After breakfast Phil spent the morning