AN ACCIDENTAL ROMANCE 
 >K <9 AND OTHER STORIES
 
 
 T4I.IF. T.
 
 Jin Accidental Romance, 
 and Other Stories 
 
 Ulilliam Sidney Rossiter 
 
 Hew Vork 
 
 Che Republic Press 
 
 u Lafayette Place 
 
 1$95
 
 Copyriflbt, IMS 
 By 0. $. RotJiter
 
 -t f 
 
 2132317
 
 Preface 
 
 * I 'HERE are no red lights in the pages 
 A which follow no literary rockets, no 
 cattails dipped in kerosene and lighted "to 
 mark the path of progress," no morals 
 pointed, no isms illumined. 
 
 This little book has only one excuse for 
 existence. The stories it contains were writ- 
 ten to divert the author's thoughts from 
 pressing daily cares, for the habit of the 
 pen, once acquired in newspaper work, never 
 can be entirely overcome. 
 
 If, by passing these sketches along, he 
 can please or divert some other member of 
 the toiling, anxious human family, he is 
 content. Possibly some more pretentious 
 brother who points a moral or lights an 
 ism, does not accomplish even as much. 
 Who knows ?
 
 Contents 
 
 fln Accidental Romance 9 
 
 E Common Seme Cupid .... 57 
 
 the Auction Bottle 100 
 
 fln Unauthcnticatcd Serpent 12$ 
 
 the twice told Cite of tbonuu Dart w
 
 Jin flccidcmai Romance. 
 
 The American Association for the Advance- 
 ment of Invention had held its annual meeting 
 in Denver. The sessions lasted three days, and 
 they had beon largely attended and marked by 
 great enthusiasm and many brilliant and schol- 
 arly addresses. After the election of officers 
 and final adjournment a large number of the 
 members decided to make a trip to Pike's Peak 
 before separating. I hailed this excursion as 
 a welcome respite from official cares, for I was 
 third vice-president of the association (to which 
 office I had just been re-elected), and I had been 
 occupied constantly with Important official 
 duties during the sessions. It was, therefore, 
 with a delightful sense of freedom that I joined 
 my fellow-members in making up the jolliest 
 party, I am Inclined to believe, that ever ascend- 
 ed Colorado's famous mountain. Of course I did 
 not realize how deeply that brief trip would
 
 10 
 
 affect all my future life; but then, nobody ever 
 does realize. The realizing business is all 
 transacted in retrospection. 
 
 We had reached the summit, and I was stand- 
 ing with a group of friends looking off on that 
 stupendous panorama of lake and mountain, 
 when Major D. Pringle Whitehouse, of Jersey 
 City, a former corresponding secretary of the 
 association, and widely known as the inventor 
 of an improved automatic cork ejector, tapped 
 me on the shoulder. 
 
 "You're going directly East, aren't you, Dunk- 
 ley?" he inquired. 
 
 "I expect to," I replied. 
 
 "Do me a big favor, won't you? Take my 
 umbrella back with you, and keep it till I call 
 for it. I've just decided to 'do* California with 
 Reed and MacSimmons. Can't rustle around 
 the land of sunshine with a family umbrella, 
 you know. Give me away completely. Haven't 
 time to pack it and hunt up an express office. 
 Haven't even time to ship it. Help me out, 
 won't you, my boy?" 
 
 I murmured something about a willingness to 
 oblige, which/ 1 was far from feeling. 
 
 "I knew you would," he continued. "Don't 
 let it bother you, but don't lose it, whatever you 
 do that umbrella, sir, was my only inheritance 
 from my Great Uncle Williams. It's thirty-four 
 years old if it's a day. I should be heartbroken
 
 11 
 
 if I lost it, Dunkley, so hang on to it tightly. 
 Great mark of esteem, in fact, to select you to 
 care for it. So long. See you in New York." 
 
 So saying, he pressed into my reluctant hand 
 a huge black silk umbrella, with a carved ivory 
 handle representing a bunch of grapes and two 
 cupids rampant, nodded reassuringly, and was 
 gone. 
 
 This development was as sudden as it was 
 unwelcome. I had come upon the excursion as 
 a relief from official cares, and here I stood on 
 the snowclad summit of Pike's Peak, Colorado, 
 looking off upon the headwaters of four great 
 rivers, upon mountain, lake and forest, and 
 Colorado lying like a map below, clasping "Great 
 Uncle Williams's" family umbrella, and charged 
 with its safe conduct for a couple of thousand 
 miles. 
 
 I think I could have claimed reasonably to be 
 as kindly and accommodating as the average 
 bachelor of thirty-seven years. I ought to have 
 been. I had a good disposition, was sound of 
 mind and body, and had had a prosperous and 
 rather uneventful career, but I abhorred favors 
 and commissions. I do not refer to cash com- 
 missions; doubtless they are different. My ex- 
 perience with that sort is limited. The antipathy 
 I felt to other people's errands, however, dated, 
 I believe, from a distressing experience in my 
 childhood, which was deeply impressed upon me,
 
 12 
 
 both internally and externally. Our nextdoor 
 neighbor, an elderly and vastly particular 
 spinster, named Wegan, had commissioned me 
 to mail a letter for her, which, boylike, I com- 
 pletely forgot to do, and when she asked me, two 
 weeks later, what I had done with that letter, I 
 searched in every pocket and solemnly declared 
 I had mailed it; as, indeed, I thought I must 
 have done. A month afterward I discovered 
 the letter in another jacket, and I still recall the 
 horror I experienced upon finding it. There 
 was but one thing to do. I mailed it, and waited 
 for the consequences with many misgivings. 
 Two days passed and I breathed easier, but the 
 third morning I was awakened by a hammering 
 in our neighbor's backyard. I opened the win- 
 dow cautiously, and saw two carpenters at work 
 and a third man unloading lumber. On the back 
 porch stood old Miss Wegan, in a red wrapper 
 and curl papers, and a halo of excitement. 
 
 "Go away, men," she called. 
 
 The carpenters looked a good deal surprised. 
 
 "It's all right," said one of them, reassuringly. 
 
 "What's all right?" 
 
 "About the henhouse." 
 
 "What henhouse?" 
 
 "Old Miss Wegan's." 
 
 "Old Miss Wegan don't want any henhouse." 
 
 "Yes she does." 
 
 "No she don't."
 
 13 
 
 "Mr. Gibbons had a letter from her ordering 
 a henhouse put up Immediately, and we're here 
 doin' it." 
 
 "He never got the letter," said the owner of 
 the curl papers, emphatically. 
 
 "Yes, he did. He says to tell you he can't get 
 the corrugated roosts till next week." 
 
 "I don't want any roosts." 
 
 "And the cupola is to have a weather-vane 
 on it." 
 
 "I don't want any cupola," repeated Miss 
 Wegan, desperately. "I don't want any hen- 
 house at all. I ordered one two months ago, 
 but the letter was lost in the mail, and it got so 
 late I sold my chickens. That's the end of it. 
 Now, go away, all of you," she added in no 
 pleasant tones. 
 
 "Can't ma'am; we've come to build a henhouse, 
 and we're goin' to. The order only came yes- 
 terday, but the lumber's cut a'ready." 
 
 I felt a cold chill run down my youthful spine. 
 
 "Yesterday?" repeated Miss Wegan in sur- 
 prise. "It's that horrid, careless Dunkley boy," 
 she said. "He shall hear of this." 
 
 I had heard of it already. I closed the win- 
 dow, jumped into my clothes and hurried down- 
 stairs. 
 
 "Ma," I said, "may I spend the day down at 
 the Centre?' 
 
 It was a useless device. It merely delayed
 
 14 
 
 the reckoning. The case in hand, however, did 
 not call for reminiscence, or a dissertation on 
 predilections or antipathies. Here I was on 
 Pike's Peak (fact one), constituted keeper and 
 custodian of Great Uncle Williams's umbrella, 
 and the umbrella was at that moment burdening 
 me (fact two.) 
 
 "Did you ever see such an imposition?" I ex- 
 claimed, irritably, to Randall, who was next to 
 me. "The man concludes to go to California; he 
 doesn't want to bother with his unsightly old 
 umbrella, so he shoves it into the hands of the 
 first man his eyes! light upon, and says: 'There, 
 take that to New York for me, and mind you 
 don't lose it.' Such unlimited cheek," I added, 
 wrathfully, "ought to be converted into horse- 
 power." 
 
 "It's a shame," said Randall, sympathetically. 
 "You've had enough to do to deserve a rest. 
 Let me have that umbrella, and when I get back 
 to Denver I'll pack it in with some belongings 
 of mine, and ship it East without worrying any- 
 body." 
 
 I protested that I had better shoulder the 
 trouble myself, and that I certainly did not 
 wish to take my turn in imposing on a friend 
 but Randall was firm. He declared that I 
 had done my share, and by relieving me he 
 could aid in a small way the cause of the Ameri- 
 can Association for the Advancement of Inven-
 
 15 
 
 tion, which we all had so deeply at heart. He 
 was so much in earnest that I yielded, and 
 turned over to him with many apologies the 
 Major's ancestral umbrella, adorned with its 
 ugly cupids, cautioning him to send it around to 
 my office in New York at his convenience, and 
 once more devoted myself to the full enjoyment 
 of the trip. 
 
 On returning to Denver I started East with 
 as little delay as possible, and all thought of the 
 Major's umbrella had faded completely from my 
 mind, due, no doubt, to the fact that I did not 
 again see Randall, as the members scattered 
 immediately after the excursion. Five weeks 
 elapsed exceedingly busy ones for me, as my 
 firm was testing a new and remarkable inven- 
 tion that had been described at the Denver meet- 
 ing, and I was deeply concerned in the results. 
 Looking up from my desk one afternoon in 
 August I saw the familiar form of Major D. 
 Pringle Whitehouse in the doorway. A vague 
 feeling came over me that there was some rea- 
 son why I did not want to see Whitehouse, but 
 I could not recall what it was, and I greeted him 
 cordially. 
 
 "We had a great meeting, didn't we, Dunk- 
 ley?" he said, as he shook hands and took the 
 chair I proffered him. "I suppose I am about 
 the last straggler to get back," he added. 
 
 "Where have you been?" I asked.
 
 16 
 
 "Why, to California," he said, looking sur- 
 prised; "you know I told you when we were 
 up on Pike's Peak that I was going to California 
 with Reed and MacSimmons. I was sorry 
 enough afterward that I left my umbrella be- 
 hind, for it seemed as though it rained every 
 day till we got to 'Frisco." 
 
 It all flashed over me. The Major had turned 
 his umbrella over to me up on the Peak, and 
 now he had come to demand his own. What 
 should I do? I had given it to that confounded 
 Randall; he had not sent the umbrella back to 
 me, and the day before I had heard that there 
 was sickness in his family and that he had gone 
 to the Catskills for a couple of weeks. Doubtless 
 he had brought the Major's umbrella East with 
 him in a packing-case and had not opened it 
 (for if he had, the umbrella would have reached 
 me.) Randall lived in New Jersey, and probably 
 at that very moment Great Uncle What's-His- 
 Name's umbrella was lying boxed up in a case 
 in the cellar of Randall's house, somewhere in 
 Brick Church or All the Oranges. In any event, 
 I must gain time, so I asked the Major about 
 California in general. He talked twenty min- 
 utes, and when he showed symptoms of verbal 
 drouth I inquired about a new invention for 
 watering the streets of San Diego. That was 
 good for ten minutes during which I concluded 
 I had better own up, for the fact must come out
 
 17 
 
 ultimately, anyway; so I asked no further ques- 
 tions, and at length the Major veered around 
 to Pike's Peak again. 
 
 'Tve often thought I imposed on you up there," 
 he said. 
 
 "Not at all, Major," I answered, briskly. 
 
 "So I dropped in as soon as I got back to 
 apologize and relieve you of your charge." 
 
 "Hasn't bothered me a bit," I said, "for I 
 haven't got it down here." 
 
 "Not lost?" ejaculated the Major. 
 
 "Oh, no. Randall packed it with some things 
 of his own, and brought it back from Denver 
 with him. He has forgotten to send it over, but 
 if you had only dropped me a line before you 
 came in I would have had it here for you." 
 
 The Major stroked his beard, which ran in 
 hairy undulations down to his lowest waistcoat 
 button, and looked solicitous. 
 
 "I don't know about Randall," he said, doubt- 
 fully. "He's flighty. Shouldn't have trusted 
 him myself. Thought I knew you, and what you 
 said could be relied on." 
 
 I found myself growing uncomfortable. 
 
 "Suppose," I thought, "just suppose, anything 
 should have happened to that umbrella, how 
 could I face my hirsute friend?" 
 
 Oh, it's all right," I said, cheerily. "Randall's 
 a first-rate fellow, and as he had some traps to 
 bring East, that umbrella came with them, and' 
 is over at his house now, I suppose."
 
 18 
 
 "Traps?" inquired Major Whitehouse, with 
 some interest. "What kind of traps?" 
 
 "Household stuff and all that. You know he 
 once lived in Denver." 
 
 "Thought you meant rat traps," said the 
 Major, the interest fading out. "I have in- 
 vented a pneumatic trap, and I am working up 
 a paper to read at the next annual meeting of 
 our association, upon The Trap in All ages.' 
 I am tracing the subject from the old wooden 
 skewers of the ancients down to the latest 
 thing in the line, my pneumatic trap. Fasci- 
 nating subject, sir, fascinating." The Major 
 rose to go. 
 
 "Now, Dunkley," he said, "don't forget that 
 umbrella, my boy. It belonged to my Great 
 Uncle Williams, and was all he left out of an 
 ample estate. I wouldn't lose it for a farm 
 for several large farms." 
 
 Saying which, Major D. Pringle Whitehouse 
 departed, to my infinite relief. The afternoon 
 was young and full of possibilities when he 
 entered. It was wrecked and broken and frag- 
 mentary when he left. Before I had closed my 
 desk that evening^ however 1 , I ;had written 
 this note: 
 
 My Dear Randall: 
 
 The whiskered form of D. Pringle White- 
 house loomed up this afternoon in my office. 
 He demanded his Great Uncle's umbrella, which
 
 19 
 
 I had completely forgotten. You recollect he 
 shoved it into my hands up on Pike's Peak last 
 month, and asked me to be a father to it while 
 he was in California. I hadn't thought of it 
 from that day to this, but it all came back 
 to me, and I told him you had kindly brought 
 it back to New York in a packing case you 
 were conveying home, and that doubtless at 
 that very historic moment, Great Uncle Will- 
 iams's umbrella lay in a box over in Brick 
 Church or All the Oranges. This box business 
 is a delicate emulation of the pious example 
 set by Great Uncle Williams himself, which I 
 should like to see encouraged, for he has oc- 
 cupied a box for twenty-nine years, and ap- 
 parently "stays put." However, the Major 
 must have his umbrella. He was pleasant but 
 persistent, so I beg of you if the family is away 
 and the house shut, to hie you to Brick Church, 
 or Orange Centre, or Orange Phosphate, and 
 produce that umbrella. Don't take any chances 
 on the packing case. Buy a three-cent hammer 
 and a two-cent chisel (stamps inclosed) of a 
 Vesey street fakir, on the way, and don't re- 
 turn without those cupids rampant. I am 
 really in earnest, though this may not sound so. 
 Whitehouse will make trouble if he does not 
 get his umbrella very soon. So please give it 
 attention. Yours faithfully, 
 
 HUNTINGTON DUNKLEY. 
 
 Two days later I received this reply:
 
 INVENTORS EXPERIMENT COMPANY, 
 
 (Pud Up Cptl, J50.000,) 
 
 INVENTIONS TESTED. BRIEFS PREPARED. 
 
 j. Bloomy Bullheimer Building, 217 Broadway, 
 
 K. RAHDALL, _ 
 
 "" dM " a8 " NEW YORK,
 
 21 
 
 I read Randall's letter through carefully, then 
 I called the office boy, who sits in the outer 
 office, and guards the doors marked "Private." 
 
 "William," I said solemnly, "do you know 
 Major D. Pringle Whitehouse when you see 
 him?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "William, if Major Whitehouse comes in and 
 asks for me, remember that I am now think- 
 ing of going to Savannah for a month, and 
 would be gone by the time he gets here. Do 
 you hear?" 
 
 William swallowed a couple of times, and 
 said: 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "ATI ft, William." 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "If Major Whitehouse should get in while 1 
 am here and actually see me it won't be any 
 use for you to come to work the next morn- 
 ing. That's alL" 
 
 William retired. I felt safe for the moment, 
 but I knew my device was a weak one. I 
 anathematized the careless and thoughtless Ran- 
 dall, and abused myself for ever relinquishing 
 the umbrella. Upon rereading Randall's let- 
 ter, my anxiety increased materially. "Couldn't 
 recall which one of our members." We had 
 3,200 in all, of whom 918 had attended the 
 Denver meeting. Excluding the Major, Ran-
 
 22 
 
 dall and myself, there were 915 possibilities. 
 Would it be necessary to circularize all, and even 
 if I did, would that ghostly umbrella ever 
 turn up? I doubted it. The members of the 
 American Association for the Advancement of 
 Invention, were, of course, all honorable men, 
 but the umbrella code of honor seems to have 
 receded before advancing civilization. 
 
 I once knew a large, stout man with $10,000 
 and a scheme. He started an umbrella in- 
 surance company. The first month he sent out 
 beautiful lithographed certificates. The second 
 month he sent out checks, and the third month 
 he sent out a notice of assignment. He was 
 a good deal smaller that month in every way, 
 for he had dropped $10,000 and twenty-four 
 pounds of meat. 
 
 I began to wonder what I would drop, and 
 concluded I had better write Cobb immediately. 
 That evening I posted this letter: 
 
 Thomas P. Cobb, Esq., Broadway, Pittsburg, 
 
 Penn. 
 
 Dear Mr. Cobb: Did you take in the Pike 
 Peak's excursion from the Denver meeting of 
 our association? While up there Major White- 
 house placed a valuable umbrella with an ivory 
 handle (bunch of grapes and cupids rampant) 
 in my hands to bring back to New York. I 
 turned it over to Randall, and he says he gave 
 it to you. If you have it, please send it imme- 
 diately at my expense to address above. Yours 
 truly, HUNTINGTON DUNKLEY.
 
 23 
 
 This seemed all I could do for the time being, 
 but the joy had gone out of life. Every time 
 the outer door opened, I stopped work and 
 listened, fearing to hear William's monotonous 
 voice explaining that I was in Savannah. About 
 2 o'clock I went out for a frugal lunch, which 
 for purposes of safety I took at a humble re- 
 sort on a side street, but my device was my 
 undoing, for turning a corner on the way back 
 I actually ran into the ample shape and flow- 
 ing beard of Major D. Pringle Whitehouse. 
 
 "Major,"! said with a presence of mind that 
 caused me great self-admiration afterward, 
 "Haven't heard a word about the umbrella yet. 
 Am expecting to hear any day." The Major 
 looked much disappointed. 
 
 "I am sorry it has not come," he said. "When 
 had I better call again?" 
 
 "Oh, drop in late in the week," I replied, try- 
 ing to look genial; then pleading business I 
 hurried on, leaving the Major standing in the 
 middle of Nassau street. The thing was really 
 getting serious. So much so that it interfered 
 with my office duties, and even invaded my 
 sleep. That night was the third one to be 
 troubled by dreams of Great Uncle Williams's 
 only bequest. 
 
 Two days afterward as I was working at some 
 complicated and exceedingly difficult calcula- 
 tions, I heard a familiar voice in the outer 
 office asking for me.
 
 34 
 
 "Not in, sir," said William. 
 
 "Very well, I'll wait." 
 
 "No use, sir, he's out of town." 
 
 "Is that so, where?" 
 
 "Savannah, Georgia, sir." 
 
 I shivered. 
 
 "Hey?' 
 
 "Savannah, sir." 
 
 "When'd he go?" 
 
 "Tuesday morning, sir." 
 
 "Tuesday, hey?" 
 
 "Yes, sir; 9 o'clock train, Pennsylvania road. 
 Carried his satchel to the ferry myself, sir. Saw 
 him off." 
 
 I shivered again. This time it was a real 
 shiver. I had forgotten to tell William of 
 my accidental meeting with the Major, and 
 here he was dressing up his lie with unneces- 
 sary and hideous details. There was a mo- 
 ment's silence in the outer office, and then 
 the Major said: 
 
 "Boy, you are lying. I saw Mr. Dunkley 
 Tuesday afternoon on Nassau street myself." 
 
 This would never do. It was bad enough 
 to merely state untruthful absence, but while 
 William's street gamin wit would doubtless 
 bring him through, the lie would be colossal 
 and variegated before the Major left. Before 
 he could reply, I flung my door open and 
 looked out 
 
 "Ah, Major," I said cordially, "glad to see
 
 25 
 
 you. I heard William say I had gone to Sa- 
 vannah. I told him I was likely to go, hut 
 have been detained. Come in and sit down, 
 Major." 
 
 Major Whitehouse cast a wrathful glance at 
 the tranquil William and strode in. His man- 
 ner lacked its whilom cordiality. 
 
 "Any news for me?" he inquired. 
 
 "None at all. How does the 'evolution of 
 the trap' progress, Major?" 
 
 "Have you heard from Randall?" he inquired, 
 ignoring my feeble effort to change the theme. 
 
 "Yes; I had a brief note. He is up in the 
 Catskills, and I presume nothing can be done 
 till he gets back." 
 
 "This is exceedingly disappointing to me, 
 Mr. Dunkley," said the Major, with much dig- 
 nity, looking sharply about my office, as though 
 his Great Uncle's umbrella might appear at any 
 moment from any direction. 
 
 "I fully expected some definite word about 
 my umbrella to-day, I trust I have made plain 
 how highly I value it. That umbrella, sir, is 
 thirty-nine years old. It was the only bequest 
 of my Great Uncle Williams to me. He died in 
 1889. I have carried it constantly since, and 
 I don't propose, sir, to lose it now." 
 
 "Major Whitehouse," I said, getting angry at 
 last, "I am heartily sick of this umbrella busi- 
 ness." 
 
 "So am I, sir," he responded.
 
 26 
 
 "Let me get you a new umbrella." 
 
 "I don't want it." 
 
 "Silver head." 
 
 "I don't want it." 
 
 "Gold head." 
 
 "I don't want it." 
 
 "I'll have an umbrella made for you," I ex- 
 claimed, desperately, "with ivory cupids ram- 
 pant, couchant, passant, from handle to fer- 
 rule." 
 
 "I don't want it," shouted the Major ex- 
 citedly. 
 
 "I'll give you an umbrella annuity. A new 
 one annually or semi-annually," I urged. 
 
 "Mr. Dunkley, you trifle, sir," said the Major, 
 severely. "I am able to buy umbrellas my- 
 self. For reasons I have stated I wish my own 
 umbrella, the one I left in your charge. The 
 matter may rest for a week or ten days. When 
 I call again, sir, I expect you to have my 
 umbrella." 
 
 Without a goodby or goodday the Major 
 stalked out. I tried to resume work, but that 
 confounded umbrella seemed to pervade and 
 confuse everything I touched. At length I 
 left the office and sought relief at my club. 
 The next three days were made uncomfortable 
 by no tidings from Cobb, but on Monday upon 
 reaching my desk I found an envelope marked 
 Pittsburg, and I opened it with feverish haste. 
 Here is the letter:
 
 
 
 * 
 
 12 
 
 O 
 
 x z 
 H 5
 
 28 
 
 I confess to a feeling of intense disappoint- 
 ment. Somehow I had really expected results 
 from Cobb, and it began to look as though a 
 circular to the whole 914 remaining would be 
 necessary. I did write. I wrote immediately. 
 
 My Dear Hotchkiss: 
 
 Please tell me whether you brought back from 
 Denver for Randall, or any one else, a big, 
 black silk umbrella, with an ivory handle, 
 carved to represent a bunch of grapes and two 
 cupids rampant. If so, I want it quick. I am in 
 a peck of trouble over this umbrella. While 
 up on Pike's Peak with the association ex- 
 cursion last month Major Whitehouse, of Jer- 
 sey City, decided to make a hasty trip to Cali- 
 fornia, and, finding his ancestral umbrella 
 would be in the way, he pitched on me to bring 
 it East, and then departed. Of course I could 
 not refuse, but I made some remarks about it 
 later, which Randall heard, and he kindly offered 
 to assume my burden, so I turned the umbrella 
 over to him. Randall was called to Utah on 
 business, and sent the Major's unwelcome prop- 
 erty East by some one else. He thought it was 
 T. P. Cobb, of Pittsburg. Cobb thinks it was 
 you. If you have that umbrella for goodness' 
 sake send it. The Major haunts me. Every 
 beard I see gives me a shock. Send the um- 
 brella by express, special delivery, special mes- 
 senger, but get it here. Yours sincerely, 
 
 HUNTINGDON DUNKLEY. 
 
 Two more apprehensive days elapsed, and 
 Hotchkiss's reply was before me. It read:
 
 MARCUS P. HOTCHKISS, 
 
 GENERAL CONNECTICUT AGENT 
 
 THE NEW YORK CHEMICAL CONTRIVANCE Co., 
 
 (ESTABLISHED, 1776.) 
 
 $ lOAfuiJtZ 
 
 t*/-"*- Wft'jucr*4. 4, ***<-lu02$ 
 
 ^a^^o^^C tv^id*, vk*Jd*c. -3 ctt**. olc ^^ %*+*****- M~ 
 
 3 **^wf ^CL K*~clAQl Le- & 4o &^XA> *~c( j 
 
 a^ ffS ' + 
 
 **si, & z^<^c 
 
 , *+*~J!^lMa 
 
 , v 
 V< 
 
 a 
 
 V
 
 30 
 
 I laid down the letter and groaned aloud. 
 How long was this to continue? Mechanically 
 I reached for paper and wrote: 
 Oliver Penfleld, Esq., Calvert street, Baltimore, 
 Md. 
 
 Dear Mr. Penfield: Have you in your posses- 
 sion a large, black silk umbrella with ivory 
 handle carved to represent two cupids rampant, 
 and a bunch of grapes? If so, it is the one 
 placed in my care by Major Whitehouse, of 
 Jersey City, while we were on the Pike's Peak 
 excursion. He wished me to bring it East for 
 him, and I turned it over to Randall. Randall 
 was called to Utah, and says he gave it to Cobb. 
 Cobb denies all knowledge of it and suggested 
 Hotchkiss. Hotchkiss says he never had it him- 
 self, but thinks he remembers it was given in 
 your charge. If so, please send the umbrella 
 to me at your earliest convenience, at my ex- 
 pense, and wire me on receiving this whether 
 you have it. Yours truly, 
 
 HUNTINGTON DUNKLEY. 
 
 I sealed the letter and mailed it, but the situ- 
 ation was evidently growing worse. Major 
 Whi tehouse was staved off by talking of Randall's 
 absence. That would not serve much longer. 
 The Major's visits would be resumed soon, and 
 I could not stand many more of them. Long be- 
 fore the 913 remaining names had been can- 
 vassed, I would be lodged in a padded cell 
 somewhere, and labelled "H. Dunkley, violent." 
 The thing was going to my head already. Only 
 the previous afternoon, in ordering some pig
 
 31 
 
 iron for our works at Seacaucus, I found myself 
 actually beginning the letter to Great Uncle 
 Williams. If there was only some way to ap- 
 pease the Major, but, alas! there was only one 
 umbrella on earth for the Implacable White- 
 house, of Jersey City, and that was Great Uncle 
 Williams's bequest. Doubtless I was the pict- 
 ure of despair as I sat leaning on my desk, 
 when our senior partner came into my office. 
 
 "You don't look well, Dunkley," he said, 
 kindly. 
 
 "I am not well," I replied. 
 
 "Then take a few days off," he exclaimed. "I 
 was just going to speak to you about that 
 Twohig matter in Portland. That's just the 
 thing for you. Go up to Maine yourself, and 
 settle it. The change will do you good." 
 
 I thanked him heartily. His suggestion came 
 like a ray of hop 3. After further consultation 
 I decided to spend a week in Maine, and the 
 next morning found me on the eastbound train. 
 I walked through every car to make sure my 
 evil genius was not on board, and sank into 
 a seat as the train started, with a sense of per- 
 fect security and intense relief. The trip was 
 one of the most delightful I have ever known. 
 By contrast with the two previous weeks I 
 was care free. I read, smoked. I watched the 
 landscape, and my fellow-passengers by turns. 
 While lazily observing the stir of arrivals and
 
 32 
 
 departures at Springfield, I noticed that the occu- 
 pant of the seat directly across the aisle from me 
 was an exceedingly pretty girl, evidently trav- 
 elling alone. Sho was not a new arrival in 
 the car, for her ticket had been punched and 
 stuck in the seat in front of her. She was be- 
 comingly attired in the inevitable shirt waist, 
 a dark dress of some rough cloth, sailor hat and 
 red belt. A wealth of light brown hair, becom- 
 ingly arranged, large brown eyes and an ex- 
 quisite complexion, made up an ideal picture 
 of a dainty and independent American girl, for 
 the whole personality was pervaded by an air 
 of self-possession and independence. The seat 
 beside her was occupied by a handsome alligator 
 skin satchel, and a lunchbox of generous di- 
 mensions. A parasol or umbrella, I could not 
 see which, stood in the corner and completed 
 her travelling equipment. I must confess that 
 my opposite neighbor was an exceedingly in- 
 teresting study, and in spite of my efforts to 
 avoid staring, I found my eyes wandering 
 across the aisle at frequent intervals. She was 
 occupied with a magazine, but twice her eyes 
 met mine, and in a vague agreeable way I felt 
 that perhaps she was not averse to an occasional 
 glance from my side of the car, and particularly 
 so when upon turning quickly around a few 
 moments later, I discovered she had been in- 
 specting me critically, a fact which threw both 
 of us into some confusion.
 
 "Here, Dunkley," I said to myself, "you're too 
 kittenish. An old bachelor making eyes is dread- 
 ful," and by way of emphasizing this mental 
 judgment I decided on a trip to the smoker, when 
 something happened that changed the whole 
 situation. A sudden jarring of the car threw 
 my fair neighbor's umbrella to the floor. She 
 regained it, and stood it up directly in my 
 line of vision. I saw that it was not a parasol, 
 but an umbrella and a tall one. Moreover, it 
 had an ivory handle which was strangely fa- 
 miliar. There seemed to be a bunch of grapes 
 
 and two 1 put my hands to my eyes. Good 
 
 heavens! Was the asylum closing in on me? 
 My horrible error in directing the pig iron order 
 to Uncle Williams flashed across me. Here I 
 was seemingly free at last from that awful 
 umbrella nightmare, and while furtively glanc- 
 ing at a pretty girl in a railway train the first 
 umbrella I see takes on the characteristics of 
 that Whitehouse pest. I looked resolutely out 
 of the window for some minutes, assuring 
 myself that I was a niiddle-aged Idiot. Here 
 was a good-looking girl, who happened to have 
 a handsome umbrella with an ivory handle. 
 Perfectly allowable; anybody with a yearning 
 for ivory-handled umbrellas could gratify it 
 upon consulting a dealer. However, it was 
 natural that I should be sensitive on umbrellas 
 in general and ivory-handled ones in particular.
 
 34 
 
 That was all; nothing serious; why not look 
 again? I did look. The pretty girl was no 
 longer a factor in the case, and as I knew no 
 rule of politeness which forbids staring at an 
 umbrella, I stared steadily. Argue as I would, 
 there was something remarkable about that 
 handle. The design was undoubtedly a bunch 
 of grapes and two figures extraordinarily like 
 cupids. Having decided this point I rested 
 my eyes and meditated. 
 
 "Suppose," I thought, "that Great Uncle Will- 
 iams's umbrella is really across the aisle from 
 me at this moment, with that girl as proprietor. 
 Then all my letters to the 914 members of the 
 American Association for the Advancement of 
 Invention will be in vain, for there is not a 
 woman among them." The conclusion seemed 
 Irresistible that it was my immediate duty to 
 Inquire about my fair neighbor's umbrella, but 
 I blushed at the mere thought. Yet an hour 
 or so more, perhaps the very next stop, might 
 see that pretty girl and her ivory-handled mys- 
 tery whisk out of the car, leaving me to con- 
 tinue my idle inquiries of the 914, and to bear 
 the Major's abuse. 
 
 The thought was too much. I sprang up 
 quickly, encountering a roguish glance from my 
 pretty neighbor. She would have been provoked 
 to know what a small part she played in my 
 thoughts as I approached her.
 
 85 
 
 "I beg pardon," I said, bowing as politely as 
 I was capable of doing, "your umbrella has such 
 a remarkable handle that I have ventured to ask 
 permission to look at it" 
 
 "Certainly," she answered simply, smiling so 
 broadly at my inquiry that I felt surprised. 
 
 Lifting her satchel to the floor and drawing 
 her lunchbox closer, she requested me to be 1 
 seated, and handed me her umbrella with a 
 look of intense amusement. Suddenly the cause 
 of it flashed across me. My query had seemed 
 merely a clumsy device to scrape acquaintance, 
 and so pitifully clumsy as to be convulsively 
 funny. Blushing and horrified, I sank into the 
 seat beside her, and looked at the umbrella 
 with a stony glare, wondering desperately what 
 I could say. 
 
 "Are you a connoisseur in umbrellas?" she- 
 asked quizzically. 
 
 "Well, I not exactly," I stammered. "I have- 
 a friend who has ai umbrella." 
 
 "Indeed!" ! j 
 
 "Yes," I floundered on, not very coherently. 
 "A remarkable umbrella. He inherited it from 
 his Great Uncle Williams. He died in 1889, 
 and left him an only bequest. It's nearly forty 
 years old." 
 
 "The bequest is forty years old, or your Great 
 Uncle Williams is?" she asked pityingly. 
 
 "Not my great uncle, but my friend's," I ex-
 
 36 
 
 claimed, horrified to have the Major's nightmare 
 relative loaded upon me. 
 
 "And your friend is forty years old?" 
 
 "No, his umbrella is." 
 
 We both laughed, and it cleared up the situ- 
 ation considerably. 
 
 "You see," I exclaimed, getting my senses 
 back by degrees, "my friend's Great Uncle Will- 
 lams died in 1889, and left him his family um- 
 brella as an only bequest, and it is now nearly 
 forty years old." 
 
 "Does he carry it still?" 
 
 "Oh, yes; he values it very highly, and it's 
 quite an interesting relic." 
 
 I suppose everybody who has been shaken 
 up mentally as I had been makes a break some- 
 where along the line. My turn was about to 
 come. My fair companion appeared politely in- 
 terested, and I continued idiotically, 
 
 'Tve been quite interested in the subject, be- 
 cause lately the old umbrella was lost, and I 
 have tried to help recover it." The real situ- 
 ation was so bluntly apparent to my new ac- 
 quaintance that her manner changed instantly. 
 
 "So you suspect my umbrella of being stolen 
 property?" she asked, coldly. 
 
 "Not by any means," I protested. 
 
 "I will trouble you for the umbrella, sir," she 
 continued. "Any one is at liberty to admire it, 
 but I cannot permit examination for identifica- 
 tion as somebody else's property."
 
 87 
 
 So saying she stood the umbrella up in the 
 corner, and covered the handle with her jacket. 
 The pleasant look of companionship had faded 
 from her face. Evidently my presence was no 
 longer agreeable. 
 
 Once more the Major's confounded umbrella 
 had brought me to grief, but I did not propose- 
 to yield so easily. Some radical turn was needed, 
 and this time the Major and not I should be 
 sacrificed. 
 
 "Please don't condemn me so hastily," I said. 
 
 "You have condemned yourself." 
 
 "On the contrary, the court isn't open. The- 
 judge and clerk went out some time ago for a 
 cheese sandwich." 
 
 "When do they return?' she asked with a 
 glimmer of a smile. 
 
 "They are just coming in now. You shall be 
 judge and plaintiff, too. Please state your side 
 of the case." 
 
 "It is very simple and very conclusive," she 
 said. "You know a man who owned an old 
 umbrella. Lately he lost it. You wanted to- 
 help him find it, and seeing a young woman on 
 a railroad train, alone, and with an umbrella 
 remotely resembling the lost one, you accosted 
 her, determined to obtain the umbrella if it ap- 
 peared at all like your friend's." 
 
 She was certainly close to the truth, but I 
 listened with an apparent air of pity.
 
 88 
 
 "Is the court ready for the defence?" I asked. 
 
 4 'It is." 
 
 "Then I put in a total denial. The whole 
 umbrella episode is a fiction." 
 
 "Your Uncle Williams and all?" she asked in 
 surprise. 
 
 "All fiction," I continued calmly. "The fact 
 was I wanted dreadfully to get acquainted with 
 the young lady who sat across the aisle, and 
 I couldn't think how to accomplish it. I racked 
 my brain from Hartford to Springfield for some 
 excuse, and finally cooked up the umbrella epi- 
 sode. I was rather shaky at first, wasn't I?" I 
 inquired. 
 
 "Indeed you were," she answered, laughing 
 at the recollection. 
 
 "This is the defence," I added, solemnly. "I 
 throw myself on the mercy of the court, and 
 ask for a decision of the case." 
 
 My companion was thoroughly mollified. 
 
 "The court decides that you are a very wicked 
 man," she said, "and that you told a very large 
 story for a very small reward. For punish- 
 ment you shall not mention 'umbrella' till we 
 get to Worcester, where I change cars." 
 
 I gave a parting glance at her ivory-handled 
 property in the corner. If that umbrella was 
 not the one given me on Pike's Peak it was 
 a well-preserved twin. The size was right; the 
 silk was right; the handle was ivory, carved to
 
 represent a bunch of grapes and two cupids 
 rampant. So much I had seen in my hurried 
 and rattled inspection. However, the Major 
 was overboard now, and I had burned my 
 bridges. 
 
 "All right," I said, "I would meekly endure 
 a far more terrible punishment than that to 
 earn your society to Worcester." 
 
 The hour that followed was a delightful one. 
 We chatted upon all sorts of subjects, and I 
 found that my companion was not only exceed- 
 ingly pretty, she was also clever. It was evi- 
 dent that she had been carefully educated, and 
 I early learned that she was either a Wellesley 
 student or had graduated from that institution; 
 which, I could not determine, for while she 
 chatted freely on impersonal subjects, she was 
 very wary in referring to herself. My admira- 
 tion increased rapidly, and I was anxious to 
 obtain some clew to her identity before reach- 
 ing Worcester, which she had mentioned as her 
 stopping place, and which we were now rapidly 
 approaching. I suggested that we at least ex- 
 change names. She laughingly declined, but 
 held up one corner of a dainty cambric hand- 
 kerchief to my eager gaze, and let me see the 
 word "Mabel." That was all; nothing would 
 Induce her to reveal more, and when, at length, 
 I helped her from the car at Worcester, and 
 reluctantly said farewell, beyond her first name
 
 40 
 
 and the fact that she stopped at Worcester to 
 merely change for some station in New Hamp- 
 shire, I had no clew to her identity or home. 
 I watched the dainty, girlish figure with the 
 satchel, lunchbox and the tabooed umbrella, 
 picking her way across the station and longed 
 to follow, which I would gladly have done, if 
 I had not felt sure it would have been consid- 
 ered a liberty. There was little time to debate 
 this, however, for my train was already mov- 
 ing. I swung on board, and returned to my 
 seat with the memory of the farewell smile 
 that my new-found friend had given me as the 
 train started, and a great sense of loneliness 
 and regret. My feelings for the rest of the 
 journey were of the most mixed and unsettled 
 character. The Major and his umbrella were 
 swept out of my mind, and I found that my 
 fair companion had been greatly like a Kansas 
 cyclone. She hadn't lasted long, but she had 
 done great damage. 
 
 "As usual, I have been a fool in one act," I 
 said angrily to myself, looking out the window 
 and seeing nothing. "She is the most attractive 
 girl I ever met, and I didn't have tact enough 
 even to learn her name. The world is full of 
 'Mabels.' That is merely the wisp of straw 
 before the starving donkey. I'm the donkey." 
 
 The average man takes pleasure in abusing 
 himself. It is a harmless occupation that re-
 
 41 
 
 lieves pressure and seems to start the mental 
 circulation. After roundly denouncing myself 
 for failing to ascertain the name of my van- 
 ished girl friend, and also for not following 
 her, I quieted my feelings by deciding to obtain 
 a Wellesley catalogue at the first opportunity 
 and to investigate every Mabel in the list. I 
 then told myself to calm down. 
 
 "You are too old, Dunkley," I said to myself, 
 "to prance around like a college boy. Nature 
 can't stand the strain. Be calm. Descend from 
 the train, old man, as tranquil as you entered 
 It." 
 
 The fact remained, however that I had had a 
 delightful adventure and met, even though for a 
 brief hour or two only, a most attractive girl, to 
 whom the adventure was evidently as novel and 
 exciting as it was to me. Added to that was the 
 tantalizing fact that I had either seen and 
 handled Great Uncle Williams's own umbrella, 
 or else one so like it that even the lynx-eyed 
 Whitehouse could not have told them apart. I 
 resigned myself to the inevitable, however, for 
 the adventure was over, and I had no means 
 of continuing it 
 
 On reaching Portland the next morning I 
 went to my hotel and found this telegram, for- 
 warded from New York, awaiting me: 
 
 Never had umbrella. Think Ditson, Middle- 
 town, Conn., took it. Try him. 
 
 O. PENFIELD.
 
 42 
 I wrote at once, as follows: 
 
 My Dear Professor Ditson: 
 
 I am having a harrowing experience over an 
 umbrella. Have you any property of that sort 
 in your possession that don't belong to you: 
 big black silk affair; ivory handle carved to 
 represent a bunch of grapes and a pair of cupids 
 rampant? If so, I beg of you to ship it to me at 
 once, at my expense. While on the association 
 excursion to Pike's Peak in July Major 
 Whitehouse placed in my charge an umbrella 
 given him by his Great Uncle Williams. It 
 was several centuries old, more or less. I was 
 to bring it East for him, but gave it to Randall. 
 He was called to Utah and says he gave it to 
 Cobb. Cobb denies the charge and says it 
 was given to Hotchkiss. He also sends an em- 
 phatic denial, but recalls the umbrella and de- 
 clares that O. Penfield, of Baltimore, has it. 
 Penfleld telegraphed a negative and says to 
 write you. He actually says you have it. I 
 am almost sceptical enough, my dear Professor, 
 to doubt the existence of that umbrella, so if 
 you haven't it don't hesitate to say so, but if 
 you have it, I beg of you to seek the nearest 
 express office at the earliest moment. You little 
 know the terrors of the Major when searching 
 for his own. Yours sincerely, 
 
 HUNTINGTON DUNKLEY. 
 
 The next three days I occupied attending 
 to business matters, which consumed little time, 
 and enjoying myself, which consumed a great 
 deal of time. I must confess, however, that the 
 fair Mabel had occupied a prominent place in
 
 43 
 
 my thoughts, almost too prominent for a staid 
 bachelor of thirty-seven, and I began to think 
 that my trip had added to> my woes rather than 
 lightened them. The fourth day came a letter 
 from Middletown. It was a large letter with 
 two stamps on it, which I felt had significance of 
 some sort, and I opened it hastily. It was as 
 follows:
 
 CHAIR OF 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL MECHANICS, 
 
 MIDDLETOWN, CONN. 
 
 September 10* 1894. 
 
 My Gear Dtinkley;- 
 
 Your letter arrived during my absence* 
 which explains 'delay. Mr. Randall asked me to 
 oriAg the umbrella East for him, and I did so 
 with pleasure. I wae Ignorant, however, of 
 the previous incident you mention or that it 
 belonged to Major ffhltehouse. I supposed It 
 was owned by Mr. Randall, and have awaited some 
 word from him. I am mortified to tell you* 
 however* that I cannot send the umbrella to you 
 at once. My daughter Mabel, w]\o ha a a weakness 
 for antiques and oddities, took a violent 
 liking to the old umbrella, and my wife Bays slit 
 .too* it with her to New Hampshire last wee},, 
 Had * feeen at home, I should- not have permitted 
 it, but the ntlechief is' done and I can only 
 apologize. She will be home October 1st, and 
 J will send the umbrella to you by express 
 immediately. 
 
 ttith much respect, 1 remain. 
 ojjtrfaithfuily,
 
 45 
 
 I laid the Professor's letter and its inclosure 
 down. The quest was over, and the Major's 
 elusive umbrella cornered at last; but better 
 than all, the identity of the bewitching Mabel 
 was disclosed. Fate had been hitting me hard 
 for a couple of weeks, but I frankly admitted 
 that handsome reparation was being made now. 
 Few men who long to meet a pretty and un- 
 known girl find a letter of introduction in the 
 morning mail from the girl's own father. I 
 picked up the unsealed envelope and read: 
 
 To Miss Mabel E. Ditson, care Hon. Josiah 
 Eddy, Main street, Nashua, N. H. Intro- 
 ducing Mr. H. Dunkley. 
 
 The inclosed note read: 
 
 My Dear Daughter: 
 
 The umbrella which I brought back from Den- 
 ver belongs to Major Whitehouse, of Jersey 
 City, and he desires it immediately. 
 
 This will introduce to you Mr. Huntington 
 Dunkley, of New York, a friend of the Major's, 
 and an esteemed friend of mine, to whom please 
 deliver the umbrella at once. 
 
 Mr. Dunkley is the third vice-president of the 
 American Association for the Advancement of 
 Invention, and a young man of high inventive 
 attainments. I commend him most heartily to 
 your favor. Your affectionate father, 
 
 D. L. D. 
 
 In three hours my business in Portland was 
 completed, and I was on my way to Nashua. 
 Professor Ditson would have been surprised, I
 
 46 
 
 presume, at my haste. He would have been 
 still more surprised, however, at the first chap- 
 ter of the story. 
 
 "There are a good many things the old peo- 
 ple don't know," I reflected facetiously. It was 
 wonderful how kittenish I had become. I went 
 over to Nashua that evening from Boston, and 
 readily found the residence of Hon. Josiah Eddy. 
 It was a substantial, old-fashioned New Eng- 
 land house, with the usual big white pillars 
 before it. The maid informed me that Miss 
 Ditson was at home, and handing her my card 
 and the letter of introduction, I waited with 
 considerable trepidation in the old-fashioned but 
 well-appointed parlor. There was a brief delay, 
 then a rustle of feminine skirts on the stairs, 
 and my whilom acquaintance of the train stood 
 in the doorway. A look of utter bewilderment 
 came over her face as she recognized the visitor. 
 It almost seemed unfair, for while I understood 
 the situation, her father's note and my card in 
 no way suggested the railway acquaintance to 
 her until she saw me face to face. For a mo- 
 ment she hesitated, blushing, irresolute and al- 
 most frightened. 
 
 "Please don't treat me like a total stranger, 
 Miss Ditson," I said, rising to meet her, "it 
 has been a great pleasure for me to avail myself 
 of your father's note of introduction. I might 
 better call it a privilege."
 
 47 
 
 Miss Ditson was not a girl to lack self-pos- 
 session long. She recovered a fair working 
 supply while I spoke, and advancing easily to 
 where I stood, she held out her hand with 
 much cordiality. 
 
 "My father's friends are always welcome visi- 
 tors wherever I am," she said, "but your face 
 is such a familiar one, Mr. Dunkley, that the 
 recognition quite overwhelmed me for a mo- 
 ment." 
 
 "It would be hard to twist a compliment out 
 of that," I commented mournfully. 
 
 "Don't try," she said, laughingly, "you have 
 enough to do making peace with your con- 
 science." 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "You seem to have totally forgotten, sir, your 
 solemn assurances to the court that you had 
 no friend, no Great Uncle Somebody" 
 
 "He wasn't my great uncle," I protested. 
 
 "Well, anybody's, then. You denied his ex- 
 istence. Denied even the umbrella. You said 
 it was all for my sake," she pouted, "and it was 
 Just a whopper after all. I am glad papa has 
 supplied you with a character, for you need it. 
 Your are a dreadfully wicked, deceitful man." 
 
 "You forget the facts, Miss Ditson," I urged. 
 "You misunderstood my explanations in the 
 train, and in consequence were about to dismiss 
 me. Heroic measures were necessary. I threw
 
 48 
 
 my friend and his umbrella completely over- 
 board to preserve your acquaintance. I would 
 have thrown anything else over to keep it," 
 I added fervently. "Was I not justified?" 
 
 "Perhaps," she said, with a glance that 
 thrilled me. "Any way, I mustn't be too severe, 
 for I am far from blameless myself. Indeed, 
 your opinion of me must be dreadful. Now, 
 Mr. Dunkley," she went on giving me no chance 
 to protest, "you must lay the umbrella subject 
 aside for this evening, anyway." 
 
 '^Certainly," I said, "I did not call to discuss 
 umbrellas." 
 
 "I thought that was your favorite theme?" 
 
 "It isn't I can talk about anything. Try 
 me." 
 
 "I will," she answered, laughing, "but I wish 
 to introduce you to my uncle and his family, 
 and then I am going to take you with me to a 
 little informal party nearby." 
 
 "I am not dressed for it," I protested. 
 
 "Yes, you are." 
 
 "Very well, I am a willing victim," I said, 
 though inwardly regretting that I could not 
 have Miss Mabel all to myself. 
 
 I spent that night as Mr. Eddy's guest, for 
 he would not hear of my return to Boston after 
 the pleasant evening passed with his family, 
 and a hotel, he declared, was inhospitable. The 
 next day there was to be a drive to Milford for
 
 49 
 
 autumn leaves, and I had been promptly in- 
 cluded. Although the party was a pleasant one, 
 I had eyes for Miss Mabel only, and as she was 
 gracious, the day was a delightful one to me. 
 That evening I returned to Boston, but before 
 leaving I had solemnly promised to come back 
 the next day for a week, to participate in sev- 
 eral festivities. The days that followed were 
 blissful ones for me. What Mabel's thoughts 
 were I knew not. My own were clear. I was 
 head over heels in love with the pretty, co- 
 quettish girl, and it was enough to be with her 
 and near her. We made excursions together 
 into the surrounding country, now doubly beau- 
 tiful with the first touches of autumn. 
 
 There are some parts of our land where sum- 
 mer seems to dry up and blow away, but in New 
 England her passing is in garments of radiant 
 jeauty. First a faint blush on all the land- 
 scape, growing deeper, until, seemingly at once, 
 the whole horizon is ablaze with endless, won- 
 drous harmonies of color, on hill and forest; 
 the dull brown-green of August has yielded to 
 tints no flowers can ever equal, no canvas re- 
 produce. 
 
 I did not look too closely into the future, con- 
 tent to let it bring its own problems, but mean- 
 time I spared no effort and no expense to 
 make myself agreeable and to win Miss Dlt- 
 son's favor. The Major and his umbrella had!
 
 50 
 
 almost faded from my thoughts. True, she had 
 not given me the umbrella, but it was here, and 
 safe, and that was enough. The Major, bad luck 
 to him, must wait. I was attending to my own 
 business now. Once or twice I had referred 
 to Great Uncle Williams's ancestral property, 
 but Miss Mabel had laughingly turned the sub- 
 ject to something else. I had noticed, more- 
 over, that she now used a dainty and modern 
 blue silk umbrella, which I took to be a delicate 
 acknowledgment of relinquished ownership in 
 the big one. 
 
 In rides, excursions and parties the week 
 passed delightfully. By general request I 
 lengthened my visit another two days to par- 
 ticipate in a final excursion to the shore. The 
 Intervening day Miss Mabel and I proposed 
 to occupy by walking out into the country for 
 chestnuts. Before we started the morning mail 
 brought me a letter in a scrawling hand. I 
 opened it with some curiosity and read:
 
 Ox Bnuuwcli.
 
 52 
 
 I put the letter in my pocket. It was the first 
 jarring note of the week. An hour later Miss 
 Mabel and I were strolling toward the outskirts 
 of the city 
 
 "I'm afraid, Miss Ditson," I remarked, re- 
 calling the letter in my pocket, "that we must 
 box up your adopted umbrella to-night and 
 ship it to the Major. He is getting excited." 
 
 Miss Mabel did not answer. I glanced at 
 Tier and noticed that the color had left her 
 cheeks. 
 
 "Would you rather wait till you return to 
 Ttfiddletown?" I inquired. 
 
 "I may as well tell you the truth at once, 
 Mr. Dunkley," she said in low tones, "the um- 
 brella is not in my possession." 
 "Then where is it," I asked in astonishment. 
 "I do not know." Tears of mortification and 
 embarrassment came to her eyes. "It is lost," 
 she faltered. "When I left the train which I 
 took after leaving you at Worcester I must 
 have forgotten it, and permitted it to remain in 
 the seat, for after reaching my uncle's house I 
 was horrified to discover that the umbrella was 
 missing. I went to the station immediately 
 and offered a reward. I telegraphed the gen- 
 eral office in Boston. It has done no good. The 
 umbrella is lost, and I cannot tell you what 
 my feelings have been. I knew this moment 
 must come, but oh how I have dreaded it, and
 
 53 
 
 hoping my efforts might produce some result 
 I have kept you here, and tried to prevent you. 
 from thinking of the subject. Oh, Mr. Dunk- 
 ley," she added, impetuously, "what a wretched 
 girl you must think me. Can you ever forgive 
 such carelessness and duplicity?" 
 
 "There is nothing to forgive, Miss Mabel," I 
 said, sadly. "The umbrella is absolutely noth- 
 ing to me. Something else grieves me far more- 
 Yes, overwhelms me." 
 
 "What is it?" she asked apprehensively. 
 
 "I have been telling myself day after day that 
 your cordiality and favor showed that I wa& 
 not distasteful to you, and from that I dared to 
 hope for even more. You have shattered all my 
 dearest hopes by telling me your favor to me 
 was a matter of calculation to stave off ad- 
 mitting the loss of an umbrella." 
 
 "Oh, not at all not so bad as that," she pro- 
 tested, eagerly. 
 
 "And that my visit and my entertainment 
 were prompted and designed to prolong con- 
 cealment," I added bitterly. 
 
 My companion made no reply. She seemed 
 overwhelmed. 
 
 "While I regret the loss of the umbrella, it 
 does not merit a second thought, but I feel 
 angry and hurt at the feigned esteem for my- 
 self." 
 
 Something I had said stung Miss Mabel to 
 momentary anger.
 
 54 
 
 "Oh, don't let that trouble you," she said 
 coldly. "I like you. I couldn't help it. You 
 know papa wrote you I had a weakness for 
 antiques and oddities." 
 
 This was a shot I was not prepared for, and 
 I was about to retort sharply, when I noticed 
 that my companion had collapsed agan, and 
 that the tears were trickling down her cheeks. 
 My anger was gone in a second. 
 
 "It's all the Major's umbrella," I said to 
 myself. "It has made me miserable for a 
 month, and now the wretched thing has cast 
 Its blight on her life. Here and now I end the 
 Major." 
 
 "Miss Mabel," I said, gently, stopping in our 
 walk and facing her. "We are having some 
 explanations this morning that may in the end 
 do us both good. Set your mind at rest about 
 the umbrella. I am thankful it is gone. May 
 It never return." 
 
 "I thought it was terribly valuable," she said 
 in surprise. 
 
 "There is something else of far greater value 
 and importance to me," I continued eagerly, 
 "for it involves the happiness of a lifetime. 
 The idle quest for an old umbrella was long 
 ago swallowed up and lost in the quest for your 
 friendship and love." 
 
 My companion started and walked on. "We 
 shall never find chestnuts at this rate, Mr.
 
 55 
 
 Dunkley," she said, looking back at me with 
 a suggestion of returning pertness. 
 
 "I cannot trifle now, Miss Mabel. In a few 
 hours I shall start for Boston. Let us have a 
 plain understanding before I go. Whatever you 
 think of me, remember now, and when I have 
 left you, that the devotion and love of my life 
 have been laid at your feet. Is there no chance 
 of my winning your love in return?" 
 
 Silence. 
 
 "Miss Mabel," I went on impetuously, "do 
 you remember the court that we held that day 
 on the train?" 
 
 "When the judge and the clerk went out for 
 a cheese sandwich?" she asked, smiling faintly. 
 
 "Yes. You were the judge and the plaintiff 
 then. Now the court is in session again. This 
 time you are judge alone. You have heard the 
 plea. Do not send me away! My happiness 
 Oh, Mabel, my all, depends upon your de- 
 cision." 
 
 I tried to control myself, but my voice faltered 
 with intensity of feeling as I paused. 
 
 We had stopped again in our walk. The spot 
 was a secluded one on the outskirts of the citv. 
 and though there were houses near, they stood 
 at increasing intervals. Back of us was a high 
 fence, over which extended the brilliantly clad 
 branches of a large maple, the fallen leaves of 
 which formed a yellow carpet beneath us. Ma-
 
 56 
 
 bel was still silent. She pushed a dead leaf 
 along with the toe of her dainty little shoe, 
 and then with a glance far more eloquent than 
 words, she said: 
 
 "The court decides in the affirmative, with 
 costs." 
 
 I didn't wait for more. I took that dear girl 
 in my arms and kissed her with a fervor that 
 spoke the devotion of a lifetime. I suppose it 
 was seen. I don't care if it was. 
 
 "What are the costs, Mabel?' I asked. 
 
 "You paid them just now," she replied, blush- 
 Ingly.
 
 J\ Common Sense Cupid. 
 
 The thronging noises of the great city, sub- 
 dued by midnight, but never ceasing, came 
 distantly over the housetops to the windows 
 of the tall bachelor apartment-house where 
 Arthur Hanford occupied a modest parlor and 
 bedroom, but they did not serve to distract 
 him from his own engrossing thoughts, which, 
 beginning apparently with an open letter on the 
 table, had carried him many years and many 
 miles away. 
 
 Stroke by stroke, each more delayed and doubt- 
 ful than the last, the little French clock on 
 the mantel struck 12, midnight Hanford's 
 clock always had especial difficulty with mid- 
 night, and on this particular occasion seemed 
 to give an asthmatic gasp of relief that the 
 twelve strokes had been duly accomplished 
 without mishap which, of course, was entirely 
 from the standpoint of the little French clock
 
 58 
 
 not Hanford's, for Hanford was acting 
 strangely. A busy, active man of affairs, he 
 was not ordinarily given to fits of abstraction, 
 yet on this particular evening he had been sit- 
 ting in his easy chair for two hours, com- 
 pletely lost in thought that was evidently sad- 
 dening in the extreme. 
 
 Arthur Hanford was a tall, well-built man, 
 with brown hair and mustache, the former 
 touched here and there with a gray line or 
 two, more indicative of hard work than age, for 
 he was still a "young man," when that hard- 
 worked phrase was made courteously broad in 
 its application. 
 
 Now that the little French clock had served 
 notice of midnight in vain, the outlook for its 
 owner's speedy mental return to everyday mat- 
 ters was discouraging, and it had settled down 
 to a steady all-night tick, when the door was 
 opened without the suspicion of a knock, and 
 a plain-featured young man of perhaps thirty 
 years, entered. "I saw your light, Hanford," 
 he remarked, making himself comfortable on 
 the sofa, "so I ventured to drop in. Can't sleep 
 so early myself. After a year on a night desk 
 in a newspaper office, you might as well chase 
 a rainbow as a snore, before 1 o'clock." 
 
 "Then you are back on day work, are you, 
 Watson," said Hanford, apparently not sur- 
 prised at his visitor's arrival.
 
 59 
 
 "Sorry to say I am, and in consequence my 
 nights, from 8 to 1, are mere vacant spaces 
 ten-acre lots of time, so to speak, a portion of 
 which I am now prepared to devote to you 
 unless you are busy," he added. 
 
 "No, I am not busy," replied Hanford, quiet- 
 ly. "I received a letter this evening," he con- 
 tinued, "that has affected me considerably, and 
 I have wasted hours in profitless thoughts." 
 
 "Thoughts," rejoined Watson, sententiously, 
 "are poor companions after the age of thirty, 
 for the 'might have beens' begin to appear, 
 and make things uncomfortable. Before thirty 
 it is all 'may be,' which, of course, is all right. 
 In your case, Hanford, you are beyond the 
 thirty line. You have no business to think." 
 
 "I fear you are right," said Hanford, wearily. 
 "This letter has brought old times back to me 
 thick and fast." 
 
 "Meditation in its most aggravated form 
 from a letter," remarked Watson. 
 
 "Why so?' 
 
 "Well, a letter generally indicates a woman in 
 the case. Am T right?" 
 
 "You are." 
 
 "And a woman in the case indicates that the 
 'might have been' microbes are simply count- 
 less. Am I right?" 
 
 "You are." 
 
 There was something in Hanford's saddened
 
 60 
 
 and lifeless manner that attracted his friend's 
 attention. They were opposites in temperament 
 and appearance, thrown much together; first, 
 because they lived across the hall from each 
 other, and afterward because a genuine af- 
 fection had sprung up between them. 
 
 Watson was a man of few natural advan- 
 tages. Plain-looking and one of those unfortu- 
 nate men upon whom everything seemed ill-pro- 
 portioned, his features were irregular, and his 
 thin and refractory beard was thickest where 
 least desired. A sensitive appreciation of his 
 own physical defects made him extremely diffi- 
 dent with the other sex, and his conversation 
 often took the careless and cynical tone which 
 frequently occurs when a man's associates 
 are almost entirely masculine. Yet beneath a 
 rough and somewhat careless exterior, there 
 were depths of unstirred tenderness and un- 
 selfish devotion. The existence of these qual- 
 ities, though unnoticed and perhaps by some un- 
 suspected, served nevertheless to make him a 
 trusted friend, and Hanford's apartment was 
 not the only one In the big building where Wat- 
 son's rough personality and crisp and original 
 remarks were always welcome. 
 
 "It has long been a belief of mine," he said, 
 watching his friend closely, and wondering 1 
 how he could aid him, "that most of the 'might 
 have beens' are totally inexcusable. We hu-
 
 61 
 
 man beings have the unhappy faculty of blun- 
 dering at a crisis. The head should be clearest 
 at the most critical moment. As a matter ol 
 fact, it seldom or never is." 
 
 "Possibly you are right," said Hanford, "but 
 I am fatalist enough to doubt it." 
 
 "You should not." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Because it is generally a question of common- 
 sense. Most of us possess that inestimable gift, 
 but too often we ignore it." 
 
 "Common-sense does not apply to affairs of 
 the heart," said Hanford. 
 
 "So lovers always declare. I never under- 
 stood why. Perhaps I shall when the tender 
 passion smites me. They take your standpoint; 
 smile a sad smile; say, 'Oh, no,' and suffer. I 
 take it your present trouble is a love affair of 
 some sort, and I'll wager most anything that 
 there is a lack of common-sense tied up in it 
 somewhere." 
 
 "I don't believe in a common-sense Cupid," 
 said Hanford, shortly. 
 
 "Come, Hanford, what is the trouble? If it 
 isn't indelicate to ask it, may I hear the story? 
 My theories may be wrong, but I should like to 
 test them." Watson's tone was hearty and 
 sympathetic. He looked anxiously at his friend, 
 feeling sure from his voice and manner that 
 some serious trouble had overtaken him.
 
 62 
 
 "I don't mind telling you about it, Watson. 
 Indeed, it may do me good to talk to a trusted 
 friend, but it will probably bore you. There is 
 nothing thrilling or dramatic in the story." 
 
 "Glad to hear it," interposed Watson. "We keep 
 that sort of thing for Sunday specials. This is a 
 week day. Go ahead, but first lend me a pipe. 
 Without tobacco, conversation after midnight, as 
 Shakespeare sweetly observes, 'is a wasteful 
 and ridiculous excess.' " Saying which he 
 filled and lighted a cob pipe from his friend's 
 tray, and resumed his comfortable attitude on 
 the sofa. "To apply my common-sense method 
 which you object to," he continued, "to affairs 
 of sentiment, we ought, of course, to have the 
 facts. I should not feel competent to advise 
 you in a love affair actually in progress, nor, 
 indeed, should I be justified in intruding argu- 
 ment and platitude under those circumstances. 
 That would be simply a case of vivisection. I 
 take it this case is old enough to permit dis- 
 cussion without indelicacy." 
 
 "Old enough, yes." Hanford paused. His 
 thoughts seemed again to have strayed from his* 
 little parlor and his friend's companionship. 
 
 "The incident was one of my youth," he said 
 after a moment's silence. "To the girl it is an old 
 and long-forgotten story. To me well, you 
 needn't mind me. Here it is: 
 
 "You have often heard me refer to my college
 
 63 
 
 life and the mistake I made, considering my 
 present occupation, of fitting myself at a tech- 
 nical school to be a mining engineer. I think, 
 however, that I have seldom mentioned the 
 two years which followed graduation. Indeed, 
 to look back on them, they seem like a dream 
 to me. They represented an earnest attempt to 
 follow my chosen profession, and were years of 
 great effort and unrequited labor. 
 
 "On concluding my course at college, I ad- 
 vertised in the technical papers for employ- 
 ment and received one reply. It came from a 
 man in Boston, who said he desired some spe- 
 cial work performed in the way of mineralogical 
 research, and suggested an interview. I went 
 to Boston and found my inquirer represented 
 a syndicate prepared to search for Iron ore. 
 
 "Perhaps you know that the western, or New 
 York, shore of Lake Champlain is rich in iron 
 deposits, which are profitably mined at several 
 points. The whole western shore is wild and 
 rugged, while the Vermont shore opposite is 
 level, accessible and highly cultivated. 
 
 "The syndicate believed that a careful investi- 
 gation would disclose iron ore at some point 
 along the Vermont shore, of better quality and 
 more easily mined. If ore could be found con- 
 taining magnetic qualities it would be of im- 
 mense value. 
 
 "After some negotiation, I was engaged for
 
 64 
 
 my expenses and a trifling salary besides, to 
 make a thorough examination of the eastern 
 shore, my incentive to diligence and success 
 lying in a handsome bonus offered by my em- 
 ployers for the desired discovery. 
 
 "I began immediately, and deciding that my 
 outside work must be done during the sum- 
 mer months, I settled on a small village just 
 below Burlington as my headquarters, and ob- 
 tained lodgings. There I remained for several 
 weeks, making a careful study of the geological 
 formation of that region, and then set out on a 
 mile-by-mile observation of the shore, making 
 a chart and obtaining specimens of rock forma- 
 tion. 
 
 "Once a week I returned to my headquarters 
 and labelled and arranged my specimens for 
 future study. 
 
 "I need not tell you that my waking hours 
 were not all devoted to the search for ore, 
 though I labored long and faithfully to that end. 
 The village I had chosen for my temporary 
 home was beautifully located, perhaps half 
 a mile from the lake, though from that side only 
 the white spire was visible. It was a farming 
 village, like most Vermont towns, peaceful and 
 spotless, with its common, its white houses and 
 elms, and that air of substantial comfor* so 
 characteristic of New England, and so seldom 
 seen elsewhere.
 
 65 
 
 "The village itself was a mere hamlet. There 
 were three stores and perhaps fifty houses al- 
 together. I early learned, however, that there 
 was one leading and dominating spirit in the 
 community. 
 
 "Vermont elects a Governor annually, and, in 
 consequence, her ex-Governors are innumerable. 
 One of them, ex-Governor Milbank, lived in 
 the village and he controlled it mentally, socially 
 and financially. 
 
 "The Governor was a man of large property, 
 and though living in a rural community, was 
 far from being provincial. His house, the most 
 pretentious in town, was surrounded by lawns 
 and shrubbery, and was furnished in perfect 
 taste. It was a gentleman's house in every 
 particular, and as both the Governor and his 
 family travelled much, they had accumulated 
 many objects of interest from other lands. 
 
 "When I went to Lyndon, Governor Milbank 
 was a well-preserved man of sixty. His wife 
 was a cultivated and agreeable woman. Their 
 large family, consisting of four sons and four 
 daughters, was much scattered. Three sons 
 had married and settled down at distant points; 
 two daughters were also married; and of the 
 two at home unmarried, cne was not over six- 
 teen, still a schoolgirl." 
 
 Hanford paused, while his friend refilled the 
 cob pipe.
 
 66 
 
 "Eligible young men, as you doubtless know," 
 he resumed, "do not teem in country villages, 
 and my arrival was soon known in the Gov- 
 ernor's house. I sought an introduction, and 
 before long I became a welcome visitor, drop- 
 ping in frequently whenever I reached town 
 from one of my numerous expeditions. Some- 
 how I found the younger daughter the most 
 companionable member of the family. Her 
 elder sister was older than I and a fine girl, 
 but much occupied with the affairs of the house- 
 hold or the many and ramifying interests out- 
 side. 
 
 "The young son at home was a shy, retiring 
 boy, with whom I had little in common. After 
 my trips I generally took a day off, and if I 
 needed a companion for a walk, a fishing excur- 
 sion to the nearby shore, an opponent at tennis 
 or, in short, a congenial associate, Kathleen 
 Milbank was always ready. 
 
 "She would not have been called pretty, but 
 she had a vivacious, attractive face, graceful 
 figure and manners that were unaffected and 
 indescribably pleasing. She was the most com- 
 panionable girl I ever met, an inveterate flirt, 
 as romantic as her age suggested, bubbling 
 over with animal spirits and good nature. She 
 showed the influence of careful rearing, for 
 she had a large store of good sense, 
 and in her quieter moods gave glimpses of the 
 genuine, earnest womanhood to come.
 
 67 
 
 "Kathleen was eight years younger than I, 
 which means more at that age than it does 
 later, and while I regarded her as an ideal com- 
 panion I studiously avoided anything senti- 
 mental, in spite of the opportunity which her 
 age and romantic disposition offered. It never 
 occurred to me to analyze this. It came, I sup- 
 pose, from a feeling that trifling might lead to 
 serious results, and as I was older and more 
 experienced I had no right to take such a course. 
 
 "We had both had affairs of the heart, at 
 least we called them so, and Kathleen related 
 hers with deepest interest and laughing eyes, 
 especially her school escapades. 
 
 "A favorite resort of ours was a bluff on the 
 lake shore, about a mile to the southward, where 
 a tongue of land jutted into the lake, breaking 
 the uniform shore line and forming a bay. OR 
 this bluff Burgoyne had encamped for a day or 
 two during his ill-fated expedition to Saratoga, 
 and had left a permanent reminder of himself 
 in rude earthworks, still dimly visible. Here 
 beneath a sentinel elm we spent many pleas- 
 ant hours reading and talking. 
 
 "Kathleen had ideas of her own, which she 
 expressed remarkably well. She acted as an 
 intellectual stimulant to me, and our discussions 
 on all sorts of topics were of value to us both. 
 
 "Gradually my association, with Miss Kath- 
 leen became the most delightful feature of my
 
 68 
 
 life at the lake, and I found myself looking for- 
 ward to our weekly excursions with consider- 
 able interest. Do not imagine, however, that 
 I neglected the rest of the family, for I found 
 them all agreeable friends, and felt in return 
 that I was liked by them. 
 
 "There were occasional visitors, young people 
 of both sexes, at the Governor's house, and at 
 such times I shortened my stay in the village and 
 made my excursions especially lengthy and 
 thorough. 
 
 " 'She doesn't want me around,' I reasoned. 
 4 I am welcome when younger and more con- 
 genial companions are lacking, but when they 
 are present I ought to be absent.' 
 
 "This policy I regarded at the time as a lofty 
 exhibition of disinterested friendship. Perhaps 
 at this distance I can see a different reason, 
 unsuspected at the time. 
 
 "In September Kathleen left for boarding 
 school, and in spite of my independence and the 
 positive assurances I gave myself, the town lost 
 interest for me immediately. As my season was 
 practically over, I packed up my data and sam- 
 ples, and early in October departed for Boston, 
 having completed about two-thirds of my task. 
 The winter was occupied in working out my 
 notes and testing specimens. Several of the 
 latter showed encouraging results, and my em- 
 ployers were so well pleased that they decided
 
 to have me complete my work the following 
 season. Accordingly, when the spring was well 
 advanced, I resumed my old miarters and mode- 
 of life. 
 
 "Kathleen and I had exchanged letters oc- 
 casionally during the winter, and I had seen her 
 twice, so the gap made by the separation was 
 not especially wide. We fell back into our old 
 ways, companionship and excursions, in the 
 most natural and comfortable style, and the sum- 
 mer sped away in this congenial combination of 
 work and holiday. 
 
 " 'I do not care for Kathleen except as a 
 jolly girl friend,' I kept saying to myself, 'and. 
 she cares nothing for me except in the same 
 way. There are two or three young sprigs 
 who stand far higher with her sentimentally 
 than I do, and I am glad of it, for, of course, I 
 am much older, and I am not laying siege to 
 her heart, so sentiment must be kept out.' I did 
 not notice that the very vehemence of this argu- 
 ment with myself Indicated something amiss. 
 
 "Thus the last weeks of my stay passed, and 
 as they approached a close I was conscious 
 that an indefinable dread was settling over me, 
 which, in spite of every effort, I could not shake 
 off. 
 
 "At length, one afternoon in late August, as 
 we sat under the elms on the bluff, I was about 
 to tell her of my completed work and speedy
 
 70 
 
 departure. I had been giving her a lesson in 
 sketching, and she suddenly looked up and said: 
 " 'You are a great comfort, Mr. Hanford.' 
 ' 'Thanks,' I replied, Tm like tea-cheer but 
 don't inebriate.' 
 
 "You have turned two dull summers into 
 pleasant and profitable ones,' she continued, 
 'and by the end of the season your pupil in 
 literature and drawing will demand a diploma 
 from the Hanford Summer School.' 
 
 " 'The Hanford Summer School, as you call it, 
 Miss Kathleen,' I answered quietly, 'will close 
 its sessions to-day for good.' 
 
 '"What do you mean?' she demanded, with 
 the slightest perceptible start. 
 
 " 'Merely that my work is complete. I think 
 that I have found what I came for, and I must 
 go back to Boston as quickly as I can, to work 
 Tip my data. I have postponed telling you 
 because-well, I couldn't bear to do it, that's 
 all.' 
 
 "The sun was sinking in a gorgeous bank of 
 clouds across the lake. Kathleen put away her 
 sketching materials. She was very quiet. 
 
 ; "We shall say goodby to-night, Miss Kath- 
 leen,' I continued, as we started homeward, 'in 
 public, at your house, but while we are alone I 
 want to tell you that I count the hours we have 
 spent together as the most delightful I have 
 known. I realize that I have failed, perhaps
 
 71 
 
 through temperament and age, to be of of ab- 
 sorbing interest to you, but that doesn't alter 
 my sentiments or my enjoyment of the society 
 of one of the loveliest and most accomplished 
 girls in Vermont' 
 
 " 'The Flattery Course in the Hanford Summer 
 School is short but violent,' said Kathleen. 
 'Omit the compliments, please, Mr. Hanford. 
 We have passed some delightful hours together 
 for two summers. You have played the role of 
 Old Man to your own satisfaction, and now 
 that the curtain is rung down we will part good 
 friends. Is there any probability that the Young 
 Girl in Vermont will ever again see the Old 
 Man from Boston?' Her tone had become light 
 and careless. 
 
 " 'If his affairs prosper, yes,' I replied. A 
 feeling of intense disappointment and bitter- 
 ness came over me as I answered, and there 
 was silence for some minutes as we walked 
 beside each other. 
 
 "Somehow a sudden coolness, unknown be- 
 fore, unexpected now, had sprung up between 
 us. With it came the sudden realization that 
 I loved the girl beside me, and with an in- 
 tensity before undreamed of. 
 
 "A moment later we reached the west gate 
 of the Milbank lawn. 
 
 " 'Kathleen,' I said, impetuously, taking the 
 hand she held out as she turned to complete
 
 72 
 
 her careless farewell, 'whatever you think of 
 me, don't let us part like this. I have been 
 the pastime of a summer day for you. It has 
 been more than that to me more than I have 
 dared to think or say, and now that the day is 
 over, we part, and apparently you have not even 
 enough interest to be kind,' I added bitterly. 
 
 "I felt her hand tremble in my grasp. She 
 drew it away as I paused, and before I guessed 
 her purpose, unpinned a bit of goldenrod which 
 she had worn on our excursion, laid it, silver 
 pin. and all, in my hand, and with one blushing, 
 radiant glance, was gone." 
 
 Hanford stopped his narrative and walked to 
 the window. He seemed overcome by the 
 thronging memories which his story recalled. 
 
 "Well?" said Watson interrogatively, at 
 length. 
 
 "There isn't any 'well' about it," rejoined 
 Hanford irritably. "That's all." 
 
 "All?" 
 
 "Yes. I called that evening to bid the family 
 goodby, and Miss Kathleen was invisible. She 
 sent a cordial farewell by her mother. 
 
 "The next morning I left for Boston, where I 
 learned that while my researches had been 
 partially successful, the syndicate had not. 
 
 "Their disagreements were brought to a head 
 by the failure and death of the principal pro- 
 moter of the plan; the whole scheme fell
 
 73 
 
 through, and I found myself with considerable 
 arrears of salary and expenses, completely with- 
 out redress, nor was I ever able afterward to 
 collect a cent, for the contract proved defective. 
 
 "Thus handicapped and deeply discouraged, I 
 came to New York, abandoned my profession, 
 and took the first employment that offered. It 
 brought me neither honor nor money; merely 
 existence. My pride prevented explanations to 
 Kathleen. Of course, I was not able to visit her, 
 and though I wrote her at intervals, our letters 
 were not satisfactory. The years that followed 
 were years of sharp conflict for me years of un- 
 remitting toil and much privation. I became 
 engrossed in my business ventures, and only 
 within the last three months have I begun to 
 see myself master of my own affairs. I had 
 struggled and saved, educated my two sisters 
 and won independence for myself. At length 
 I could do justice to my own yearnings, which 
 were ever toward Kathleen, but to-night, re- 
 turning to my apartment, I found an invita- 
 tion to her wedding." 
 
 Hanford paused a moment to recover his 
 composure. 
 
 "That's all, Watson," he concluded. "I didn't 
 mean to inflict it on you at such length, but 
 somehow it told itself. All but my own feel- 
 Ings. A man who sees the hopes, plans and 
 dreams of his life suddenly swept out of ex- 
 istence can't describe them as they go.
 
 74 
 
 "Now, you can moralize, old fellow. There 
 may be some vivisection, as you call it, but never 
 mind, go ahead, for two weeks from to-mor- 
 row," he added bitterly, "Kathleen Milbank will 
 be some one else's wife." 
 
 Watson made no immediate reply. His friend 
 walked up and down the room in gloomy silence, 
 the prey to a swarm of unhappy thoughts. 
 
 "Hanford, do you want to know what I think 
 of you?" asked Watson, at length. 
 
 "I suppose so." 
 
 "You are about as big a fool as I ever met." 
 
 "Why?" asked his friend humbly. 
 
 "Because the wreck of your happiness is en- 
 tirely your own fault. You won the love of a 
 sweet girl, said nothing more, and left her. Then 
 you plunged into business with varying success. 
 You forgot that she had time for thought. 
 Underneath, you cherished a genuine affection, 
 which you proposed to bring out properly capari- 
 soned, when you were ready, and somehow ex- 
 pected to find the girl waiting. Instead, you are 
 surprised to learn that she belongs to another." 
 
 "It's an old story, I suppose," said Hanford 
 gloomily. 
 
 "Perhaps it is, but it wouldn't be such an old 
 story if people used a little common-sense, as I 
 said when we began." 
 
 "Hang your common-sense," exclaimed Han- 
 ford irritably. "It's easy for a man without a
 
 75 
 
 love affair to moralize to a man who has one. 
 The whole realm of sentiment is built on the 
 opposite idea. A common-sense Cupid couldn't 
 exist." 
 
 "A common-sense statement of your case is 
 this," continued Watson, ignoring the interrup- 
 tion. "You loved a girl, and you had reason to 
 believe she loved you, but your affairs would not 
 permit you to marry her speedily. Common- 
 sense and common justice demanded that you 
 have a plain talk with her, and if she loved you 
 and was any kind of a girl, she would stick to you 
 for years, waiting till you were able to marry 
 her." 
 
 "It would have been unjust to Kathleen to pin 
 her down lo an uncertain future like mine," 
 urged Hanford. 
 
 "Not if she loved you. That isn't a woman's 
 way of arguing. Time enough to release her 
 when you had tried and failed. Your failure 
 to be sensible has worked injustice to you 
 both. Talk of your feelings, Hanford; what 
 have hers been during these years while faith 
 in you turned slowly to doubt and anxiety, 
 and that to bitterness and indifference?" 
 
 Hanford winced. 
 
 "These are the might have beens," continued 
 Watson, noting his advantage. "Merely the 
 common-sense Cupid you jeer at, applied to the 
 past; now what of the future?' Watson arose.
 
 76 
 
 "Arthur Hanford," he said with an earnest- 
 ness that his friend had never before seen him 
 exhibit, "I said at the outset that I wouldn't 
 pretend to advise a man on a current love affair. 
 I do pretend to advise you now, for there is a high 
 and manly duty before you. Mark this well. 
 One of two conditions exists at this moment. 
 Either Miss Kathleen, disgusted by years of 
 neglect and waiting, has forgotten you com- 
 pletely and turned to others, or else she still 
 cares for you, but has become discouraged by 
 your neglect and yielded to the importunities 
 of another. You've treated the girl shamefully, 
 and now you have reached a crisis in her life 
 and yours. It's your duty to see her and to see 
 her now. Tell her all your trials, privations 
 and faith. 
 
 "If she is immovable, and annoyed at your ad- 
 vances, you've proved to your own satisfaction 
 that her love for you is at length completely 
 dead, and whatever your own feelings, you will 
 at least be absolved from the responsibility of 
 having destroyed her happiness by your con- 
 duct. On the other hand, if by any possibility 
 she should still cherish your image in her heart, 
 you can save her from a life of sorrow and win 
 your own happiness besides." 
 
 "The cards are already out, Watson," falter- 
 ed Hanford, deeply agitated. 
 
 "That means hours and days to spare," re-
 
 77 
 
 torted Watson, with an intensity that fired 
 his friend. "I am a plain, blunt man, Arthur 
 Hanford, but I see a duty when it lies before 
 me as plainly as yours, and in this case it is 
 partially a question of honorable dealing. There 
 is only one course to pursue. I could hardly 
 respect you or even speak to you if you didn't 
 follow it. That isn't a threat, old fellow," he 
 added in a gentler tone, throwing his arm upon 
 his friend's shoulder in the half-caress which 
 a man sometimes uses to another. "I know you 
 too well, Hanford, to doubt you. You are a 
 strong-willed, true-hearted man. The very rec- 
 ord of your devotion to Miss Milbank proves 
 it. There is your duty; you will follow it, and 
 just suppose mind, I don't think it probable, 
 but then goodby, and good luck." 
 
 For an hour by the little French clock Arthur 
 Hanford struggled with his own despondency, 
 but when Watson arose in the morning he found 
 a card beneath the door and on it was penciled: 
 
 "Dear Watson: Have taken morning train. 
 Will telegraph you. A. H." 
 
 H. 
 
 Hanford had ample time for reflection dur- 
 ing the long hours of that Tuesday in late Sep- 
 tember as the train rolled northward. 
 
 He was not averse to reflection. There have
 
 78 
 
 been a few master minds of lightning action. 
 Doubtless some still exist capable of grasping 
 a complex situation without reflection and 
 adapting themselves to any emergency, but 
 most of us prefer an opportunity to withdraw 
 the scattered forces of the brain from the field 
 of battle, and to reorganize their broken ranks 
 in preparation for new conflicts. 
 
 Hanford had fallen into a method of thought 
 regarding his affairs of sentiment which was 
 now sadly shattered. He had trained himself 
 for years to a policy of repression. Accompany- 
 ing this had grown up the vague belief that 
 when his own wishes could be considered and 
 he could make them known, everything would 
 come out satisfactorily. 
 
 The violence of the shock attested how far 
 this idea had become rooted in his mind. 
 
 His friend's aggressive advice, and his un- 
 wonted earnestness in urging it, had added 
 another host of considerations, and now for the 
 first time, with the rush of the train and the 
 knowledge that action of some sort lay before, 
 came comparative tranquillity and the opportu- 
 nity to set his mind In order for the new con- 
 flict. 
 
 Doubtless Hanford's thoughts were not all 
 of the common-sense order. Perhaps even 
 Watson would not have expected that. Cer- 
 tainly the contending emotions which arise from
 
 79 
 
 such an experience greatly influence thought 
 and conduct, and make it difficult to follow a 
 logical course. 
 
 Out of the throng of thoughts which crowded 
 upon him came the increasing conviction that 
 however conscientious and self-sacrificing he 
 had been, his policy had been a fatally erro- 
 neous one. This brought the twin conviction 
 that his friend's advice was sound, and that he 
 was now following a plain duty. 
 
 Intent, however, upon avoiding another blow 
 such as he had received, Hanford assured him- 
 self again and again that he had not the slight 
 est hope of his own success. Things had gone 
 too far for that. His journey was solely to 
 justify his own conduct and assure himself 
 of Kathleen's happiness. 
 
 The mind, however, is a headstrong servant. 
 We do not always realize the hopes it cherishes 
 until their destruction brings us pain. 
 
 Having decided the question of his past con- 
 duct against himself, and approved with in- 
 creasing heartiness of the trip he had under- 
 taken, Hanford set himself to outlining a plan 
 of campaign. Wearied at length with the in- 
 numerable possibilities liable to arise and over- 
 throw any set scheme, he arranged a simple 
 programme to produce opportunity, and deter- 
 mined to let everything else arise spontaneously 
 from his sense of honor, manliness and affection.
 
 80 
 
 The trip at length drew to a close, and in the 
 twilight of the shortening fall day Lyndon was 
 reached. In the early morning, before leaving 
 the city, Hanford had visited a fashionable flor- 
 ist on Broadway and secured a box of the 
 finest orchids obtainable upon such a hasty order 
 and had had them packed with extreme care. This 
 box, which he had jealously guarded throughout 
 the trip from officious porters, he addressed to 
 Miss Kathleen Milbank, and as the train stopped 
 he intercepted the station agent as that worthy 
 was about to attack the baggage-car and said: 
 
 "Can you deliver a package for me this even- 
 ing with absolute certainty if I pay you enough 
 twice over?" 
 
 "I guess there ain't much doubt about it," an- 
 swered the surprised agent, forgetting the bag- 
 gage-car for the moment. 
 
 "Here's the money," said Hanford, passing a 
 liberal fee into the agent's hand. "Deliver this 
 box to Miss Milbank this evening at the earli- 
 est moment you can after this train leaves. 
 Can I depend on you?" 
 
 "You can. I'll give it to her myself." 
 
 Hanford's first move was made. He returned 
 to the train and went on to Burlington, where 
 he sought a hotel and much-needed repose. 
 
 Early that evening Miss Kathleen Milbank 
 examined with surprise and delight the exquisite 
 contents of Hanford's box. Within it she found 
 this note:
 
 81 
 
 "My Dear Miss Kathleen. The invitation to 
 your wedding has reached me just as I am 
 starting for Montreal on business. 
 
 "Permit me to offer these flowers as an ad- 
 vance-guard of innumerable good wishes which 
 I am anxious to express in person. I know how 
 occupied you must be, but may I have an hour 
 with you to-morrow afternoon, for an oldtime 
 walk and chat? 
 
 "I shall be in Burlington all the morning, and 
 a dispatch will reacn me at the Van Ness. 
 
 "Faithfully, ARTHUR HANFORD." 
 
 Emerging from breakfast the next morning a 
 telegram was handed to him. It read: 
 
 "Shall be delighted to see you as proposed at 
 3 o'clock. K. M." 
 
 The early afternoon found Hanford strolling 
 up the familiar shaded walk to the Governor's 
 house, outwardly calm, but keenly realizing how 
 much depended on the events of that afternoon. 
 A gentle breeze moved in the treetops, and the 
 soft haze of September hung over the landscape. 
 A moment more and he found himself in the 
 well-remembered parlors, h^ard a light step on 
 the stair, and Kathleen Milbank stood before 
 him with the cordial, unaffected greeting of an 
 old friend. 
 
 To Hanford's eager glance she had changed 
 little. The years had brought maturity to face 
 and figure, which more than bore out the pleas- 
 ing promise of her youth. Her large blue eyes 
 beneath delicately arched brows still looked as
 
 frankly forth upon the world as they did in 
 girlhood, and the singular charm of voice and 
 manner, which had made her a favorite in the 
 village from her earliest years, was still ap- 
 parent, though softened by an indefinable dig- 
 nity and maturity. She wore a pink dress of 
 some soft summer material, and a large white 
 hat trimmed with pink roses. So hearty and un- 
 embarrassed was Kathleen's greeting as Han- 
 ford stepped forward and took her hand that he 
 vaguely wondered whether it would not have 
 been better strategy to have surprised her and 
 thus have been able perhaps to gather some 
 clew to her feelings from her deportment. "It 
 is all useless, though," he thought, bitterly. "I 
 have sunk to the low level of a casual acquaint- 
 ance, and must be careful lest my call outlives 
 my welcome." 
 
 "That exquisite box which reached me last 
 evening, Mr. Hanford," said Kathleen, "was a 
 delightful surprise, not only in the contents, but 
 in the prospect it brought for to-day, and you 
 see I have my hat on already in anticipation. 
 Our old haunts are all the same, except May- 
 nard's wharf, which caved in three winters 
 ago." 
 
 "How about the bluff?" asked Hanford. "Is 
 there a summer hotel there yet?" 
 
 "Your inquiry is a year early," replied Kath- 
 Jeen, laughing; "the bluff has been sold, and
 
 88 
 
 there is to be a big hotel erected there next 
 spring." 
 
 "I hope they haven't begun work yet," inter- 
 posed Hanford, anxiously, "for I confess to a 
 weakness for the bluff. Is it still the same?" 
 
 "I believe so," said Kathleen. "I seldom or 
 never go there." 
 
 In a vague, indefinite way Hanford felt 
 pleased. 
 
 "Suppose we walk in that direction, anyway," 
 he suggested. 
 
 "Gladly," she answered, arising; "but you 
 must first let my mother and sister welcome 
 you, and promise to remain to supper with us." 
 
 A few moments later they were strolling along 
 the well-remembered path to the lake. Hanford 
 was conscious that he himself had improved in 
 the years which had elapsed since their parting. 
 Success is a great factor in any one's deport- 
 ment. Under it a small-minded man grows 
 pompous, but to a man of cultured sensibilities 
 success brings the confidence required to com- 
 plete good manners. Hanford belonged to the 
 latter class. His deportment, always that of a 
 gentleman, had measurably improved in ease 
 and grace. 
 
 There was much to talk about, even had they 
 avoided reminiscences. Hanford answered 
 Kathleen's kindly inquiries about himself cour- 
 teously but briefly that subject would come up 
 later.
 
 84 
 
 "I wrote you, Miss Kathleen," he said, "that 
 I wanted to deliver my congratulations to you 
 in person, and now that I try to do so, your 
 welfare is so dear to me that I hardly know 
 how to express with sufficient earnestness my 
 hope for its continuance and your life-long happi- 
 ness." 
 
 "I appreciate what you say, Mr. Hanford," 
 said Kathleen, quietly. "I expect to be very 
 happy. Colonel Ware is a noble, generous- 
 hearted man. He is much older than I, but 
 his devotion is unwavering, and I am proud to 
 have won his affection. Unfortunately he is an 
 Englishman, and lives in Toronto, which greatly 
 grieves my father, but one cannot control mat- 
 ters of sentiment. They are his only faults, I 
 believe." 
 
 "Not serious," said Hanford, pleasantly. Then 
 skilfully turning the conversation, he asked 
 numberless questions about village celebrities. 
 Some had been dead long, but Kathleen re- 
 lated with much animation events which had 
 befallen the others, and their odd characteristics. 
 Her clever descriptions and keen sense of humor 
 compelled many pauses and much laughter, till 
 it seemed to Hanford as they strolled on through 
 sunshine and shadow as though a day were 
 being lived over from the old days which his 
 memory cherished so tenderly. Talk of indi- 
 viduals led to recalling old events, and many an
 
 85 
 
 excursion and adventure was laughed over and 
 recounted. 
 
 "Do you remember, Miss Kathleen, that trip 
 we took to Bowman's Pond for black bass, and 
 how on the way over I stole a tintype of the 
 Boston boy you had flirted with at boarding- 
 school, and would not give it back because I de- 
 clared that one beau at once was enough?" 
 
 "Indeed I do," laughed Kathleen. 
 
 "And how I put the picture in my coat pocket 
 and left the coat beside the lunch basket on 
 shore, while we went fishing in an old scow, and 
 when we came back we found a tramp had 
 stolen the lunch and my coat, too, so that I had 
 to walk home in my shirt sleeves, and you 
 laughed all the way, and declared that there was 
 no honor among thieves because one thief had 
 been robbed by another thief?" 
 
 Kathleen's laugh had the same old mischiev- 
 ous ring as she recalled Hanford's coatless fig- 
 ure. 
 
 "I've often thought of it," she said, breath- 
 lessly. 
 
 "What's become of the Boston boy, Miss Kath- 
 leen?" 
 
 "How should I know, Mr. Hanford; that was 
 ten years ago." 
 
 "So you've forgotten him?" 
 
 "Ages ago." 
 
 "Have all your lovers shared that dreadful 
 fate, Miss Kathleen?'
 
 86 
 
 "I'm afraid they have," she answered, care- 
 lessly. 
 
 A sudden chill struck Hanford to the heart, 
 but he gave no sign of emotion. 
 
 "No remembrance, and no pity, I suppose," he 
 said. 
 
 "I have not observed that they need any." 
 
 The lake shore had been reached some min- 
 utes before, and they were now walking along 
 the bluff, with Kathleen slightly in advance. It 
 seemed to Hanford as he looked at the lithe, 
 well-poised figure before him as though he could 
 not give her up. All things in heaven and 
 earth were shut out by one overmastering de- 
 sire. Upon the highest point of the bluff four 
 elms still stood just within the old, grass-grown 
 earthworks. Under their welcome branches 
 Kathleen and Hanford had many times found 
 shelter in days gone by. Hanford made a seat 
 with a mossy stone for the back for his com- 
 panion, and threw himself on the turf at her 
 feet. The memory of their last visit to the 
 spot affected him powerfully, and perhaps even 
 Kathleen recalled it, for she also was silent. 
 
 Already the declining sun had begun the close 
 of a perfect day. The morning's sapphire blue 
 of lake and mountain had vanished. Across 
 the wide sweep of water lay an ever-moving 
 pathway of gold, and beyond the far Adirondack 
 peaks seemed clouded in a golden haze. Here
 
 87 
 
 and there a bit of white cloud relieved the deep 
 blue of the sky. In the far distance to the 
 south two blunt-prowed schooners were slowly 
 tacking down the lake. The only sound that 
 broke the stillness of the afternoon was the 
 measured ripple of tiny waves along the rocky 
 edge of the bluff. 
 
 Hanford broke the silence. 
 
 "Tell me of yourself," he said. 
 
 "There is little to tell," she answered. "I spent 
 three years after you left in school and college, 
 then two years in travel abroad, and since have 
 lived quietly at home, occupied with household 
 duties and occasional visits to Toronto, Washing- 
 ton and Boston." 
 
 "You make it an uneventful record, Miss 
 Kathleen." 
 
 "It is." 
 
 "Hardly so colorless as that, I think. You 
 know we used to be confidants," he added, 
 smiling. 
 
 "Habits fallen into disuse for a decade cannot 
 be lightly resumed, Mr. Hanford. Ten years 
 mean change to us alL You, for example, 
 changed many years ago." 
 
 Hanford colored at this thrust. 
 
 "You asked me about myself a little while 
 ago, Miss Kathleen," he said gravely, "and I 
 said little in reply. Now that you charge me 
 with change, and thus have implied inconstancy,
 
 it is but justice to myself to speak more freely 
 of my life than you have spoken of yours. I 
 grant that I have changed. I have attained a 
 man's estate in capacity for affairs, in knowledge 
 of life and in experience. In matters of heart 
 and sentiment no man was ever more true, un- 
 changed and unchanging. Ten years ago I left 
 this town bubbling over with a young man's 
 confidence and happiness. I had won your love, 
 though before I had not dared to hope for it, and 
 I had found the object of my professional re- 
 search, thus insuring liberal reward. I intended 
 to bring the business part to a quick and happy 
 termination, and then to seek you and reach the 
 understanding not touched in our last talk. Alaa 
 for human plans! I found my triumphant re- 
 port coldly received. Quarrels and death pre- 
 vented further action, and I was not only cheated 
 out of my reward, but I could not collect my ex- 
 pense account and salary. Thus I suddenly found 
 myself with the tables completely turned, and 
 actually in debt. I cannot tell you of my suffer- 
 ings during the month I lingered in Boston. I 
 tried to make my letters to you cheerful and in- 
 teresting, but their forced nature must have made 
 them hollow. About that time my mother died, 
 leaving my two younger sisters in my charge, 
 and when at length I had settled her affairs 
 and placed my sisters with a relative, guaran- 
 teeing their expenses, I found myself in New
 
 York with but $11 in the world. I had no friends 
 in the city, but I started out to find employment. 
 My profession seemed filled. In no direction 
 could I find an opening. Work I must and 
 would. It came at length in humble form, and 
 for five weeks, Miss Kathleen, I swept out a 
 grocery store and delivered parcels. I cannot 
 describe the discouragement and gloom of that 
 period. It was then I failed to write you, and 
 you chided me for neglect. Heaven knows 
 your memory grew bright as my own perplex- 
 ities and sorrows increased. Later I secured a 
 humble position in a broker's office. It brought 
 a mere pittance, but my sisters received their 
 allowance without a break. They never knew 
 what it cost me to send it. I lived practically 
 in a garret, and for more than a year I ate 
 meat but once a week, so rigidly did I econo- 
 mize. Do you wonder that when my poor, 
 parched nature turned to far away Vermont 
 and the girl I loved unfalteringly, and con- 
 trasted your luxurious surroundings and my 
 own condition, that I grew sick at heart? 'Not 
 yet,' I kept repeating, 'Not yet.' At length my 
 employers began to notice my attention to duty 
 and I was slowly advanced. It then became 
 necessary to educate my sisters, for I determined 
 they should have the advantages their birth 
 demanded. My own debts, incurred unjustly for 
 others, were still unpaid, remember, but I pushed
 
 90 
 
 steadfastly forward. Day and night I labored, 
 and year by year I slowly advanced. Last 
 month found me free of debt. One sister was 
 married in June. The other is engaged, and is 
 now, besides, self-supporting. As for myself, 
 two weeks ago the firm made me a junior part- 
 ner. I have taken no vacations beyond a day 
 here and there with my sisters, and it all seems 
 to me, as I look back upon it, one long, un- 
 ending stretch of labor. During all this time 
 my love for you was a thing apart from common 
 life. Other women were nothing to me, and I 
 kept saying to myself, 'When I am free I will 
 go to Kathleen and tell her all' " 
 
 Hanford's voice faltered and he paused a mo- 
 ment 
 
 "You must not tell me this," said Kathleen, 
 struggling to preserve her ordinary tone. She 
 was unconsciously leaning forward toward Han- 
 ford, and nervously twisting a bit of grass to 
 shreds. 
 
 "I must tell you," he said with an intensity 
 that permitted no opposition. 
 
 "When at length my business affairs shaped 
 themselves satisfactorily my thoughts turned to 
 you, for at last I was free. Monday I deter- 
 mined to write you fully, and on returning to my 
 apartment that evening I found the invitation 
 to your wedding." 
 
 Again Hanford stopped as the recollection of 
 that evening came over him.
 
 91 
 
 Kathleen was silent. With parted lips and 
 hands unconsciously folded, her eyes were fixed 
 upon the far-away hills across the lake. Han- 
 ford's frank recital of his experiences and his 
 unwavering devotion came like a revelation to 
 her and affected her deeply. 
 
 "Of course my own hopes were entirely swept 
 away by the news," continued Hanford quietly, 
 "but one thought remained and that was of 
 your happiness. I determined to take advantage 
 of a northern trip to see you, and to ask a 
 question." 
 
 "I cannot answer any questions, Mr. Hanford," 
 interposed Kathleen, much agitated. "You have 
 no right to ask them now, and I have no right 
 to answer." 
 
 "The question was a simple one, Miss Kath- 
 leen. I felt that our relations in the past and 
 my own unfaltering devotion to you gave me 
 the right to ask it without presumption." 
 
 "I cannot answer your question, Mr. Hanford," 
 she replied, "but after what you have just told 
 me you are entitled to know more of my own 
 life and thoughts than I have already explained. 
 The story is not a long one, Mr. Hanford, nor 
 is it pleasant. Do not delude yourself with the 
 masculine idea that you have done all the suffer- 
 ing. It is the same old story, of a woman griev- 
 ing In silence and alone, and maintaining an 
 outward cheerfulness. Doubt, anxiety and sor-
 
 92 
 
 row, and their concealment, are not agreeable 
 ten-year companions." 
 
 Hanford started at her unnoticed admission. 
 Kathleen's tone was hard and bitter. Her face 
 was pale, her hands tightly clasped. Long re- 
 pressed emotions seemed struggling for the 
 mastery. 
 
 "This is the final reckoning between us, Arthur 
 Hanford," she continued more deliberately, "and 
 you shall know the truth. When we parted ten 
 years ago I loved you with all the earnestness 
 I am capable of. I think few young girls of that 
 age love with the fidelity and devotion that I 
 did. You made the sad mistake of thinking my 
 affection for you depended upon success. Why, 
 I never thought of success. It would have been 
 a mere incident, anyway. No true woman ever 
 doubts her lover's ultimate success whatever 
 his present misfortunes and if success never 
 comes, her woman's heart merely grows tenderer 
 and truer to console him in defeat. Your letters, so 
 dear to me, became infrequent and they sounded 
 hollow. My pride told me to write you as you 
 wrote me, and only as often. As for my feelings, 
 you must search your own suffering to under- 
 stand mine. I finished school and entered col- 
 lege, but my heart was not in it. I was wait- 
 ing and watching for one who never came. My 
 thoughts were here. I lived over and over the 
 days we had spent together. I read the books
 
 we had read together. I have them yet. And 
 all this time I lived my life and took my part 
 in the events about me, and no one knew. No 
 one but my mother, she knew all. She urged 
 me to forget you. She said you were untrue, 
 and even if you were not you were unworthy 
 of me." 
 
 Kathleen paused. Hanford made no attempt 
 to answer. His face looked pale and drawn, 
 as though her simple story were an indictment 
 of his mistaken conduct too terrible to bear. 
 
 "I was not well for some time," continued 
 Kathleen, "and at the beginning of my second 
 year at college I became seriously ill. I was 
 taken from my studies and sent to Europe. Oh, 
 if you had only come to me then," she exclaimed 
 vehemently, as memory brought back the 
 thoughts of old. 
 
 "Kathleen," said Hanford, starting eagerly. 
 
 She regained her composure as quickly as she 
 had lost it. 
 
 "Too late," she said quietly. "No word came 
 from you. I was still true, but doubt and anx- 
 iety were usurping your place, and I was con- 
 scious of a growing sense of anger. My own 
 self-respect and pride were asserting themselves. 
 'What right has this man,' I kept saying, to 
 blast my life, and bring sorrow by reflection to 
 all who love me?' And so 1 arose, and shook 
 you off, Arthur Hanford, and began to do justice
 
 94 
 
 to myself. Four winters ago, in the south of 
 France, I met Colonel Ware. His attentions be- 
 came marked at once. I did not encourage 
 them, but, unlike many others in previous years, 
 I did not discourage them. I longed for rest. 
 The remaining years have been years of in- 
 creasing happiness. I had shaken off the old 
 life, and found a new one. I live in the pres- 
 ent, Mr. Hanford, not in the past. That is folded 
 up and laid away. I am blameless, unless, per- 
 haps, I might be blamed for suffering so long. 
 Not so with you. You were the master. You 
 had the power of speech or silence. The mean- 
 ing of each was plain. You chose silence. Per- 
 haps you had wishes and hopes. Perhaps it was 
 all a mistake. Well, the result is here before us. 
 We cannot change it. If you still love me you 
 must bear it to the end. You have brought sor- 
 row on yourself and you have you have" 
 
 Kathleen faltered and stopped. 
 
 "I have what, Kathleen?" he demanded. 
 
 Again she recovered herself, and altered the 
 sentence that was growing dangerous for her 
 self-control. 
 
 "You have cut your own path, and you must 
 walk in it" 
 
 Kathleen arose. 
 
 "And now, Mr. Hanford," she said in even 
 tones, "we have had our explanations. You 
 have told me what for years I hoped and dreamed
 
 95 
 
 and did not know. It conies too late, and I have 
 told yon well, Is it a pleasant thing to hear? 
 The explanations are over. Have they profited 
 either of us? Come, let us leave this place," she 
 added vehemently. 
 
 Hanford did not rise. A sudden realization 
 came over him that he had reached the end. 
 The furtive, unnoticed hope which had buoyed 
 him up on his journey fell away, arid left a 
 dreadful sense of error and failure through all 
 his years of effort. Overwhelmed, he buried his 
 face in his hands, and his strong frame shook 
 convulsively. 
 
 No words of Arthur Hanford, had he pleaded 
 till old age, could have spoken so eloquently to 
 Kathleen Milbank as the bowed and quivering 
 figure of the man she had loved so long and 
 faithfully. Her self-control was swept away, 
 and she kneeled beside him on the turf, an 
 eager, anxious girL 
 
 "Arthur," she cried, touching his arm, "you 
 must not, you must not. Think of yourself 
 of of me. We must not give way. I cannot 
 stand it. Ask any question you wish, but please, 
 please, be yourself." 
 
 With a great effort Hanford recovered his 
 composure. 
 
 "The story of your life and mine makes one 
 question just," he said. "The answer to it be- 
 longs to us both. Kathleen, do you love the 
 man you have promised to marry?"
 
 Her self-possession deserted her now. 
 
 "You should not ask that," she murmured, pale 
 and agitated. 
 
 "I should ask it," he said, relentlessly. "An- 
 swer, on your soul. Do you love him, Kathleen?" 
 
 "He loves me far more than" 
 
 Hanford arose and stood before her. "Kath- 
 leen Milbank," he said, speaking with an in- 
 tensity that thrilled her, "if you love this man, 
 no friend of yours will rejoice more earnestly 
 at your happiness, or pray more unceasingly for 
 its continuance than I. But if you cannot say 
 you love him, as you and 1 1 understand the mean- 
 ing of the word, you have no right to marry 
 him, for if you do, you wrong him and you 
 wrong yourself for life." 
 
 Kathleen was very pale. She made no effort 
 now to go. 
 
 "I should not have come here with you," she 
 said helplessly. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Because I felt a strange certainty that yon 
 would bring this subject up." 
 
 "Why did you come, then, and did you dread 
 this question?" asked Hanford. 
 
 Kathleen's will made one last stand. 
 
 "I cannot answer you, Mr. Hanford," she ex- 
 claimed. 
 
 He would not yield. 
 
 "Do you love him, Kathleen?" he urged,
 
 97 
 
 No armor she possessed would keep that dread- 
 ful question out. There were traitors, too, with- 
 in the citadel, for her own heart had often 
 asked the question before. She hid her face in 
 her hands to hide the rising color. 
 
 "Why have you come back," she exclaimed 
 passionately, "you ruined my happiness for 
 years, and as I struggle to regain it you snatch 
 it away again." 
 
 "You are strangely inconsistent," said Han- 
 ford, quietly. "I said at the outset that if you 
 really loved Colonel Ware my own feelings 
 would sink instantly out of sight, and you should 
 know me only as a loyal, steadfast friend. If I 
 seem otherwise, why is it?" 
 
 Hanford waited a moment for a reply. None 
 came. 
 
 "Kathleen," he continued deliberately, "you 
 cannot meet the test. You do not love the man 
 whom you are about to marry." 
 
 No answer. The silence that followed was 
 broken only by a sob. It seemed to change 
 them both. 
 
 "Does he know?" asked Hanford gently, at 
 length. 
 
 "Yes," she whispered. "He says he can make 
 me love him." 
 
 "And you thought he could?" 
 
 "Yes; I hoped so." 
 
 Hanford's voice sank to a whisper.
 
 "Do you think so, now?' he asked. 
 
 Kathleen's slender figure trembled. She made 
 no answer. 
 
 "Our mementoes of each other and the old 
 days," Hanford went on without pressing a 
 reply, "were not numerous, as you know, Kath- 
 leen, but I have one which has never left me, 
 and for ten years has been the shrine of my 
 heart. It is very precious to me, but I am 
 going to return it to you now, for it may plead 
 with you to do justice to yourself and to me." 
 
 He drew from his pocket a little worn leather 
 case, and placed it in her hand. Kathleen 
 opened it eagerly, and found within a wisp of 
 withered goldenrod, clasped in a tarnished sil- 
 ver pin. 
 
 "Will you promise me on that token, Kath- 
 leen, that you will not marry any man you do 
 not love?" Silence. It seemed to Hanford as 
 though the beating of his heart drowned the 
 ripple of the waves. 
 
 Kathleen raised her frank blue eyes to his. 
 
 "Yes," she said. 
 
 "Watson, J. D.?" inquired the messenger in- 
 terrogatively, about midnight. 
 
 "Yes, fourth floor," answered the elevator 
 man in no pleasant humor. 
 
 "Youse fellers," he said, as they went up, "is 
 like flies, No sleepin' oil account of yer. Thirty-
 
 99 
 
 seven," he added as he let the boy out of the 
 car and went down again. The messenger 
 knocked at 37. 
 
 "Telegram for Watson," he said. 
 
 There was a muffled sound within. Watson 
 opened the door, and took the envelope. He 
 tore it open and read: 
 
 "The common-sense Cupid won. A. H." 
 
 "Watson's got a jag on," remarked the mes- 
 senger to the elevator man five minutes later. 
 
 "What," exclaimed the latter in astonishment. 
 "It's the first he's had in this house, then." 
 
 "Well, he gin me two plunks. If it tain't a 
 jag, what is it?" 
 
 "It must be a jag," said the elevator man re- 
 flectively. 
 
 finT wS
 
 Che Jfuction Bonk. 
 
 "You ain't the only one that's got left," said 
 the station agent consolingly. "There's a man 
 inside the station little feller. Looks as though 
 he mount be from Lewisville or Cincinnatty. 
 Reckon you're from one of 'em yourself, ain't 
 yer?" he added inquiringly. 
 
 "I'm from New York," I said, wondering 
 vaguely if the station agent's flannel shirt hadn't 
 reached the age limit which entitled it to be re- 
 tired on a pension. 
 
 He was a man of perhaps forty years, of 
 large frame and smooth-shaven face. One cor- 
 ner only of his wide mouth was utilized for 
 purposes of conversation and expectoration, pos- 
 sibly to avoid the exertion of opening it all at 
 once a habit which imparted a whistling sound 
 to the conclusion of each sentence. 
 
 There was a moment's silence while he in- 
 spected me with an evident accession of in- 
 terest
 
 101 
 
 "Be you?" he said at length, "Well I'm sorry 
 you got left, and now No. 3 is in trouble, too." 
 
 "What do you mean?" I asked anxiously. 
 
 "She's due at 9 o'clock, but I've just heard 
 she's three hours late and gettin' later." With 
 which comforting news he etrolled away. With 
 the next train three hours late and getting later, 
 why hurry? 
 
 The feeble rays of a half -obscured October sun- 
 set were strugging across the station platform, 
 along which I was aimlessly walking. 
 
 Enforced idleness is seldom pleasant to a busy 
 man. I had missed my railway connections, 
 and found myself angry but powerless on the 
 platform of a little railway station in a sparsely 
 settled mountain county of Eastern Kentucky. 
 
 Perhaps not the smallest factor in my dis- 
 content was the knowledge that I ought not to 
 have attempted the trip at all. It was entirely 
 my partner's suggestion. 
 
 "See here, Van Dunk," he said to me as we 
 were discussing the firm's affairs one morning 
 of the previous week, "Colonel Bibb objects to 
 our bill for his book on 'Kentucky in the Re- 
 bellion.' He says $24 for alterations Is out- 
 rageous; that the only alteration he made on the 
 whole proof was to add an 's' to sassafras in the 
 foot note on Page 19. He says that he won't 
 pay the item. As a matter of fact, he tore his 
 proof to pieces, and added and subtracted ad
 
 102 
 
 lib. Here is all tlie data and somebody ought 
 to go and prove the thing to him." 
 
 "To Kentucky?" I asked incredulously. 
 
 "To Kentucky. We are always running up 
 against alterations, and every case ought to be 
 argued out with the customer." 
 
 "It strikes me," I remarked, "that it would 
 be money in our respective pockets to yield the 
 whole item and stay home. The amount in- 
 volved is $24, and the trip would cost $75, leav- 
 ing entirely out the time lost." 
 
 "Van Dunk," said my partner, impressively, 
 "we are young men building for the future. For 
 the sake of our reputation that item must be 
 argued, and the Colonel convinced whatever it 
 costs. My domestic affairs make it impossible 
 for me to go. You are the man." 
 
 Peace must be preserved in the business fam- 
 ily at all hazards, and I reluctantly started for 
 a certain small out-of-the-way village in Ken- 
 tucky, in no pleasant frame of mind, prin- 
 cipally anxious to have the argument out with 
 the military Bibb and return, and here I was 
 within sixty miles of the Colonel's home and 
 laid up indefinitely. 
 
 I looked off at the single track perspective, 
 running drearily out to a point in the fast grow- 
 ing dusk, and tried to be as philosophical as 
 the circumstances permitted. 
 
 There was absolutely no settlement about or
 
 103 
 
 near the station, unless one house about three 
 hundred yards away could be so dignified. The 
 country itself was not unpleasing. The station 
 stood on high ground that sloped gently to a 
 small river, perhaps half a mile away, and easily 
 seen. On the other side the country was rolling, 
 broken and heavily wooded, the background of 
 distant hills being sharply outlined by the set- 
 ting sun. It was not exactly the place one would 
 select for a long stay, and the chances for ac- 
 commodation depended, it appeared, on the one 
 house, where doubtless the agent resided. 
 
 The station itself lacked the customary sights 
 and sounds. There were no engines, no belated 
 freights, no arriving passengers and baggage. 
 Not even the ever-present small boy disturbed 
 the serenity of the October evening. 
 
 For a weary half hour I paced the platform, 
 watching the shadows disappear and the dim 
 outline of the river grow dimmer and fade. As 
 the quiet became a bit oppressive, and the inner 
 man began to make demands, I decided to con- 
 sult the station agent about refreshments and 
 possibly accommodations. The other passen- 
 ger had evidently reached the same conclusion, 
 for as I turned toward the waiting-room I con- 
 fronted my fellow-unfortunate and the agent in 
 conference. 
 
 "This is the other passenger," said the latter 
 to me as I approached. "I Just told him you
 
 104 
 
 'uns could come over to my house to supper. 
 It's the only house around here yet, and you 
 can get a bite there, even if it ain't the Springs. 
 Will you come?" 
 
 "With pleasure," I replied, noticing a strange 
 but puzzling familiarity in the slight figure of 
 the other passenger, who stood dimly outlined in 
 the dusk. He was evidently struggling with 
 the same problem, for he said suddenly: 
 
 "Aren't you Van Dunk, of New York?" 
 
 "I am, and you are" 
 
 "Binney, pamphlet binder on West Broadway. 
 Recollect, old man?" 
 
 I greeted him with a warmth that indicated 
 my extremity. Although a small man there was 
 enough of Binney to go a great way. He was 
 one of those men whom you escape when you 
 can, and regret it when you can't. I had al- 
 ways regarded him as a misfit in his calling. 
 He was delicate, indolent and foppish, possess- 
 ing a fondness for late hours and large rings, 
 which fitted the prosaic and hustling require- 
 ments of a pamphlet bindery about as appropri- 
 ately as a monkey at a funeral, and the continued 
 existence and fair prosperity of his establish- 
 ment were due largely to a plodding and faithful 
 foreman, who did business when Binney did not, 
 that is, most of the time. 
 
 "What on earth brings you here, Binney?" 
 I asked in surprise.
 
 105 
 
 "Business," he answered briskly. "Same 
 with you, old man?" 
 
 "Yes," I gasped, trying to take in the thought 
 that business could draw Binney from New 
 York to Kentucky. It was too colossal to permit 
 conversation at the same moment 
 
 "It will be a good 10 o'clock before our train 
 comes," continued the little man rapidly, ap- 
 parently glad to get away from explanations. 
 "And I was just going over to Mr. Todd's to get 
 a bite. I'm mighty glad to meet a friend. So 
 beastly unexpected, you know. Come along, old 
 man." 
 
 The station master's house was a long, ram- 
 bling, Kentucky farmhouse, which in one spot 
 reached the dignity of two stories, and then 
 relapsed again to one. He had been born in the 
 house, he told us on the way over, and had al- 
 ways lived there, but the death of his mother 
 about a year before had deprived him of his 
 family relations and home life. 
 
 " 'Tain't much there now," he said apolo- 
 getically over his shoulder to me as we walked 
 in single file along the rough road, thus intensi- 
 fying the peculiar whistle with which he talked. 
 "You see ma was a good hand about the house, 
 but the gal I got to tend to me and John ain't 
 no earthly good. I reckon she's better'n noth- 
 in', so she stays." 
 
 It seemed to me she was several degrees
 
 106 
 
 worse than nothing, when I saw her, a few 
 minutes later in the kitchen, where the even- 
 ing meal was being spread. 
 
 An indescribable and accumulated odor of 
 pork fat pervaded every nook and cranny of the 
 long, low-studded apartment, and it seemed to 
 have settled on the walls, the shelves and the 
 dishes, as a sort of greasy grime. Amid these 
 fragrant surroundings clattered a figureless fe- 
 male of uncertain age, with hair half fallen, 
 and slippers half on, clapping the floor like bones 
 at each step. 
 
 While she completed preparations for the sup- 
 per Binney and I attacked the tin hand basin 
 on the back porch, and then waited outside. 
 
 "There's beehives in the settin'-room," said 
 the station master, as he joined us outside, and 
 shut the door to drown the noise of frying. 
 "Three of 'em was empty, and we put 'em in 
 there for the winter. We don't use the room 
 any more now ma's gone. Me and John is 
 over to the station or on the farm most of the 
 time." John appeared at that moment and an- 
 nounced supper. "The gal," having pitched the 
 dishes on the table in utter confusion, was al- 
 ready seated herself, and eating when we 
 entered. The station master took what seemed 
 to be the head of the table, if one ignored the 
 dishes, which were strewn more thickly about 
 me than any one else, and John pushed the
 
 107 
 
 fried pork and boiled potatoes along to the host 
 to serve. It would have been an interesting 
 study to have watched little Binney's expression 
 during the progress of the meal, had not a more 
 interesting study been presented by "the gal." 
 She sat impassive and unintelligent, unless a 
 few furtive glances at little Binney's neatly 
 curled mustache could be called intelligent. 
 With but one interruption, occasioned by a de- 
 mand from the host for more potatoes, she de- 
 voted herself to a steady absorption of food, 
 eating everything with her knife, except bread, 
 which she ate with her fork, doubtless as a con- 
 cession to the strangers present. The station 
 agent seemed ill at ease, and. though he made a 
 remark or two during the meal, was inclined to 
 be silent. John ate and said nothing, and fas- 
 tidious Binney was so occupied and over- 
 whelmed with a generous slab of salt pork that 
 he seemed to have lost the power of speech. As 
 for myself, I have knocked about enough to 
 take the world as it comes, and devoted myself 
 to a glass of milk, boiled potatoes and bread, 
 reflecting with a good deal of sympathy upon 
 the station agent's saddened life. The sorrow 
 which deserves the most sympatay is that un- 
 complaining, unconscious sort which solicits none. 
 Into this lonely Kentucky farmhouse Death had 
 come and taken the mother and homekeeper 
 away, but the son, unwilling to change from the
 
 108 
 
 old way of life, pushed doggedly along, cher- 
 ishing ma's memory, and longing for the touch 
 of ma's hand, amid uncongenial associates who 
 intensified her loss. Nothing new about the in- 
 cident but the sorrow of it, and sorrow is al- 
 ways new. 
 
 "Let's go back to the station," said Binney 
 abruptly, as we ended the meal. A suggestion 
 that both the station agent and I welcomed. 
 
 "Where'd you leave your satchel, Binney," I 
 inquired, as we started. 
 
 "Station." 
 
 "I have two," I said. "I left them in the wait- 
 ing-room, and I hope no bear or wildcat has run 
 off with the little satchel, especially." 
 
 "Precious papers?' 
 
 "Precious liquid," I answered. 
 
 "Got a flask of brandy, old man?" asked little 
 Binney eagerly. 
 
 "Better than that." 
 
 "What do you mean, Van Dunk?" In his 
 eagerness he crossed the road and walked in 
 the dust so as to be at my side. 
 
 "I mean I've got a bottle of champagne in my 
 small satchel. Thought I might need it to cheer 
 up on in just such a scrape as this." The 
 transformation that occurred in little Binney 
 was marvellous. 
 
 "Old man," he said patting me affectionately 
 on the arm, as he walked beside me in the
 
 109 
 
 dark, rising or sinking as he happened to strike 
 a rut, "you're the most thoughtful man I ever 
 heard of in my life. When shall we tap it, my 
 boy?" 
 
 "Whenever you please," I replied, "provided 
 you can procure ice and glasses of our friend, 
 the agent." 
 
 The station agent was walking ahead of us, 
 but he did not reach the station before Binney, 
 and when I arrived I found the little man hold- 
 ing my small black waterproof satchel affection- 
 ately on his lap, and. explaining the delights of a 
 cold bottle to Mr. Todd. 
 
 "Open your satchel, Van Dunk," he said, 
 eagerly. "Let's see the bottle." 
 
 It did not take long to satisfy that require- 
 ment, and little Binney fondled it as tenderly 
 as if it had been a thing of life. 
 
 "You pull the cork out, and come up into 
 the ticket office, and I'll get some cups," said 
 the agent, eyeing the bottle with considerable 
 curiosity and interest. 
 
 "Where's the ice?" asked Binney. 
 
 "What ice?" 
 
 "Why ice for the champagne, man." 
 
 "You don't need any." 
 
 Binney looked shocked. 
 
 "Champagne," he remarked, "must be cold 
 or it's no good. Did you ever taste champagne?" 
 he added.
 
 110 
 
 "You can't tell a Kentuckian anything about 
 liquor, sir," said the agent with dignity. 
 
 "Perhaps not, but champagne must be cold, 
 or it loses its flavor and its life." 
 
 "Life; does it pop?" asked Mr. Todd, pity- 
 ingly. 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 "Sort of birch beer, hey?" 
 
 Binney gave a gasp of horror. 
 
 "Sir," he said solemnly, "this bottle contains 
 the most sparkling, delicious, expensive and in- 
 toxicating beverage known in the civilized 
 world." 
 
 "Is it anything like whiskey?" asked the agent 
 incredulously. 
 
 "Far better." 
 
 "Does it corn yer?" 
 
 "One glass from that bottle, old man, and 
 you'll think you own the whole State of Ken- 
 tucky." 
 
 The agent looked relieved. "I'll git the cups," 
 he said briskly, "bring her inter the office." 
 
 "Where's the ice?" 
 
 "We ain't got any." 
 
 Binney's face was a study. He looked at the 
 bottle, at Mr. Todd and then at me. 
 
 "What shall we do, Van Dunk?" he asked ap- 
 pealingly. "Shall we go without ice, old man, 
 or, or not open it?" 
 
 "I haven't carried that bottle down from
 
 Ill 
 
 Washington," I said with emphasis, "to drink 
 the contents warm. Better put it up, Binney, 
 and come outside for a walk on the platform 
 with me," and to point the suggestion I strolled 
 out into the cool October air, and began a leis- 
 urely promenade. 
 
 Little Binney did not follow, but a few min- 
 utes later the station agent came out. 
 
 "I reckon we can fix that," he said. 
 
 "How?" 
 
 "We'll ride d ver to the Casino at the Springs." 
 
 "What do you mean?" I asked, not especially 
 pleased with a night trip to a rustic resort. 
 
 "Why, the Springs," he repeated, as though 
 any one ignorant of that locality must be an 
 idiot 
 
 "The Casino over there is the finest saloon 
 and eating house in America. Losin' a train is 
 one thing, but great day'n morning, I ain't 
 goin' to see a man git left on his bottle." 
 
 I didn't look enthusiastic. 
 
 "It's all right," he added reassuringly. "There 
 is five hours before your train'U get here, ana 
 it's only eight miles over the mountain. John 
 can work the wire and tend station while I'm 
 gone, so I'll saddle up the three farm horses 
 and we'll start right away. You kin git a ton 
 of ice over there, Mr. Van Dunk," he called 
 back, as he disappeared down the road toward 
 his house.
 
 112 
 
 "Isn't it elegant, old man?" said little Binney 
 delightedly at my elbow. 
 
 "Well, not exactly elegant, but I'm willing. I'd 
 like to see the Casino the agent talks about. 
 What Springs does he refer to, Binney?" 
 
 "I don't know. Hang the Springs! Shall I 
 carry that little black satchel of yours, Van 
 Dunk?" 
 
 "Can you ride well?" 
 
 "Splendidly, old man." I avoided the decision 
 of the satchel question, and a few minutes 
 later we heard the tramp of hoofs, and the agent 
 appeared riding a big white horse, leading two 
 other steeds of passable appearance. I distrust- 
 ed Binney's equestrian ability in spite of his 
 emphatic statements, and so took possession 
 of the precious satchel myself. The station 
 agent procured a conductor's lantern, mounted 
 his horse and led the way. I followed on one 
 of the two other horses, and little Binney, 
 perched on the third, a fat and broad-backed 
 beast, brought up the rear of the strange caval- 
 cade. 
 
 The clouds which had obscured the sunset 
 had broken away. The night was still and clear, 
 and through the tree tops of the woods into 
 which we had almost immediately plunged, 
 the stars shone with that exhilarating and in- 
 spiring clearness which follows a period of 
 storm. If one's early years were associated
 
 113 
 
 with life in the saddle, no amount of grinding 
 and vexatious office cares in a great city can 
 destroy the early love, and though more years 
 had passed than I liked to reckon since I had 
 even mounted a horse, it was a delightful ex- 
 perience to find myself once more in the sad- 
 dle. The distant office, with its perplexing 
 cares of policy and finance, the pugnacious Bibb, 
 and his bothersome bill of alterations, were all 
 forgotten, and I gave myself up to the full en- 
 joyment of the trip. The road which was 
 rough and apparently little used, was level for 
 the better part of two miles, then turned abrupt- 
 ly across a mountain brook, and led upward by 
 sharp ascent through ever thickening woods 
 over the hills seen dimly from the station. Of 
 conversation there was little. The agent rode 
 well ahead, and I should have been glad to 
 have pressed him in speed had it not been evi- 
 dent that little Binney was already making his 
 topmost pace. The riding was not good, and 
 every now and then a groan from Binney indi- 
 cated a tumble just escaped. Otherwise he had 
 preserved a complete silence since the start, a 
 phenomenon which indicated a serious state of 
 affairs. 
 
 "Getting along all right, Binney?" I called 
 back to him. 
 
 "Finely, old man," he answered, but the senti- 
 ment did not fit his feeble tones.
 
 114 
 
 "I thought I heard you groan a few moments 
 ago." 
 
 "You're mistaken. Must have been my saddle. 
 It creaks like the deuce. Don't happen to have 
 any oil in your satchel, do you, old man?" 
 
 "Where did you learn to ride, Binney?" I asked 
 pretty well assured that this was his first 
 lesson. 
 
 "Say, Van Dunk," he called back as though 
 he had not heard my question. "How in the 
 world do you happen to be toting that sample 
 bottle of wine around down here? Are you 
 subsidized to exhibit wine through Kentucky 
 during October?" 
 
 "It's very simple," I said. "I started South 
 via Washington; had a couple of hours there, 
 strolled around the city, and happened to see a 
 grocery selling out at auction. I always had 
 a weakness for auctions, so I walked in and bid 
 on that bottle, which I was paralyzed to find 
 knocked down to me for eighty cents. There's 
 the whole story." 
 
 "I wish they had auctions like that in New 
 York," said Binney. "I'd hang around and 
 bid" 
 
 Another groan, followed by a howl of terror 
 and a thud, and Binney 's horse seemed to be 
 running. Reining in my own beast, I sprang 
 to the ground and caught the other horse, as it 
 trotted placidly toward me.
 
 115 
 
 "Are you hurt, Binney?" I called. 
 
 No answer. 
 
 Ahead, the station agent's lantern danced and 
 glimmered among the trees. After several in- 
 effectual calls our guide heard me and returned. 
 
 "What's wrong?" he inquired, as he saw me 
 holding the two horses. 
 
 "Mr. Binney has had a bad fall. We must 
 tie up the horses and hurry back to him. I 
 hope he isn't badly hurt," I added, feeling rather 
 anxious in spite of myself. 
 
 To be burdened with a wounded companion 
 while travelling on horseback along a wild 
 mountain road at night seemed about the last 
 straw to that unique and troubled journey. 
 Hastily tying the horses to trees, we hurried 
 back, guided by the groans which Binney was 
 now emitting with increasing frequency and 
 force. By the dull light of the lantern we saw 
 that he lay in a heap at the side of the road. 
 
 "Are you hurt, Binney?" I demanded. 
 
 "I am fatally hurt, Van Dunk," he whispered. 
 
 "Don't say that, my man; you're all right," I 
 assured him as cheerfully as I could, but much 
 alarmed at the turn matters were taking. An- 
 other groan. 
 
 "Send word to Mrs. Binney that I was trying 
 to get through by horseback and was thrown 
 in the woods in the dark and killed. Don't 
 mention the wine part," he added, with a sup- 
 plementary groan.
 
 116 
 
 I was about to suggest an examination when 
 a sudden breeze blew the lantern out. 
 
 Binney's groans were redoubled. 
 
 "Van Dunk," he gasped, "it is gettting very 
 dark. I have only a few minutes to live. There's 
 something I must tell" 
 
 "Here, here," I said briskly, "of course it's 
 dark, the lantern's out. As soon as Todd lights 
 up we are going to look you over." 
 
 A moment later, amid a volley of groans, I 
 stretched the huddled form of my fellow-towns- 
 man and traveller at length in the road, re- 
 gardless of mud, and anxiously sounded his 
 vital parts. 
 
 "Is your head hurt, Binney?" I asked as I felt 
 around for a gaping wound. 
 
 "It's not the head." 
 
 "Is it the chest?" I asked, transferring my 
 investigations. 
 
 "I think it is." 
 
 I loosened his clothing and felt him over care- 
 fully. 
 
 "Did the horse step on you?" 
 
 "Lord, yes; all over me." 
 
 "I don't think your chest is hurt, Binney," 
 I said at length, failing to find even a scratch. 
 
 "Perhaps not." His tones were slightly strong- 
 er. "I think it is the hips, Van Dunk. I have 
 dislocated both legs." 
 
 this pointer I went to work in that di-
 
 117 
 
 rection, and heedless of protests, punched, 
 kneaded, slapped and worked every joint in his 
 body. 
 
 "Get up, Binney," I said at length. 
 
 He sat up. 
 
 "Is it anything serious, old man?" he asked. 
 
 "Nothing whatever. You slid off the horse, 
 and likely sat down hard on a rock. That's all. 
 Come, get your beast." 
 
 "Sat down hard," he said groaning at the 
 recollection. "I can never sit down again. Oh, 
 Van Dunk," he added in genuine anguish as he 
 slowly came to his feet, "you don't know how I 
 feel. One boil growing on top of another boil 
 and hit with a club, don't express it." 
 
 "Shall I telegraph your wife?" I inquired. 
 
 Binney seemed to improve suddenly. 
 
 "The trouble with that horse is he's so wide 
 I can't get any purchase on him," he said. "How 
 will you swap horses, old man?" 
 
 Anything for peace. The station agent and I 
 helped Binney on my horse, and the procession 
 started again. This time with Binney in the 
 middle. The road from the summit down the 
 other side seemed more trodden and was much 
 smoother. With no mishaps, therefore, we 
 reached the valley, and, turning to the left, a 
 glimmering of distant lights told of our ap- 
 proach to some settlement. The road was now 
 excellent, and quickening our pace we were soon
 
 118 
 
 riding through a small town, apparently lying 
 picturesquely between hills. The village itself 
 seemed to consist largely of cottages and hotels, 
 marking it at once as a fashionable resort We 
 had evidently crossed the State line, and this 
 was doubtless one of the innumerable mineral 
 spring resorts in the Virginias. The main street, 
 which was lined with villas, ran along a narrow 
 river, the same, so Todd informed me, as the 
 one that I had seen from the station. Across the 
 river, which was spanned by a rustic bridge, 
 and on the high bank opposite, stood a large 
 and brilliantly lighted building, with towers and 
 a promenade extending some distance along the 
 crest of the hill, above the river. This was our 
 objective point, the long-sought Casino. The 
 promenade was hung with Chinese lanterns and 
 dotted with colored electric lights, imparting an 
 exceedingly festive air to the scene. Although 
 October, the chill of the Northern fall was lacki- 
 ing, and people were to be seen in every direc- 
 tion with but light wraps, enjoying the festive 
 scene and the music which came softened from 
 one of the towers. Little Binney forgot his 
 wounds, and, cantering up to me, exclaimed: 
 "Isn't this great, old man; biggest adventure 
 of my life, Van Dunk." 
 
 Before reaching the bridge the station agent 
 halted, and we surrendered our horses to be 
 stabled.
 
 119 
 
 "What is your plan?" I asked a few moments 
 later, when he rejoined us. 
 
 "It's just this: Take that gripsack of yours 
 right up to one of them tables in the Casino, call 
 a nigger, and tell him to open the bottle for three 
 gentlemen. I ain't ever been in there before, 
 and now, if we've got a bottle of the best stuff 
 in the world, I'd like to let 'em know it." 
 
 I couldn't help feeling amused at the propo- 
 sition, though not overanxious to appear in a 
 fashionable resort, unkempt myself and with my 
 unique companions. No better plan, however, 
 suggested itself at the moment, and little Binney 
 settled the matter by saying: "It's a good 
 scheme, old man. I'll stand the corkage my- 
 self. Let's move along." 
 
 Accordingly we walked across the bridge, and 
 climbed the stairway that led to the general 
 promenade. I walked ahead and carried the 
 satchel, and in consequence did not notice the 
 attention we were attracting; but when we 
 reached the main building and entered the 
 restaurant the full glare of the brilliantly lighted 
 room fell on my two companions with paralyzing 
 effect. For a moment I wondered whether we 
 would be admitted. The station master, with 
 his stalwart frame incased in a flannel shirt of 
 unknown antiquity, bearing the grime of the 
 day's toil upon him and the newly acquired 
 fumes of the stable about him, was embarrass-
 
 120 
 
 ing enough! in a fashionable meeting-place, where 
 evening dress was seen on all sides. But he 
 was as nothing to little Binney. 
 
 There is a tradition in my family that in child- 
 hood I found a pot of yellow paint in the stable, 
 and industriously daubed my little sister from 
 head to foot, and then proudly presented her to 
 my mother's horrified gaze with the triumphant 
 announcement that I had brought her a little 
 canary. This tale I have always denied, but if 
 true, that mite of a girl in yellow could not have 
 looked more demoralized than little Binney as 
 the glare of the lights fell full upon him. There 
 was mud everywhere except on his collar, whictt 
 had completely disappeared beneath the horizon. 
 The back of his mud-besprinkled coat was torn 
 from the collar to the pocket; his face was 
 streaked, his hair on end, and the luxuriant 
 mustache so carefully watched and tended had 
 yielded to the killing dampness of the woods 
 and drooped mournfully over his mouth. All 
 unconscious of his appearance, little Binney was 
 enjoying every moment. He evidently believed 
 that the attention he attracted was a tribute to 
 his metropolitan air and manners. My own ap- 
 pearance I well knew could not be reassuring, 
 and I hastily led my motley companions to a 
 table in an alcove adjoining the large dining- 
 room, from which we could look out on the ani- 
 mated scene. The myriad lights, the waltz
 
 121 
 
 music from the band in the tower just beyond, 
 the buzz of laughter and conversation, and the 
 hurrying waiters flitting from table to table 
 made a vivid picture long to be remembered. 
 The station agent gazed upon the gay scene with 
 open-mouthed admiration. Suddenly he leaned 
 over to me and whispered: 
 
 "I want to see the boss." 
 
 "What's the matter?" 
 
 "Them niggers is hurryin' too much. They'll 
 drop the dishes sure as you live. I never seen 
 a nigger hurry yet that he didn't spile what he 
 was doin'. It's unnatural for a nigger to hurry." 
 
 Little Binney had been slowly recovering from 
 the shock of sitting down, and the reference to 
 waiters brought him to himself. 
 
 "Don't mind the dishes," he said, irritably. 
 "We didn't come across the mountains to save 
 dishes. Where's the satchel, Van Dunk?" 
 
 I called the head-waiter, who was passing, and 
 said: 
 
 "There's a quart bottle of champagne in this 
 little satchel. I wish you would take it and have 
 it served properly. My friends and I have come 
 across the mountain on purpose to drink this 
 particular bottle together, well served." 
 
 The head-waiter looked at the unkempt sta- 
 tion agent and little Binney's streaked but 
 eager countenance in dignified surprise, but he 
 took the satchel, and the auction bottle seemed 
 at last about to be uncorked.
 
 122 
 
 "How does it happen to be so gay over here 
 and so deserted on your side of the mountain?" 
 I asked the station agent, to distract his thoughts 
 from the waiters, whom he was still watching 
 with alarm. 
 
 "'Taint a pleasant story," he answered short- 
 ly. "My station was put in to reach the springs, 
 and the wagon-road cut through across the moun- 
 tain, and when we got it started and it looked 
 like there'd be a town around the station in six 
 months, blamed if some fellers didn't build a 
 branch railroad from South Forks right inter the 
 town and it left my station clean out. That's 
 how." 
 
 I did not answer, for I saw my little black 
 satchel approaching, borne in a gingerly manner 
 by a small colored man. 
 
 "Is this yours, sah?' he asked. 
 
 "It is." 
 
 "De wine am clean gone, sah." 
 
 "What do you mean, man?" 
 
 "De cork had popped and de wine was all 
 out in de gripsack, sah." 
 
 The brand was the best. 'For a moment I felt 
 utterly bewildered. As nearly as I could recol- 
 lect it was perfectly corked and wired. 
 
 "The wire seemed cut, sah," suggested the 
 waiter. 
 
 A sudden thought flashed through my mind. 
 I looked across the table at little Binney, blink-
 
 133 
 
 ing and dilapidated. His sheepish look and tell- 
 tale silence were enough. 
 
 "Binney," I said, sharply, "did you cut that 
 wire?" 
 
 "Yes," he said, humbly. 
 
 "When?" 
 
 "After you left the station." 
 
 "What did you do It for?" 
 
 "I wanted to drink it, anyway, Van Dunk, ice 
 or no ice, and I just cut one wire; the other was 
 there. I don't see how it popped. I'm dread- 
 fully sorry, old man, indeed, I am." His voice 
 quavered mournfully out and left him on the 
 verge of collapse. 
 
 The station agent glared at Binney in silence. 
 His looks expressed it all. It was fortunate his 
 anger took that form, for had he whistled out 
 a few picturesque Kentucky phrases they would 
 have insured our immediate ejection. 
 
 I was conscious of an overwhelming sense of 
 irritation at my meddlesome fellow-passenger. 
 He had no right to touch the bottle I had carried 
 down from Washington with so much care, and 
 now, through his offlciousness, I had lugged an 
 empty flask at infinite inconvenience in the 
 dark. 
 
 "It's a fine satchel," said the station agent at 
 length, his professional instinct aroused. Not a 
 drop was spilled. I never see the like. Last 
 spring a can of preserves was busted in the bot-
 
 134 
 
 torn of a trunk I was puttin' on the baggage-car 
 of Number 2, and the juice come out on my shirt 
 so I reckon I smelt like I was a quince for a 
 week." 
 
 The story was doubtless true. The stains were 
 still in evidence. 
 
 Little Binney paid the corkage, and had I not 
 been well convinced earlier in the trip 
 that he was much cramped financially I 
 should have insisted on generous repara- 
 tion. As it was, the situation was embar- 
 rassing; for while I would gladly order a new 
 supply of champagne for the station master, I 
 was determined that Binney should not receive 
 any such attention at my hands. I was disgust- 
 ed with the whole trip; regretted that I had con- 
 sented to make it, and felt anxious to return 
 immediately. 
 
 "Waiter," said I, decisively, "bring a bottle of 
 beer and a plate of cheese sandwiches, and bring 
 them quick." 
 
 The station agent looked horrified. A bottle 
 of whiskey and three glasses he could have un- 
 derstood and approved, but beer was a strange 
 and watery drink. This sentiment, however, he 
 modified on its arrival, and when, an hour later, 
 I insisted on our departure, both the station 
 agent and little Binney were feeling like prop- 
 erty-owners. It was 9:30 when, with many 
 groans, little Binney was again in his saddle, and
 
 125 
 
 we turned toward the hills. The little binder 
 was especially voluble, and, after we had pro- 
 gressed a mile or two, he developed an unpleas- 
 ant habit of stopping his horse, twisting around 
 in his saddle and apologizing profusely for the 
 wire episode. We lost so much time by this di- 
 version that the station master was far ahead 
 and the glimmer of the lantern died suddenly 
 away. 
 
 "Shut up, Binney!" I called, angrily, as he be- 
 gan the sixth apology. "You're completely in 
 the dark. Your horse may stumble, and if he 
 does, it will be serious for you." 
 
 In fact I felt considerably alarmed. We were 
 now in the thickest part of the forest. Occasion- 
 ally a star glimmered for a moment overhead, 
 but it was blackest night below. Although the 
 horses moved cautiously along, we were absolute- 
 ly at their mercy, and my companion, who on 
 such a journey needed more than his faculties 
 when at their best, was semi-intoxicated. Sharp 
 words and his own fears, however, did much to 
 sober him, but our progress at best was exceed- 
 ingly slow. It seemed to my excited senses that 
 we had travelled hours, and I was beginning to 
 fear we had strayed from the road, when I caught 
 the distant glow of a light apparently stationary. 
 The horses quickened their pace, and in a few 
 minutes we had reached the station master's 
 lantern, standing in the middle of the road. His 
 horse was tied to a neighboring tree, and he
 
 126 
 
 himself sat on a fallen stump, apparently in 
 great pain. 
 
 "What's the trouble?" I asked, in alarm. 
 
 "It's the first time, and, by gum, it's the last!" 
 he ejaculated. 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "That beer. Idea of asking a Kentuckian to 
 take a sickly, watery drink with suds on top, and* 
 I'm just where I orter be. Sick. Sick, I tell 
 you. Sick as an old cow," he moaned. 
 
 "Can't you ride?" I asked, sympathetically. 
 
 "Ride?" he paused to double up with another 
 paroxysm, "ride? "I'd rather die!" 
 
 "But man, we must catch that train." 
 
 "Ketch it." 
 
 "And leave you here?" 
 
 "Certainly. Take the lantern and get out. I'll 
 wrastle it out with the beer and come home in 
 the morning. John'll take the horses, or you 
 
 kin Great day 'n mornin', there it comes 
 
 again!" 
 
 I disliked to leave Mr. Todd in such a plight, 
 but compromised by giving him a small bottle of 
 brandy carried for just such emergencies, and 
 when Binney and I resumed our journey with 
 the lantern it was already after 11. We there- 
 fore pushed forward with increased speed, in 
 spite of the roughness which characterized that 
 end of the road, and at twenty minutes before 
 12 we drew up at the station platform. 
 
 I must confess it was with a feeling of pro-
 
 127 
 
 found relief that I sprang from my horse. I pre- 
 sume Binney was equally relieved. He had said 
 nothing for at least three miles. One dim light 
 glimmered from the station, which seemed ut- 
 terly deserted, in the midst of a wilderness. I 
 hastened around to the waiting-room entrance. 
 The room was dark and empty. The single light 
 I have mentioned came from the ticket office. 
 I opened the door and stepped in. John was 
 asleep on two chairs. 
 
 "Wake up!" I exclaimed. "When will the 
 train be here?" 
 
 "Where's Todd?" he asked, vacantly. 
 
 "He's sick in the woods," I answered. "When 
 will the train be here?" 
 
 "What train?' 
 
 "Number three, I think you call it, when Is It 
 due, man?" 
 
 "Number three went through at half-past ten." 
 
 "What?" I gasped. 
 
 The intellectual John bunched up his coat for 
 a pillow, and laid down again. 
 
 "Yes," he said drowsily. "Wildcatted through." 
 
 I didn't wait to hear his snores resumed. 
 
 "Binney," I called in despair, hastening out 
 on the platform. "What do you think has hap- 
 pened? While we fooled our time away over 
 there at the Springs, that train has come and 
 gone. It passed here at half-past ten. What 
 
 on earth" But Binney didn't answer. He was 
 
 curled up on the baggage truck asleep.
 
 Che Unambcmicmed Serpent 
 
 "You're about the only man," he said slowly, 
 "that ever asked what his first name was." 
 
 "Why is that?" 
 
 "Well, sir, I never knew why. He was just 
 'Walker' to everybody. Always was, from a 
 boy. I knowed him from a little chap at school, 
 and he was just Walker, then. His name was 
 Edward, but bless your soul, there wa'n't a dozen 
 folks in Wyoming County knew it, and after 
 awhile it did seem like the Edward sort of mil- 
 dewed off, from lack of use, and left him plain 
 'Walker.' " 
 
 I was a stranger on the lake, and I had idly 
 asked the weather-beaten old fellow fishing from 
 a flat-bottomed scow near me who kept the time- 
 worn hotel which stood on the further shore. 
 My neighbor's luck had been no better than 
 mine, and he was quite willing to talk. 
 
 "Yes," he said reflectively, "it's Walker's,
 
 129 
 
 Walker is dead, but it's Walker's Hotel. It 
 always has been and it always will be, I sup- 
 pose, till it burns down or dries up. I reckon," 
 he added, after a pause, "that no other house 
 in America was ever built in the way that was." 
 
 "How was that?" 
 
 "Perhaps you never heard of the Great Sea 
 Serpent of Silver Lake?" 
 
 "I never did." 
 
 "Well, the sea serpent built that house, and 
 he built it well. It's stood forty years just as 
 you see it now." 
 
 "What was the sea serpent?" 
 
 "Well, it all happened before the war. They 
 talk about jokes and schemes and fakes, as they 
 call 'em, nowadays, but that snake was the all- 
 firedest biggest hoax ever heard on in these 
 parts." 
 
 "Do you know the story?" 
 
 "Know the story?" echoed the occupant of 
 the scow, looking compassionately at me across 
 the water. "Man and boy I've lived here sixty 
 years, and I was in that job from beginning to 
 end. Mebbe you'd like to hear about it?" he 
 added inquiringly. 
 
 "I certainly should," I replied, with a sense of 
 satisfaction that the lake might be made to pro- 
 duce some compensation for poor fishing. The 
 old fellow let out his anchor a turn or two, 
 swung around my way, and after putting on a 
 fresh bait he began:
 
 180 
 
 "In 1855 my father owned a farm along the 
 western shore of the lake. If we was a bit fur- 
 ther out you could see some of the medder land, 
 just round the point over there. I was a likely 
 young feller in those days, and there wasn't 
 much about this lake I didn't know. It wasn't 
 like it is now around here. To be sure there 
 were picnics and all that in the summer sea- 
 son, but there wasn't a house on the lake shore 
 from end to end, except the old hotel of Walk- 
 er's, and the water was alive with fish. In the 
 spring of '55 I was twenty -one; I reckon Walker 
 was about twenty-eight. Walker was a curious 
 feller, one of them quiet, deep sort of men. The 
 Perry village people hadn't thought he was very 
 heavy-headed, but since 1855 I hain't seen a 
 man in the whole town of Perry that could have 
 kep' up with Walker in solid brains. 
 
 "His father had died the year before, and left 
 him a farm just back from the lake and a good 
 piece of land along the shore with an old hotel 
 and picnic grounds. The Walker family was 
 supposed to run the hotel in the summer and 
 sort of farm it the rest of the time. But Walker 
 wasn't satisfied with that. Si Blodgett and I 
 was his best friends, and he used to talk to us 
 of how things was goin' and wish he could stir 
 'em up. Si lived next to me up on the West 
 Road. One night early in June Si and me 
 rowed over to Walker's. I could row across
 
 131 
 
 the lake in those days quicker than I can now. 
 Well, Walker had been doin' chores around that 
 old hotel, getting ready to open it up for the 
 season, and I tell you it looked dismal enough 
 in the dusk. He seemed to have something on 
 his mind. 
 
 " 'Boys,' sez he, 'I'll lock up here and then 
 yon can come down to the boathouse with me 
 awhile; I've got something to talk to you about.' 
 He locked up the hotel and we three went down 
 to the lake shore. I never see'd a prettier night 
 than that was; there wasn't a cloud in the sky 
 nor a ripple on the whole blessed lake, and 
 every star shone up from the water as though 
 it was sky above and sky below. We sat down 
 on a bench by the boathouse. 
 
 " Tve got a plan in my head, boys,' said 
 Walker, 'that's a pretty serious one. I want to 
 know whether you two will stand by me to the 
 end? 
 
 " 'Walker,' says SI Blodgett, 'we three was 
 brought up together; if you want any help 
 from us, we're with you till you say no.' Then 
 I told him about the same thing. 
 
 " 'Well,' he said, 'I knew we three hadn't been 
 friends for nothing, but I've reached a plnce 
 where I've got to make a big move of some kind 
 or go under. What with a poor season last year 
 and father's death, I don't mind telling you it's 
 as much as I can do to hold on to the farm and
 
 182 
 
 hotel. I thought of working the farm and try- 
 ing to rent the hotel, but I could not see enough 
 in that to pull me through. Fact is, boys, there's 
 only one chance; I need ready money for the 
 mortgages, and if the hotel has a good season 
 I'm all right. I've been thinking and thinking 
 how to make sure of that sort of season, and 
 I've got an idea about it. You see this is a 
 little lake; it's out of the way and not much 
 known, and people come to fish and picnic, but 
 the hotel don't draw much business. Boys, an 
 ordinary season won't pull me through; I want 
 a sensation, and I've got to get one or smash. 
 Last winter I read an article In a newspaper 
 about the sea serpent being seen in Long Island 
 Sound, and how city people just poured into the 
 towns around there and kept up a big excite- 
 ment. Now, Si Blodgett, why can't we have a 
 sea serpent right here in Silver Lake?' 
 
 "Walker was excited. He talked low and 
 quiet, but I tell you he was worked up. Well, 
 sir, it fairly took the breath out of Si Blodgett 
 and me. I think Si nearly fell off the bench. 
 'Wouldn't it be found out?' he asked, sort of 
 shaky. 
 
 " 'Not if it's worked right.' 
 
 " 'How's that?' 
 
 " 'My Idea is to have the serpent appear pretty 
 often at first, and get people excited and com- 
 ing to the lake, and then we can stop when 
 they get too thick/
 
 188 
 
 "Si Blodgett didn't seem to think much of the 
 plan. 
 
 " 'I'll tell you what, Walker,' said he, sooth- 
 ingly, 'I'll do anything to help you, but this 
 is dangerous for us all. You want to rig up a 
 log or something, and get people all by the ears, 
 and then when they're worked up they'll find us 
 three down in the marsh pulling a big wooden 
 snake around with a string. I tell you, Walker, 
 they'll tar and feather us.' 
 
 " 'You're right, Si,' said Walker, just as quiet 
 as you please. 'If we had a lame plan like that, 
 we might as well go to jail beforehand. I've 
 got a safe plan all laid out; listen to it, boys, 
 and then I'll leave it to you whether we try it or 
 not.' 
 
 "Well, sir, Si Blodgett and I had always been 
 fond of Walker, but till he began to talk that 
 night we never knew what a head there was on, 
 him. He had the whole thing planned out. His 
 serpent was to be a big hosepipe, painted dark 
 green, with white spots. There was to be a keg 
 at one end, made over to resemble a big ser- 
 pent's head, and painted a bright color. The 
 critter was to be raised by air and sunk by 
 water, and operated from the shore by a small 
 pipe which should be connected with the tail 
 of the snake. Walker's idea was that as the 
 hotel was but a few rods from the lake, the pip- 
 ing should be run underground to the house,
 
 184 
 
 and then up to a room which commanded a good 
 outlook and from which the whole thing could 
 be operated. 
 
 "The trouble seemed to be to move the thing 
 around, but Walker said that when it was on 
 the surface and full of air it would be easy to 
 work about, and a coil of light rope connecting 
 from the snake to the other shore and then 
 back over a pulley, and another line from the 
 other side, would do. Well, he drew such a 
 vivid picture of the whole thing, the snake's 
 appearance, the fright of the people on the lake, 
 the newspaper accounts and the crowds that 
 would come, that when he ended by saying: 
 'Now, boys, there's the plan. I said I would 
 leave it to you, and I will. What do you say to 
 it?' neither Si Blodgett nor I hesitated a sec- 
 ond. We were really only boys. We jumped off 
 that bench by the boathouse and told him we 
 would go in heart and soul, and swore by all 
 our old friendship to stand by him to the end. 
 
 "Well, sir, at that Walker almost broke down, 
 and I began to see how much depended on it 
 for him. We settled that evening what each 
 of us was to do. Walker had about $100 in 
 money, which he thought would get the hose 
 and fittings, and he was to go to Buffalo for 
 them by the end of that week. We arranged 
 while he was gone that Si and I should make 
 the head and a strong bellows in a vacant loft
 
 185 
 
 over my father's toolhouse. The fitting to- 
 gether could only be done in Walker's barn at 
 night. We concluded ten days would be enough 
 for that part of the work and that we could be 
 ready for business about July 6. It was so late by 
 this time that Si and I said a hurried good-night, 
 and started across the lake. I shall never for- 
 get that trip. In our excited state every shad- 
 ow was the dim outline of a sea serpent, every 
 ripple the beginning of a head. Well, sir, for a 
 week off and on as we got the chance, with- 
 out exciting any attention, Si and I worked 
 away on that head, and I tell you we fixed up 
 the reddest and awfullest-looking critter you 
 ever see. We wrapped it up in sacking and 
 rowed it over the lalte one quiet night about 
 the end of June. We took it right up to the 
 loft in Walker's barn, where he was collecting 
 all his material. He cut off the sackin' and 
 took a look at the head. You should have seen 
 how pleased he was. 
 
 " 'Boys,' says he after a minute, 'it almost 
 makes me shiver. That head will pull Wyom- 
 ing County clean out of its boots.' 
 
 " 'Well,' says I, 'if that head hadn't been 
 wrapped up coming over in the boat, and them 
 eyes had been out a-lookin' at us, I reckon Si 
 Blodgett and I would have fell overboard.' 
 
 "Si and I spent that night with Walker, and 
 we put in some work on the critter, I can tell
 
 188 
 
 you. Walker had bought a lot of things in 
 Buffalo piecemeal, and so no one up there was 
 suspicious. As he was getting the hotel ready 
 for summer, Perry people didn't think anything 
 about the bundles that kep' a-comin'. I reckoned 
 he'd have some trouble gettin' the hose, but 
 somehow Walker's luck was always stiddy. He 
 found just the thing. It had been made for a 
 hose company up in the city and rejected be- 
 cause it was too large for them. It was about 
 a foot thick, made of leather, closely riveted. 
 Most hose like that is stiff and heavy, but this 
 was limber and just about the right weight. 
 There was twenty-four feet of that hose, and 
 Walker had painted it green, and mottled it up 
 some with white paint. Well, sir, we fitted 
 the head on and got the critter pretty well into 
 shape that night. The connecting air pipe was 
 left until the last thing. The critter was the 
 first step. The next thing was laying the pipe. 
 Walker said he would attend to that, to prevent 
 suspicion, and Si and I set the pulleys on the 
 east shore. That was no easy job. Walker 
 was always sayin', 'Boys, do everything so well 
 that you won't be afraid of gettin' found out 
 if the whole of Wyoming County camp out 
 along the lake'; and Si and I set those pulleys 
 into rock under water and then arranged brush 
 and stone over the place along shore. We did 
 it all at night, and if we hadn't set marks we
 
 137 
 
 never in the world could have found those 
 pulleys again. 
 
 "Walker himself pegged away at them pipes, 
 and I tell you it was a job. He laid two pipes 
 side by side underground from a swampy place 
 down on the lake shore, a little way below the 
 hotel, right up to the cellar and then up the 
 east chimney, that being boarded up, to the 
 southeast room on the second floor. The air 
 pipe was small, but the other pipe, which was 
 intended to carry the cords to operate the critter, 
 was a two-inch tubing, and strong. 
 
 "Walker was anxious to have things all ready 
 by the Fourth of July, because that always 
 brought a crowd to the lake, but it was no use 
 tryin' for that. I never see'd a scheme with so 
 much solid work in it. Si and I was busy round 
 the farms all day, and I tell you when we got 
 through with our night work besides we was 
 petered out. By the 10th of July we was about 
 ready. Si and I was pretty excited when we 
 rowed over that night We each had a bundle 
 of clothes with us, as Walker had hired us to 
 help at the hotel for a couple of weeks at least 
 that was the story we told. It was a hard 
 time for both of us to get away, bein' right in 
 the busy season, and my father kicked like a 
 mule about it, but I went just the same. 
 
 "That night we sort of put things together. 
 We connected the bellows and air pump with
 
 138 
 
 the air pipe, after blowing a small plug through 
 the other tubing. To the plug was fastened a 
 string, and with that we pulled through all 
 the cords, carefully soaped to make them move 
 freely. It may seem sort of unlikely to you 
 that there was any chance of moving this big 
 critter around as we expected to do, and con- 
 trolling it from such a distance, but it really 
 was not. Walker had such a head on him that 
 he had all the details figured out. His plan 
 was just this: A small leaded rubber pipe, and 
 plenty of it, connecting the air pipe on the shore 
 with the middle of the serpent. This made it 
 easy to raise or lower the serpent at will, water 
 being admitted when the air pressure was re- 
 moved by a suction valve in the side of the hose. 
 In the other tubing were five cords, one at each 
 side of the head, leading forward, but to oppo- 
 site shores, and one at each side of the tail, 
 leading the other way. Another cord connected 
 with the head so as to give that an independent 
 motion. Then the work was finished, but night 
 after night we watched and waited for one that 
 was dark enough to be safe. At last on the 16th 
 there came up a hard northeast storm. 
 
 "That night was as dark as a pocket, and I 
 tell you, sir, there were three excited men 
 around Walker's Hotel. About 11 o'clock we 
 crept out to the barn and took the serpent down 
 to the shore, connected the pipes with great
 
 139 
 
 care, and Si Blodgett and I towed the snake out 
 to the spot agreed upon. Walker hurried back 
 to the hotel; he was to signal with a light from 
 the southeast room when we were to cast the 
 critter off. We had hardly reached the spot 
 when he gave the signal and we cut loose. 
 Although the night was so dark, we were close 
 enough to the serpent to see it lying on the 
 surface of the lake beside us. The head rode 
 high in the water, being of wood, and those 
 horrible eyes glared straight ahead. 
 
 "Minute after minute passed. Each one 
 seemed an hour. The snake's position showed 
 not the slightest change. Was it a failure after 1 
 all? Si Blodgett and I were so excited that we 
 breathed with difficulty. Suddenly I heard Si's 
 hoarse whisper: 'Hen, the head is sinking.' 
 
 "It surely was. Little by little it lowered into 
 the lake until the water rippled over the eyes. 
 Then down the whole dark and mottled length 
 there was a convulsive tremor, so lifelike that 
 it was hideous, and the snake appeared to be 
 moving toward us. The head arose out of 
 the water and swayed slightly from side to 
 side. I never expect to see a more horrible 
 sight than that critter presented. I knowed 
 all about it; I had made that head myself; but 
 I jumped back to my seat, and rowed for the 
 shore till both oars bent. The Great Sea Serpent 
 was in the lake, a reality at last.
 
 140 
 
 "That night Walker, Si Blodgett and I had 
 a long discussion about the serpent's public 
 appearance, and we agreed to let it be seen only 
 at night until we were accustomed to working 
 it. Walker was the proper man to operate the 
 critter, but, of course, he had to be about the 
 hotel and be very careful not to excite suspicion, 
 so he gave Si Blodgett the key of that southeast 
 room and put him in charge. I was to be the 
 outside man, loafing around on the lake, fishing 1 
 or rowing, near where the serpent was, and 
 ready with a set of signals in case of any 
 trouble. The next day was bright and sunny 
 and we all worked quietly around the house. 
 About suppertime five or six young fellows from 
 Perry drove up to the hotel. One of 'em was 
 Lon Scribner, who worked for the newspaper 
 that came out every week at Perry. Walker 
 gave me a look, and then he went to meet 'em. 
 
 " 'How's the fishin', Walker?' says Lon. 
 
 " 'First rate.' 
 
 " 'Let us have a boat for a couple of hours?' 
 
 " 'Glad to,' says Walker. 
 
 "They got out and hitched, and Lon, says he: 
 'Where are the bass bitin' this year, Walker?' 
 
 "Walker sat down on the horse-block and 
 thought about it. 'Well,' says he, 'I haven't 
 been out much myself, but I hear the best place 
 is over east of the inlet. You might try it 
 there.'
 
 141 
 
 "I knew what was coming. The serpent lay 
 just east of the inlet. 
 
 "They started out, and I told Walker I thought 
 I would go fishing myself. So I rowed slowly 
 over a ways, and kept watch on the party. It 
 was about 9 o'clock when they came over by the 
 inlet. It was time for the serpent. I lit my pipe 
 and rowed slowly along. The light was the sig- 
 nal to begin. The fishing party had been having 
 good luck before, but they were perfectly quiet 
 for about five minutes, then Joe McKnight said: 
 'Guess we're driftin', ain't we, Lon?' 
 
 " 'No, we ain't.' 
 
 " 'Well, there's a big log over there.' 
 
 " *Can't be,' says Lon. 
 
 "There was a silence, and then Joe McKnight 
 said in the scaredest voice I ever heard, 'Boys, 
 that thing is moving!' 
 
 "'It's bendin' round!' says one of the others. 
 'There's a head on it! Great heavens, look at 
 those eyes!' 
 
 "Well, sir, there was all creation let loose in 
 that boat. Those fellows just fell over each 
 other to get at the anchor, and they lost their 
 knives in the water trying to cut the rope. 
 They pulled and cussed and shouted, and all 
 the time Lon Scribner was calling loud enough 
 to be heard a mile, 'Pull, pull, or we'll all be 
 killed!' 
 
 "Well, they did pull. I never seed a boat move
 
 142 
 
 so fast before, and in five minutes they landed 
 by a medder on the east side, and left the boat 
 there, and walked home. The next morning 
 Lon Scribner came over for the wagon, and be- 
 fore noon the newspaper man come over to see 
 Walker. 
 
 " 'Mr. Walker,' says he, 'there was a terrible 
 occurrence on the lake last evening.' 
 
 "What's that?' says Walker, lookin' sur- 
 prised. 
 
 " 'A monster of the deep, sir, pursued a party 
 of young men.' 
 
 '"Hoax, isn't it? said Walker. 
 
 " 'I thought so myself at first, but I have the 
 sworn statement of every man in the party.' 
 
 " 'What did it look like? 
 
 " 'They describe it, sir, as an enormous ser- 
 pent, of horrible appearance, fully fifty feet long, 
 with a head as large as a cow, and immense, 
 fiery eyes.' 
 
 " 'Well,' said Walker, 'I hope it isn't true. 
 It'll stop fishin' and ruin my business if it is, 
 but the fact is I shouldn't be surprised if queer 
 things turned up in the lake now and then. 
 You know that place where they've never been 
 able to find bottom?' 
 
 " 'Yes,' said the newspaper feller, anxiously. 
 
 " 'Well, my father always declared that was 
 an underground outlet to Lake Ontario.' 
 
 "The newspaper man made a note of that.
 
 143 
 
 Then he went down to the boathouse and looked 
 about; and you should have seed the newspaper 
 he turned out two days after that. There was a 
 picture of a tremenjous snake printed on the 
 first page, and eight columns of readin' matter 
 about the monster in Silver Lake, with affer- 
 davits from ten or fifteen people who had seed 
 it. Well, sir, Walker give one glance at that 
 paper and then he sent word over to Perry 
 for a big lot of provisions and rowed down the 
 lake himself and bought up every rowboat at the 
 south end. 
 
 " 'Now, boys,' says he to Si and me, when he 
 got back, 'watch out sharp, the crowd'll be here 
 to-morrow.' An' it was. There's no use makin' 
 a long story 'bout the people, but I never seed 
 the like of 'em. The population's growed in 
 forty years, and that education business over 
 there in the grove, and the cottages and what- 
 not brings a crowd here every summer nowa- 
 days, but I tell you they're just nothin' to the 
 slathers of people that poured around this lake 
 for five weeks in the summer of '55. They 
 come in wagons, they come a-foot. There was 
 single men and women and whole families. I 
 reckon there were 500 people camped out every 
 clear night through August. The roads all about 
 were lined with teams askin' the way to Silver 
 Lake, and had they caught the serpent? 
 
 "As for Walker, he just tended hotel night
 
 144 
 
 and day stiddy. He run his prices up out of 
 sight, but it didn't make no difference. There 
 was a crowd a-beggin' and quarrellin' for 
 rooms all day long, and as fer boats, they was 
 50 cents an hour, and even then the crowd 
 at the boathouse had to draw lots fer next 
 chance. Walker wasn't the only one, though, 
 that was workin' that serpent. The newspaper 
 man was nearly crazy; along in the spring the 
 Sheriff had been lookin' fer him on a judgment, 
 but by the middle of August he had hired a 
 crowd of men and bought two more printing 
 presses. Every other day he run out a sea ser- 
 pent extra, with cuts and big headlines. It 
 wasn't Wyoming County alone, though, that was 
 broke up over that serpent. The postmaster at 
 Perry was about wild with letters from every- 
 where askin' was it real. He got 'em from New 
 England and Pennsylvania, and two from Ken- 
 tucky in one day. 
 
 "As fer the serpent, I tell you we was cautious. 
 Up to the latter part of August we had let it ap- 
 pear ten or a dozen times, mostly at night. 
 Twice the thing had been seen in the daytime 
 by people on the shore; somehow it happened 
 no one was on the lake at the time, and I will 
 say that a more lifelike critter I never see. I 
 didn't blame the fellows that walked around 
 and swore to that snake. I'd almost swore 
 myself.
 
 145 
 
 "Well, about the first of September the ex- 
 citement was so great it began to get hot. Over 
 in Perry they formed a company with a capital 
 of $1,000. They called it the Experiment Com- 
 pany, and the members swore they'd ketch that 
 snake, dead or alive. The president and secre- 
 tary went to Buffalo to consult fishermen and 
 divers, and three days afterward they come 
 over to Walker's bringin' a tall feller with 
 chin whiskers and a harpoon. Blamed if he 
 wasn't a whaler, and the company had im- 
 ported him from Nantucket. They bought a 
 boat and that whaler sat there on the lake all 
 day with his harpoon on his arm. 
 
 "The day after that feller came the crowd 
 was twice as big, just to see the whaler, I 
 reckon. Walker began to look worried. Well, 
 about 1 o'clock the next day a Rochester man 
 turned up with a tremendjous iron fish hook, an 
 old clothesline and two live hens. 
 
 "Everybody laughed fit to kill, but he didn't. 
 He hired a boat, rowed out on the lake and 
 somehow drifted over east of the inlet. Then 
 he stuck one of them squawkin' chickens on his 
 hook and dropped it over. About ten minutes 
 after that the feller give a screech, and there he 
 was, a-hangin' to the clothesline, and it was 
 pullin' his boat along! The effect of that screech 
 was wonderful. People on the shore ran along 
 the bank and shouted like Indians, and all the
 
 146 
 
 boats on the lake rowed like mad fer the man 
 with the hook. The whaler led the pack, stand- 
 in' up in the bow of his boat with the harpoon 
 ready. Just then the fisherman's boat slacked 
 up, and he stood up with a piece of cord in his 
 hand. The clothesline had broken. I almost 
 fainted, I was so scared, but I hurried over to 
 the hotel and found Walker. He was most 
 crazy. We went up to the southwest room and 
 had a hurried conference. It seemed that Si, 
 seein' that fisherman rather too close to where 
 the serpent was, had tried to shift the critter, 
 and must have caught the hook by doing it. 
 The snake begun to work badly just before the 
 clothesline broke, and I tell you it didn't break 
 a minute too soon. 
 
 " 'Boys,' says Walker, decidedly, 'it's gettin' 
 too hot; the snake has served its purpose; we've 
 made enough money to pull me out of trouble 
 and do the handsome thing all around. Now 
 we'll end the whole thing.' 
 
 "Si and I agreed. We were ready enough to, 
 bein' a little scared. By good luck that night was 
 stormy. After midnight we three went out on 
 the lake, found the pulley connection on the 
 other shore, and hauled up the serpent. Sure 
 enough there was that Rochester feller's hook 
 and chicken wedged round the hose near the 
 critter's head. The hook had picked a hole in 
 the leather and so the serpent was damaged
 
 147 
 
 anyway. We towed it out to the place where 
 they have never touched bottom, and let the 
 Great Sea Serpent sink for the last time. 
 
 "The next day I heard that my father was 
 sick, so I left in a hurry for home. I found 
 father in bed. 
 
 " 'Hennery,' says he, when I got to his room, 
 'I have something to say to you alone, my son.' 
 So the others left, and says he, 'Are you home 
 for good, Hennery?' 
 " 'I reckon so,' says I. 
 "'Through with your serpent now?' 
 "'What do you mean, pa?' I said, feeling 
 queer. 
 
 " 'Well, I saw the head you was making up in 
 the toolhouse, my son, and I thought mebbe this 
 was only a visit.' And sure enough, that old 
 feller had knowed the whole thing, and never 
 opened his mouth to a soul. 
 
 " "Hennery,' he said after a minute, 'I've been 
 thinkin' about you, my son. You didn't pay any 
 attention to me; you left the farm when I needed 
 you, and with me sick here this summer, your 
 sister Maria has been the only dependence of 
 the family. I can't live long, Hennery, and I've 
 made a will givin' you the cottage and lot up on 
 the road, and leavin' the house and farm to your 
 sister, my son.' Well, he died a couple of months 
 after that. Maria has the farm yet, and some- 
 how I've"
 
 148 
 
 The old man stopped his story abruptly. A 
 look of intense annoyance overspread his face. 
 "Well, I swow," he ejaculated. "Sure as you 
 live that fish has bit off bait, hook and all, and I 
 never knowed it." Then after a moment's 
 pause, he added, half resignedly, "Well, that's 
 just like me; ever since '55 I've jest been agoin' 
 to ketch a fish; never do."
 
 Driven by a high autumn wind, the rain swept 
 down Fifth Avenue in billowy sheets, forcing 
 itself into doorways and crannies, and beating 
 fiercely on every window-pane that faced the 
 east 
 
 Seen at long intervals through the driving rain, 
 a few belated unfortunates were struggling up or 
 down the avenue under the scanty and pitiful 
 shelter of umbrellas tilted unavailingly against 
 the storm. 
 
 A cab now and then rattled hurriedly by, as 
 though driver and horse were both equally anx- 
 ious to regain shelter. 
 
 On such a night the average mortal, however 
 restless, elects to stay at home, and on this par- 
 ticular evening nearly all New York seemed to 
 be of one mind. 
 
 Even the clubs were well nigh deserted, and 
 in one of the larger ones there were but three
 
 150 
 
 members in the long, softly lighted library. They 
 sat together by a broad window, that would 
 have commanded a fine view of New York's 
 most famous street had not the gusts of Novem- 
 ber wind driven the rain along the glass in 
 little rivulets, which for minutes at a time shut 
 out all the outside world except the prismatic 
 glimmer of the electric lights steadily glowing 
 along the avenue in spite of wind and storm. 
 
 "A gloomy night conduces to gloomy thoughts," 
 remarked the Doctor to his two companions. 
 "I attended the funeral of a distant cousin of 
 mine yesterday afternoon, and I've been think- 
 ing about the poor fellow off and on ever since." 
 
 "Especially sad case?" asked one of the others, 
 sympathetically. 
 
 "No; it was not. There were few present at 
 the funeral, and few, whether present or absent, 
 to mourn that the poor fellow slept his last 
 sleep. He was fifty-two years old when he died; 
 a quiet, unobtrusive old bachelor; one of New 
 York's great army of hall-bedroom boarders. 
 He began life in this city as a bookkeeper, and 
 when death came, twenty-seven years later, he 
 had not moved. He was a bookkeeper still. 
 
 "We had nothing in common, and I seldom saw 
 him, but after the services yesterday I began 
 to look up his life, and it has haunted me ever 
 since." 
 
 The Doctor paused.
 
 151 
 
 "To think," he resumed after a moment's si- 
 lence, "that a human being in the midst of 
 civilization can pass from the cradle to the 
 grave without leaving behind even the slightest 
 impress, influence or incident is actually appall- 
 ing. Did you ever trace an absolutely unevent- 
 ful life from beginning to end?" he added, 
 abruptly. 
 
 "To answer for myself, no," replied the young- 
 er of the Doctor's two companions. "All of us 
 who are normally constituted desire to leave 
 some imprint on the world, be it large or small, 
 before we depart, and perhaps the normal mind 
 recoils from its abnormal, ambitionless brother." 
 
 "Maybe you are right," said the Doctor, 
 thoughtfully, looking out through the blurred 
 window-pane. "The life of Thomas Dart was 
 as stagnant as a millpond. I cannot shake off 
 the memory of its utter failure. 
 
 "He came to New York in 1867. His early 
 life had not been phenomenal. Most peo- 
 ple would have called it uneventful, but youth 
 is always the uneventful period. His parents 
 were people of position, education and small 
 resources. They had sent Tom to college as their 
 extremest effort, and as he manifested no incli- 
 nation toward a profession his father secured a 
 chance for him as a bookkeeper in the business 
 house of John Morton & Co., feeling that with 
 his home training, his thorough education and
 
 152 
 
 good sense the making of his son's success- 
 ful future lay in his own hands. 
 
 "The boy had many good qualities. He was 
 likewise handicapped by some bad ones. He 
 was a strong, active, handsome fellow, popular 
 with all who knew him, possessing good habits 
 and an excellent mental equipment. His be- 
 setting sin, and one which threatened fatal con- 
 sequences to success in life, was a tendency to 
 accept what the day brought forth, and to 
 neither care nor plan for the future, indolently 
 content to let events shape themselves. 
 
 "Attention to his new duties won the confi- 
 dence of his superiors and an occasional pleas- 
 ant word from the head of the firm. The first 
 year was a busy, but not especially significant 
 one. 
 
 "Like most young men of moderate resource he 
 occupied a hall bedroom in a comfortable but 
 inexpensive boarding-house, and his evenings 
 were spent in careless but harmless ways. 
 
 "Times flies in the metropolis. Somehow it 
 seems to move faster here than elsewhere. The 
 country sleeps eight good hours of the twenty- 
 four sound, refreshing sleep, that wraps the 
 whole community in its dreamless robe, but the 
 city never sleeps. Its throb of life is unceasing. 
 The myriad lights that glow to speed the set- 
 ting sun are there to greet his coming. 
 
 "Two years vanished before careless Tom Dart
 
 153 
 
 realized their passage. His position in the book- 
 keeper's office had but slightly improved. Al- 
 though well liked and respected, he seemed to 
 lack that indefinable something which inspires 
 confidence and brings promotion. A lack of 
 alertness or, better stated, perhaps, a lack of 
 ambition that should keep his mind ever fixed 
 and ready to go ahead at full steam on demand 
 seemed to blame for his failure to secure ad- 
 vancement. In business the man who does not 
 expect advancement, and does not act as though 
 he expected it, seldom gets it. 
 
 "And so Tom Dart settled slowly down into a 
 rut. His daily routine accomplished, he felt 
 too tired or too indolent to cultivate social 
 chances. He neglected his father's friends, who 
 had gladly opened their family circles to him, 
 and they forgot him. He read in his hall bed- 
 room, talked and smoked with the man at the 
 other end of the hall, played whist at the inex- 
 pensive club which he had joined, and spent 
 an occasional evening at the theatre. 
 
 " 'You've been with us three years, haven't you, 
 Dart?* inquired Mr. Morton, pleasantly, one 
 evening, as they happened to leave the office 
 together. 
 
 "'Yes, sir.' 
 
 " "Don't forget, young man, that attention to 
 duty must be supplemented by a constant watch- 
 fulness for chances to advance. Opportunities
 
 154 
 
 reach their fruition when they appear. Unac- 
 cepted they vanish.' 
 
 Tom respectfully assented. 
 
 That evening was one of much self-examina- 
 tion, and he resolved to make changes in his 
 conduct. 
 
 " 'I believe you live in the city, don't you, Mr. 
 Dart? inquired the cashier of Tom, a few days 
 afterward, as the business of the day was about 
 over. 
 
 " 'Yes; Twenty-eighth street, near Fourth ave- 
 nue,' replied the young bookkeeper. 
 
 " 'Will you do me the favor to take this pack- 
 age to Mr. Morton, and deliver it to him per- 
 sonally? He has gone home without it, and it 
 contains some papers which require attention 
 this evening. They are too valuable to trust to 
 a messenger, and as he lives on Fifth Avenue 
 near you, it will not be out of your way and 
 will greatly oblige me.' 
 
 Tom expressed his entire willingness to be of 
 service, and half an hour later rang the bell of 
 Mr. Morton's handsome residence. 
 
 " 'Mr. Morton isn't at home,' said the servant, 
 in answer to the bookkeeper's inquiry. 
 
 Tom hesitated. He could not leave the pack- 
 age, and did not wish to retain it. 
 
 A prettily dressed young girl was coming 
 downstairs and had overheard his inquiry. 
 
 " 'My father is not to return until late, I be-
 
 155 
 
 lieve. Is there anything I can do?' she asked, 
 stepping forward. 'I am Miss Morton.' 
 
 " 'Thank you,' said Tom, courteously. 'I have 
 a valuable package from the office for Mr. Mor- 
 ton, and was told to deliver it to him only, but, 
 of course, Miss Morton is a satisfactory substi- 
 tute.' 
 
 " 'A safe one, anyway,' she replied, pleasant- 
 ly, taking the envelope. 
 
 "Tom bowed and withdrew, but his dreams 
 that night were filled with pretty Marie Morton, 
 and it was several days before her image faded. 
 
 "Perhaps good-looking Tom Dart had remained 
 in Miss Marie's mind also, for one afternoon 
 in the following week Mr. Morton stopped at 
 Tom's desk and expressed his regret at not see- 
 ing him, adding a kindly invitation to call at his 
 house. 
 
 "The young bookkeeper was more than pleased 
 at the chance. Til go next week,' he said, em- 
 phatically, to himself. But next week came and 
 went and Tom never made the call. 
 
 " 'I can't help it,' he said. 'I couldn't go any- 
 way. My evening clothes are worn out, and I'd 
 be out of place. Of course Miss Marie is beauti- 
 ful and accomplished, but I'd fall in love with 
 her and be miserable. What business have I, 
 Thomas Dart, bookkeeper, inhabiting one suit 
 of clothes and a hall bedroom, to think of her? 
 Mind your business, Tom. Smoke your pipe, be 
 comfortable, and stay where you belong.'
 
 156 
 
 "Occasionally he saw his parents. They were 
 older now, and needed more attention, but his 
 visits were necessarily brief. His life in the 
 city was monotonous, but Tom enjoyed it, and, 
 after all, he was the most concerned. Moreover, 
 he had a circle of friends. There were the 
 Rosenbaums opposite. Not exactly Tom's style 
 or class, if judged by the old days, but, then, the 
 girls were awfully jolly; and Colonel Taxter, 
 who had a bachelor apartment on the next 
 block, and the Connelly's, just across Sixth Ave- 
 nue. Of course he had friends. And between 
 them all time ran tranquilly away ran the fast- 
 er because there was little to mark its passage. 
 
 " 'Five years to-day since I came here,' he re- 
 marked, one morning at the office, to the book- 
 keeper next to him. 
 
 " 'That so? You ought to ask for a raise.' 
 
 " 'I suppose I should,' rejoined Tom, 'but the 
 woods are full of bookkeepers; they might 
 bounce me.' 
 
 " 'All right,' said his neighbor, cheerfully, 'then 
 I'd move up to your desk." 
 
 "They both laughed and resumed work. That 
 was all the anniversary brought to Tom, and 
 before he took time to think about it another 
 had come and gone. 
 
 "Curious how fast the years sped away. Why 
 notice the passage of a single paltry year in an 
 uneventful life? Take them in twos and threes
 
 157 
 
 and groups. Take them in their effects, for in 
 that alone is their passage apparent. 
 
 "The five years of Dart's service became multi- 
 plied by four. 
 
 "His parents were dead. 
 
 "Mr. Morton was dead. The old firm was now 
 the John Morton Company. The officers were 
 new men, and most of the clerks were new com- 
 ers also, but half a dozen veterans held on. 
 Among these Thomas Dart ranked high in years 
 of service. 
 
 "Mr. Dart was a middle-aged man, fairly well 
 preserved, but his hair was gray, his brow a bit 
 wrinkled, his form less erect. Life sentence to 
 hard living in a boarding-house had borne fruit 
 in slovenly appearance and decreased attention 
 to habits of polite living. A button off, collar 
 torn, coat threadbare and worn far beyond its 
 natural life. Symptoms, but unfailing ones. 
 
 " 'What's become of Dart?' asked a classmate 
 at the quarter-century reunion. 
 
 " 'Just where he was twenty years ago,' an- 
 swered another, 'growing old and standing 
 still. The man in the parable buried his talent. 
 Dart didn't even do that. He laid it down just 
 where it was given to him, and the wind and 
 rain and snow and sun beat on it, and it 
 weathered and crumbled and blew away.' 
 
 "There remained to Thomas Dart the habits 
 of his earlier years. The future with its wealth
 
 158 
 
 of possibility, which is the birthright of every 
 young man, was his no longer. The expecta- 
 tions of a home, a family and a fair degree of 
 prosperity, which all men ought to cherish and 
 most men realize, had long ago faded below his 
 mental horizon. Thought, hope and wish had 
 contracted; habits narrowed. The boarders 
 thought Mr. Dart was prosy. Only a few more 
 years were needed to make him a slippered, 
 white-headed bore. 
 
 "Why trace the change? 
 
 "The infinite possibilities of a human life had 
 blossomed and died. The wilted leaf of exist- 
 ence alone remained, withering and useless. 
 Why watch it disappear? 
 
 "The general manager came out of his private 
 office with a telegram in his hand. 
 
 " 'Mr. Dunnell,' he said, gravely, to the head 
 bookkeeper, 'I have sad news for you. Our Mr. 
 Dart died this morning at 7 o'clock.' 
 
 " 'I am distressed to hear it, sir.' 
 
 " 'I knew you would be. He was an old and 
 trusted clerk.' 
 
 "The cashier joined the little group that had 
 gathered at the news. 'Dart came here three 
 years after me,' he said, sadly. 'He had twen- 
 ty-seven years of service to his credit in this 
 house. I have thirty.' 
 
 " "With the difference,' said the general man-
 
 159 
 
 ager, 'that he was always a routine man. You 
 never were.' 
 
 " 'How old was he?' asked a young bookkeper. 
 
 "The cashier meditated 'Dart was not an old 
 man,' he said. 'I suppose he was about fifty- 
 three.' 
 
 " 'Was he married?' asked a new clerk. 
 
 " 'No; he never seemed to have any matri- 
 monial inclinations.' 
 
 " 'Very sad,' commented the head bookkeeper, 
 mentally considering which of the younger men 
 to advance to Dart's place. 'I did not know 
 he was seriously ill. He was here last Tues- 
 day. We had better order flowers,' he added, 
 'and appoint a committee to attend the funeral.' 
 
 " 'Certainly,' said the general manager. 'And, 
 Mr. Dunnell, I think we won't fill Mr. Dart's 
 place just now. We can get on very well. Just 
 divide up his work among the others. He was 
 not a necessity.' 
 
 "Two days later a little company gathered at 
 the funeral. There was not even crape on the 
 door. The landlady objected. She said it made 
 the house look dismal for the other boarders. 
 
 "Another day, and Thomas Dart slept beside 
 his parents in the inland city of his birth. His 
 sister had come on to be with him at the end. 
 She tenderly gathered up her brother's few sim- 
 ple belongings and transferred them to her own 
 distant home.
 
 160 
 
 "That was all. 
 
 "Another life had come, matured and vanished 
 unnoticed. 
 
 "Seemingly not even an atom of strength had 
 gone out of the hem of the great world's gar- 
 ment 
 
 "On the mighty tides of sorrow, joy, business, 
 pleasure and suffering there was not a ripple 
 to mark the passing of Thomas Dart, dead." 
 
 The Doctor paused, much affected. His two 
 friends made no effort to break the silence. 
 Rain had ceased for the moment, and the wind 
 was sweeping down the deserted avenue with 
 redoubled fury. The long line of lights twinkled 
 sharply beneath its influence. 
 
 "That is the life of Thomas Dart as he lived 
 it," continued the Doctor, quietly. "No power 
 can change it now, but last night I lay awake 
 and thought about him, and it seemed to me 
 that if he had only done something, traded 
 horses, speculated anything to break his life- 
 time of monotony I could have forgiven him, 
 and so, for my own satisfaction, I constructed 
 a fictitious Dart; made him speculate for spec- 
 ulation generally depends on luck, not brains. 
 I made the fictitious Dart succeed in life, and 
 yet so narrow is the line between success and 
 failure that the only difference between Dart, 
 failure, and Dart, success, was that I gave the
 
 161 
 
 latter a push at the right moment. He merely 
 accepted opportunities instead of declining 
 them." 
 
 "Let us have the fictitious Dart, Doctor," re- 
 marked Bradley. "You owe him to us," he add- 
 ed, emphatically, "as some compensation for the 
 gloomy reality." 
 
 "Fiction is a poor match for truth in any con- 
 test," said the Doctor, "but you are welcome to 
 my successful Dart. I made the turning point 
 in his life come just after his employer gave 
 him that kindly bit of advice." 
 
 " Dart,' remarked a young broker who lived 
 on the floor below him in the commonplace 
 uptown boarding-house, as they sat at the din- 
 ner-table together the next evening, 'have you 
 any money to invest? 
 
 '"Mighty little, why? asked Tom, with lan- 
 guid interest. 
 
 " 'I don't want to talk shop,' replied his friend, 
 'and even to a customer I seldom offer advice, 
 but as a friend I want to tell you there is an 
 opportunity just now for money making in 
 stocks that comes only once or twice in ten 
 years, and I thought I might do you a service.' 
 
 " 'Of course,' continued the broker, as he fold- 
 ed his napkin and pushed back from the table, 
 at which he and Tom alone remained, 'of course 
 there never was any speculation of any kind 
 that was absolutely safe. It would not be spec- 
 ulation if it was.'
 
 192 
 
 "In Tom's trunk there was an envelope con- 
 taining $100. It represented his savings from 
 a small salary with a still smaller ability to 
 save. His inclination was to keep it there and 
 take no risks, but the advice of his employer 
 flashed across his mind. 'My tendency,' he said 
 to himself, 'is always to hang back and I am 
 making no progress in any direction. If I lose 
 my $100 I am not vitally affected. If I make 
 money in the transaction I may be able to bet- 
 ter myself materially.' 
 
 " 'If you satisfy me you are right,' said Tom, 
 aloud, 'I will invest a small amount.' 
 
 "Thereupon his friend sketched the prevailing 
 conditions in the market; the rise and fall of 
 values and their effect, especially upon one stock, 
 which seemed to have been overlooked, but was 
 now apparently on the verge of a sharp upward 
 movement. 
 
 "Tom was convinced. The next morning he 
 called at his friend's office, deposited with him 
 his $100, and arranged the details of the pur- 
 chase. 
 
 "He was in a feverish condition that day, far 
 removed from his usual careless state of mind, 
 and he watched anxiously for closing hour, and 
 the afternoon paper obtainable with it. Turn- 
 ing to the financial column he saw, with burn- 
 ing cheeks, that his friend's predictions were 
 more than realized. There had been a sharp ad-
 
 168 
 
 vance in the market, and he, Thomas Dart, 
 clerk, by the doubling-up process his friend 
 recommended, possessed, with principal and 
 profit, over $800. 
 
 " 'Well, Dart,' his broker friend said that even- 
 ing as Tom greeted him, 'It's a pleasure to see 
 the market come your way, but I've got one 
 piece of advice to give you in sober earnest. 
 Don't squander a cent and don't lose your head. 
 You have made a beginning in the way of cap- 
 ital which you can build up further with cau- 
 tion, but keep your head.' 
 
 "Tom did not go to the club that evening. 
 He told a friend who called for him that he had 
 a business matter to attend to, the first personal 
 business that had afflicted Thomas Dart since 
 his arrival in the metropolis. 
 
 "The result of his consideration was to begin 
 a new and cautious transaction, but with double 
 the amount of the former one, which had been 
 closed. 
 
 "It so happened that the moment was ripe for 
 the three transactions which Tom made in the 
 ensuing few days, and within two weeks he had 
 to his credit the sum of $2,000. 
 
 " 'I am through,' he said, emphatically, to his 
 friend. 
 
 " 'And by stopping you show more head than 
 most men,' remarked the other. To know when 
 to stop, and stop there, is half of success.'
 
 164 
 
 "The two weeks that had passed had been in- 
 tensely anxious ones for Dart, but they had 
 worked a mighty change in him, which, with the 
 success he had attained, became almost a revolu- 
 tion. 
 
 "Tom felt like another man himself, and the 
 change was decidedly noticeable to others. He 
 displayed redoubled energy at the office, and 
 the head bookkeeper remarked to the cashier 
 that Dart was becoming a valuable man. He 
 seemed to take genuine interest in his work. 
 
 " 'You surprise me,' said the other. 'I always 
 liked Dart, but he appeared to me too lazy to 
 succeed.' 
 
 " 'He's all nerves and energy now,' rejoined 
 the head bookkeeper. 
 
 " 'Dart,' said the cashier a few evenings later, 
 as the clerks were leaving, 'I wonder if I can 
 impose on you for an important errand uptown. 
 You live in the city, do you not?' 
 
 " 'Yes, sir; but that would not signify. I 
 should be at your service, anyway.' 
 
 " 'Thank you,' replied the cashier, pleased at 
 his response, and recalling the head bookkeep- 
 er's remark. 'I have an exceedingly valuable 
 package for Mr. Morton. He has forgotten to 
 take it with him, and must have it to-night. I 
 do not dare to trust it to a messenger, and you 
 can do me a great service by putting it in his 
 hands.'
 
 165 
 
 "Tom buttoned the precious envelope secure- 
 ly up in his coat and hurried uptown. 
 
 " 'Perhaps there is an opportunity here,' he 
 said, and, stopping at his own room, which was 
 within a few blocks of Mr. Morton's Fifth Ave- 
 nue residence, he made himself thoroughly pre- 
 sentable, and with little delay rang the bell of 
 his employer's handsome house. 
 
 " 'Mr. Morton is not at home,' said the ser- 
 vant, in response to his Inquiry. 
 
 "Dart hesitated. He could not retain the pack- 
 age, and yet he surely could not give it to a 
 servant 
 
 "A prettily dressed girl was descending the 
 stairs as Tom had made his inquiry. 
 
 " 'My father is not expected home until late,' 
 she said, coming forward. 'Is there anything 
 I can do for you? I am Miss Morton.' 
 
 " 'I have some important papers from the 
 office for Mr. Morton, to be intrusted to no one 
 but himself. In his absence, however, I am sure 
 Miss Morton is a satisfactory substitute.' 
 
 " 'Reliable, anyway,' she answered, smiling, 
 with the least bit of admiration in her glance. 
 Tom made an attractive picture as he stood in 
 the doorway handsome, well-dressed and well- 
 bred. 
 
 "He placed the package in Miss Morton's 
 hands, bowed courteously and was gone. 
 
 "In no such brief way, however, did he dis-
 
 166 
 
 miss the memory of Miss Marie Morton. She 
 was the heroine of many a daydream and the 
 inspiration for his new-found ambitions. 
 
 " 'Who was the young clerk, John, that called 
 here last night with a package for you?' asked 
 Mrs. Morton, at the breakfast-table, the morn- 
 ing after Dart's errand. 'Marie was quite im- 
 pressed with his youth and beauty,' she added, 
 laughingly. 
 
 " 'Potter or Fellows, from the cashier's office, 
 I suppose,' replied Mr. Morton. 'Neither one is 
 beautiful nor remarkable,' he added. 
 
 "Miss Marie looked indignant. 
 
 " 'I said the man was a gentleman and good 
 looking, that was all,' she protested, 'and it's 
 true, whether it was Potter or Fellows or some- 
 body else.' 
 
 " 'Potter has red chin whiskers,' continued 
 her father, with some amusement, 'and Fel- 
 lows has nothing in particular except a pair of 
 ears as big as griddle-cakes. I should not back 
 either one of them in a beauty show, but, then, a 
 man can't judge of his own sex. Maybe they 
 are both beautiful.' 
 
 "The recollection of the breakfast-table chat 
 crossed Mr. Morton's mind that afternoon at 
 the office. 
 
 " 'Whom did you send up to my house last 
 evening?' he inquired of the cashier. 
 
 " 'Dart, sir.'
 
 167 
 
 " *Dart!' repeated Mr. Morton, in surprise. 'I 
 did not suppose lie lingered long enough after 
 closing-hour to be available for such an errand.' 
 
 " 'Bart is doing very well, sir,' replied the 
 cashier. 'The head of his department tells me 
 that he has completely changed within the last 
 month, and promises to be one of his most valu- 
 able men.' 
 
 "Mr. Morton found opportunity before leaving 
 to stop at Tom's desk. 
 
 " 'I was sorry not to see you last evening, 
 Dart,' he said, in his kindly way. 'Mrs. Mor- 
 ton and my daughter will be at home until June, 
 and I should be glad to have you call upon us.' 
 
 "The young bookkeeper thanked his employer 
 heartily, and decided to take early advantage 
 of the invitation. 
 
 "Tom Dart's thoughts, however, were not all 
 of sentiment. His capital was deposited to his 
 credit in one of the larger banks, and he was 
 seriously considering his next step. 
 
 " 'This is a matter of head,' he said to him- 
 self. 'If I make few missteps I have the foun- 
 dation of independence. I want no more stocks. 
 I have had my success there. The next result 
 would be failure. I want no schemes. They are 
 all right for men without capital or with a great 
 amount of it' 
 
 "By this process of elimination he found him- 
 self reduced to real estate, and he at length de-
 
 168 
 
 cided to buy one or two lots, build a house and 
 sell it. Accordingly his spare time was spent 
 in searching for an available and satisfactory 
 site. This accomplished, he made his cash pur- 
 chase the means of obtaining a low price, bor- 
 rowed money on mortgages and began the erec- 
 tion of a dainty cottage. Before it was com- 
 pleted he had found a purchaser, and had hand- 
 somely increased his capital. 
 
 "This gave him an opportunity to purchase 
 two other small pieces of property that he had 
 noticed favorably, and he began the repetition 
 of his successful building venture. 
 
 "His personal life had completely changed. 
 Improved work at the office had brought ad- 
 vancement, and Tom had removed to an inex- 
 pensive bachelor apartment, which his mother 
 had aided him to make homelike and attractive. 
 The club was forgotten. Tom was a man of 
 business. The effect was noticeable in his im- 
 proved appearance and bearing. His manners, 
 and even his clothing, showed the change. 
 
 "Twice Tom had called at Mr. Morton's house. 
 He had been most kindly received, and his own 
 impressions of Miss Morton had been renewed 
 and strengthened, but serious thoughts in that 
 direction were of course presumptuous. 
 
 "Time passes quickly in the metropolis and 
 five years have gone. 
 
 "Tom Dart's capital, in spite of one or two
 
 169 
 
 reverses, now amounted to $5,000. At the office 
 he was assistant to the head bookkeeper and 
 would probably succeed that worthy some day, 
 but Dart was conscious of a growing discon- 
 tent. He had demonstrated his own ability to 
 succeed outside of the routine of the counting- 
 room, and for more than a year he had continued 
 in Mr. Morton's employ solely to accumulate 
 a sum of ready money sufficient to live on for one 
 year without employment, during which time 
 he figured that he could nurse his real estate 
 enterprises into profitable and self-supporting 
 realities. 
 
 "Another potent cause of discontent came from 
 the heart. Wisely or unwisely, he had permitted 
 himself to fall deeply in love with his employ- 
 er's daughter. Unwise it undoubtedly was if his 
 chances of success were the sole consideration, 
 but this attachment had many times formed a 
 welcome reinforcement to Tom's wearied ambi- 
 tion, and spurred him on to renewed or increased 
 effort. 
 
 "As an employe of Mr. Morton, however, he 
 saw no prospect of anything like actual equal- 
 ity in spite of the cordial welcome he always re- 
 ceived. He felt that he must be able to come 
 to the house as an outsider, an independent busi- 
 ness man, at least fairly successful, and wel- 
 come for his own qualities. 
 
 "Matters were approaching a crisis, when
 
 170 
 
 Thomas Dart was summoned one morning in 
 June to Mr. Morton's private office. 'Mr. Dart,' 
 said his employer, seriously, 'We are about to 
 make a most important and radical change in 
 this business. I have sold my interest to a 
 syndicate of business men younger in years than 
 I, and they are about to form a corporation with 
 large capital to conduct it. The details are now 
 complete, and will take effect the first of next 
 month. I have sent for you to tell you that I 
 urged your appointment as head bookkeeper with 
 advanced salary, but one of the new proprietors 
 has a man for the place, and my request was not 
 granted. I wish to express my own regard for 
 you and my appreciation of your work. Your 
 present position is doubtless secure, but I am 
 sorry you will obtain no advancement.' 
 
 " 'Let me thank you, sir, for your kind efforts,' 
 said Tom earnestly, 'and your still kinder words, 
 but your announcement brings to a point a plan 
 I have been maturing for some months and have 
 hesitated to carry out. I have been fortunate 
 enough, by profitable real estate investments, to 
 develop my savings into a considerable property. 
 I believe I can make far more by devoting my 
 time to real estate enterprises than I can in the 
 counting-room, and therefore, with your retire- 
 ment, I shall resign also, for that,' added Tom, 
 skilfully, 'relieves me of my only regret.' 
 
 "Mr. Morton had heard his employe's state- 
 ment with much surprise.
 
 171 
 
 " Do you own real estate now,' he asked, in- 
 credulously, 'or are you about to acquire it? 
 
 " 'I own four houses, sir, two In Yorkville, one 
 in the suburbs of Brooklyn, and one in Orange. 
 They are valued at about $20,000, and are mort- 
 gaged for $14,000. I said four houses,' added 
 Tom, 'I should say three, for I think I have sold 
 the Brooklyn house, and as it is empty I am es- 
 pecially fortunate. The others are rented and 
 paying well.' 
 
 " 'You have greatly surprised me, Mr. Dart,' 
 said his employer, rising. 'You have proved to 
 me that you possess qualities I did not attribute 
 to you, and if I were to remain in business I 
 should make it an object for you to stay with 
 me in a responsible position. As it is, remem- 
 ber you are always welcome socially at my 
 house. Mrs. Morton and my daughter are going 
 abroad this month for the summer, but we shall 
 be at home next winter as usual.' 
 
 "Tom's resolution was made instantly. 'Your 
 decision gives me the chance for a hurried trip 
 to Europe myself, this summer,' he said. 'I 
 have longed to go, and had almost given up hope 
 of It' 
 
 "Already the evidence of Tom's ability and 
 success had made a change in Mr. Morton's man- 
 ner and attitude toward his whilom employe. 
 'Do you really propose to go?' he inquired. 
 
 " 'I do indeed, sir.'
 
 172 
 
 " 'When? 
 
 " 'Some time this month,' hazarded Tom, not 
 deeming it necessary to explain that he must 
 first learn when and by what line Mrs. Morton 
 and Miss Marie were to sail. 
 
 " 'My family go over alone,' continued Mr. 
 Morton, thoughtfully, 'for I shall be detained 
 here another month, and am to meet them in 
 Paris in August. I have worried somewhat at 
 their crossing unattended. I wonder if you could 
 not arrange as a particular favor to take the 
 same steamer and go over with them?' 
 
 "Tom Dart could hardly believe his ears. 'I 
 should be delighted to make the passage in their 
 company, Mr. Morton,' he said, 'and I am still 
 more pleased to be able to serve you,' 
 
 "And so it happened that when a certain 
 Cunard steamer sailed from New- York in late 
 June, 1873, it bore among its passengers Mrs. 
 Morton, Miss Marie Morton and Mr. Thomas 
 Dart. 
 
 "Miss Morton's attitude toward the devoted 
 and good-looking young man in whose care she 
 and her mother had been placed was that of a 
 friend. Mrs. Morton seemed unable to forget 
 that Mr. Dart was, or had long been, a book- 
 keeper in her husband's employ, and though 
 kindly and courteous, she permitted no approach 
 to intimacy. It was different with Miss Marie. 
 She was a bright, good-looking and singularly
 
 173 
 
 unaffected girl, and Tom had always been a 
 favorite from their first meeting. She now found 
 him a delightful companion. He seemed to think 
 of her comfort only, and was devotedly, but not 
 obtrusively attentive. 
 
 "The voyage over was not eventful, but Tom 
 would not have rendered that verdict. He 
 planned after landing to devote a few weeks to 
 a hurried trip through England and Scotland 
 and then to return to America. 
 
 "Reluctant, however, to part with the Mortons, 
 he decided at Mrs. Morton's suggestion, to re- 
 main with them during their stay in London. 
 
 "The elder lady's motive was a double one. 
 She had early discovered that the young book- 
 keeper's attentions were too earnest and continu- 
 ous to be a mere matter of duty. She also 
 thought she saw some encouragement in her 
 daughter's manner and actions, and the latter 
 impression was a source of much uneasiness and 
 anxiety. Mrs. Morton had her own plans for 
 her daughter, and they did not include the young 
 bookkeeper. Her first idea was to part company 
 with Tom at Liverpool, and so decisively that 
 he would not be seen again during the trip, but 
 the approach to a strange land brought with it 
 a dread of travelling unattended, and she was 
 compelled to admit that Tom was a model trav- 
 eller. She concluded, moreover, that It would 
 be better to encourage his presence with them
 
 174 
 
 for a few days longer, merely to let the cruel 
 separation which wealth and position enforce 
 perform its blighting task. The formalities' that 
 vanish on shipboard quickly reappear on land. 
 Marie would see the wide gulf between herself 
 and Mr. Dart, and he would perceive the folly of 
 aspiring to the hand of his employer's daughter. 
 Accordingly on arriving in London Mrs. Mor- 
 ton chose the most expensive accommodations, 
 determined to set a pace which her husband's 
 altogether too gentlemanly clerk could not equal. 
 
 "By a kindly good fortune, however, Tom's 
 Brooklyn real estate transaction had been cleared 
 up profitably before he left New-York. He was, 
 therefore, well supplied with money, and Mrs. 
 Morton was surpried and annoyed to find her 
 escort retaining quarters fully equal to hers, as 
 a matter of course, and instead of being over- 
 whelmed by the usages of polite society when 
 politest, Tom Dart was so well-bred and fault- 
 lessly dressed that he made a far more attract- 
 ive appearance than most of the fashionable 
 young Americans whom they met. 
 
 "All of which was quite unimportant to Tom. 
 He was watchful of appearances and determined 
 to lose nothing on that score, but beyond that 
 Marie was his only thought, and he contrived 
 innumerable little excursions and trips that 
 would give him more of her society. To her 
 mother's annoyance and increasing alarm, Miss
 
 175 
 
 Marie seemed to prefer Tom and his daily plans 
 to the elder lady's more fashionable programmes. 
 
 "The last day of their first week in London 
 was marked by an incident that intensified Mrs. 
 Morton's annoyance. A party of wealthy and 
 exclusiveBostonians had just arrived. Tom was 
 now so dangerous that he must be disposed of, 
 for her theories were evidently all wrong, and 
 she merely awaited the arrival of her friends to 
 form a convenient pretext for disposing of her 
 escort; but to Mrs. Morton's disgust two mem- 
 bers of the party proved to be college friends 
 of Tom's, and greeted him with delight. 
 
 "That was the last and most aggravating an- 
 noyance, and she decided to end it promptly. 
 
 " 'What are your plans, Mr. Dart?' she asked 
 pleasantly that evening. 
 
 " 'For to-morrow, Mrs. Morton?' 
 
 " 'Well, no, In general, now that you have 
 located us so pleasantly in London.' 
 
 " 'Oh, I have no particular plans. Perhaps I 
 may go up to the Scotch lakes in a week or ten 
 days.' 
 
 " 'I was beginning to fear, Mr. Dart,' continued 
 Mrs. Morton, in especially pleasant tones, 'that 
 we were imposing on your kindness, and keeping 
 you in London against your own inclination. 
 Now that the Rhodes are here, we shall have an 
 increasing number of friends. So pray feel at 
 liberty to leave us at any moment you please.
 
 178 
 
 You have been so attentive to our wants, and 
 have been such a useful escort, especially to my 
 daughter, that we are both more than grateful. 
 The financial part can be reimbursed readily, 
 the personal part cannot, and I can only thank 
 you most earnestly.' The words and tone were 
 studiedly courteous, but there was no mistaking 
 the inference. 
 
 "Tom said nothing. He bowed coldly and 
 withdrew. She had made hideously plain at 
 length the financial distance that separated him, 
 Thomas Dart, from the girl he loved. 
 
 "Tom's best efforts at the theatre that evening, 
 were not satisfactory to Miss Marie. 
 
 " 'What is the matter, Mr. Dart?' she in- 
 quired during the intermission, as Tom seemed 
 unable to recall the principal character in the 
 first act. 'Are you sick, or bored?' she asked. 
 
 " 'Neither, Miss Morton. I am sad.' 
 
 " "That is worse than either of my suggestions. 
 Whence does it arise? Indigestion?' 
 
 " 'I am going back to the United States day 
 after to-morrow,' said Dart quietly. 
 
 "Marie's cheek paled slightly. 
 
 " 'Why do you go?' she asked after a moment's 
 silence. 
 
 " 'One reason is because my business needs 
 me.' 
 
 " 'Then that is only one reason of several, 
 Mr. Dart?' The resumption of the play pre-
 
 177 
 
 vented further conversation. Miss Morton heard 
 as little of the dialogue of the second act as her 
 companion did of the first. 
 
 " 1 want to know the other reasons,' she whis- 
 pered as Dart helped the two ladies into their 
 carriage after the play was over. 
 
 " Tm afraid I cannot tell you,' replied Tom 
 sadly. 
 
 "The next day he announced to Mrs. Morton 
 that a business matter of importance recalled 
 him to America; that he had abandoned his trip 
 to Scotland in consequence, and would catch 
 the earliest steamer. 
 
 "The farewell with Marie was not so easily 
 accomplished. Her usual unaffected cordiality 
 was gone, and Tom found a quiet, well-bred, 
 self-possessed young woman. His own high- 
 spirited nature responded to the chill of the part- 
 ing with an added chill, and their frank and 
 pleasant intercourse seemed to have suddenly 
 become all constraint. 
 
 "The last thanks were spoken by mother and 
 daughter, the last farewell said. Tom bowed 
 himself out of their parlor and started aimlessly 
 down the corridor. 
 
 " 'Mr. Dart,' said a familiar voice. 
 
 "He turned hastily. 
 
 " 'We expect you to call upon us after we re- 
 turn to New-York. Will you not? 
 
 It had not escaped Dart that Mrs. Morton had
 
 178 
 
 omitted the usual invitation. He felt that the 
 omission was intentional, as, indeed, it was. 
 
 " *Do you wish me to come, Miss Morton?' 
 he asked. 
 
 " 'Oh, I am not particular,' she said demurely. 
 
 " 'Then why do you invite me?' 
 
 " 'Papa will be glad to see you.' 
 
 "Tom was very close to her. Somehow the con- 
 straint was all gone. 
 
 " 'Is he the only one who would welcome me, 
 Miss Morton? After the pleasant hours we have 
 spent together on sea and land, I had hoped 
 that that we were at least good friends.' 
 
 " 'I hope we are Mr. Dart.' 
 
 " 'Certainly I shall never call at your home 
 again, Miss Morton,' said Tom gravely, 'unless 
 your invitation represents your own wish that 
 I should come.' 
 
 The color suddenly rushed to Marie's face. 
 
 " 'Please come,' she said half glancing at the 
 handsome young fellow before her, 'and besides 
 I have something to say to you when you call.' 
 
 " 'Can't you say it now? asked Tom, eagerly. 
 
 " 'Not possibly." 
 
 " 'Is it important?' 
 
 "Marie pulled a leaf or two out of the rose 
 she was wearing, and meditated. 'That de- 
 pends on circumstances, Mr. Dart, and possibly 
 I might not tell you after all.' 
 
 " 'Don't say that,' pleaded Tom.
 
 179 
 
 " "Then you must promise to call,' 
 
 " 'Indeed I do promise.' 
 
 " There is one other condition, Mr. Dart,' she 
 added severely. 
 
 " 'I agree in advance, Miss Morton.' 
 
 " 'You must be exceedingly nice,' and with a 
 smile that Tom cherished all the way across the 
 Atlantic, and she was gone. 
 
 "The voyage allowed Tom Dart plenty of time 
 to consider his affairs in every light, and lay out 
 a plan of action. 
 
 "There was a strong inclination at times tow- 
 ard the old, indolent, careless way of life, but 
 the incentive to action was so great that Tom 
 looked eagerly forward to an energetic and sen- 
 sible campaign. He decided to get down to busi- 
 ness without a day's delay, in order to have defi- 
 nite plans by early fall. The Mortons were to 
 return in September, and Tom was especially 
 anxious to have some results secured by that 
 time, for he early decided that he would make 
 his feelings known to Miss Marie at the first 
 opportunity. With these resolutions uppermost 
 Tom Dart, bronzed, hearty and well dressed, left 
 the steamer and plunged into the busy throng of 
 commercial New York. 
 
 "The three months that followed seemed to 
 pass with more than ordinary rapidity, and Tom 
 had scarcely awakened to the fact that autumn 
 had come when he met Miss Morton on Broad- 
 way one afternoon in late September.
 
 180 
 
 " 'You were actually rushing by without see- 
 ing me at all,' she said, indignantly, as Tom 
 wheeled joyously around and joined her. 
 
 " 'Impossible,' he said, solemnly. 'I should 
 have seen you, or known you were near, even if 
 I were two blocks away.' 
 
 '"Nonsense, Mr. Dart. Friends don't have 
 affinities like that. You know we agreed in Lon- 
 don that we actually were friends,' 
 
 " 'A knowledge, Miss Morton, that has been 
 pleasanter to me than any other recollection of 
 our trip.' 
 
 " 'We only returned last week,' continued 
 Marie, 'and already papa is deep in some new 
 business plans. We thought he had retired per- 
 manently, but he says he must have occupation.' 
 
 "The short walk to the Morton residence was 
 covered all too soon for Tom, and he lingered 
 at the steps. 
 
 " Tlease come in and dine with us, Mr. Dart,' 
 said Marie, heartily. 'Mamma is in Stockbridge 
 and papa and I are alone. Moreover, I am sure 
 he wants to see you, for yesterday he inquired 
 your address.' 
 
 "Thus urged, Tom accepted, and was heartily 
 welcomed by Mr. Morton, who invited him to 
 his library when dinner was over. 
 
 " The fact is, Dart,' he remarked as he lighted 
 a cigar, 'I cannot keep out of active work of one 
 kind or another, and several of us have lately
 
 181 
 
 organized a company to handle trust money and 
 real estate. I thought immediately of you in 
 connection with it. How are you progressing?' 
 
 "Tom explained his affairs, and an hour later, 
 when he arose to go, he had been offered and had 
 accepted an official position in the new company 
 at an ample salary. 
 
 " 'I presume my daughter thinks I have stolen 
 her guest,' said Mr. Morton, smiling, as Tom bid 
 him good night. 'You will find her in the rear 
 parlor, if you do not mind making iny apologies.' 
 Tom was entirely willing. He had some re- 
 marks of his own to make. 
 
 "The door of the back parlor was partly open, 
 the light burned low, and Marie was playing 
 softly on the piano. 
 
 "She turned as Tom entered. Time is almost 
 up, Mr. Dan,' she said. 
 
 "Tom began his apologies. 
 
 " 'Oh, you need not apologize,' she interrupted. 
 'To a man the plea of business is ever new and 
 ever unanswerable. I know all about it. A 
 man meets another man, and they smoke, tell 
 jokes and completely forget engagements or 
 duties, and when confronted by their short- 
 comings they look solemn and fall back on "busi- 
 ness," for business covereth all things. Men, 
 Mr. Dart, are one and all deceitful creatures, 
 and, also, you are no better than your sex.' 
 Which freed Marie's mind and she resumed play- 
 Ing.
 
 182 
 
 "Tom was standing a few feet from the piano. 
 He had never seen her look so attractive. A gown 
 of some soft, clinging silk was wondrously be- 
 coming to her slender, girlish figure, dark hair 
 and black eyes. It was almost joy enough to be 
 alone with her in the quiet lamp-lighted room, 
 even though her greeting was a lecture. 
 
 " 'Miss Morton,' said Tom, impetuously, *your 
 father and I have been talking business, and I 
 have this evening reached conclusions that will 
 affect my whole future life, but I can truthfully 
 tell you that there was not a moment of the whole 
 time when I would not have hurried to you, had 
 I consulted my own inclinations.' 
 
 "Tom's face was very near her as he leaned 
 on the piano. 
 
 "The conversation had grown suddenly per- 
 sonal. Miss Morton made no reply. Her hands 
 wandered gently over the keys in Rubinstein's 
 Melodie. 
 
 " Til forgive you,' she said, looking up brightly 
 a few moments later. 
 
 " 'Turn up the light, Mr. Dart, and be seated. 
 I have some photographs to show you.' 
 
 "Tom did not move. 
 
 " 'You have something to tell me, Miss Morton,' 
 he said. 
 
 " 'I have? 
 
 " 'Yes. Don't you recall our parting in Lon- 
 don?'
 
 188 
 
 " 'Indeed I do, and I recall the condition at- 
 tached to my remark.' 
 
 " 'Have I not complied with it?' asked Tom- 
 anxiously. 
 
 "Marie arose with mock solemnity. 
 
 " 'How can you ask such a question,' she in- 
 quired, 'when I have actually been obliged to 
 lecture you for neglect?' 
 
 " 'And you won't tell me, Miss Morton?' 
 
 " 'Not to-night.' 
 
 " 'Suppose I call soon again, on purpose for it,' 
 suggested the artful Dart. 
 
 " 'It might not do any good.' 
 
 '"Why?' 
 
 " 'I may never tell you.' 
 
 " 'Miss Morton,' said Tom, impulsively, 'I have 
 something to say to you. Unlike your "some- 
 thing," it cannot wait. It may not interest you, 
 but it is all important to me. 
 
 " 'Ever since that night when I called here to 
 see your father, and Providence brought you 
 instead, you have been my ideal, my hope, my 
 ambition. All my efforts have been but to de- 
 serve you.' 
 
 "Marie stood by the piano with hands clasped 
 and eyes downcast. 
 
 "Tom was very close to her. 
 
 " 'Ever since that night in the hall,' he con- 
 tinued gently, 'I have loved you, and when I 
 knew you better and saw you daily I loved you
 
 184 
 
 more and more for your own good qualities. As 
 for myself, Marie, I'm only an ordinary young 
 fellow, who has made a little place for himself 
 in the world, and for whom all of life and happi- 
 ness depend on your loving him, though only a 
 little, in return.' 
 
 " 'I don't think you are just to yourself, Mr. 
 Dart,' said Marie, without looking up. 
 
 "'Why?' 
 
 " 'You are not an "ordinary young fellow," 
 judged by my standard,' and then raising her 
 dark eyes to Tom's with a woman's first spoken 
 love in their depths she whispered, 'for you are 
 the dearest man in the world to me.' 
 
 "That was enough for Tom. 
 
 " 'What were you going to say to me, Marie?' 
 he asked half an hour later. 'Have I not the 
 right to hear now?' 
 
 " 'I said I might never tell you,' she said, 
 'and that it all depended on circumstances, any- 
 way, didn't 17 
 
 " 'You did, and worried me all the way across 
 the Atlantic.' 
 
 "Marie laughed. 'I've said it already,' she said, 
 blushing. 'You see I thought you liked me, and 
 I knew I liked you, and so under proper circum- 
 stances'Marie iid her face on Tom's shoulder 
 'what I had to say was yes.' 
 
 "That was twenty years ago," concluded the 
 Doctor, reflectively. "The middle-aged hand-
 
 185 
 
 some, prosperous New Yorker whom you passed 
 at Twenty-third street and Fifth avenue this 
 afternoon was Thomas Dart, man of wealth, po- 
 sition and influence In this big community. The 
 well-built young fellow with him was his oldest 
 son." 
 
 The Doctor paused, and lighted the cigar which, 
 neglected, had gone out. 
 
 "Your theoretical Dart, Doctor," said Bradley, 
 heartily, "is a great success. We shall all sleep 
 the better for him." 
 
 "There is only one trouble with Dart, happy, 
 prosperous and married," rejoined his friend 
 sadly. 
 
 "What is that?" asked Bradley. 
 
 The Doctor arose, buttoned up his coat and 
 pushed back his chair. 
 
 "The story is totally false," he said.