Dabster stepped from an elevator to
the top floor of the skyscraper. Then up a short, steep stairway and out
upon the roof. Dabster led her to the parapet so she could look down at
the black dots moving in the street below.
"What are they?" she asked, trembling. She had never been on a height
like this before.
And then Dabster must needs play the philosopher on the tower, and
conduct her soul forth to meet the immensity of space.
"Bipeds," he said, solemnly. "See what they become even at the small
elevation of 340 feet--mere crawling insects going to and fro at
random."
"Oh, they ain't anything of the kind," exclaimed Daisy,
suddenly--"they're folks! I saw an automobile. Oh, gee! are we that
high up?"
"Walk over this way," said Dabster.
He showed her the great city lying like an orderly array of toys far
below, starred here and there, early as it was, by the first beacon
lights of the winter afternoon. And then the bay and sea to the south
and east vanishing mysteriously into the sky.
"I don't like it," declared Daisy, with troubled blue eyes. "Say we go
down."
But the philosopher was not to be denied his opportunity. He would let
her behold the grandeur of his mind, the half-nelson he had on the
infinite, and the memory he had for statistics.
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