Pretty Bessie King has all the cowboys' hearts thumping ragtime jigs against their ribs whenever she comes to town, and Alkali is the hardest hit of all. After a series of flirtations she finally takes Alkali for better or worse and they are married. A year later a small son and heir keeps Alkali doing Marathons across the midnight floors. A newspaper article now alarms the community concerning a new disease called "Kimonitis," that attacks women and babies. Consequently, when Alkali goes home one day and finds a note left by his wife saying she has gone to Pocatello "to have her kimono cut out," he rides wildly into town on a hand-car, meets wifie coming from a store and is horrified when she tells him she has her "kimono" in the box under her arm. On reaching home Alkali is both amazed and delighted to find the kimono is nothing but a calico affair the town seamstress has cut out for wifie and his wild ride has been in vain.