[
{"chunk":134,"story":18,"summary":"A quiet hotel offers a few guests the pleasures of a mountain resort, and they hide there fearing discovery by other pleasure-seekers.","predicament":"People guard a comfortable refuge and fear the crowd that would spoil it."},
{"chunk":135,"story":18,"summary":"A gracious lady arrives and is treated by staff and guests as the perfect ornament of their exclusive retreat.","predicament":"Someone's bearing alone persuades everyone around them of a station they never state."},
{"chunk":136,"story":18,"summary":"Rumours make the lady a cosmopolitan; a well-dressed young man arrives, asks about sailings and settles in for a few days.","predicament":"Two strangers each arrive carrying an account of themselves that the place is eager to believe."},
{"chunk":137,"story":18,"summary":"A dropped handkerchief introduces them, and the two agree that the old resorts are ruined by the crowds who follow them.","predicament":"Two people flatter each other with a shared complaint neither has the standing to make."},
{"chunk":138,"story":18,"summary":"Each says they leave on Monday, she for a chateau abroad, and they spend a last evening together on the balcony.","predicament":"Two people approach the end of a pretence that neither wants to be the first to break."},
{"chunk":139,"story":18,"summary":"The lady confesses she sells hosiery for eight dollars a week and saved a year to live like a lady once.","predicament":"Someone confesses the truth about themselves rather than leave the other deceived."},
{"chunk":140,"story":18,"summary":"He writes her a receipt: he collects instalments on that very dress, saved as she did, and they plan an outing together.","predicament":"Someone answers another's confession with the same one, and the pretence becomes a shared joke."},
{"chunk":141,"story":19,"summary":"A village-born actress has risen to stardom, and a young character actor seeks the rustic part in her next play.","predicament":"Someone who left a small place is now the judge of who may imitate it."},
{"chunk":142,"story":19,"summary":"Told the star rejects every imitation of a country dweller, the actor spends three days gathering the facts of her home village.","predicament":"Someone studies another's origins in order to pass a test only that person can set."},
{"chunk":143,"story":19,"summary":"At the star's late supper table an awkward country youth enters, and the whole room turns to look at him.","predicament":"Someone enters a room where they plainly do not belong, and is watched by everyone."},
{"chunk":144,"story":19,"summary":"The youth greets the star as a neighbour and retails the village news until she draws him to a private table.","predicament":"News of the place someone escaped pulls their attention away from all their present company."},
{"chunk":145,"story":19,"summary":"She cannot recall him but asks after her family, and he answers with the changes at her parents' house.","predicament":"Someone asks a stranger for news of the family they have not visited."},
{"chunk":146,"story":19,"summary":"He describes her mother watching the road daily for her return, and gives her a rose from the home doorstep.","predicament":"Someone is shown how long they have been waited for by the people they left."},
{"chunk":147,"story":19,"summary":"She laughs the village off and goes; when the actor calls next day her maid says she has returned there to live.","predicament":"Someone laughs off what moved them, then abandons everything to go back."},
{"chunk":148,"story":20,"summary":"A detective meets an old friend on the street, takes him aside and asks straight out why he killed the murdered man.","predicament":"Someone must act against a person they owe a debt of friendship to."},
{"chunk":149,"story":20,"summary":"The detective produces the gold pencil he once gave his friend, found at the scene, and warns him he must do his duty.","predicament":"Someone's own gift becomes the evidence that convicts the person they gave it to."},
{"chunk":150,"story":20,"summary":"The killer explains the shooting and the theft, then says the detective owes him a thousand dollars and cannot touch him.","predicament":"Someone escapes justice by holding an old favour over the person who must judge them."},
{"chunk":151,"story":20,"summary":"The detective concedes that the debt binds him, and says nothing else could have bought the man out of his hands.","predicament":"Someone is stopped from doing their duty by a debt they never repaid."},
{"chunk":152,"story":20,"summary":"The detective says he will resign, and the killer's boasting of past crimes turns his old gratitude into cold disgust.","predicament":"Someone repaying an old kindness discovers the person they are protecting deserves nothing."},
{"chunk":153,"story":20,"summary":"Enraged at the mention of newspapers, the killer goes to a telephone to prove to an editor what he thinks of them.","predicament":"Someone's vanity drives them to taunt the one power they have not accounted for."},
{"chunk":154,"story":20,"summary":"On the telephone he confesses the murder to the editor and proves it with a detail only the killer could know.","predicament":"Someone proves their boast by handing over the one fact that can convict them."},
{"chunk":155,"story":20,"summary":"He hangs up gloating and spends the night at shows and suppers, while the detective broods and then begins to wonder.","predicament":"Someone celebrates their safety while the person beside them looks for a way out."},
{"chunk":156,"story":20,"summary":"At dawn the newsboys cry the papers; the detective buys one, looks at the front page and begins writing with the pencil.","predicament":"Someone finds a way to do their duty and clear their debt at the same time."},
{"chunk":157,"story":21,"summary":"A village woman comes to the city with an easel to study art; at home she was reckless, here she looks a spinster.","predicament":"Someone leaves a small place for a bold life and arrives as nobody in particular."},
{"chunk":158,"story":21,"summary":"She takes a cheap room and lessons from a fraudulent teacher, one of the hopeless army of the mediocre.","predicament":"Someone pays for training from a teacher who has nothing to teach them."},
{"chunk":159,"story":21,"summary":"After a day of small defeats she accepts a dinner invitation from the boarding-house's showy man of the world.","predicament":"Someone worn down by failures accepts an invitation they would otherwise refuse."},
{"chunk":160,"story":21,"summary":"He takes her to a fashionable resort of artists, where a young man at a table hails him and invites them to join.","predicament":"Someone is taken into a world they have only read about, on another's introduction."},
{"chunk":161,"story":21,"summary":"Dazzled by the music and company, she drinks what is poured for her and speaks fondly of the farm she came from.","predicament":"Someone out of their depth speaks of home and is heard as a curiosity."},
{"chunk":162,"story":21,"summary":"Home in her room, conscience overwhelms her, and at midnight she writes to her sweetheart renouncing him as one lost forever.","predicament":"Someone judges one evening as the ruin of their whole character, and gives up their future."},
{"chunk":163,"story":21,"summary":"She resolves that no return is possible and models herself on famous fallen women, keeping her room for two days.","predicament":"Someone commits to a grand ruin that nobody else has noticed happening."},
{"chunk":164,"story":21,"summary":"Her sweetheart arrives, tells her to wipe off the paint and pack, mentions the trees at home, and she goes.","predicament":"Someone's grand renunciation is ended by the plain arrival of the person renounced."},
{"chunk":165,"story":22,"summary":"A quarter of the city shelters exiles of many nations, who pass through its cafes and lodging houses and vanish into service.","predicament":"People arriving with nothing find shelter among others like them and are quickly replaced."},
{"chunk":166,"story":22,"summary":"In a struggling rooming house the daughter keeps the rooms, and the best lodger is a splendid, prompt-paying foreigner.","predicament":"Someone working in a poor household is courted by the one person there who pays."},
{"chunk":167,"story":22,"summary":"The lodger courts the daughter; she likes him but suspects he is one more penniless foreign gentleman with a story.","predicament":"Someone doubts a suitor's fine manners, fearing they mean debts rather than fortune."},
{"chunk":168,"story":22,"summary":"He invites her to dine and takes her through a dark door into a hidden restaurant's crowded back yard.","predicament":"Someone is taken somewhere impressive by a suitor whose means they cannot account for."},
{"chunk":169,"story":22,"summary":"He excuses himself, and the whole company applauds and calls his name while she sits dazzled among the fine guests.","predicament":"Someone sees their companion greeted as a great person by a room full of strangers."},
{"chunk":170,"story":22,"summary":"He returns in shirtsleeves to season the dishes at every table; her fear of a penniless nobleman rises fourfold first.","predicament":"Someone's fear of a suitor's grand pretensions peaks just before the truth arrives."},
{"chunk":171,"story":22,"summary":"He tells her he is the restaurant's famous owner and cook and asks her to marry him; she accepts with relief.","predicament":"Someone learns their suitor is a worker, not a gentleman, and is glad of it."},
{"chunk":172,"story":23,"summary":"A clubman is bored by his companions' repeated stories and has been refused for the fifth time by the woman he courts.","predicament":"Someone's days are identical and the one thing they want keeps being refused."},
{"chunk":173,"story":23,"summary":"Strolling out, the clubman is accosted by a man from the loafing corner of thieves, and gladly goes aside to talk.","predicament":"Someone starved of novelty welcomes an approach that anyone else would avoid."},
{"chunk":174,"story":23,"summary":"The stranger announces himself a burglar and confidence man, and asks the clubman what is wrong with the way he dresses.","predicament":"Someone asks a stranger for the one expertise they lack, offering candour in exchange."},
{"chunk":175,"story":23,"summary":"The clubman itemises every fault of the burglar's expensive outfit, and the burglar demands more of the criticism.","predicament":"Someone hears their own faults catalogued and asks for the rest of the list."},
{"chunk":176,"story":23,"summary":"Offered his host's tailor, the burglar boasts of a robbery and lays the clubman's own watch and pocketbook on the table.","predicament":"Someone proves their trust by returning what they had already taken from the person trusting them."},
{"chunk":177,"story":23,"summary":"Introduced at the club as a burglar and disbelieved, the stranger holds the whole table with an account of the West.","predicament":"Someone brings an outsider among their set and the outsider outshines all of them."},
{"chunk":178,"story":23,"summary":"Before leaving, the stranger tells the clubman he is the real thing and promises to return the favour some day.","predicament":"Someone's help is repaid with an offer they may never be able to use."},
{"chunk":179,"story":23,"summary":"At lunch the clubman talks only of ranches and says he is going West; the woman who refused him says she will come.","predicament":"Someone stops asking for what they wanted, and is given it at once."}
]