DAVID MALCOLM

BY

NELSON LLOYD

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

NEW YORK

1913

COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

Published August, 1913

TO

THE RARE, SWEET MEMORY OF

SUSANNE LIVINGSTON GREEN LLOYD

MY WIFE AND THE DEAR COMPANION

WHO WORKED

WITH ME OVER THESE PAGES

DAVID MALCOLM

CHAPTER I

"Take care not to tumble into the water, David, " said my mother. 

She was standing by the gate, and from my perch on the back of theoff-wheeler, I smiled down on her with boyish self-assurance. The ideaof my tumbling into the water! The idea of my drowning even did I meetwith so ludicrous a mishap! But I was accustomed to my mother'sanxious care, for as an only child there had fallen to me a doubleportion of maternal solicitude. In moments of stress and pain it cameas a grateful balm; yet more often, as now, it was irritating to mygrowing sense of self-reliance. To show how little I heeded heradmonition, how well able I was to take care of myself, as I smiledloftily from my dangerous perch, with my legs hardly straddling thehorse's back, I disdained to secure myself by holding to the harness, but folded my arms with the nonchalance of a circus rider. 

"And, David, be careful about rattlesnakes, " said my mother. 

Had I not seen in her anxious eyes a menace against all my plans forthat day I should have laughed outright in scorn, but knowing it neverwise to pit my own daring against a mother's prudence, I returnedmeekly, "Yessem. " Then I gave the horse a surreptitious kick, tryingthus to set all the ponderous four in motion. The unsympathetic animalwould not move in obedience to my command. Instead, he shook himselfvigorously, so that I had to seize the harness to save myself from anignominious tumble into the road. 

"You won't let David wander out of your sight, now, will you, James?"my mother said. 

James was climbing into the saddle. Being a deliberate man in all hisactions, he made no sign that he had heard until he had both feetsecurely in the stirrups, until he had struck a match on his boot-legand had lighted his pipe, until he had unhooked the single rein bywhich he guided the leaders and was ready to give his horses the wordto move. Then he spoke in a voice of gentle protest:

"You hadn't otter worry about Davy, ma'am, not when he's with me. " Hislong whip was swinging in the air, but he checked it, that he mightturn to me and ask: "Now, Davy, you're sure you have your hook andline?"

I nodded. 

"And your can o' worms for bait?"

Again I nodded. The whip cracked. And I was off on the greatestadventure of my life! My charger was a shaggy farm-horse, hitchedignominiously to the pole of a noisy wood-wagon; my squire, the lanky, loose-limbed James; my goal, the mountains to which were set my youngeyes, impatiently measuring the miles of rolling valley which I mustcross before I reached the land that until now I had seen only in thewizard lights of distance. 

Every one lives a story--every man and every woman. A million miles ofbook-shelves could not hold the romances which are being lived aroundyou and will be unwritten. I am sure that when your own story has beenlived, when it is stored in your heart and memory, you will follow thebinding thread of it, and find it leading you back, as mine leads me toone day like that day in May when I went fishing. There will be yourChapter I. Before that, you will see, you were but a slip of humanitytaking root on earth. My own life began ten years before that Maymorning, but on that May morning began my story. Then I rode allunconscious of it. I was simply going fishing for trout. Yet, as Iclung to my heavy-footed horse and kept my eyes fixed on the distantmountains, my heart beat quick with the spirit of adventure, for tofish for trout in mysterious forests meant a great deal to one who hadknown only the sluggish waters in the meadow and the martyrlikeresignation of the chub and sunny. I might begin my story on thatwinter morning when I came into the world and bleated my protestagainst living at all, but I pass by those years when I was only a slipof humanity taking root on earth and come to that May day which is thefirst to rise distinctly on my inward vision when I turn to retrospect. Even now I mark it as a day of great adventure. Since then I havebattled with salmon in northern waters, I have felt my line strainunder the tarpon's despair, I have heard my reel sing with the rushesof the bass, yet I do not believe that a whale with my harpoon in hisside, as he thrashes the sea, would give me the same exulting thrillthat came with a tiny trout's first tug at my hook. Filled with soexciting a prospect, I did not look back as we swung down the hill fromthe farmhouse. I dared not, lest I should see my too solicitous motherbeckoning me home to the protection of her eyes. Though I clutched theharness and bounced about on my uncomfortable seat, the horse's roughgait had no terrors for me when every clumsy stride was carrying menearer to the woods. As we rattled into the long street of thevillage, it seemed to me that all the people must have come out just tosee us pass. The fresh beauty of the spring morning might have calledthem forth, but from the proud height where I sat looking down on themthey had all the appearance of having heard in some mysterious way thatDavid Malcolm was going fishing. They hailed me from every side. Eventhe Reverend Mr. Pound added to the glory of my progress, leaving hisdesk and his profound studies of Ahasuerus to stand at the open windowas we passed. 

With boyish exultation I called to him: "I'm goin' a-fishin', Mr. Pound--fishin' for trout. "

In Mr. Pound's personal catechism his own chief end was to uttertrenchant and useful warnings to all who came within reach of hisvoice. Even to a lad riding forth under careful guidance to fish in alittle mountain stream he had to sound his alarm. The soft fragranceof the May-day air, and the restful green and white of the May-daycoloring had brought to the minister's face a smile of contentment inspite of his melancholy ponderings over the weaknesses of Ahasuerus; helooked on me benignly from his window until I spoke, and then his faceclouded with concern. 

"David, David, " he cried, stretching out his hand with fingerswide-spread, "don't fall into the water. "

There was a mysterious note in his reverberating tones, which expresseda profound conviction that not only should I fall into the water, butthat I should be drowned, and looking at his solemn face I could feelthe cold pool closing over my head. I tried to laugh away the fearwhich seized me, but chill, damp currents seemed to sweep the shadedstreet. Not till we reached the open sunlit square did my sluggishblood start again. There I came under the genial influence of SquireCrumple's radiating smile, and Mr. Pound and his lugubrious warningwere forgotten. The squire was trimming his lilac-bush, and from thegreen shrubbery his round face lifted slowly, as the sun rises from itsnight's rest in the eastward ridges and spreads its welcome light overthe valley. 

"Well, Davy, where are you bound?" he shouted, so pleasantly that Icould well believe my small wanderings of interest to so great a man. 

"Fishin', " I answered, drawing myself up to a dignity far above thechub and sunny--"fishin' for trout. "

"Fishin', eh? Well, look out for rattlers. " His voice was so cheerythat one might have thought these snakes well worth meeting for theircompanionship. "This is the season for 'em, Davy--real rattler season, and you're sure to see some. " To make his warning more impressive, thesquire gave a leap backward which could not have been more sudden orviolent had he heard the dreaded serpent stirring in the heart of hislilac. "Watch out, Davy; watch sharp, and when you meet 'em be sure togo backward and sideways like that. "

He gave a second extraordinary leap, which was altogether too realisticto be pleasant for the boy who saw the mountains, sombre and black, beyond the long street's end, yet very near him. I forced a laugh athis antics, but I rode on more thoughtfully, my hands clutching theharness, my eyes fixed on my horse's bobbing mane. I feared to look uplest I should meet more of these disturbing warnings, and yet enough ofpride still held in me to lift my head at the store. I had alwayslooked toward the store instinctively when I passed that importantcentre of the village life, and now, as always, I saw Stacy Shunk onthe bench. 

He was alone, but alone or in the company of half a score, in silenceor in the heat of debate, Stacy had a single attitude, and this was oneof distortion in repose. Now, as always, he was sitting with legscrossed, his hands hugging a knee, his eyes contemplating his leftfoot. In the first warm days of spring, Stacy's feet burst out withthe buds, casting off their husks of leather. So this morning his foothad a new interest for him, and he was absorbed in the study of it, asthough it were something he had just discovered, a classic fragmentrecently unearthed, at the beauty of whose lines he marvelled. He didnot even look up when he heard the rumble of our wagon. Stacy Shunknever troubled to look up if he could avoid it. He seemed to have athird eye which peered through the ragged hole in the top of his hat, and swept the street, and bored through walls, a tiny search-light, butone of peculiarly penetrating power. I saw his head move a little aswe drew near, and his body shifted nervously as would a mollusk at theapproach of some hostile substance. Yet sitting thus, eying me onlythrough the top of his hat, he saw right into my mind, he saw rightinto my pockets, he saw the mustard can full of worms, he saw the line, and the fish-hooks which my mother had thoughtfully wrapped in apill-box. How else could he have divined all that he did?

"Well, Davy, " he said in a wiry voice, which cut through the din ofrattling harness and creaking wagon, "I see you're goin' a-fishin' fortrout?"

"Yes, sir, Mr. Shunk, " I returned, with a politeness that told myrespect for his occult powers. 

"Well, mind, " he said, intently studying his foot as though he werereading some mystic signals wigwagged from the gods, "mind, Davy, thatyou don't fall into the hands of the Professor. If the Professorcatches you, Davy--" The foot stopped wiggling. The oracle wassilent. Did it fear to reveal to me so dreadful a fate as mine if Ifell into the Professor's clutches? I waved a hand defiantly to theseer and I rode on. Rode on? I was dragged on by four stout horsesthrough the village to the mountains, for in my heart I was calling tomy mother, wishing that her gentle warnings had turned me back before Iheard the voice of doom sounding from the depths of Mr. Pound; before Ihad seen the comic tragedy enacted by Squire Crumple; above all, beforethe man who saw through the top of his hat had uttered his enigmasabout the Professor. 

There is something innately repugnant to man in the word "professor. "It makes the flesh creep almost as does the thought of the toad orsnake. Though when a boy of ten I had never seen a "professor, " theword alone was so full of portent that the prospect of seeing one, evenwithout being caught by him, would have frightened me. I suppose thatthe chill which reverberated through my spine and legs echoed thehorror of many generations of my ancestors who had known professors ofall kinds, from those who trimmed their hair and dosed them withnostrums to those who sat over them with textbook and rod. Beingmyself thus perturbed, it was astonishing that James should show nosign of fear, but should keep his horses in their collars, pullingstraight for the mountains where the dreaded creature lived. He smokedhis pipe nonchalantly, as though a hundred professors could not daunthim. I was sure that there was something of bravado in his conductuntil he began to sing, and his voice rang out without a tremor, sofull and strong that it fanned a spark of courage into my coweringheart. James had a wonderfully inspiring way of singing. He tuned hisvoice to the day and to the time of the day. This morning the sky wasclear blue above us, and about us the orchards blossomed pink andwhite, and the fresh green fields were all awave under the breeze, notthe grim wind of winter, but the soft yet buoyant wind of spring. Sohis song was cheery. The words of it were doleful, like the words ofall his songs, but under the touch of his magic baton, his swingingwhip, a requiem could become a hymn of rejoicing. Now the birds in themeadows seemed to accompany him, and our heavy-footed four to step witha livelier gait in time to his rattling air, all unconscious that hesang of "the old gray horse that died in the wilderness. " It was aboast of his that he could sing "any tune there was, " and I believedhim, for I had a profound admiration of his musical ability. Indeed, Ihold it to this day, and often as I sit in the dark corner of anopera-box and listen to the swelling harmonies of a great orchestra, Iclose my eyes and fancy myself squatting on the grassy barn-bridge atJames's side when the shadows are creeping over the valley and he weepsfor Nellie Grey and Annie Laurie in a voice so mighty that the veryhills echo his sorrow. 

This May morning, as James sang, my spirits rose with his soaringmelody from the depths into which they had been cast in the passage ofthe village, and when the last note had died away and he was debatingwhether to light his pipe or sing another song, I asked him with quitea show of courage:

"Is it very dangerous in the mountains?"

James looked down at me. A smile flickered around the corners of hismouth, but he suppressed it quickly. 

"Yes--and no, " he drawled. 

Inured as I was to his cautious ways, I was not taken aback by thisnon-committal reply, but pursued my inquiry, hoping that in spite ofhis vigilance I might elicit some encouraging opinion. 

"Am I likely to tumble into the water while I'm fishing, James?"

"That depends, Davy. " James looked profoundly at the sky. 

"And what's the chance of my being bit by a rattlesnake, James?"

"I wouldn't say they was absolutely none, nor yet would I say they wasany chance at all. " At every word of this sage opinion James waggedhis head. 

We rode some distance in silence, and then I came to the real point ofmy examination. "James, what kind of a man is a professor?"

James looked down at me gravely. "I s'pose, Davy, you have in mindwhat Stacy Shunk said about him catchin' you. "

"Oh, dear, no, " I protested. "I was just wondering what kind of a manhe was. "

"Well, Davy, " James said, in a voice of mockery which silenced as wellas encouraged me, "if you can fall into the creek, be bit by a rattler, and catched by the Professor all in the one-half hour we will be in themountains while I loaden this wagon with wood, I'll give you a medalfor being the liveliest young un I ever heard tell of. Mind, Davy, I'll give you a medal. "

With that he checked further questioning by breaking into a song, andhad he once descended from the heights to which he soared and shown anysign that he was aware of my presence, pride would have restrained mefrom pressing my trembling inquiry. 

So, singing as we rode, we crossed the ridge, the mountain's guardingbulwark; we left the open valley behind us and descended into thewooded gut. We passed a few scattered houses with little clearingsaround them, and then the trees drew in closer to us until the green oftheir leafy masonry arched over our heads. At last I was in themountains! This was the mysterious topsy-turvy land, the land ofstrange light and shadow to which I had so often gazed with wonderingeyes. In the excitement of its unfolding, in the interest with which Ifollowed the windings of the narrow road, I forgot the dangers whichthreatened me in these quiet, friendly woods; and when I cast my lineinto the tumbling brook I should have laughed at Mr. Pound, at SquireCrumple, and Stacy Shunk, had I given them a thought. But even James'skindly warnings were now uncalled for. That he should admonish me atall I accepted as merely a formal compliance with his promise to mymother that he would keep an eye on me. For him to keep an eye on mewas a physical impossibility, as the road plunged deeper into thewoods, bending just beyond the little bridge where he had fixed me formy fishing. He was soon out of my sight, and his warning to me to stayin that spot went out of my mind before the rumble of his wagon haddied away. Had he turned at the bend he would have seen me lying flaton my back on the bridge, unbalanced by the eagerness with which I hadanswered the first tug at the hook. 

I could have landed a shark with the strength which I put into thatwild jerk, but I saw only the worm bait dangling above my astonishedface. With my second cast I lifted a trout clear of the water; thencaught my line in an overhanging branch and saw my erstwhile prisonershoot away up-stream. The tangled line led me from my post of safety. Had I returned to it; had I remembered the admonition of the cautiousJames, and held to the station to which he had assigned me--my lifemight have run its course in another channel. Now, as I look back, itseems as though my story became entangled with my line in thatoverhanging branch, as though there I picked up the strong, holdingthread of it, and followed its tortuous windings to this day. 

My blood was running quick with excitement. I had no fear. Awonderful catch, a game fish six inches long filled me with the prideof achievement, and with pride came self-confidence. The stream luredme on. The rapids snapped up my hook, and with many a deceitful tugenticed me farther and farther into the woods. The brush shut thebridge from my view, but I knew that it was not far away, and that avoice so mighty as James could raise would easily overtake my slowcourse along the bank. So I went from rock to rock with one handguiding my precious rod, and the other clutching overhanging limbs andbushes. 

What sport this was for a lad of ten who had known only the placidbrook in the open meadow and the amiable moods of its people! How manya boyish shout I muffled as I made my cautious way along thatboisterous stream and pitted my wits against its wary dwellers! Iwormed through an abatis of laurel; I scampered over the bared andtangled roots of a great oak; I reached a shelf of pebbly beach. Around it the water swept over moss-clad rocks into a deep pool; aboveit the arched limbs broke and let in the warm sunlight, making it agrateful spot to one chilled by the dampness of the thicker woods. Eager to try my luck in that enticing pool, I leaped from the massedroots to the little beach without troubling to see what others mighthave come here to enjoy with me a bit of open day. My hook touched thestream; my line ran taut; my rod almost snapped from my hands. Iclutched it with all my strength. Every muscle of arms, legs, and bodywas bent to land that gigantic fish. That it was gigantic I was sure, from the power of its rush. I pitted my weight against his and felthim give way. Then, shouting in exultation, I fell over backward. Isaw him leave the water, not quite the leviathan I had fancied; I sawhim fly over my head and heard him flopping behind me. Getting to myfeet, I turned to rush at my prize and capture him. I waschecked--first by my ears, for in them rang the sharp whir of a rattle. Cold blood shot from my heart to the tips of my toes and the top of myhead. I needed nothing more to hold me back, but there before my eyeswas the other visitor to this pleasant sunny spot, his head rising fromhis coiled body, his tail erect and lashing in fury. 

Since that day I have learned that the rattler when disturbed by manwill seek refuge in flight, and fights only when cornered. Thisparticular snake, I think, must have been told that a boy will glideaway into the bushes if a chance is given him, for he seemed determinedto stand his ground and let me flee. But where was I to escape when heheld the narrow way to the bank, and behind me roared the stream, grownsuddenly to mighty width and depth? How was I to move at all whenevery nerve was numbed by the icy currents which swept through myveins? Could I escape? Was it not foreordained that I should meet myend in these woods? Had I not spurned the chance of life given methrough the prophecies of good Mr. Pound and the warning of the squire?

The snake before me grew to the size of a boa-constrictor. The brookbehind me roared in my ears like Niagara. The snake began to drive hishead toward me, showing his fangs as though he were making areconnoissance of the air before his spring. He was so terrible that Iknew that when he did hurl himself at me I must go backward and fulfilthe prophecy of Mr. Pound. I had forgotten the man who saw through thetop of his hat. I awaited helplessly the triumph of Mr. Pound. 

From out of the bush, from out of the air, as though impelled by aspirit hand, a long stick swung. It fell upon my enemy's head anddrove it to the ground. He lifted his head and turned from me, striking madly, but the rod fell again upon his back. He uncoiled andtried to run; he twisted and turned in his dying agony and lashed theair in futile fury. The merciless rod broke him and stretched him tohis full length. But even though dead he was terrible to me, for had Inot heard that a snake never dies until sunset; could I not see thebody still quivering; might not the bruised head dart at me in dyingmadness!

I took a step backward, and hurtled into the water. For a long time Igroped in the depths of the pool. To me it seemed that I struggledthere for hours in the blackness; that serpents drew their slimylengths across my face; that fishes poked their noses with boldinquisitiveness about me and dared to nibble at my hands; that Mr. Pound looked up at me from the abyss, benignly in his triumph, and thathis solemn voice joined with the roaring of the torrent. Knowing wellthat my end had come and that the prophecy was being fulfilled, Istruggled without hope, but my fingers clutching at the water at lastmet some solid substance and closed on it. I felt myself turn, andsuddenly opening my eyes saw the sunlight pouring through the greenwindow in the tree-tops. My legs straightened; my feet touched thestony bottom; my shoulders lifted from the stream, and I looked into asmall girl's face, while my hand was tightly clasped in hers. 

Since that day the sun's soft brown has faded from her cheeks, uncovering their radiance; since then she has grown to fairestwomanhood, and I have seen her adorning the art of Paris and Vienna;but to me she has given no fairer picture than on that May morningwhen, shamefaced, I climbed from the mountain stream and looked downfrom my ten years of height on the little girl in a patched blue frock. Nature had coiffed her hair that day and tumbled it over her shouldersin wanton brightness, but she had caught the crowning wisp of it in afaded blue ribbon which bobbed majestically with every movement of herhead. Had some woodland Mr. Pound told her that I was coming? Sincethen I have seen her more daintily shod than when her bare brown legshurried from view into broken shoes of twice her size. Since then thehard little hand has turned white and thin and tapering, to such a handas women are wont to let dawdle over the arms of chairs. Then I was aboy, with a boy's haughty way of regarding girlish softness. I washaughtier that day because I sought in my pride to cover up my debt toher. Now I am a man, but the boy's picture of Penelope Blight, thelittle girl in the patched blue frock and broken shoes, standing by themountain stream, holds in the memory with clear and softening colors. 

She leaned, a tiny Amazon, on the stick which towered to twice herheight, and she said to me: "Boy, you hadn't otter be afraid of snakes. "

In my shame I answered nothing and my teeth chattered, for I was verycold from fright and the ducking. 

Then she said to me: "Boy, you had otter come over to our house and getwarm. "

I remembered my dignity, and, in a tone of patronage assumed by rightof the one year of difference in our ages, I asked: "Where is yourhouse, young un?"

She pointed over her shoulder, over the quivering body of the snake, across the bushes, and through the green light of the woods. There Isaw a bit of blue sky, cut by a thin spire of smoke. 

"Yonder's our patch, " she said, "and father will give you something towarm you up. "

I asked: "Who is your father, little un?"

She drew herself up very straight, and even the blue ribbon in her hairrose in majesty as she answered. Then I almost tumbled into the poolagain, for she said: "Some call him the Professor. "

CHAPTER II

The words of Penelope Blight fell on my ears as chillingly as therattler's whir. That the prophecies of Mr. Pound and Squire Crumplehad come to nothing was little consolation for me. So near had theybeen to fulfilment that it seemed that I must have been spared only fora harder fate, and the figure of Stacy Shunk peering at me through thetop of his hat, uttering his ominous warning, rose before my startledeyes. I should have run, but my retreat was barred, the girl blockingthe way over the shelving beach. I took a backward step and for aninstant the Prophet Pound's star was in the ascendant, for the foottouched the water. So great was my dread of the Professor that had Ibeen in a position to choose my course I should have taken my chancesin the stream, but I lost my self-control with my balance and made adesperate clutch at the air. 

Again the brown hand caught mine, and this time it did not release me. 

"Come with me, " my small captor said in a tone of command. 

I did not resist, but I went with fear. To resist would have been aconfession of cowardice, and there is no pride of courage like that ofa boy of ten in a girl's presence. I might have made excuses, but withthat little spire of smoke so close at hand, promising a fire, I, dripping and shivering as I was, could think of nothing to say inprotest. I did declare feebly that I was not cold. My teethchattered, and my body shook, and the girl looked up at me and laughed, and led me on. 

James, a man of a superstitious and imaginative mind, in the quietevenings on the barn-bridge had often told me strange stories in whichgiants and dwarfs, witches and fairies, entangled men in their spells. One of these tales, a favorite of his, came to me now and caused myfeet to lag and my eyes to study my guide with growing distrust. Itwas of a lady called "Laura Lee, " who, James said, sat on the bank ofthe big river combing her hair and singing, the beauty of her face andvoice luring too curious sailormen to their destruction. It was a farcry from the big river to the mountain brook, from the lovely "LauraLee" to this tiny girl, about whom all my careful scrutiny coulddiscover no sign of a comb. Yet it did seem to me that there was aresemblance between the creature of the story, "the beautiful lady withblue eyes and golden hair who hung around the water, " and this child ofthe woods who had no fear of snakes and boasted a professor for afather. She felt the tug of my resisting hand. 

"You're not afraid of me, are you, boy?" she asked, turning to mesharply. 

I, a boy of ten, afraid of this mite! Had she really been what I wasbeginning to suspect, a decoy sent out by the Professor to lure me tohis den, she could not have used more cunning than to put to me such aquestion. I afraid? Though the blood still waved through me, Isquared my shoulders, dissembled a laugh, and stepped before her, andit was I who led the way along the path into the open day of theclearing. There I came face to face with the Professor. 

First I saw that he was human in shape and attire. Indeed, both hisappearance and his occupation were exceedingly commonplace. When wecame upon him he was leaning on a hoe and watching a passing cloud. Had he smiled at me, I think I must have fallen to my knees and liftedmy hands in pleading, but he gave no sign of pleasure that anothervictim had fallen into his toils. In fact, there was somethingreassuring in the perfect indifference with which he regarded me. Whenthe crackling of the bushes called his eyes to us, he threw one glanceour way as though a trifle annoyed at being disturbed in his study. Then he returned to the contemplation of the sky. So I stood on theedge of the woods my hand holding the girl's, and watched him, and asthe seconds passed and he did not change his form, but remained a lazyman leaning on a hoe in a patch of riotous weeds, fear left me andwonder took its place. 

There was nothing about this man to merit the opprobrium of his name, and from appearances Stacy Shunk had as well warned me against beingcaught by Mr. Pound. In the village Mr. Pound was the mould ofrespectability. He always wore a short frock-coat of glossy blackmaterial, which strained itself to reach across his chest. So did theProfessor. But his black had turned to green in spots, and he was sothin and the tails were so short and the coat so broad that it seemedas though its length and breadth had become transposed. It was amarvellously shabby coat, but even in its poverty there was nomistaking its blue blood. It was a decayed sartorial aristocrat, illnourished and sad, but flaunting still the chiselled nose and high, white brow of noble lineage. Here it was all out of place. Mr. Poundwore a great derby which swelled up from his head like a black ominouscloud, and so dominated him that it seemed to be in him the centre ofthought and action, and likely at any moment to catch a slant on thewind and carry him from earth. The Professor wore a great derby, too, but one without the buoyant, cloud-like character of Mr. Pound's. Itwas a burden to him. Only his ears kept it from dragging him to earthand smothering him, and now as he looked up at the sky I saw clear cutagainst its blackness a thin quixotic visage, shaded by a growth ofstubble beard. I marvelled at a man working in such attire, for thesun baked the clearing, but watching, I saw how little he swung his hoeand how much he studied the sky. The whole place spoke of one who kepthis coat on while he worked, and gazed at the clouds more than he hoed. It was wretched and dismal. It hid itself away in the woods from veryshame of its thriftlessness. Age had twisted the house askew, so thatthe mud daubing crumbled from between the logs, and the chimney wasready to tumble through the roof with the next puff of wind. Theshanty barn was aslant and leaned heavily for support on long props. The hay burst through every side of it, and the sole occupant, anancient white mule, had burst through too, and with his head projectingfrom an opening and his ears tilted forward, he was regarding mecritically. Everywhere the weeds were rampant. Everywhere there weresigns of a feeble battle against them, bare spots where the Professorhad charged, cut his way into their massed ranks, only to retreatwearied and beaten by their numbers. 

Over this wretchedness the girl waved her hand and said: "Here is ourfarm. " The blue ribbon in her hair bobbed majestically as she pointedacross the stretch of weeds to the cabin. "And yonder is our house. "She pinched my arm as a sign of caution. "And there is father, " sheadded in a voice of muffled pride. "He's studying. Father's alwaysstudying. "

She would have led me on in silence, not to disturb his labors witheither mind or hoe, but he looked down and asked in a tone of yawninginterest: "Who's the lad, Penelope?"

"I don't know, " she answered. "He fell into the creek, and I pulledhim out. I've brought him in to warm him up. "

Wet, shivering boys emerging suddenly from the woods might have been acommon sight about the Professor's home, did one judge from the way hereceived his daughter's explanation. He merely nodded and fell uponthe weeds with newly acquired vigor. As we walked on we heard thespasmodic crunching of his hoe. But the noise stopped before wereached the house door, and the silence caused us to turn. He wasstanding erect looking at us. 

"I think you'd better have something, lad, " he cried, and, dropping thehoe, he hurried after us. 

So it came that the Professor did me the honors of his home, and withsuch kindness that all my fear of him was soon gone. He stirred thefire to a roaring blaze and placed me in front of it. He spread mycoat before the stove and drew my boots, and quickly my clothes beganto steam, and I was as uncomfortably warm as before I had beenuncomfortably cold. The shy politeness of my age forbade my protestingagainst this over-indulgence in heat, and not until the Professordeclared that he must give me a dose to ward off sickness did I raise afeeble voice in remonstrance. 

My protest was in vain. From the cupboard he brought a large blackbottle. Had I seen my mother approaching me with a bottle as ominousas that, even her favorite remedy that I knew so well, the Seven Sealsof Health and Happiness, I should have fled far away, but now the girlhad my coat, and was turning it before the fire, while her father stoodbetween me and my boots. He smiled so benignly that had he offered meour family nostrum I should have taken it without a grimace. Iaccepted the proffered glass and drank. Never had anything morehorrible than that liquid fire passed my lips. In a moment I seemed tobe turned inside out and toasting at a roaring blaze, and to increasemy discomfort the Professor poured another dose, many times larger thanthe first. Had he held it toward me I should have abandoned my coatand boots, but to my relief he raised it to his lips and drained it offwith a smile of keen appreciation of its merits. 

"Now I feel better, " he said, putting the bottle and glass on thetable, and dropping into a chair. 

It was strange to me that he, who was perfectly dry, should prescribefor himself exactly the same remedy that he had given to me for mywringing wetness. Yet there was no denying the beneficence of thedose, for I was most uncomfortably warm, and had he been feeling badlyhe was certainly now in fine spirits. 

Drawing his daughter between his knees, he enfolded her in his armsprotectingly. "Well, boy, I warrant you feel better, " he said. 

I replied that I did, and if he did not mind I should like to sit alittle farther from the stove. 

He consented, laughing. "And now we should introduceourselves--formally, " he went on. "You have met my daughter, MissBlight--Miss Penelope Blight. I am Mr. Blight--Mr. HendersonBlight--in full, Andrew Henderson Blight. And you?"

"I am David Malcolm, sir, " I answered. 

"Ah!" He lifted his eyebrows. "You are one of those bumptiousMalcolms. "

"Yes, sir, " I returned proudly, for the word "bumptious" had a ring ofimportance in it, and I had every reason to believe that the Malcolmswere persons of quite large importance. 

Why Mr. Blight laughed so loud at my reply I could not understand, butI supposed that in spite of his saturnine appearance he was a man ofjovial temperament and I liked him all the more. 

The wave of merriment past, he regarded me gravely. "Then you must bethe son of the distinguished Judge Malcolm. "

"Yes, sir, " I said, pride rising triumphant over my polite humility. 

"Penelope, " he said, as though addressing only his daughter, "we aregreatly honored. Our guest is a Malcolm--a sop of the celebrated JudgeMalcolm. "

By this adroit flattery my host won my heart, and in the comfort he hadgiven me I lost all care for passing time. When I recalled James, itwas with the thought that I was safe and he would find me, and I wastroubled by no obligation to save him worry. This strange maninterested me, he held my family in high regard, and I was wellsatisfied to see more of him. So I fixed my heels on the rung of mychair, folded my hands in my lap, sat up very straight, and watched himgravely. In this was the one grudge that I long bore against theProfessor--that he baited me as he did, played with my child's pride, and with my innocent connivance vented his contempt on all that I heldmost dear. I did not understand the covert sneer against my father. Years have given me a broader view of life than was my father's, and attimes I can smile with Henderson Blight at the solemnity with which heinvested his judgeship, but mine is the smile of affection. With noknowledge of the law, with a power restricted to county contracts, whenhe sat on the bench in court week with his learned confrère, drew hischin into his pointed collar, and furrowed his brow, Blackstone besidehim would have appeared a tyro in legal lore. The distinguished JudgeMalcolm! So Henderson Blight spoke of him in raillery and so he was intruth, distinguished in his village and his valley, and as I have cometo know men of fame in larger villages and broader valleys I can stilllook back to him with loving pride. Yet that day I sat complacentlywith my feet on the chair-rung, regarding the Professor with growingfriendliness. 

"You know my father?" I asked, seeking to draw forth more of thisagreeable flattery. 

"I have not the honor, " he replied. "You see I am comparatively new inthese parts--driven here, as you may suspect, by temporary adversity. But a man with ideas, David, must some day rise above adversity. Allhe needs is a field of action. " He looked across the bare room and outof the door, where the weeds were charging in masses against the verythreshold; he looked beyond them, above the wall of woods, to a smallwhite cloud drifting in the blue. Young as I was, I saw that in hiseyes which told me that could he reach the cloud he might set theheavens afire, but under his hand there lay no task quite worthy ofhim. "A field of action--an opportunity, " he repeated meditatively. "It's hard, David, to have all kinds of ideas and no place to use them. When a man knows that he has it in him and----"

"Is that why Mr. Shunk calls you the Professor?" I interrupted. 

Henderson Blight turned toward me a melancholy smile. "Yes, " he said. "They all call me that, David, down in the village. Ask them who theProfessor is. They will tell you, a vagrant, a lazy fellow with a giftof talking, a ne'er-do-well with a little learning. Ask Stacy Shunk. Ask Mr. Pound--wise and good Mr. Pound. He will tell you that ideassuch as mine are a danger to the community, that I speak out ofignorance and sin. As if in every mountain wind I could not hear abetter sermon than he can give me and find in every passing cloud atext to ponder over. They don't understand me at all. "

The Professor drew his little daughter close to him and regarded mefixedly, as though to see if I understood. 

"Yes, sir, " I said. "I will ask them. "

At this matter-of-fact reply his mouth twitched humorously. "Andperhaps you will find that they are right, " he said. "That's the worstof it. Even dull minds can generate a certain amount of unpleasanttruth; that's what sets me on edge against them--when they ask me why Idon't carry out some of my fine ideas instead of criticising others. "

"Why don't you?" The question was from no desire to drive my host intoa corner, but came from an innocent interest in him and a wish to getat something concrete. 

He took no offence at my presumption, but rose slowly, lifted his armsabove his head, and stretched himself. Unconsciously he answered myquestion. 

"Had I the last ten years to live over again I would, " he said as hepaced slowly up and down the room. "Perhaps I shall yet. Long ago, when I was home on a little farm with the mountains tumbling down overit, I used to plan getting out in the world and doing something morethan to earn three meals a day. It is stupid--the way men make mealsthe aim of their lives. I wanted something better, but to find it Ihad to have the means, and means could only be had by the mostuncongenial work. So here I find myself on a still smaller farm withthe mountains coming down on my very head. It was different withRufus. "

"Rufus who?" I demanded with the abruptness of an inquisitive youth whowas getting at the facts at last. 

The Professor halted by my chair. "My brother Rufus. You see, David, I taught school because it was easy work and gave me time to think. Rufus was a blockhead. He never had a real idea of any kind, but hecould work. When he owned a cross-road store he was as proud as thoughhe had written 'Paradise Lost. ' He went to conquer the county town anddid it by giving a prize with every pound of tea. He wrote me about itand you might have supposed that he had won a Waterloo. Yet he had hisgood points. Now if Rufus and I could have been combined, his physicalenergy with my mental, we should have done something really worthwhile. "

"Yes, sir--yes, indeed, sir, " I said politely. My conception of theProfessor's meaning was very faulty, but I found him engrossing becausehe talked so fluently and made so many expressive gestures. He, Isuspect, was pleased with a sympathetic listener, though one so small. 

Laying a hand on my shoulder, he asked: "David, what are you going todo when you grow up?"

"I am going to be like my father, " I replied. 

"Like the distinguished Judge Malcolm?" he exclaimed. "That's a highambition--for the valley. " He was standing over me pulling his chin, and from the manner in which he eyed me I believe that he quiteapproved my choice of a model. Suddenly his arms shot out. "Try to bemore, David. Try to be what Rufus and I combined would have been. Tryto work for something better than three meals a day. Wake up, David, before you fall asleep in a land where everybody dozes like the verydogs. "

To enforce his admonition his hands closed on my shoulders; he liftedme from my chair and began to shake me. Being so much in earnest hewas rather violent, so that James, now in the doorway, saw me wincingand looking up with a grimace of fright and eyes of pleading. 

"Steady there, man, " he cried. He thought that he was just in time torescue me from torture, and came forward with his whip raised. 

"I beg your pardon, " said the Professor, dropping me gently into mychair. "I didn't mean to hurt you, David. Did I hurt you?"

"Not at all, sir, " I answered, and feeling more at ease with James nearI made a dive for my coat and hat. 

"Well, " said James, glaring at my host. "I advise you to keep yourhands off anyway, for if I catch you a-hurting of him again--" Therewas a terrible threat in the eyes and in the upraised butt of the whip, but suddenly the manner changed, for James was looking at the bottle onthe table and it had a strangely quieting influence on his temper. Theblaze died away from his eyes; his voice became soft to meekness; thewhip fell limply. "I might think you'd done it a-purpose, Professor, and you know I allus tries to be friendly. "

"I hardly believe David will complain of my treatment, " returned theProfessor. "You see he came to us all wet and cold from a tumble intothe creek. "

James turned to me with wide-opened eyes. "And I suppose you met arattler, " he cried. 

"Oh, yes, " I answered, as though this was but a petty incident of myday. 

"Well, you are a boy!" From me his eyes moved to the bottle again, andas he looked at it he began to tremble and his legs lost their strengthand he sank to a chair by the table. "You'll be the death of me yet, Davy. Why, my nerves has all gone from just thinking of what mighthave happened. "

His hand was groping toward the bottle, and he gave the Professor aglance that asked for his permission. 

"Penelope, " the Professor said quietly, "the gentleman would like aglass of water. "

Evidently the gentleman did not think that water would quiet hisnerves, for he did not hear the command and was contented with thehealing power nearer at hand. He poured the tumbler almost full of thefiery liquid and raised it to his lips. He winked gravely at Mr. Blight, threw back his head, and drained the glass without takingbreath. The Professor failed to see the humor of the act, and, seizingthe bottle, drove the cork in hard, while the unabashed James beamed onhim, on Penelope, and on me. 

"Thank you, " he said, rising, and slowly drawing his sleeve across hismouth; "I feel better--much better. Another drop would set me up allright, but, as you say--" He looked hopefully from the bottle in theProfessor's hands to the Professor's face, but finding there no promiseof more of the sovereign remedy, he took my arm and led me to the door. "Davy, you must thank Mr. Blight and the young lady. "

"You'll come again, Davy, " Penelope cried. 

"And all by yourself, Davy, " the Professor added. 

To me this remark was of the kindest, but it irritated James. Hepicked up his whip and fumbled with it while he stared at our host, whostood by the table, with one hand on the bottle and the other pointingthe way over the clearing. "You're a good talker, Professor, " Jamesdrawled. "You can argue down Stacy Shunk and make Mr. Pound tremble, but when it comes to manners--the manners of a gentleman--I never seesuch a lack of them. "

With this parting shot he strode away so fast that I could hardly keeppace with him. At the edge of the woods, I looked back and saw thefather and child in the slanting doorway waving their hands to me. From his window in the barn the white mule was watching with earspricked, and now he brayed a hostile note, as though he divined thetrouble which could come at the heels of a wandering boy. I waved myhat and plunged into the bush. 

"Now, Davy, tell me how it all happened, " said James, drawing himselfup very straight in the saddle as he started the horses toward home. 

I began to tell him. He broke into a song. When I tried to makemyself heard, his voice swelled up louder. Never before had James sungas he was singing now, and I watched him first with wonder and thenwith increasing terror. As we dragged our way up the ridge, out of thenarrow gut, he droned his music in maudlin fashion in time to the slowmotion of the beasts. When the valley stretched before us he fairlythundered, striving to make himself heard across the broad land. Ihoped that before we entered the village exhaustion would silence him, but in answer to my appeals he raised his voice to a pitch and volumethat brought the people running out of their houses, and he seemed tofind great pleasure in the attention that he was attracting. The highthrone from which I had looked down so proudly that morning as I rodeto my fishing became a pillory of shame. I could not escape from it, for the whip was swinging in time to the music, and the horses, confused by the riot, were rearing and plunging. I had to cling to theharness with all my strength. We halted at the store. It was quiteunintentional and made the climax of a boisterous progress. James, lurching back in his saddle, would have fallen but for the support ofthe rein. The horses stopped suddenly. He shot forward, clutching atthe air, and hurtled into the road. From my height and from my shame, I saw the whole world running to witness our plight--men, women, andchildren, it seemed to me hundreds of them, who must have been lying inwait for this very thing to happen. Through them Mr. Pound forced hisway, waving back the press until he reached the side of the fallen man. 

"James, " he said, looking down and speaking not unkindly, "how oftenhave I warned you!"

The answer was a look of childish wonder. 

"Come, come, " said Mr. Pound, taking a limp, sprawling arm and liftingthe culprit to his feet. "Tell me, who was the tempter who brought youto this?"

James gazed stupidly at the minister. Then a devil must have seizedhim, for in his nature he was a gentle soul, as I knew, who had heardhim so often crooning over his horses or sitting on the barn-bridge ofan evening sorrowing for Annie Laurie and Nellie Grey, women whom hehad never seen. Before all the town he raised his hand and brought itcrashing down on Mr. Pound's cloud-like hat. 

CHAPTER III

My mother was a McLaurin of Tuckapo Valley. In the mid-part of theeighteenth century, when that valley was a wild forest, hergreat-grandfather, Angus McLaurin, came out of the air, out of thenothingness of a hiatus in our genealogy, and settled along the banksof the Juniata. His worldly goods were strapped on the back of a cow;his sole companion was his wife; his sole defence his rifle. To thedusky citizens of the valley he seemed a harmless person, and they soldhim some thousands of acres for a few pounds of powder and beads. Theymust have smiled when he attacked the wilderness with an axe, as weshould smile at the old woman who tried to ladle up the sea. With whatchagrin must they look down now from the Happy Hunting Ground to seeMcLaurinville the busy metropolis of McLaurin township, and McLaurinsrich and poor, McLaurins in brick mansions and McLaurins in log cabinswhere they once chased the deer and bear! My mother was one of _the_McLaurins, which is to say that she was born on the very spot whereAngus felled the first tree in Tuckapo. These McLaurins were naturallythe proudest of all their wide-spread family, some of whom had gonedown to the poor-house, and some up and over the mountains to be lostand snubbed among the great ones of other valleys. There was atradition in our family, which grew stronger as the years covered theroots of our family tree, that Angus was really _The_ McLaurin, chiefof the clan, and had fled over the sea to save his head after PrinceCharlie's futile struggle for a crown. With my mother tradition hadbecome history. She had one grudge against Walter Scott, whose novels, with the Bible, made her sole reading, and this was that he nevermentioned "our chief, " as she called him. More than once I canremember her looking up from the pages of "Redgauntlet, " and declaringthat had the Prince been a more capable man we should be living in acastle in Scotland. From the incompetence of Prince Charlie, then, itcame that my mother entered life in a red brick house in McLaurinvilleinstead of in a highland keep, and as it is just six miles as the crowflies over the ridges to Malcolmville in Windy Valley, she met myfather in the course of time, and in the course of time the two greatfamilies were united in my small self. The Malcolms were a greatfamily, too. They were a proud people, though not in the same way asmy McLaurin kin. They had no fine traditions based on the fragments ofa Scotchman's kilt. Quite to the contrary, my father used to boastthat they had been just simple, God-fearing folk, Presbyterians inevery branch for generations, and sometimes he delighted in the ideathat he was a self-made man. As he always chose a large company tomake this boast in, it was to my mother a constant source ofirritation, and she would contradict him with heat, and point out thathis father before him had farmed three hundred acres of land, while hisgrandfather on his mother's side had been for fifty years the pastor ofthe Happy Hollow church. 

Knowing this little of our family history, it is possible to realizethe consternation which prevailed when in the middle of a formaldinner-party, in the presence of Mr. Pound, Squire Crumple, and thatmost critical of women, Miss Agnes Spinner, in the presence of theseand a half-dozen others of the most important persons in theneighborhood, in the silence which followed the appearance of the firstasparagus of spring, I, a small boy, suddenly projected my head fromthe shadow of the good minister and asked: "Mother, what is a bumptiousMalcolm?"

Mr. Pound lowered his fork, turned half around, and looked at me. MissAgnes Spinner began to choke and had to cover her face with her napkin, while Squire Crumple with great solicitude fell to patting her veryhard between the shoulders. Mrs. Pound glanced at my father, and thenfound a sudden interest in her coffee, pouring it from her cup into hersaucer, and from her saucer into her cup, so often that she seemed tobe reducing it to a freezing mixture. Mrs. Crumple discoveredsomething awry with the lace of her gown, for she drew in her chin, andone eye examined her vertical front while the other covertly circledthe table. Old Mr. Smiley, never an adroit man in society, crossed hisknife and fork on his plate, lifted his napkin half across his facelike a curtain, and over the top of it stared at my mother as though hewere waiting with me to learn just what a bumptious Malcolm could be. 

My father never lost his self-command. He seemed not to have heard me, for he leaned over the table, and in a voice designed to smother anyfurther interruptions from my quarter, said: "Mrs. Malcolm, my dear, Mr. Pound's coffee is all. " As a matter of fact Mr. Pound's coffee wasnot "all. " My mother, never niggardly, had just filled it for thethird time to overflowing, and a full cup rose from a full saucer; butshe had an opportunity, while turning solicitously to her guest, togive me a frown, which in private would have found fuller expression ina slipper. As Miss Spinner was still choking, my father proposeddropping a brass door-key down her back as the most efficacious ofcures. Had she consented to this heroic treatment I might have beenshunted into silence, but her prompt refusal to allow any one to doanything for her left diplomacy at its wit's end. In the portentoussilence which followed I was able to repeat my question with moreincisive force. 

"Yes, but, mother, what is a bumptious Malcolm?"

"David, " said my father sternly, "children should be seen and notheard!"

"But, father, " I exclaimed, being aroused by this injustice to defendmyself, "Professor Blight said that I must be one of those bumptiousMalcolms. Those were his exact words--bumptious Malcolms. "

As the horse saith among the trumpets, ha! ha! and smelleth the battleafar off--the thunder of the captains and the shouting--so Mr. Poundlifted his great mane at the mention of the Professor and swept thetable with eyes full of fire. 

"Ha! Judge Malcolm, what have I not told you of this man? Don't yourecall that I warned you we should have to deal with him? When I foundhim making trouble in my flock, setting the sheep against the shepherd, I told you the time would come when he would strive to set the sonagainst the father. "

While I could not understand in what way I had turned against myfather, it was plain to me that the term which the Professor hadapplied to my family was one of opprobrium. It was clear, too, that ithad considerable explosive power, for after the first frightened hushit stirred the whole company into a terrific outburst against my friendof yesterday. Even Miss Spinner stopped choking, and announced thatshe "declared. " What she declared was not imparted, but as the generaltrend of exclamation was against the Professor I knew that did shecontinue her statement it must be aimed at him. 

My father leaned back and grasped the knobs of his chair-arms. "David, " he said slowly, "when did Henderson Blight speak in terms sodisrespectful--no, that is not the word I want--in this sarcastic--thatis hardly correct--when did he speak thus of us?"

"Yesterday, sir, " I answered, "when I was in his house getting warm. But he didn't mean anything bad, father. Why, he told me that you werethe celebrated Judge Malcolm. "

I expected that such gentle flattery would propitiate my father. Instead, his brows knitted, and he shot forward his head and asked:"The what kind of a judge, David?"

Before I could reply Mr. Pound injected himself into the examination. 

"Pardon me, Judge, but I should like to ask my young friend ifHenderson Blight smiled as he said it. "

"No, sir, " I answered promptly. "He was just as solemn as you are now. "

Miss Spinner fell to choking again. My mother gave vent to along-drawn "Dav-id!" an exclamation which I had come to fear as much asthe Seven Seals, and her use of it now so unjustly made me feel as ifevery man's hand were against me, for Mr. Pound was solemn, and inusing the best comparison at hand I meant no ill. 

"Dav-id!" said my mother again, lifting an admonishing finger. 

The good minister saw nothing offensive in my remark, but even repeatedit with a nod of understanding. "As solemn as I am now. JudgeMalcolm, your son has quite accurately described this man Blight's wayof speaking--of saying one thing when he means quite another. I shouldhardly dare repeat some of the terms which have come to my ears ashaving been applied by him to me. Just the other day, as we werewalking through town, I overheard him talking to Stacy Shunk, and hereferred to my wife as the lovely Mrs. Pound. Now I have no objectionsto persons speaking of my wife as lovely, but I want them to mean itand not to infer quite the opposite. "

It was Mrs. Pound's turn to "declare, " but she was clearer in themeaning than Miss Spinner. She would have told us some of the thingsMr. Blight had said of Mr. Pound with a meaning quite as inverted. Mymother, seeing the tempest rising, sought to still it by protestingthat she was sure that in this instance the Professor was quite sincere. 

"I know he meant it, " she said over and over again, until Mrs. Poundwas unable to make herself heard and retired to silence and coffee. 

But Mr. Pound, a believer in truth at all hazards, would not admit thatthe Professor did mean it. "A person of such an insinuating characteris a danger to the community, " he said. "I have repeatedly warned thejudge against him, Mrs. Malcolm, and now my warning has come home. Yesterday's deplorable incident has been forgotten by me; I haveblotted it from my memory because I realized that you were in spiritstruck down as I was, though not so publicly. I have forgiven James. Since he has come to me sober and penitent, and confessed where he gotthe liquor, I have passed his part in the affair by with a kindlywarning. But I cannot pass by the real culprit, the man who struck atme through the weak James, and almost felled me before the town, theman who furnished James with the sources of his intoxication. Hispunishment I leave to you. " Mr. Pound drove his fork into an asparagusstalk to show that he had said all that could be said and all that hewould say. That he had said enough to bring others to his way ofthinking was evident from the gravity with which my father shook hishead. 

"David, when I questioned you as to yesterday's unfortunate occurrenceyou confessed that this man Blight gave James the liquor. "

"No, sir, " I returned quickly. "I didn't say that. "

"How was it, then?" my father asked. 

I had pleaded with my mother to allow me to be one of this greatdinner-party, that I might partake, first-hand, of the good thingswhich I had seen preparing. I was to enjoy the feast in a silenceproper to my years. So I had promised. And now one of those dangerousquestions which rise like a rocket from a boy's lips had transformed mefrom a small guest whose part was to sit silently in the shadow of themighty clergyman, and there only to even up the side of the table, intoa person of unpleasant importance. Had my father rapped for order, risen, and announced that we had the good fortune to have with usMaster David Malcolm, who would tell us where James found the source ofhis intoxication, he could not have made me more dreadfullyconspicuous. I wanted to run, but, if nothing else, my father's eyeswould have held me. I wanted, above all, to keep silent because Iloved James, who from the day when I had first toddled out of the houseinto the broad world of hay and wheat fields had been almost my soleplayfellow. As yet I did not know what a bumptious Malcolm was; I didnot understand the man who always said what he did not mean; Iremembered him only as the kindly host who had found me dripping andcold and had made me gloriously warm. And more than that, I rememberedthe little girl who had dragged me from the creek. Something in thegaunt man who lived among the clouds, something in the ragged creaturewho lifted a smiling face and ribboned head above the weeds of thatlonely clearing, had touched me strangely. It seemed that I must betheir only friend, and for them I would tell the truth. I should havetold the truth but for Mr. Pound. 

"I said, sir, " I answered my father, "that James just took the bottleand----"

"The bottle was Blight's, was it not?" broke in Mr. Pound. 

"Yes, sir, " I said. 

It had dawned on me the afternoon before, as James and I rode home, just what was the medicine I had taken. It was hard for me to believethat the vilely tasting stuff was whiskey, which I had heard men drankfor pleasure, but when all doubt was removed by the exclamations of thecrowd who hovered about the prostrate man I was overwhelmed by a senseof my own sin. Yet I had feared to confess to my mother the dose whichI had taken. It would only make her unhappy, I had told myself, and Ihad tried to still my turbulent conscience with the plea that mysilence was saving others. Now simple justice demanded that I telleverything, even to the admission of my own fault. 

"Father, " I cried, "the Professor didn't want James----"

"It is high time the community were rid of this man, " Mr. Poundinterrupted. 

"David!" said my father, and I shrank into the minister's shadow. 

"And it seems to me, Squire Crumple, " Mr. Pound went on, "it is clearlyyour duty as a justice of the peace to act. "

"Act how?" cried the astonished squire. 

"Have him arrested!" replied Mr. Pound, making the dishes rattle underthe impact of his fist on the table. 

At this suggestion every one forgot the dinner and sat up verystraight, staring in amazement at the bold propounder of it. 

"Arrest him, " exclaimed the squire, "and for what?"

"For anything that will rid the community of him, " snapped Mr. Pound. "Do you not agree with me, Judge?"

The Judge quite agreed with Mr. Pound. He admitted that until theunfortunate occurrence of yesterday he had opposed any proceedingswhich were not altogether regular in law. "And yet, " he said gravely, "it is incumbent on us to rid the community of him. We all know thatfrom the porch of Snyder's store he has been preaching doctrines thatare not only revolutionary but, if the ladies will pardon me, I willcall damnable. What good is it for us to have Mr. Pound in the pulpitfor one day of the week, and this glib-tongued man contradicting himfor seven. Yet no statute forbids him to do this. What can yousuggest, Mr. Pound?"

Mr. Pound sought an inspiration in the ceiling. "The man has novisible means of support, " he said after a moment. "His child is badlyclothed, and, I presume, badly fed. Right there is an indictment. Vagrancy. "

This bold suggestion was greeted with general approval save by thesquire, who protested that a man could not be called a vagrant who hadpaid seventy dollars in cash for his clearing and was never known tobeg or steal. 

"But I tell you he is a moral vagrant, " argued Mr. Pound, "and I willmake such a charge against him. It will be your duty then, SquireCrumple, to offer him his choice between six weeks in jail and leavingthe valley and taking his bottle with him. "

Still the squire was unconvinced, but he saw himself being overawed bymy father and the minister, and his efforts to combat them evolvedfutile excuses. 

"Who will arrest him?" he pleaded. 

"Haven't we a constable?" retorted my father. "What did we elect ByronLukens for?"

"Precisely!" cried Mr. Pound. 

"The one arrest he has made was a source of endless trouble, " returnedSquire Crumple. "He had to lock the prisoner overnight in his bestroom, and his wife has since said distinctly and repeatedly that----"

"You can avoid trouble with Mrs. Lukens by arresting him in themorning, " said Mr. Pound. 

"And the chances are he will leave the valley rather than go to jail, "my father added. 

"But suppose he is cantankerous and chooses jail, what will we do withthe girl?" argued the reluctant magistrate. 

"The girl?" Mr. Pound waved his great hands about the table. "Surelywe can find her a better home and better parents than she has now. Surely there are among us good women who will esteem it a privilege tocare for an orphaned child. "

My mother said "surely, " too, and so did all the other good women atthe board. Even Miss Spinner, while not prepared to receive the childinto her home, was ready to teach her "as she should be taught. "

"And she should be taught, " my mother broke in. "Her father has beenthe stumbling-block. I heard him say myself to a committee of ourLadies' Aid that he would gladly place her in Miss Spinner'sSunday-school class if Miss Spinner could convince him that she had anyknowledge worth imparting. I never liked to tell you that before, MissSpinner; I feared it might hurt your feelings. "

Miss Spinner's feelings were decidedly hurt, and she began to vie withMr. Pound in urging that the valley be rid of the obnoxious Professor. So drastic were the measures which she called for, and so vigorous herdemands on the gentle squire, that he retreated on Mr. Pound for aid, advocating all that the minister had proposed as the most humanitarianmethod of dealing with the case. 

"A warrant will issue to-night, but to avoid trouble with theconstable's wife I shall order it served in the morning, " he said atlast as he stood by his chair, folding his napkin. Thus he eased hisconscience by making the warrant responsible for its own existence, andhis words struck deeper into my heart for their impressive legal form. 

A warrant will issue! As I slipped out by the kitchen this rang in myears with the insistence of a refrain. Because I had disobeyed, leftmy post of safety, and plunged into the woods in pursuit of a few smalltrout, a warrant would issue, a ghoulish offspring of my recklessspirit, seize the gentle Professor in its claws and drag him toignominy. A warrant would issue! And the blue ribbon would no longerbob majestically in Penelope's hair, but would droop with her father'sshame. The picture of them standing in the cabin door, waving theirfarewell and calling to me to come again, was very clear in my mind, and made sharper the sense of the trouble which I had brought to them. Three times I ran around the house wildly, as though I would blur thepicture by merely travelling in a circle; but instead it grew clearer, and the Professor seemed to regard me with eyes more kindly andPenelope to call to me in a more friendly voice. So became clearer myobligation to help them, and intent on making my plea I burst into theparlor. The scene there chilled my ardor. In the dim evening light, like sombre ghosts, the company sat in a wide circle about the bordersof the room, erect and uncomfortable as one must sit on slipperyhorse-hair, listening to Miss Spinner at the piano droning through thefirst bars of "Sweet Violets. "

"Ssh!" exclaimed my father, and even the gloom could not hide his frown. 

"But, father, the Professor didn't----"

My mother tiptoed across the room and gently pushed me out of the door. "David, go to bed!" she commanded. 

To bed I went, but not to sleep. Did I close my eyes I saw theProfessor in the clutches of Byron Lukens being dragged along thevillage street amid the jeers of the people. Swallows fluttered in thechimney, and I heard there the echoes of the struggle when theconstable laid his hand on the shoulders of my friend. The wind moanedin the trees, and I fancied Penelope now upbraiding me for the troubleI had brought upon them, now pleading with me to send her father hometo her. A faint crowing sounded from the orchard, hailing the shadowof the morning, the gray ghost rising from the dark ridges. I slippedfrom my bed to the window, and watched the valley as it shook itselffrom sleep. How slowly came that day! The birds stirred in theirnests, but, like me, they dared not venture forth into a world sofilled with uncanny shadows. Yet the day did come. Over by the dark, towering wall that hemmed in the valley the gray turned to pink, and Icould see the trees on the ridge-top like a fringe against thebrightening sky. Louder sounded the crowing in the orchard, and to meit brought a warning that I must hurry. I looked to the northward, andsaw only the mists covering the land, and in my fancy beyond them themountains where bear and wildcat lurked. There the Professor andPenelope lay unconscious that even now the terrible warrant might beissuing and at any moment would fall upon them. There was only onething for me to do, and though when I had closed the house door softlybehind me and turned my back to the reddening east the mists weretenfold more mysterious and the mountains tenfold more forbidding, Iran straight down the road into the gloom, as though the warrant wereracing with me. 

CHAPTER IV

When with a last desperate spurt I ran into the clearing, I saw theProfessor sitting in the cabin door, smoking his pipe and basking inthe sunshine as though life held no trouble for him. I believed that Iwas in time to warn him of the threatening danger, that I had outspedthe warrant, that I had outrun the redoubtable Lukens, and in theluxury of that thought my overtaxed strength ebbed away and I sank downon a stump, hot and panting. I had run a hard race for so small a boy. At times it seemed as though the mountains drew back from me, thatevery one of the five miles had stretched to ten, but I kept bravelyon, going at top speed over the level places, dragging wearily up thesteep hills, cutting through fields and woods where I could savedistance, following every brief rest with a spasmodic burst of energy, and now I had come to the last stretch, the ragged patch of weeds, exhausted. I tried to call my friend, but my throat was parched and Icould not raise my voice above a whisper, and as my head barely liftedover the wild growth of his farm, he smoked on, unconscious of mypresence. Something in a distant tree-top engaged his attention, something vastly interesting, it seemed to me, for he never turned myway to see my waving hand. So I struggled to my feet and staggered on. At last he heard me, sprang up, and came striding over the clearing. Then my tired legs crumpled up; I sat down suddenly and, supported bymy sprawling hands, waited for him. 

"Davy--Davy Malcolm, " he cried, "who has been chasing you now?"

"A warrant!" I gasped. "Mr. Lukens, he is coming with a warrant toarrest you!"

The tall form bent over me and I was raised to my feet. Supporting mein his strong grasp, he held me off from him, and for a moment regardedme with grave eyes. 

"And you've come to warn me, eh, Davy?" he said. 

"Yes, sir, " I answered. "Mr. Pound he thinks you are a dangerous man. Mr. Pound he wants to get you out of the valley. Mr. Pound he----"

The Professor seemed to have little fear of Mr. Pound and as littleinterest in him. "Never mind the learned Doctor Pound, " he exclaimed, and his mouth twitched in a smile inspired by the mere thought of theminister. "The point is, Davy, that you left home before daylight totell me, and you must have run nearly all the way--eh, boy?"

"I had to, " I panted. "You see, Mr. Lukens he was to come here earlyfor you, and I thought if I was in time you might run away. "

To run away seemed to me the only thing for the Professor to do, and Iexpected that at the mere mention of the terrible Lukens he wouldscurry to the mountain-top as fast as his legs would carry him. Yet heheld the constable in as little terror as he did Mr. Pound, for insteadof fleeing he drew me to him, and held me in an embrace so tight as tomake me struggle for breath and freedom. 

"Davy, Davy!" he cried; "you understand me, boy. You are a friend, areal friend--my only friend. "

Again and again he said it--that I was his only friend--and not until Icried out that I had had no breakfast and would he please not squeezeme so tight did he release me, and then it was to keep fast hold on myarm and lead me to the house. Penelope had heard us and met ushalf-way, running, halting suddenly before us, and staring wide-eyed atthe bedraggled boy who lurched along at her father's side. 

"Davy, " she cried, "have you come fishin' again?"

My answer was to hold out my hand to her, and together we three wentinto the house. There, with my breath regained, and my parched throatrelieved, and my tired legs dangling from the most luxurious ofrocking-chairs, my spirits rose with my returning strength. It nettledme to see the Professor giving so little heed to my warning. I hadperformed what was for me a herculean task, and yet the preciousmoments which I had fought so hard to gain for him were being fritteredaway in preparations for a breakfast for me. He was evidently gratefulfor what I had done, but he was getting no good from it. Had I run allthose miles to tell him that the bogie man was coming he could not havemoved about his cooking with less concern. For a time I watched himwith growing indignation, yet I hesitated to mention the purpose of myerrand before Penelope, who had fixed herself before my chair and, withher hands clasped behind her back and her head lifted high, was gazingat me in admiring silence. My uneasiness increased as the minutes flewby, and when the first sharp demands of appetite had been satisfied Ilooked at the Professor, now seated at the other side of the table, andnodded my head toward his daughter, and winked with a sageness beyondmy years. 

"Mr. Blight, hadn't you otter be going?" I asked. 

The Professor, in answer, laughed outright. He clasped his hands tohis sides and rocked on two legs of his chair in exuberance. "Davy--Davy, you'll be the death of me yet!"

To me this seemed a very hard thing to say, as I had no wish to be thedeath of the Professor; but, quite to the contrary, had made a greateffort and had risked much trouble at home in my desire to help him. Now I was beginning to think that I had done as well to drop apost-card in the mail to warn him of his danger. The disappointmentbrought tears to my eyes. He saw them. His face turned very gentleand he leaned across the table toward me. 

"Davy, I can't thank you enough for what you have done. But don'tworry about me--I'm not afraid of Byron Lukens. "

At the name of the constable Penelope broke into laughter, and placed ahand on my arm to draw my eyes to her. "Mr. Lukens was here thismorning, Davy, just before you came. And, oh, you should have seenfather knock him down!"

My fork and knife clattered to the plate as I turned to the girl, andshe saw doubt and wonder in my eyes. 

"He did!" she cried. "And oh, Davy, you'd have died laughing if youhad seen Mr. Lukens tumble over the wood-pile and hit his head againstthe rain-barrel. "

I stared at the Professor. I had liked him for his kindness to me andhad pitied him for his misfortune. Now I was filled with admirationfor the physical prowess of this man who could whip the intrepidconstable, for in Malcolmville there was no one whom I held in so muchawe as Byron Lukens. He was mighty in bulk; his voice was proportionedto his size; his words fitted his voice. Often I had sat on thestore-porch and listened to his stories of his feats, and I believedthat to cross him in any way must be the height of daring. The tale ofthe men whom he had whipped in the past and promised to whip in thefuture if they raised a finger against him would almost have made acensus of the valley. That this frail man should have resisted him, that those thin hands should have been raised against him, that theintellectual Professor should have knocked down the Hercules of ourvillage, was beyond my comprehension. So my friend across the tablesaw amazement welling up from my open mouth and eyes. 

He shrugged his shoulders. "There was nothing else to do, Davy. Hebeat you here after all. Probably you missed him in your short cutsover the fields. Why, it was hardly light when I heard him pounding atthe door. He said he had come to arrest me. " Rising and drawinghimself to his full height, the Professor began to tell me of the earlymorning conflict, forgetting, in his indignation, how small were histwo auditors, and throwing out his voice as though to reach amultitude. "He had come to arrest me--me; said that I was a vagrant;spoke to me as you wouldn't speak to a dog, and told me to comealong--to come along with him, a hulking, boastful brute. Why, it wasall I could do to keep my temper, Davy. I answered him as politely asI could, said that I had done no wrong, and certainly would not allowmyself to be arrested. And then----"

"Then father knocked him down, " cried Penelope, clapping her hands. "Oh, Davy, you'd otter seen it. "

"Should have, Penelope, should have seen, " said the Professorreprovingly, and having done his duty as a father and a man ofeducation he drove his fist into the air to show with what quicknessand force he could use it. "Yes, that's the way I did it, David. Heapplied an oath to me and laid a hand on my shoulder. What else couldI do? I appeal to you--what else could I do but knock him down?"

"And didn't he whip you for it, sir?" I cried, still doubting that thegiant could have fallen beneath such a blow. 

"Whip me?" The Professor laughed. "Do you think that great bully couldwhip me? Why, David, you quite hurt my feelings. By the time he hadgone over the wood-pile into the rain-barrel there wasn't any fightleft in him. He didn't even speak till he was safe across theclearing. Then you should have seen him. He has gone down to thevillage to get help; he is going to teach me what it means to assaultan officer of the law; he is going to send me to jail for life. " TheProfessor glared out of the open doorway as fiercely as though theconstable were standing there and he defying him. Then suddenly heleaned over the table to me, and fixing his eyes on mine asked in ahoarse voice: "David, did you ever hear of such injustice?"

"No, sir, " I answered. "But Mr. Pound said----"

At the mention of Mr. Pound the Professor sat down and the table reeledunder his fist. "Pound--he is at the bottom of it all. He has saidthat I am a good-for-nothing loafer and the county should be rid of me. Maybe he is right. But he won't have his way. I have done nothing andI will not go--do you hear that, Davy, I will not go. Now tell me whatMr. Pound said. "

In a faltering voice I began my story with that fateful home ride withJames. As I went on I lost my diffidence in my interest in the tale, and spoke rapidly till the need of breath slowed me down. There wereretrogressions to speak of things which I had forgotten, and manycorrections where I had slightly misquoted Miss Spinner, Mr. Smiley, orsome other equally unimportant person. I told the story as a small boyrecites to his elders the details of some book which he has read; sothe Professor had to check me frequently with admonitions not to mindwhat Mrs. Crumple said about my mother's ice-cream and such matters, but to tell him exactly what my father said of him. Still I persistedin my own way, bound that whatever I did should be done thoroughly, even though he might hold in contempt my effort to be of service tohim. When at last there was not a word left untold, he leaned back inhis chair and gazed at me with a look of utter helplessness. 

"Well, what am I to do now?" he cried. His head shot toward me and hishands were held out in appeal. "Davy, can't you suggest something?"

In my pride at being asked for advice by one so old, I sat up verystraight as I had seen my father do and allowed a proper interval ofsilence before I spoke. 

"Yes, " I replied slowly. "If you were me I'd run away before Mr. Lukens got back. "

This excellent suggestion was met by a frown so fierce that I pushedback from the table in alarm. 

"Run away?" he exclaimed. "Why, that's just what they want me to do. What have I done that I should run away? And if I did, what wouldbecome of Penelope?"

He drew his little daughter close to his side, while he looked out ofthe door into the patch of blue sky, seeking there some inspiration. His lips moved, and I knew that he was asking again and again of thatlittle patch of sky what he should do. Then suddenly he rose, asthough the answer had been given, for he clapped on his hat, stooderect with shoulders squared and hands clasped behind him, facing theopen door with the demeanor of a man whose mind was made up, who wasready to meet the world and defy it. This, to me, was the hero who hadknocked down the constable, and I imagined him confronting a dozen likeByron Lukens and piling them one on top of the other, for surely thingshad come to pass that the man would have to hold the clearing againstan army. But as suddenly the shoulders drooped, the back bowed, thehead sank, and he turned to me. 

"Davy, Davy, what shall I do?" he asked in a hoarse whisper. 

As I was silent, he addressed the same appeal to Penelope, and she, inanswer, ran to the door and pointed across the clearing. 

"Look, father, " she shouted; "he has come back. "

Byron Lukens had indeed returned and with a heavy reinforcement. Fivemen climbed out of the wagon which had appeared from the road, and nowthey began a careful reconnoissance of the house. As they stood on theedge of the woods looking toward us I marked each one of them, and theproblem uppermost in my mind concerned what I should do myself, for Iwas fairly cornered. I could not run away, for they were watchingevery exit from the cabin, and there was not one of them who would notrecognize me did I flee over the open. The presence of James alonemeant my undoing, and there he was, standing by the constable, eyingthe place with a lowering glare which threatened a storm, for here hehad fallen and here he would redeem himself by some act of exceptionaldaring. Caught in this net, I hid behind the door-post and peeredaround it through a protecting shield made by the Professor'scoat-tails. In the silence I could hear my heart beat. 

There was one thing for the Professor to do now, and he did that well. He gathered his scattered senses and stood quietly in the doorway, smoking, leaving to the invaders the burden of action. Theirindecision gave him strength. 

"The idea of my giving in to a crew like that, " he said to me in asteady voice. "It's a pity Mr. Pound didn't come, and your father too, David, that they might see how little I cared for their warrants. "Then, to show how undisturbed he was by their presence, he called tothem pleasantly: "Good morning, gentlemen. "

This mild greeting gave courage to our foes and Stacy Shunk advanced. His coming was a sign that reason was to be used before force, and withhis first step he began to gesticulate and to protest his friendlypurpose. But he could not argue with any acumen while his bare feetwere traversing a carpet of briers, and a silence followed, broken byexclamations as he came on slowly but resolutely as though he walked oneggs. Half-way over the clearing he stopped with a cry of pain, andthe herald's mission was forgotten in the search for a thorn. Thepicture of Stacy Shunk balancing on one foot while he nursed the otherin his hands made the Professor laugh hilariously and he called to himto hurry. 

But Stacy would come no farther. He planted himself firmly on hisbleeding feet; his great black hat-brim hid his face, but the voicewhich came from under it was soft, and he held out his hands as thoughhe offered his dear friend the protection of his arms. 

"You know what these other fellows want, Professor, and you know I'donly come along to help you. The whole thing was only a joke firstoff, but you've gone and assaulted the constable, and there'll betrouble if you don't settle it and be reasonable. Now, my adviceis----"

"Thank you for your advice, Stacy Shunk, " exclaimed the Professor. "But you know as well as I do that I have done nothing that I can bearrested for. "

"Of course I do, " returned the herald. "But you hadn't otter upset thepreacher so. You'd otter believe what he says, and when he preachesabout Noah and the like you hadn't otter produce figures in public toshow that Noah and his boys couldn't have matched up all the animalsand insects in the time they was allowed, let alone stabling 'em in abuilding three hundred cupids long and thirty cupids wide and threestories high. Now I allus held----"

"I don't care what you held, " said the Professor sharply. "You can'tget me into an argument now. I suppose it was unwise of me to try tomake you people think, but you can't arrest a man for simply beingunpopular. This is my home, and no law of your twopenny village canmake me leave it. "

"I'm not going to argue about Noah, " protested Stacy Shunk. "As yourfriend, I'm trying----"

"As my friend, you had best go home and take your other friends withyou. " The Professor's voice was dry and crackling. 

He reached behind the door and took up the long rifle which leanedagainst the wall. There was no threat in his action, for he held itunder his arm and looked off to the mountain-top as though he weretrying to make up his mind whether or not it was a good day forhunting. Stacy Shunk saw another purpose beneath this careless air, and he abandoned argument. Without heeding the briers, he fled to hisfriends; he did not even stop there, but plunged into the bushes, andabove them I saw his head and hands moving together in an excitedcolloquy. The ludicrous figure which he cut in his retreat excited theProfessor to laughter, in which Penelope joined, clapping her handswith mirth. I, wiser than she as to the danger of firearms, andtrusting less to her father's mild intentions, broke into tearfulpleading. 

"Please don't shoot, Professor, " I whimpered, tugging at his coat-tailsto drag him back. "They won't hurt you, I know they won't. "

"Don't worry, Davy, " the Professor said with a reassuring smile. "Theywouldn't hurt any one, nor would I. Didn't Shunk run at the mere sightof a gun? Why, if I pointed it at the rest of them they would fly likebirds. "

It was not fair to judge the courage of the others by the cowardice ofStacy Shunk. The constable's boasts came out of the past to goad himinto action, and while Joe Holmes, the blacksmith, might have been veryweak in the knees, he was not ready to retreat so early in the actionwhen his helper, Thaddeus Miller, was watching him. As for James, despite the fall his moral qualities had taken in my estimation, Ibelieved him to be a man of unflinching bravery, and he it was that Ifeared most when at last the advance began across the clearing, thefour moving abreast with military precision, while Stacy Shunk hurledat them many admonitions to be cautious. I knew that nothing wouldstop James; that while his comrades might scatter like birds, he wouldcome on to a deadly hand-to-hand conflict, and I pictured the Professorand him swallowing each other like the two snakes of tradition. Iforgot my own safety, and threw both arms about one of the Professor'slegs and tried to pull him into the house. Penelope, too, lost hercourage when she saw the numbers of the enemy and their bold advance, and she clung, wailing, to her father's waist. He shook us off, andfor the first time spoke to us sharply, and so sharply that the childreached her hand to mine and together we slunk into a dark corner. 

Of what followed we saw nothing. We heard the voices, nearer andnearer. Then the men seemed to halt and to address the Professor intones of argument. We are a peaceable folk in our valley and littlegiven to the use of firearms, and I suspect that the constable and hisaids really knew the Professor to be a peaceable man or they would nothave come thus far with such boldness. To come farther they hesitateduntil they had made it perfectly clear that they acted in his bestinterests. Even Byron Lukens was willing to let "bygones be bygones. "

"I'm just doing of my duty, Mr. Blight, " he said in a wheedling tone, "and if you'll come along quiet-like I'll say nothing about it to thesquire. "

"You can fix it all up with the squire, " I heard Joe Holmes say. "There's really nothing again you, only you must comply with the law. "

Then James spoke--to my astonishment not in a bold demand that theProfessor surrender, but softly, asking him to be careful with the gun. 

"Nobody has nothing again you, Professor, " he said as gently as hewould have spoken to me, and hearing this I took heart, for with Jamesin such a temper there seemed no danger of a serious clash. 

"No one has nothing against me, " the Professor repeated in a tone ofirony. "You only want to drag me through the village before thesquire. Tell the squire to come here to me and explain. "

There was a moment of silence. It was so quiet outside that even thebirds seemed to be listening and watching; then came the swish of weedstrampled under foot. 

"Be off, the whole crew of you, " cried the man in the doorway, and Isaw the butt of the gun rise to his shoulder. 

I wanted to cry out, but my throat was parched with fright, andPenelope was clinging to my neck in silent terror. 

There was another moment of silence. Then James began to laugh in thatvast ebullient way of his, and a bit of dry brush snapped sharply undersome foot. The report of the rifle shook the cabin. It must haveshaken the mountains too, it seemed to me, for the floor beneath merocked in time to the echoes of it rattling among the hills, and Iheard a wild scream, the cry of a man hurt to death, and the shrillcries of startled birds fleeing to the hiding of the trees. A puff ofwind swept a thin veil of smoke into the room, but for me the air wasfilled with sickening fumes, and I sank to my knees and closed my eyesas a child does at night to shut out the perils of the darkness. Ifelt Penelope's arms gripped tightly about my neck, her dead weightdragging me down. I heard the last echoes of the shot, faintly, downthe narrow valley, and outside the incoherent shouts of men. Thenthere was a silence, broken only by Penelope's sobs. It seemed to melong hours I was there on my knees before I dared to open my eyes andbring myself into the world again. And when I did it was to see theroom darkened and the Professor leaning against the closed door withhis hands wide-spread, as though with every muscle braced to hold itagainst an onslaught. Yet he trembled so that a child might havebrushed him aside. 

There was no onslaught. I waited the moment when the door would becrashed in. I heard the clock ticking monotonously on the cupboard andthe wood crackling in the stove. The birds were singing again, andoutside in the clearing it was as peaceful as on that day when I firstcame upon it, wet and shivering, to find joy in its cheerful sunniness. 

I broke from Penelope's embrace and got to my feet. The Professor, hearing me, raised his head from the door and turned to me a facechalky-white, whiter for the dishevelled hair that hung about it. 

"Davy, " he whispered, "look out of the window and tell me what you see. "

I had no care for any trouble that might lie ahead for me. I wanted tobe seen. I wanted to be taken from this stifling cabin with itsdeafening noises and sickening fumes and above all from this mad fellowwho looked as I had seen a rat look when cornered in a garner. I ranto the window and peered through the smutted panes, but there was noone outside to see or to help me. The clearing was as quiet as in theearlier morning when I had looked over it at the Professor studying thedistant tree-top. 

"What do you see, Davy?" he asked in a hoarse voice. 

"Nothing, " I answered. "They've gone away. "

"And isn't Lukens there--out there in the weeds?"

I rubbed the smutted glass and peered through it again into everycorner of the clearing. "No, " I said, "there's nothing there. "

The Professor drew back from the door and stood before me brushing hismatted hair from his face. 

"I didn't mean it, Davy, " he said. "It was all a mistake. They weregoing away and I was dropping the gun, and somehow I touched thetrigger and Lukens fell. They've taken him home, but they'll comeback--a hundred of them this time. Oh, Davy, Davy, help me!"

I knew that I could not help him. My thought then was for myself, andI did not answer, but measured the distance to the door and waited mychance to dart to it and get away, for in him before me, driving hislong fingers through his hair and staring at me with frightened eyes, Isaw the man whom I had pictured in fear that first morning when I cameto the mountains. This was the real Professor and I was caught. 

"Oh, let me go!" I cried. 

"Why, Davy!" He gave a start of surprise. The frightened look passedand he reached out his hands to my shoulders. I shrank back. Thescream of Byron Lukens still rang in my ears, and to me there wassomething very terrible in this man who had dared to kill, this man forwhom all the valley would soon be hunting, this man who even now mightbe standing in the shadow of the gallows. He saw the terror in myface; to his eyes came that same look my dog would give me when Istruck him. 

"Why, Davy, " he said, holding out two trembling hands. "Boy, I thoughtyou were my only friend. "

This was the cry of a man worse hurt than Byron Lukens, and in a rushof boyish pity for him I forgot my dread and running to him threw myarms about him, hugged him as I should have hugged my dog in a muteappeal for pardon. So we three stood there in silence, the Professor, Penelope, and I, with arms intertwined and our heads close together. Then after a moment he raised himself and shook us off gently. 

"I've been a fool, Davy, " he said, speaking quietly. "I've been anidle, worthless fool and now I must pay for it. Soon they'll be comingfor me and I must run. But I'll come back; I'll make it all up--someday Penelope will be proud of me. Until then, Davy, my friend, you'lltake care of Penelope, won't you--till I come back?"

Hearing this, Penelope dragged his face down to hers imploring him totake her with him. He kissed her. Then he lifted her high in his armsas though in play and held her off that she might see how gayly he wassmiling and take heart from it. 

"I don't know where I am going, child, " he said, "but I am coming backfor you very soon, and you will see what a man your father really is. I haven't been fair to you, Penelope--but wait--wait till I come back. And Davy will take care of you--won't you, Davy?"

"Yes, sir, " I said boldly. 

What else could a boy have said in such a case, when every passingmoment meant danger to his friend? I had no thought of the fullmeaning of my promise, for I did not look beyond that day, and that daymy goal was home. Home there was safety for me and for Penelope aswell. Home all perplexing problems solved themselves. Home was aplace of great peace, and my father and mother benign genii who livedonly to make others happy. It was easy to lead Penelope home, and Iwas sure that if I told my father and mother of my promise to take careof her, they would make the way easy for me. So when the Professor hadkissed the child and lowered her to the floor, I put out my hand andtook hers in a self-reliant grasp. 

The Professor picked up the fallen rifle and put it away in its corner;he pushed the kettle to the back of the stove; he seemed to be tidyingup the house. He blew the dust from his hat and crushed it down on hishead. Then standing in the open doorway, he surveyed the roomcritically as if to make sure that all was in order before he strolleddown to the village. 

"Good-by, Penelope, " he said in a quiet voice. "Stay with Davy till Icome back--I'll come back soon. "

For a moment Penelope believed him. "Good-by, father, " she called ashe turned and walked away. 

He had passed the door. Hearing her voice, he gave a start, then brokeinto a run. He ran as never I had seen a man run. He was not alone aman in flight. Every limb was filled with fear and moving for itslife. Even his hat and coat were sensate things, struggling madly toget away to a safe refuge. Seeing him flying thus across the clearingtoward the mountains, Penelope broke from me with a cry, but I caughther and held her in my arms. She called to him wildly, yet he did notturn, and in a moment had plunged into the bush. 

Long after he had gone we two stood in the cabin door searching thesilent wall of green for some sign of him. None was given. The shadowof the ridge crept away as the sun climbed higher and the clearing wasbathed in its brightness. A crow called pleasantly from a tall pine. The birds, back from their hiding, sang as though on such a day therecould be no trouble. 

I felt the blue ribbon brush my cheek, and two small bare arms about myneck. 

I turned to Penelope and said: "Don't cry, little 'un. I'll take careof you. "

CHAPTER V

To Nathan, the white mule, I owed it that I was able to take good careof Penelope Blight in the first hours of my guardianship. But for himI should have brought her face to face with the mob that rode out ofMalcolmville to storm the clearing. I knew but one road home from thegut, and that was the way James had brought me fishing. Had wefollowed it, we should have hardly crossed the ridge before we met thevan of an ill-organized but determined army, and then to her griefterror must have been added by the wagons filled with men armed asthough they were going into battle. The obstinate temperament of themule served us a good turn. When Penelope and I led him from the barnand climbed to his back, he must have supposed that we were going tothe store and should leave him tied for hours in the hot sun, switchingflies, while we sat comfortably in the shade of the porch discussingthe universe's affairs. Believing this, he protested, stopping in themiddle of the clearing to enjoy a few tidbits of sprouting corn. Discovering that the small boy on his back lacked his master's strengthand courage, he decided to go on, but as he chose. He chose first atrot. To Penelope and me it seemed a mad gallop, and I clungdesperately to his scanty mane while she clutched my waist and pleadedwith me to halt him and let her down. In this eternity ofsuffering--ten minutes really--her greater grief was forgotten, and shewas spared the pang of a last look at her deserted home, for whenNathan decided to walk she turned her head to see only a long archwayof trees ending in a green wall. 

"Davy, " she cried, "please let me get off!"

Now I wanted to get off myself, but I suspected her desire to run backto the clearing, and my over-powering thought was to carry her awayfrom that forbidding place. I had promised the Professor to take careof the girl, and responsibility had added years to my age and inches tomy stature. I was no longer a shivering, frightened boy clinging toher hand, and, though I was not the master of the mule, while we stayedon his back I was Penelope's master, and that was what I had determinedto be. 

"Don't be afraid, little 'un, " I returned boldly, when I had recoveredmy breath and balance. "I can handle him all right. "

To make good my boast, I even dared to kick Nathan, fearing lest apause in our journey might allow her to slip from his back. 

"I want to find father--to go with him, " she pleaded. It was thehundredth time she had told me that. 

"He said you were to come with me, Penelope, " I argued. "And he toldme particular that he wouldn't be home till a week from Monday. "

This last was a little fiction of mine, which seemed warranted by thecircumstances, and had Penelope pressed me and asked me when her fatherhad made such a definite statement I was ready to go to any extent withlike imaginings if only I could keep her with me. She did not, and hercheerier tone quieted my conscience. 

"Is he?" she cried. "Do you really think he will come home, Davy?"

"Didn't he tell me so?" I returned haughtily. "And besides, what wouldhe stay away any longer for?"

Still Penelope was inclined to doubt. She knew that the morning'sstrange events had brought her father into great trouble, and she couldnot believe that a vain search for him would satisfy his enemies. Twoweeks, she thought, would suffice to wear them out, but two weeks inher small mind was an eternity when it was to be faced without him. 

"Oh, Davy, I wish he hadn't done it, " she cried. "If he hadn't shotMr. Lukens, then he wouldn't have to run away, would he?"

"That was just a mistake, " I replied, as though shooting constableswere quite a favorite sport where I lived. "He told me particular hedidn't mean it, but having done it, and they not understanding that hedidn't mean it, he kind of had to get out till things blowed over. "

"Didn't he do wrong to shoot Mr. Lukens?"

"Wrong?" My tone expressed the greatest astonishment at such an idea. "Why, Penelope, if I was him I'd have done exactly the samething--exactly. "

My approval of her father's act was a great consolation to her. Thepressure of her encircling arms made me gasp, and there was a note ofgratitude in her voice. "Oh, Davy, I know you would; you are so brave. "

"And I'll take care of you, Penelope, " I said, quite as though Iseconded her approval of my courage and had forgotten that there weresuch things as rattlesnakes. "As long as you are with me you needn'tbe afraid of anything. "

Nathan's pace was quieter and steadier, and being secure on his back Ifelt capable of any heroism. We had passed the worst part of the road. It was broader, the trees parted overhead, letting in the sunshine, anddanger never seems so near when one moves in the bright day; so myheart grew lighter, and, had I known the words of any rollicking song, I should have sung, like James, but lacking these I had recourse towhistling. Nerves which had been set on edge by the rifle's report, the fumes of smoke, the cries of pain and fright, were quieted first bylong-drawn, melancholy notes, and then I swung into a bold trilling, more suited to my adventurous spirit, throwing back my head, extendingmy lips heavenward, addressing my melody to the sky. Pausing, exhausted, I expected to hear from behind me some expression ofastonishment and pleasure at my birdlike song. Instead there was onlya muffled sobbing. 

"Little 'un, " I said in a chiding voice, "you hadn't otter cry when I'mtaking care of you. There's nothing to be afraid of. Why, we're goinghome. "

Oh, wise Nathan! Then I thought him obstinate and contradictory. Halting, he planted his feet as though no power on earth could movehim, and shot forward his long ears. Then it seemed to me that he wastrying to show how futile my boast, and in my anger I dared to kickhim. A fly would have moved him as well. His long ears trembled as hewatched the road rising to cross the ridge, and he seemed to see overthe crest and to hear noises too distant and indistinct for me. Then Ithought him obstinate; now I suspect that while the Professor had givenPenelope to my care, he must have ordered Nathan to watch over us both. The mule looked right through that hill. He saw the threatening armycharging the other slope. He turned. The bushes opened, and weplunged into a narrow path which skirted the base of the ridge. Invain I tried to pull him back. In vain Penelope addressed to him herappeals. He was fixed in his purpose neither to hear nor to obey, andstruck into a steady canter. I clung to his mane; Penelope, to me. The earth swung around us. Solid became fluid. The path moved up anddown, and flowed beneath us like running water. Great trees broke fromtheir roots and ran at us, and when Nathan dodged them, they swung downtheir branches to blind us with their leaves, and sometimes almost tolift us in the air like Absalom. The memory of Absalom was very clearin my mind, for just a week before I had seen his picture in ourSunday-school quarterly, and now, confused in my eyes with the dancingtrees, I saw him, as I had seen him in the picture, suspended from alimb by his long hair, quietly waiting to be taken down. There wassomething more than a mere coincidence in that Sunday-school lesson. Here was another warning neglected. With Mr. Pound and Stacy Shunk, Miss Spinner took a place as a prophetess. She had taught me that boyswho mocked their respectable elders were eaten by bears, and I believedher. She had demonstrated beyond all doubt that boys who defied theirparents and ran away from home must come to a dreadful end in theentangling limbs of trees. With Absalom's example before me I had runaway from home, and here I was being carried through the forest on amad steed, and here were the trees running at me from every side, reaching out their forked limbs to seize my hair. Penelope wasforgotten. More than once I tried to avert my impending fate byletting go of Nathan's mane and taking my chances with his heels andthe stony path, but as I was about to close my eyes and let myself gohe rose in the air, and the distance between me and the earth seemed sostupendous as to become the greater peril. Had the mule kept on hiswild career I might at last have gathered courage for the fall, but thepath came to an end, our pace slackened, the trees took root again; Iwas conscious of Penelope's encircling arms, and raising my head sawthat we were in a broad road, and, better still, we were climbing thehill; each step was carrying us nearer the clearest and bluest of skiesthat always held over my home; I knew that from that line where ridgeand sky met, I should look down and see home itself. 

We reached the top of the ridge, and the valley lay beneath us. It wasyoung and cheerful in its fresh green, with here a brown checkering offallow, and there a white barn glistening in the sun, and orchards inthe full glory of their blossom. Below us a stone mill grumbled overits unending task, and from the meadows came the blithe call of thekilldee. It was all home to me from the fringing pines on theridge-top, across the land to the mountains by the river, for on such athreshold one casts off fear. Danger might lurk about us in theshadows of the woods, but never out there in the broad day under thekindly eye of God. Nathan might gallop through tangled brush, but hereeven his mood changed and he walked sedately. Even the strange roadwas friendly to me, for it led into a friendly land. It descended theridge, passed the mill, rose again over a hill; there at the crest Ilost it, but only for a moment while it crossed the hollow and cameinto view on the easy slope beyond, going straight into the valley'sheart and beckoning me on. 

"It's all right now, Penelope, " I cried, and I pointed to the twosteeples of Malcolmville, and then led her eyes to the right to a longstone house, almost hidden in a clump of giant oaks. I could find itby our barn, for our barn would dominate any land. In the distance itseemed a mighty marble pile, lifting its white walls into the blue, andthen ambitiously reaching higher with red-tipped cupolas. TheColosseum to-day is not half so large as our barn when placed in memorybeside it. So there was pride in my voice as I spoke. 

"Yon's our home, little 'un, and yon's our barn, and just the otherside is the meadow and the creek where I'll take you fishing. "

The splendid promise of fishing had little effect on Penelope'sspirits. Such a prospect as I offered, such a home, a Babylonianpalace beside the cabin in the clearing, with the added joys of themeadow and the creek, should have compensated in part, at least, forthe temporary loss of her father, and I was much surprised that shegave no sign of pleasure. She made no answer even, and I had noevidence of her nearness to me but the two brown hands clasped beforeme and the brush of the ribbon against my neck. So we rode on insilence, save when I whistled, and I did not whistle very much, for mythoughts were too busy with the morning's adventure and forecasting thedays to come. My mind was wonderfully clear about the future; the wayseemed very easy. Thereafter I should listen to warnings. I hadbrought myself to unpleasant passes by a reckless disregard ofwarnings, and now if Mr. Pound told me to beware, or Stacy Shunk tolook out, or Miss Spinner to remember Absalom, I should heed theiradmonitions, yet those unpleasant passes became in retrospectdelightful adventures, and I congratulated myself that I was comingthrough them with so much credit. That I was conducting myself withcredit, I had no doubt. My father could not have accepted theProfessor's charge more confidently than I, nor could he have used moreadroitness in persuading Penelope to leave the clearing. So I was sureof commendation when I brought her home. Home was such a bountifulplace. My mother had impressed that on me very often. She had laidemphasis on my obligation to share my riches with others--generallywhen I had to carry heavy baskets down to the parsonage. To-day I wasmindful of that injunction, and to take care of Penelope was a pleasanttask, since for the present it meant simply to share with her from aninexhaustible store. Considering the future, I wandered into hazy andvery muddled dreams. Did the Professor never return, I was quitewilling to keep my promise and to care for his daughter always. Thisdid not mean that I was contemplating matrimony at some remote time. Matrimony, to my youthful observation, was a prosaic state. It did notseem to me that my father and mother led an interesting life. If theywere happy in it, then it was in a very strange way, for they only knewa dull routine of work and worry. Sometimes they laughed, and whenthey did it was hard to discover the sources of their mirth. How myfather could find pleasure in Mr. Pound's sermons was a mystery, andwhen my mother declared that the meeting of the Ladies' Aid had beenmost enjoyable I was sure that she was pretending. No; the future heldsomething better for me than such dull days. Somehow, somewhere, whenI became a man I should live days like this day, I should live as now Irode, with every sense keyed to the joy of living, and Penelope's armswould encircle me and the blue ribbon would gently brush my neck. 

These pleasant dreams were disturbed by realities. I had come to oneof those dreadful moments when danger rises like an appalling cloud, through which we can see no gleam of light beyond. This cloud, "atfirst no larger than a man's hand, " arose from a fence in the person ofPiney Savercool. I saw him with pleasure, for I knew that I was comingto familiar roads, and then he was such a very small boy that I had notthat sense of humiliation which I must have felt had one of my own ageseen me riding with a girl. 

"Morning, Piney, " I said grandly. 

For an answer Piney simply opened his mouth very wide, and his eyesstarted from his head. 

My effect upon him was very pleasing to me, and I ventured still moregrandly: "Pleasant day, Piney. "

Then he found his voice, "Ma-ma--come quick!" he shrieked. "DavyMalcolm's runnin' away with a lady!"

This announcement brought Mrs. Savercool from the house, and in a fewbounds she was before us, checking our further advance with awide-spread apron. 

"Dav-id Malcolm, " she cried, "the idea of you lettin' such a little 'unas her set on such a dangerous animal. Stop! Get down, I say, both onyou!"

I could not break through that apron, and my heart sank, for, insteadof riding grandly home and presenting Penelope to my parents with aproper speech, we were threatened with an ignominious journey in theSavercool buggy. With Mrs. Savercool's charge that we were foolishchildren, and that she could never forgive herself if she did not stopour wild career at once, years dropped from my age and inches from mystature, and I was at the point of obeying her meekly. But Nathan tookoffence at her tone. He bolted. Just what happened I could not see, for I had to take myself to his mane again, and he held his terrificpace until we reached the pike, and along the pike to the fork wherethe road branched off to our farm. When he paused here it was toconsider whether he would go on toward Malcolmville or into the quiet, shaded lane. He must have recalled the hitching-rail, the sun, and theflies, and preferred to risk even a road that he did not know, for onhe went--quietly. 

We crossed the little knoll and the house came into view. The cry ofexultation which rose to my lips was checked when I saw, stretchingfrom the gate down the road, a long line of vehicles. The first heldthe hitching-post. The others took to the fence--buggies, buckboards, phaetons, single horses, and teams, an ominous picture. Not since mygrandfather's funeral had I seen quite such a sight before our house, and my heart sank. Could death have come in my absence? On secondthought I remembered how brief that absence had been, measured inhours, and I sought another reason for the gathering. I began at thelast vehicle and carried my eye along the line, to find that I knewthem all. There was Doctor Pearl's buckboard, with his mustang eatinga fence post; Squire Crumple's gray mare in his narrow courting buggy;old Mr. Smiley's ponderous black with his comfortable phaeton, speakingthe presence of Mr. Pound and Mrs. Pound, who used it as their own; theBuckwalters' rockaway and the Rickabachs' spring-wagon. Even MissAgnes Spinner's bicycle had a fence panel all to itself, as though itwere very skittish and likely to kick and set the whole road incommotion. To my own unimportant self I never attributed this assemblyof all the great folk of the valley. There was some more potentreason. As I pondered, hunting for it, we came to the lane. Until Ifound that reason it seemed wise for me to turn there, and under thecover of the orchard to reach the hiding of the barn, where I couldleave Penelope while I scouted and had a peep through the keyhole ofthe back door. But Nathan saved me from such an ignominious return. He kept right on. My efforts to stop him only made him trot, and in amoment we were at the gate. He seemed to like the house and the shadeof the oaks, for he halted, let himself down on three legs complacentlyand began to switch at flies. And I, with nothing left to do, wasmeasuring the distance to a safe landing when I heard a cry from thedoor. 

"Davy! Davy!" I saw my mother running down the path with her armsoutstretched, and after her came a great company. 

"Davy--Davy, dear--we thought you had been drowned!" she cried. 

Here, then, was the reason for this great gathering. What a commotionfor so small a reason--as though a boy's chief end were to tumble intothe water, as though he never were to be trusted out of his mother'ssight? I dropped the reins; my eyes and my mouth opened wide withastonishment. 

"Your father's dragging the mill-dam for you this very minute. " Shewas at the gate. "Where--where have you been?"

She did not let me answer. She lifted her hands and caught me in herembrace, and Penelope's arms were clutching me about the neck as shewas swung with me from Nathan's back. 

My mother was crying, from gladness I took it, for there certainly wasjoy in her eyes when she held me off and looked down at me. Then cameastonishment, and she lowered her spectacles from the top of her headto make sure that she saw aright. 

"But who--who is this?" she said. 

For answer I took Penelope's hand and faced the whole company; facedMr. Pound and the squire, old Mr. Smiley and Miss Spinner, Mrs. Pound, and a score of others of the great folk of the valley. I faced themwith defiance in my eyes, for were not they the authors of theProfessor's troubles and was I not his only friend?

"It's Penelope Blight, " I said, "and I promised the Professor to takecare of her. "

"What?" cried Mr. Pound. "The Professor's daughter--the man who almostkilled Constable Lukens? Dav-id!"

"Yes, sir, " I said. Penelope's hand was tightening in mine, and Iglanced to my side, to see her standing very straight, and the blueribbon was tilted as proudly as on that morning when we met by themountain brook. 

"Dav-id!" cried my mother. 

"Yes, sir, " I said, looking right at Mr. Pound. "I promised theProfessor that I would take care of her--always. "

CHAPTER VI

It was well for me that in my hours of absence fear had brought myparents to a just estimate of my character and to a truer appreciation ofmy essentiality to their happiness. My mother had long been haunted by aconviction that I should meet an early death by drowning or an accidentalgunshot, and this very morning she had awakened from a dream in which shesaw her only child floating on the murky waters of the mill-dam. Rushingto my room and finding me gone, she had had her worst fears confirmed, and at the moment of my reappearance Mr. Pound was endeavoring to consoleher for her loss and to bring her to a state of Christian resignation. So all was forgotten in the joy of my unexpected return, and though inthe eyes of the minister, Miss Spinner, and the others I was just a smallblack sheep about whose absence an unnecessary pother had been raised, there was only rejoicing in the home fold. Even my father did nothumiliate me with forgiveness, but took me in his arms silently and heldme there, as he might have held me had he just rescued me from the depthsof the mill-dam. To follow such a greeting with chastisement, howeverwell merited, was quite out of the question. In the seclusion of my ownroom I did meet with gentle chiding for the anguish I had caused, but mymother remembered her dream, and my father his hours of futile searching, and I knew that the hands which pressed mine would not be raised againstme in harsh reproof. Below us, I was sure, ears were strained to hearsome real evidence that I was receiving my deserts, for there was asilence there like that outside of the prison wall when the crowd waitsfor the doleful tidings tolled by the prison bell. Perhaps the listenerswere disappointed. I remember that Mr. Pound looked rather nonplussed ashe saw us coming down-stairs, my father leading the way, smiling gravely, my mother following, clutching my hand as though she would never releaseit. 

I had told them everything then. The story I had tried in vain to tellthem at dinner on the previous day was now listened to with eagerness, and my father, knowing the truth of James's fall from grace, wasoutspoken in his declaration that an injustice had been done theProfessor. In a solemn conference in the parlor, with Mr. Pound and thesquire, Doctor Pearl, Mr. Smiley, and all the other important men of theneighborhood, he decried the attack on Henderson Blight as an outrage; hefound solace alone in the fact that the constable had been morefrightened than hurt, for it seemed that the bullet had only clipped theflesh of his leg; he took upon himself all the blame for the affair, onthe ground that he, at least, should have known better. Squire Crumpleheartily agreed with my father, and pointed out that on his part he hadonly allowed the warrant to issue under protest; henceforth he would relyon his own judgment and would not interpret the law to suit the whims ofhis friends. Mr. Pound was contrite, but he took comfort in the thoughtthat they had acted for the best in the light of their knowledge of thecircumstances, but now, knowing the facts, he advised that the wholematter be allowed to simmer down quietly. He still took issue with hisrespected friend the squire on the illegality of the means used to ridthe community of a most undesirable member. The squire replied withheat, referring to the case of The Commonwealth _versus_ Hodgins, and thesubsequent action of Hodgins _versus_ The Commonwealth for damages. Itwas very evident that he would be relieved in mind if the case of TheCommonwealth _versus_ Blight did simmer down. But there was one obstacleto this programme of forgetting. It was not the constable. Lukens couldbe quieted easily. It was Penelope. Even the gentlest ministrations ofMiss Spinner had failed to bring the small girl to a realization of thehappy change in her lot. Even Mr. Pound was touched by her grief and sotroubled that he offered amends in a home under the parsonage roof. Herealized now that the reason he had never been blessed with a child ofhis own was that when the time came there might be a place at his boardand a nook in his heart for this abandoned little girl. On the strengthof her husband's offer Mrs. Pound was claiming Penelope as her own, andvery soon was complaining that she had a most troublesome child to dealwith. Penelope had divined that Mr. Pound was her father's arch-enemy, and she met his most benign approach with her head tilted defiantly andher eyes flashing, so that now, in a quandary, he asked: "What shall wedo with the child?"

The question was a sign that he surrendered her. He had shown an honestdesire to take her under his roof, and no one could say that if he hadfired the train which had wrecked her home, he was not willing to makeatonement. 

"What shall we do with the child?" my father repeated. He rose to showthat the conference was ended and the question settled. "David hasalready answered that, " he said, laying a hand upon my shoulder. "My boypromised Henderson Blight to take care of her until he returned. Theyhave settled it among themselves, and I shall do nothing to interferewith them. "

He spoke so firmly that no one dared to remonstrate, and so it came thatI kept my promise to the Professor as far as it was in my power. He musthave said himself that Penelope had a home better than any he could havegiven her. She had a mother's care--a care so loving that I should havegrown jealous had I not found a certain compensation in the fact that thewatchfulness over me relaxed and I was less hampered in my comings andgoings. Before a month had passed my mother was confessing a dread thatthe Professor might return and claim the child; she was pleading with myfather to abandon what she called a useless and an expensive search. Chance had left the door open, and chance had brought me into the hall, so I stopped and stood as silently as I could that I might not disturbtheir conference. I was frightened by the sternness in my father'svoice. He spoke of his duty. To him duty summed up life. He had hisduty, even in the matter of so worthless a creature as this HendersonBlight. Declaring this, he stamped the floor in emphasis. 

Often in the weeks that followed, when Penelope and I roamed over thefields, when her merriment rang out the highest, and her laughter was sofree that it seemed she was forgetting the clearing and the days when hersole companion was the gaunt and bitter-tongued Professor--often then Iwould hear again the stamp of my father's foot and his stern avowal, andto me it was as though he were conspiring against me in seeking to sendaway the only comrade I had ever known, and would leave me to pass mydays in the wake of James. I abhorred James now. I had come to know thepleasure of real companionship, and looked back to the old days wonderinghow I had endured them, and with dread to those that seemed to lie ahead. Penelope was a girl, to be sure, but she was not like the insipidcreatures of the village who were held in such contempt by boys of myage. Where I dared to go she followed. Did I climb to the highestgirder in the barn and balance myself on the dizzy height, she was withme. Did I venture to run the wildest rapids of the creek in the clumsybox which I called my canoe, she trusted her newest frock and ribbons tomy seamanship. And better than all was the respect and admiration inwhich she held me. To her I was no longer the frightened, shivering boyof the mountain brook. I was in a land I knew and followed its familiarways without fear. One day she saw me tumble from the bridge into thedeep swimming-hole, and while she cried out in fright I swam nonchalantlyashore, a full dozen strokes, and as I dried myself in the sun I reprovedher for her little faith in me. On another I presented her to old JerrySchimmel, sitting, a brown, dishevelled heap on his cobbler's bench, andfrom my accustomed seat by his stove, in a voice cast into the echoinghollows of my chest, I commanded him to tell us how he had fought in thebattle of Gettysburg. From my familiarity with the stirring incidents ofthe fight as Jerry described them, Penelope thought that I must have hada part in it too, and my modest disclaimer hardly convinced her that Ihad not been a companion-in-arms of this battle-worn veteran. 

What days those were! Even the fear that my father would find themissing Professor grew less. They drifted into weeks, and weeks intomonths, and there was no sign of the fugitive. I found myself lookinginto the future as though in the quiet evening I were turning my eyesover the valley to the west and the golden clouds hovering there. Idealt only with results. I crossed mountains without climbing them, andalways Penelope shared my glory with me. I look back now smiling at thatboyish self-reliance. Mountains have been crossed, but with whatheart-breaking struggles? Battles have been won, but with what a toll ofsuffering?

As I recall the day when I first came face to face with real trouble, with a trouble that leaves in the heart a never-healing wound, it was thebrightest of all that summer. It was one of those days when there wasnot the filmiest cloud to veil the sun; you could see the ethershimmering over the land, and the fields of yellow grain looked likelakes of molten metal. Shaded by our wide straw hats, Penelope and I hadno thought of the tropic heat. We were engrossed in the reaper as it cutits way through the wheat; we followed it, counting the sheaves as theydropped with mechanical precision; we stepped along untiringly in itswake, as though the rough stubble were the smoothest of paths, and theclatter of the machine the sweetest of music. Above the raucous clackingI heard my mother calling, and, suspecting some needless injunction notto get overheated, I pretended not to hear and looked the other way. Butshe was insistent. When we had rounded the field again, she crossed theroad to the fence; the reaper stopped, and on a day so still that a dog'sbark carried a mile there was no escape from her uplifted voice. Reluctantly Penelope and I abandoned our enchanting travel and obeyed thesummons. 

"Penelope, " my mother said, taking the girl by the hand, "come into thehouse. Your uncle is here. "

Penelope stopped and looked up into my mother's face, and there waswonder in her eyes. She had forgotten her uncle, so rarely had she heardher father speak of him, and I was quicker than she to grasp the meaningof his coming, for I remembered that Rufus, who never had had a realidea, who made his first success by giving away a prize with every poundof tea. I believed that he had come to take Penelope from me, and withevery step I saw my fears confirmed. 

"Your Uncle Rufus, " my mother said, and she closed her lips very tightlyas she walked on. 

The parlor shades were up--an ominous sign, for the parlor would only beopened to a person of importance. Had the Professor visited us, thehumbler sitting-room would have been quite good enough to receive him in, and it seemed a strange commentary on his harsh judgment that his brothershould be ushered into the stately chamber where the very air grew old indignified seclusion. Still more forcibly was this idea impressed on mymind when I stood at the door and saw my father sitting very erect, on amost uncomfortable chair, listening respectfully to the stranger's rapidwords. 

Rufus Blight spoke in a loud voice; he lolled in the big walnut rocker, with his arm stretched across the centre table, to the peril of mymother's precious Swiss chalet and the glass dome which protected it; onthe family Bible his fingers were beating a tattoo as carelessly as theymight have done on the counter of his general store. There was nothingin his appearance to suggest kin to the lean and cadaverous Professor. The Professor always seemed to move with effort, but his brother wasalive all over. Though short and fat, he had none of the placidity whichwe associate with corpulence. As he talked his hands moved restlessly;his bristling red mustache accentuated the play of his lips; his heavygold watch-chain moved up and down with his breathing; even his hair wasalert. 

"He is a remarkable man--I might say, a very remarkable man, " were thewords that came to us as we entered the hall. "Of course, you couldn'tunderstand him--few could. He had to go his own way and would take helpfrom no one, not even his brother. Upon my word, Judge----"

Our entrance checked him. He rose, and with arms akimbo stood gazingdown at Penelope. She, clinging to my mother, her cheek pressed againsther as she half turned from him, looked up at him, abashed and wondering, for to her small mind there was in this stranger something awe-inspiring. The sleek man in spotless, creaseless clothes, with polished boots andclose-shaved, powdered, barbered face, was so different from her unkemptfather that she could hardly believe him kin. Baal would have seemed asnear to her, and had the idol stretched out his arms to take her into hisdestroying embrace, she could hardly have been more frightened than whenshe saw Mr. Blight's fat hands reaching toward her. Mr. Blight smiled, and well he might, for this slip of a girl gazing up at him was of hisown blood, and all that was good in that blood found expression in hersweetness. He had come prepared to see a slattern, ill-fed, unkempt, thetrue daughter of shiftless parents and a wretched mountain home; he hadfound a graceful little body, and he wanted to take her into hispossession at once. 

"Penelope, " he exclaimed, "don't you know your Uncle Rufus?"

There was no particular reason why Penelope should know her Uncle Rufus. She could have submitted herself as easily to the embrace of anywell-dressed, smiling stranger, and she shrank back, but my mother pushedher forward within reach of the restless hands. 

"It's your dear uncle, child, " she said soothingly. "He has come to takeyou to a nice home. "

"And he is going to bring you up, " my father added in a wonderfullycheerful voice, born either from his own escape from responsibility orher brightened prospects. "He is going to give you everything. "

Penelope was on the verge of tears, but she held them back. "I don'twant everything, " she said, as she strove to check her forced advance byplanting her feet firmly and leaning back against my mother. "I justwant to stay here till father comes. "

"But your father will come to us--of course, he will come to us, Penelope, " Mr. Blight cried. His hands closed on hers, he hooked an armabout her and held her very cautiously, as though he were as afraid ofher as she of him. "You mustn't be frightened, my dear, " he went on, and, soothed by his kindly tones, she leaned against his knee. "That'sbetter, child. " Encouraged by her half-yielding attitude, he stroked herhair. To me, watching them from the hiding of my mother's skirt, she hadfallen into a magician's clutches and was being lulled by soft words intoan indifference to danger. 

"I'm your father's brother, child, " he pursued, in his insinuating tone. "Next to him I'm nearer to you than any one else, and to me there is noone as near as he. We will try to find him together--you and I, eh? Andwe'll all live together in Pittsburgh. You'll like Pittsburgh--it's avery lively, pushing town. "

"But I want to stay here with Davy, " said Penelope in a low voice. 

"With Davy?" Mr. Blight stared at her in surprise. Then he began tolaugh as though he were contrasting all he could give her with Davy'shumble powers. "Child--child--you don't realize what you are refusing. You don't realize what your Uncle Rufus is going to do for you. I've noone to look after--you will be the joy of a poor old bachelor's heart, won't you, now?"

He spoke as though being a poor old bachelor was quite the pleasantestpossible condition, yet he rolled out the phrase twice as if to touchPenelope's heart. Remembering the only other bachelor I had ever seen, Istared at him in wonder. This other was Philip Spangler, who sat all dayin the store gazing vacantly at the stove. Once I asked Stacy Shunk whyhe stayed there, and Stacy, lifting a warning finger, whispered: "He'sjest a bachelor, Davy, an old, old bachelor. " Contrasting him with Mr. Blight, I was puzzled. If it was a terrible thing to be an old bachelor, certainly he accepted the condition lightly; he was trying to arousesympathy when it was plain that he did not need or deserve it, forevidently he was quite well satisfied with a single state, howeverdeplorable it might come to be. Penelope was being enmeshed by unfairmeans, and it was hard to keep still, but there was nothing that I coulddo. 

Now my father lifted his chin clear of the high points of his collar. "Penelope, " he began, "you are fortunate--very fortunate--in having suchan uncle. Mr. Blight is a prominent man, and I might say"--glancingapologetically at the guest--"a rich man. " Then, meeting nocontradiction, he added--"a very rich man, who can give you suchadvantages as would be far beyond my means, even were you my daughter. "

"I don't want advantages, " said Penelope, hardly above a whisper, and forwant of a better resting-place she dropped her head on her uncle'sshoulder and burst into tears. 

"There--there--there--" cried Mr. Blight, patting her clumsily on theback. Had she been a full-grown woman, he could hardly have been moreembarrassed, yet he was pleased that she clung to him thus, for he wassmiling. "I'll not give you any advantages you don't want--I promiseyou. I just wish to make you happy. What's the use of my working all mylife, piling up money, capturing the steel trade, adding mills and millsto my plants, if I have no one to look after. There--there--there--now, child, don't cry. Won't you come with your poor, lonely, old uncle?"

Even to my prejudiced mind, he was playing his part well, for thisawkward kindness touched Penelope at last. She did not reply, nor didshe demur, but she clung closer to him in silence. I saw my danger andhers, and ran to him and grasped his knees. 

"Oh, Mr. Blight, don't take her away!" I cried. "I promised theProfessor I'd look after her. I promised----"

"Dav-id!" exclaimed my father, and he grasped my arm and began to draw meaway. 

My fear of him even could not restrain me, and I resisted, digging myfingers into the knees, clutching the folds of the trousers where Mr. Blight had so carefully arranged them to prevent them bagging. Heintervened, as much, I think, to save his immaculate clothes as me frombeing torn asunder. 

"Dav-id!" cried my father. 

"Mr. Blight--Mr. Blight--don't take her away!" I pleaded. 

Mr. Blight began to laugh. "Judge--Judge--release him, " he said, andfreeing me from the paternal grasp, he drew me toward him. When he hadironed out the wrinkled knees with his hand, he patted me on the head. "You are a good boy, David, " he went on, "and I understand exactly howyou feel. What you have done for Penelope will never be forgotten, willit, my little girl?" The emphasis on the last phrase of possessionextinguished the spark of hope in me, and had he stopped there I shouldhave surrendered feebly, but turning to my father, he added: "You have afine boy, Judge, and I like him. When I get home I shall send him a gun. What kind of a gun do you want, David?"

Young as I was then, I had not yet learned to value the good things oflife in terms of dollars, and to the power of the dollar my eyes werejust being opened. This man wielded it. He was enticing Penelope behindthe barrier of his fat, oily prosperity where I could not reach her. Holding her there, he was magnanimously compensating me with a gun, asthough we were making a trade in which the profit were mine, as though hewere valuing her in money. My dislike, born of the Professor'scontemptuous reference to him, had turned to distrust and aversion as Iwatched him weaving his toils about Penelope. Now I hated him and drewback from him as though his touch were baneful; I stamped a foot andshook a fist and shouted: "I don't want your old gun; Penelope doesn'twant your money. You have no right----"

My father's arms were about me. He lifted me from my feet and carried meto the door, and as I struggled blindly to free myself and return to theattack I looked back at Rufus Blight. It was not to see him sinkingunder the shame of my anathema. Signs of anger in him would haveincensed me far less than his lofty unconcern. He even interceded forme, but this only proved how secure was his victory, and that to his viewwhat fell to me was of little moment. 

"Don't be hard on Davy, Judge, " he said, interrupting my father'sapologies for my rudeness. "He's just a boy. I don't know but what, ifI were in his place, I should do exactly the same thing--feel exactly thesame way. "

This was small consolation to me, for Penelope's head was buried in hisshoulder; her face was hidden by her tousled hair, but I could hear hersobbing: "Uncle--uncle--let me stay with Davy. "

In the plea alone she acknowledged her kin to him and surrendered. Hecould well afford to be generous. By every law of custom I had meritedsevere punishment at my father's hands, and that his hands were stayed byMr. Blight's intercession was but another evidence of his power. When myfather reasoned with me kindly, instead of whipping me, I yielded, not tohis sophistry but to that masterful influence before which even he seemedto bend. I realized the hopelessness of my cause, and found myselffacing Mr. Blight again, an humble suppliant for his pardon. Humbly Iasked him if I might not soon see Penelope again, and she joined in mypetition. Humbly I asked that some day he would bring her back to thevalley, and she seconded my prayer, standing at my side, clasping my handand looking up at her uncle from tearful eyes. He promised everything. He took my hand and hers, and for the moment it seemed that this littlecircle was my real family, and that my father and mother, standing overus, were hardly more than law-given preceptors. Before our guest'sexpanding smile and the magic of his tongue the clouds fled. Those whichhung heaviest he brushed away with his restless hands. Soon, very soon, I was to go to that bustling, pushing town of Pittsburgh and withPenelope explore its wonders. We should ride behind the fastest pair oftrotters in the State--his trotters; we should see the greatest mills inthe country--his mills--where steel was worked like wax into a thousandgiant forms; we should take long excursions on the river in a wonderfulnew boat--his boat-- Why it would make a boy of him just to have us withhim!

Under the spell of his words an hour flew by, and then my mother ledPenelope away to make her ready for the journey. She brought her back tous decked in a hat and frock born of many days of planning and threetrips to the county town. The humble art of Malcolmville had not beenintrusted with so important a commission as Penelope's best clothes. Forthese the shops of Martinsburg, crammed with the latest fashions ofPhiladelphia, had been ransacked; the smartest modiste in Martinsburg hadtrimmed the hat with many yards of tulle and freighted it with pinkroses; the smartest couturiere in Martinsburg had created that wonderfulblue chintz frock, with ribbons woven through mazes of flounces; the lasttouch was my mother's--the plait of hair, done so masterfully that eventhe weight of the great blue bow could not bend it. 

I looked at Penelope in awe. She was no longer the little girl whom Ihad met by the mountain stream. I was still an uncouth boy, with facesmudged with the dust of the fields and hands blackened in play. Yet shedid not see the wide gulf which separated us, and, forgetting the hat, the frock, the chaff that clung to my matted hair and the grime of myshirt, she ran to me, threw her arms about my neck and cried:"Davy--Davy--I don't want to go!"

I knew that she had to go, and though the tears seemed to burst up in agreat flood from my heart, I would not show them in my eyes. Tears areunmanly--unboyly rather--and I fought them back, but for them I could notspeak. My father took Penelope from me. He lifted her in his arms andcarried her out of the house and down the path to the gate, where thecarriage was waiting. He placed her on the seat; he straightened out herrumpled frock, and even crossed her hands upon her lap, as though shewere quite incapable of doing anything for herself. Then he kissed her. It was the first time I had ever seen him kiss her. When he spoke it wasto say good-by to Rufus Blight, who was in his seat, pulling on a pair ofyellow gloves. 

"We shall all meet again, very soon, " said Mr. Blight omnipotently, asthough Fate were a henchman of his. "You must all come to Pittsburgh tosee us. It's a lively, pushing town, and you'll enjoy it. " Leaning fromthe carriage and holding out his hand to me, he added: "And you, Davy--you will come very, very soon. "

I believed him. But the dream that he had conjured for us of the days tocome, of his lively, pushing town, the fastest trotters, the wonderfulboat, were shattered by contact with the harsh fact of this parting. 

I looked past him at Penelope, sitting very straight, with her hands inher lap as my father had placed them. There was a giant frog in mythroat, but I conquered it as I had conquered my tears, and speaking verysteadily, I said: "Good-by, Penelope--I'll not forget. Some day I willtake care of you. "

She did not turn. Her eyes held right ahead, but she answered bravely:"Good-by, Davy. I'll see you soon--very soon. Remember----"

The rest I did not hear. A medley of hoofs, harness and wheels broke inand she was away to a new world and a new life. The brave little figurebowed suddenly, and the roses and the tulle, the precious creation of theMartinsburg modiste, were ruthlessly crushed against the sleek bulk ofthe man who had never had a real idea. 

CHAPTER VII

That the Professor, with fear at his heels and the devils ofretribution clutching at his flying coat-tails, should have plungedinto silence when the bush closed around him was not strange. Everycircumstance of his parting argued a long absence, a discreetobliteration of self. But Penelope left the valley in prosaic fashion, in a livery wagon, with a man as easy to find as his own bustling, pushing town; yet the dust-clouds which closed around them as theydrove away shut them from my ken as the mountains had enclosed herfather in their most secret hiding-places. It was the fault of RufusBlight. He had blown beautiful bubbles to divert us in those lasthours of his visit, and bubbles bursting silently into nothingness werenot more fragile than his promises. To the true value of thosepromises I awoke slowly, as the months went by and there came no hintof their fulfilment. 

I wrote to Penelope. My letters would have made volumes were theirlength commensurate with the pain of composition. Even the heart ofRufus Blight would have been touched could he have seen me, bent over atable, digging my teeth into my tongue and my pen into the paper asletter by letter and word by word I constructed those messages of myboyish love. But he knew only the finished gem, and not the labor ofits cutting. The more I sought to break the silence, the surer Ibecame that he, the omnipotent one, had ordained it, and I fancied himreading my letters and destroying them, a thin smile lighting hischubby face as he thought of the easy way in which I was beingoutwitted. I went to my mother for help. She knew nothing of myunavailing struggles, and was herself offended and heart-sick. At myentreaty she overcame her pride and wrote to Mr. Blight inquiring as toPenelope's welfare. In return her existence was recognized; hardlymore than that, for the great man did not trouble himself with apersonal answer. His reply was given vicariously, through one P. T. Mallencroft, his secretary, on flawless paper, three sentences in boldclear type and a Spencerian signature closing it. It was a bloodlessthing. It spoke the commands of omnipotence as though carved ontablets of stone. 

Mrs. Malcolm's favor of the 10th ultimo was acknowledged; Mr. Blightinstructed Mr. Mallencroft to thank Mrs. Malcolm for the interest whichshe had shown, and to assure her that Miss Penelope was quite well. 

It was perfectly polite. It was the finished bow with which RufusBlight was backing from our presence, never to trouble us again. Iknew this when I saw the sheet drop from my mother's limp fingers and, sinking to a chair, she tossed her apron over her head and rockedviolently to an accompaniment of muffled sobs. 

It was clear to me that Rufus Blight was not only neglectful of ourclaims, but had been so with purpose, and as I wandered aimlesslythrough the fields in the wake of James, and as in the evening I satagain with him on the barn-bridge, looking over the darkening valley, there held one enduring thought in the chaos of my brain. Looking backnow, I see in my childish enmity toward Rufus Blight the impulse thatset me on my course. But for that I might have stayed in the valley, dozing, as the Professor had said, like the very dogs. In Rufus BlightI was conscious of an opposing force. He had taken Penelope from me;he had cheated me with flattery and broken promises; and the dominatingsense in my mind was one of conflict with him. I looked to the west. Mountains rose there, range beyond range, and beyond them, miles away, was his bustling, pushing town. To cross them and to close with himwas my one desire, and though time dulled the edges of my purpose andthe figures of the Professor, of Penelope and of Rufus Blight grew dimin the distance, and at last the old motive was lost beneath a host ofnew impelling forces, still it was Mallencroft's letter that touchedthe quick and aroused me from my canine slumber. 

The Professor's words came back to me. The mountains seemed to echothem always. "Wake up, Davy! Do something; be somebody; get out ofthe valley. " Here was my shibboleth. I must do something; I must besomebody; I must get out of the valley! And then I should go toPenelope Blight, and a hundred urbane, unctuous uncles could notdefraud me of my right in her. 

In my father I found the first mountain on the way that I had chosen, for to his mind my destiny was settled and to be envied. All that washis would some day be mine--the best farm in the county, hisPennsylvania Railroad stock, his shares in the bridge company, and hisKansas bonds. The dear soul had arranged my course so comfortably andin such detail that in me he would have been living his own life overagain. And what my father said, my mother echoed. Was I too proud tofollow in his footsteps? Was I, a child in years, to hold myself abovethe ways of my forebears?

Such arguments came too late to my rebellious spirit. I should nolonger have told the Professor that I was going to be like my father. Necessity had made me more ambitious. I dreamed now of the power andfame of a Washington, a Webster, a Grant--names which stood to me assymbols of accomplishment. So what my parents at first brushed asideas the idle dreaming of a boy they soon realized to be a vague butpersistent purpose which must be beaten down. They gave me a certaindignity by descending to debate. What did I want to be? How could Ianswer, who could not even name the vocations in which men won theirway to coveted heights? My mother gave me the key which opened theworld to me. 

"William, " she said, addressing my father, "I do believe Davy isthinking of being a minister and is kind of ashamed to own it. "

I caught the softening note in my mother's voice and in her eyes alight of pride as she regarded me inquiringly. Whatever obligation layon me to till the ancestral acres, there was a higher duty which wouldabsolve it. This she had pointed out. My plans at once took aconcrete form, and though my first faltering assent might have savoredof hypocrisy, I was soon sincere in my determination. And now theopposition crumbled and my parents found pride in a son whose heart atthe age of ten was stirred by the need of lost humanity. My fatherdiscovered that it had been his own early ambition to be a minister; itwas as though I was to erect the edifice to which he had feared to puthis strength, and it comforted him. He delighted to lay his hand uponmy head in the presence of company and to announce that his David wasgoing to do the work to which he had always believed he had himselfbeen called. With my mother the son's gifts became a subject on whichshe never tired dilating, and naturally such flattery reconciled me toa calling far removed from all my old ambitions; but had it beenintimated to me that I might become a plumber I should have acceptedthat vocation just as readily, provided that by following it I shouldgo out of the valley, over the mountains, to Pittsburgh and thepresence of Rufus Blight. 

Now arose Mr. Pound to help me. Here was the crowning incongruity in achain of incongruous events. I had never liked Mr. Pound. He hadoverwhelmed me too often. His sermon was the rack on which I wasstretched for an hour every Sunday to endure untold agonies ofrestlessness; his house the temple to which too often I had to carrypropitiatory offerings of vegetables and chickens. And then hispersecution of my friend the Professor still rankled in me. Yet Ifound myself, of necessity, using him as the one known quantity in theequation over which I worked. He became my model. I fancied myselfattaining a mien like his, a deep, resonant voice and a vocabulary ofmarvellous words. I dressed myself in material garments like his, inspreading folds of awe-inspiring black; I wrapped myself in hisimmaterial cloak, his dignity and goodness. I faced Rufus Blight andhe quailed before a presence so imposing, and when I spoke in a voicevibrating truth my eloquence smothered his feeble, shifty protests. Always I asserted my right to Penelope and led her from her prison. And always, it seemed, with that victory I cast off my Pound-likesanctity and became as other men. With it the great task of myministry was accomplished, though there was a certain charm in the ideaof continuing it in the hunting fields of Africa, an appeal of romancein a kraal, a cork hat, and the picture of Penelope and me settingforth with a band of faithful converts to the slaughter of elephantsand lions. 

Idle dreams of boyhood! Absurd, incongruous fancies! And but for themI might at this very moment be dozing in the valley; I might be anotherdistinguished Judge Malcolm, with my little court of ministers andsquires, with old Mr. Smiley as master-of-the-horse and Miss AgnesSpinner as lady-in-waiting. Instead? I did not stay in the valley. Aroused by the sense of antagonism to Rufus Blight, and spurred on bythe ambition to confront and defeat him, I began my struggle to crossthe mountains, and Mr. Pound became my support and guide. He neverknew the real truth behind my commendable resolution. The inspiringthought in my mind, as he insisted on judging it, was born of his ownteaching. As my father had planned to live his life over again in me, so Mr. Pound saw a hope of his own intellectual immortality. Were notthe evidences of grace so suddenly revealed in me the reward of his ownlabors?

When he came to the house, summoned in consultation over my future, heplaced a hand upon my head and solemnly repeated the lines of the grandold hymn: "God works in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform. "There was here a gentle hint that my past had not been altogether goodor full of promise, and as Mr. Pound undoubtedly believed this, it mademore generous his conduct toward me. He was a narrow man, an egotist, unlearned, too, save in the cruder forms of his calling, but he wassincere. He sought to mould me to what he thought the form a manshould take, and now as I look back on the five years through which helabored with me, I may smile at the memory of his mien, his pomposity, his bigotry, yet I smile too with affection. He taught me without pay. His study became my school-room, and when at times I chafed under hisvigilant tutelage and wearied in my well-doing, he steeled himself withthe remembrance that Job endured more than he without complaint. In mysulkiness or open rebellion he found evidences to confirm his belief inthe doctrine of innate evil; he seemed to rush singing into battle withthe devil that was in me. 

Through this intimate association I became a little Mr. Pound. Howcould it have been otherwise when day after day, books in hand, Iwalked down to his house to recite my lesson of Latin and Greek, andwith him worked through the mysteries of algebraic calculation andstudied the strange habits of the right line? He pressed me into hismould. Years went by. In the valley the Professor was forgotten, andto me Penelope was but a dim figure in the past. Even the memory ofRufus Blight ceased to awaken rancor, and I could contemplate withgrowing cynicism my old-time hatred of him. Unconsciously newambitions stirred within me, and they were fostered by the flattery ofmy elders. In that Africa of my dream-land I no longer pictured myselfin a cork helmet slaying lions, but dying at the stake, a martyr to myduty and--must I add it?--being preached about afterward from athousand pulpits. 

Mr. Pound was my model of deportment, my glass of fashion. I see himnow as we used to sit, vis-a-vis, at his study table. Samson'sphysical strength came from his hair. From the same source, it seemedto me, Mr. Pound derived that mental vigor with which he pulled downthe temples of ignorance and slew the thousand devils of unorthodoxywhich sprang from my doubting mind. From the top of his head a redlock flamed up, licking the air; over its sides the hair tumbled incataracts, breaking about his ears; then the surging hair lost itselfin orderly currents which flowed, waving, from his cheeks, leaving arift from which sprang a generous nose and a round chin with manyfolds. His mouth was formed for the enunciation of large words andpompous phrases. From it monosyllables fell like bullets from acannon. He seldom descended to conversation. He declaimed. He soughtto impress on me the importance of using resounding sentences which hesaid would keep reverberating in the caverns of the mind. For thiseffect he had a theory that words ending in "ation" and "ention" wereespecially fitted. Trumpet-words, he called them, brazen notes whichpenetrated the deepest crevices of the brain. I must admit that in thepractice of his theory he was wonderfully successful, for after thirtyyears I can still hear his sonorous voice filling the church with theannouncement that the "Jewish congregation was a segregation for thepreservation of the Jewish nation. " I can see him pausing in hisdiscourse to lubricate his vocal chords with a glass of ice-water, andthen drawing himself to his full height, fix his eyes on his hushedpeople and cry: "What did I say the Jewish congregation was? Let merefresh your recollection. " His answer must ring to-day in the cavernsof many minds. Others of his phrases, I know, still echo in my own. But this is because so often in my own room I practised declaimingthem, striving to enunciate them with my mentor's finish. 

Was it a wonder that I became a little Mr. Pound? I suppose, too, thatI became a veritable little cad. Conscious of my advantages in birthand breeding, much impressed on me by my mother, I had never beenintimate with the village boys. Now I shunned them altogether. To methey were thoughtless heathen and unprofitable company. I strove for atime to correct their evil ways and to bring them to repentance. Thatwas something which I could properly do without unnecessaryassociation. I had for my reward only taunts. They called me "Goody"and "Miss Malcolm, " and like names contemplated to shame me from thecourse which I had chosen, but in the martyrdom which they made mesuffer I only gloried, and I could have let them stone me to death andforgiven them, provided, of course, that Mr. Pound preached about meafterward and that my name were enrolled in the company of well-knownmartyrs. Looking back, I realize that I was playing. There was a fineexcitement in being hunted in my comings and goings through thevillage. It became my Africa, where any tree might hide a deadlyenemy, and any fence an ambush. I discovered secret passages throughbackyards. I matched cunning against overwhelming force, andsometimes, when the odds were not too great against me, I rememberedJoshua and another David and turned on the Philistines and smote themright manfully. At other times the hostilities lagged, but they neverceased entirely, and often they broke out suddenly with increased fury. It was a mass and class war. To the butcher's son and the blacksmith'sboy and their like, the restless masses, I was indeed a bumptiousMalcolm. Conscious of the superior quality of the blood of theMcLaurins, and a little inflated with the pride of wealth, I had longpatronized them, so there was needed only my assumption of virtue tofan the flames. But as I grew in years and knowledge, and the days ofmy departure from the valley drew nearer, I relied less on my fists forprotection and more on a defensive armor of dignity. I became less atarget for missiles and more an object of jibes. These I met withcontempt, for I was going to college; I was going to McGraw University, the alma mater of Mr. Pound, and this thought alone nerved me to stepout of the course of a flying stone with unconcern and to move down thestreet with Pound-like mien. 

There never was any discussion in our family as to where I should takemy collegiate training. Had there been, Mr. Pound would speedily havequelled it. McGraw was the one college of which I knew anything. Thelittle that I could learn of others was through the sporting pages ofmy father's Philadelphia paper, and here the name of Mr. Pound's almamater was strangely missing. But he drew a real picture of it for me;gave me a concrete conception which I could not form from records oftouch-downs and runs and three-baggers to left field. Sometimes in thestudy I would rise to points of information on Harvard, Princeton, orYale, but I was promptly declared out of order. Mr. Pound admittedthat these universities were larger than McGraw, and acknowledged thatin some special lines of education they might be in advance of McGraw;yet, withal, had he a son he would intrust him only to the care ofDoctor John Francis Todd. As an educator and builder of characterDoctor Todd had no equal in the country. Mr. Pound could prove this. He pointed to his old friend Adam Silliman, who graduated at Princetonand was to-day a struggling coal merchant in Pleasantville, and drank. With him he contrasted Sylvester Bradley, who got his degree at McGrawin exactly the same year, '73, and had been three times moderator ofthe Pennsylvania Synod. Of such comparisons between McGraw men who hadsucceeded and other university men who had failed Mr. Pound had so manyat his fingers' ends as to be absolutely overwhelming. So before I hadseen McGraw I was a McGraw man to the core, and my mentor, with asubtlety astonishing for him, missed no opportunity to increase mydevotion. He even taught me the college yell in one of his lightermoments, and I, in turn, taught it to James that it might ring out withmore volume from the barn-bridge of an evening. 

You may think that I was to be disillusioned. That could not be. Whenfirst I saw McGraw she was a giantess to my eyes. The time was to comewhen I was to see her in a new light, to judge her from a newperspective, to realize the incongruity between her aspiration andaccomplishment, to smile at her solemn adherence to academic ritual;and yet to realize that in her littleness and poverty she gave me whatwas good and all that was in her power. I may regret that I did notdelve deeper into the mysteries of those foot-ball scores and discover, through them, the greater seats of learning. Perhaps I might haveknown then that not all their sons became coal-merchants and drank, andI might have gone much farther on that September day when first I setout into the world beyond the mountains. But for all that I cannotimagine the four years which I spent at that tiny college taken from mylife. For all the four years that might have been I would not exchangethem. 

That September day? It is a tall white mile-stone on my way. I canlook back and see its every detail. On its eve James and I sat for thelast time on the barn-bridge and he sang of Annie Laurie and NellieGray. And when we heard my mother calling me, we stood together andgave the college yell. 

"I s'pose, Davy, " he said, as we were moving toward the house, "folkswill think I'm a little peculiar, but I'm going to give that cheerevery night, just for old times' sake--for your sake, Davy. "

Our elders have a fashion of making like inopportune remarks when weare struggling to keep our hearts high. It seemed as though they weretrying to break my spirit. My mother's white silence, my father's longprayer, James feverishly coming and going on that last morning--littlethings like these almost made me abandon my great plans. But pridesustained me--that same pride which sends men into battle for foolishcauses. I wanted to hurry the fall of the blow. I even protestedagainst my parents and Mr. Pound driving with me to the railroad, andthey did not understand. I had to meet their last embraces under theeyes of the motley crowd who had come to the station to see the train, and under such conditions I dared not show emotion. Again they did notunderstand and were a little hurt by my coldness. I sprang up the carsteps jauntily. To show my independence I stood by the smoker door andwaved a smiling farewell to the silent, wondering three. I did notwait there, as they waited, looking after me, but turned, tossed my newbag into a rack, threw myself into a seat, and crossed my legs with thenonchalance of one who left home every day. 

The river travelled with me out of the valley. I looked from the carwindow and saw it at my side, and together we went away. I was silent, wondering at the shadow which seemed to overcast the earth. The littleriver was bright in the noonday sun--a cheery fellow-traveller throughthe green land. I leaned from the car window in the suddenly born hopethat I might see the three still figures, back there in the hot glareof the station. But the river had turned, and I saw not the roofs ofPleasantville dozing in the sun like the very dogs, nor the court-housetower and the tall steeples that pierced her shade, but a high wall ofmountains. We seemed to be driving straight for their heart. Theriver's mood was mine. It shrank from that forbidding wall and themysteries beyond; it swept in a wide curve into pleasant lowlands. Andnow I looked across it northward, to other mountains--to _my_mountains, to the friendly heights that watched over _my_ valley. Closing my eyes I saw it as on that morning when Penelope and I rode interror from the woods. I looked across it as it lay in the broad day, under the kindly eye of God, across the rolling green, checkered withthe white of blossoming orchards and the brown of the fallow, past thevillage spires and up the long slope to the roof among the giant oaks. You've had enough, the river seemed to say; and, turning, it chargedboldly into the other mountain's heart. I went with it, but my facewas pressed against the pane, that those who travelled with me mightnot see. 

CHAPTER VIII

Harlansburg, with practical sense, shields itself from northern windsby a high hill, spreading over the barren southern slope. Trade clingsto the river-front, in a compact mass around the square, and from therethe town rises, scattering as it climbs, and the higher it goes thelarger are the houses and the more imposing, suggesting a contest inwhich the stronger have overtopped their weaker brethren. But theuniversity, I suspect, was never surfeited with practical sense, elseshe would not have settled on the very crest of the hill, to shiver thewinter through in icy winds and in the summer to bake in tropic heat. There was, indeed, a delightful lack of responsibility about theuniversity. She had something of Micawber's nature, and was so inuredto adversity that she would have been ill at ease in a position lessimposing, even though less exposed. She might shiver, but she woulddominate the town. She was hopefully waiting for something to turn up, and for such a purpose was well placed, for the railroad threaded thenarrow valley below, and at any moment some multi-millionaire might seeher from the car window, take pity and endow her. This impression ofworth in honorable tatters, of virtue appealing for aid, is made on meto-day when the train swings around the jutting hill and I behold theroof of "Old Main" rising from the trees, and the smutted white dome ofthe observatory. But that afternoon when I first saw my alma mater, Iwas quite overwhelmed by her magnificence. Before that I had knownMcGraw only by an ancient wood-cut of Mr. Pound's, which showed a longbuilding, supremely bare, set among military trees; with a barouche inthe foreground in which was a woman holding a parasol; withwooden-looking gentlemen in beaver hats pointing canes at the windowsas though they were studying the beauties of imagined tracery. Themilitary trees had grown, and through the gaps in the foliage as I drewnearer I made out the detail of the most imposing structure I had everseen. Not St. Peter's, nor the Colosseum, nor the Temple of the Sunhave awakened in me the same thrill of admiration that shot through myveins when "Old Main" stretched its bare brick walls before me toincomprehensible distances, and rising carried my eyes to the skyitself, where the Gothic wood-work of the tower pierced it. 

In the name, "Old Main, " there is a suggestion of a score of collegiateGothic quadrangles clustering about their common mother, but theseexisted only in the dreams of Doctor Todd, and the most tangibleexpression they found was in a blue-print which was hung in aconspicuous place in his study and presented his scheme of placing thedifferent schools in that hoped-for day when the multimillionaireuntied the strings of his money-bags. 

"Our founder, Stephen McGraw, " Doctor Todd was fond of explaining, "gave us the nucleus of a great educational institution. Our task isto build on his foundation. It is true that in fifty years not a newstone has been laid, but that must not discourage us. We shall go onhoping and working. "

Dear old Doctor Todd! He still works on and hopes. He has had bitterdisappointments, but they have never beaten him down. Had StephenMcGraw left his money and not his name to the university, the doctor'stask would have been easier, for it is not the way of men to beautifyanother's monument. Once, I remember, a Western capitalist waspersuaded to make a great gift to McGraw. He made it with conditions, and for a while our hopes blazed high and with exceeding fury. Thecollegiate Gothic quadrangles were within our reach, as near to us asthe grapes to Tantalus. A half-million dollars was promised us if weraised a like sum within a year. Doctor Todd tried to effect acompromise by accepting two hundred thousand dollars outright, but thephilanthropist did not believe in making beggars of institutions bysurfeiting them with charity. So we cheered him right heartily andwent to work to gather our share. I remember it all very well becauseI sang in the glee-club concert which we gave in the opera house tohelp the fund, and because our classroom work was very light, as thepresident and half of the faculty were canvassing the State for aid. We worked desperately--faculty, alumni, and students. Even Mr. Poundgave ten dollars from his meagre salary, and the Reverend SylvesterBradley, three times moderator of the synod, a round hundred. Withonly a month in which to make up a deficit of four hundred thousanddollars, we did not abandon hope. Every morning in chapel the doctorprayed earnestly for a rain of manna or a visitation of ravens, whichwe knew to be his adroit way of covering a more mercenary petition. But heaven never opened, and a check never fluttered to earth from theonly source from which it could be expected. The year ended and ourwould-be benefactor gave his money outright to Harvard or Yale, Iforget which, for a swimming tank or a gymnasium. 

Some day McGraw may get the coveted money. I know that were it in mypower the collegiate Gothic quadrangles would rise on the lines ofDoctor Todd's faded blue-print. I should build Todd Hall and McGrawLibrary, but not one brick would I add to "Old Main. " There would bethe only condition of my gift of millions. They might suggest orielwindows to relieve the bare facade, buttresses to break the flatness ofthe wall and pinnacles to beautify the roof, but I would have "OldMain" always as I saw it on that September afternoon, when I hadclimbed the hill, paused, set down my bag and stood with arms akimbowhile I scanned the amazing length and height of the splendid pile. Myheart at each remove from home had become a heavier weight until Iseemed to carry within me a solid leaden load. Now it lightenedmysteriously. Face to face with a new life that had its symbol in thisnoble breadth of wall, the cords which held me to the old snapped. That very morning seemed the part of another age, and yesterday wasspent in another world. I was wide awake at last. The cheer which Mr. Pound had taught me was on my lips, and I should have given it as apaean of thanksgiving had I not been embarrassed by the scrutiny of agroup of young men who loitered on the steps before me. So I picked upmy bag, a feather-weight to my new energy, and went boldly on. 

My impression of the splendor of college life was heightened by thefirst acquaintance I made in my new environment. This was Boller of'89, and today Boller of '89 holds in my mind as a true pattern of theman of the world. His was the same stuff of which was made "theperfect courtier. " The difference lay solely in the degree of finish, and justly considered, true value lies in the material, not in thegloss. Boller, polished by the society of Harlansburg, appeared to myeyes quite the most delightful person I had ever met. It was theperfection of his clothes and the graciousness of his manner that awedme and won my admiration. In those days wide trousers were thefashion, and Boller was, above all, fashion's ardent devotee. His, Ithink, exceeded by four inches the widest in the college. Recallinghim as he came forth from the group on the steps to greet me, I thinkof him as potted in his trousers, like a plant, so slender rose hisbody from his draped legs. His patent-leather shoes were almosthidden, and from his broad base he seemed to converge into a gray derbyof the kind we called "the smoky city, " the latest thing fromPittsburgh. Looking at him, so wonderfully garbed, I became consciousof my own rusticity, so old-fashioned did the styles of Pleasantvilleappear beside the resplendent garments of my new friend. I was surethat he must notice it. If he did, he gave no sign. 

"I'm Boller of '89, " he said, grasping my hand cordially. "What's yourname?"

"Malcolm, sir--David Malcolm, " I answered. 

Boller clapped an arm across my shoulders in friendly fashion. "You'rethree days late, Malcolm, but better late than never. I suppose youwere hesitating between McGraw and Harvard. "

"Oh, no!" I faltered, not fathoming his pleasantry. "I had to waituntil the tailor finished my new suit. It should have been done lastMonday, but----"

Something in Boller's eyes checked me. He was regarding me from headto foot so gravely that I divined that I might have joined the crew ofthe Ark in my new clothes, judged by their cut. 

"You have come here to study agriculture, I presume, " he remarked mostpleasantly. 

So subtle a reference to my bucolic appearance was lost on my innocentmind. He seemed quite serious and as he was mistaken I wanted to sethim right. I was proud of my laudable ambition. Proclaiming it hadbrought me only commendation, and I proclaimed it now. 

"I'm going to be a minister, " I said, drawing myself up a little. 

"Indeed--a minister--how interesting!" returned Boller, raising hiseyebrows. 

Now had he laughed at me, had he called his fellows from the step tomob me, in the glory of my martyrdom I should have held fast to mypurpose; or had he flattered me like Miss Spinner or Mr. Smiley, myvanity would have carried me on my chosen path. His middle course wasdisconcerting. He treated my ambition as though it were quite anatural one and just about as interesting as to follow dentistry orplumbing. 

"I'm going to be a missionary, " I said in a louder tone, hoping toarouse in him either antagonism or adulation. 

"Curious, " he returned. "Very curious. Why I am thinking of taking upthe same line myself. It makes a man so interesting to the girls. I've a cousin who is a minister, and last year he received seventeenpairs of knit slippers from the young ladies of his congregation. That's going some--eh, Malcolm?"

What a different picture from my cherished one of cork hats and expressrifles! The suggestion was horribly insidious. To be interesting towomen _en masse_ was to my manly view exceedingly unmanly; to labor forreward in knit slippers the depth of degradation. I was about todeclare to Boller that I was not going to be his kind of a clergymanwhen I stopped to ask myself if I had ever known any other kind, if myown ideal were not as unattainable as to be another Ivanhoe or CaptainCook. Mr. Pound rose before me, his feet incased in the lovinghandiwork of Miss Spinner. From him my mind shot wide afield to theReverend Doctor Bumpus, fresh from the dark continent, thanking ourcongregation for the barrel of clothing sent to his eleven children infar-off Zululand. Thoughts like these were as arrows in the heart ofmy noble purpose. 

"I haven't absolutely made up my mind, " I said suddenly. 

But Boller refused to accept such a qualification. He had me firmly bythe arm and brought me face to face with the loungers on the step. 

"Gentlemen, " he said, "allow me to present to you the Reverend DoctorDavid Malcolm!"

And the loungers on the step saluted me as gravely as if I had beenthat friend of Mr. Pound's, the Reverend Sylvester Bradley, thricemoderator of the synod. 

It was thus that I became the Reverend David Malcolm, and this was allthe authority I ever had for so honorable a cognomen. So it was thatby the insidious raillery of a moment, Boller shook the foundationslaid by Mr. Pound in five years of labor, and it was not long beforethe whole structure of his building tumbled into ruins. My firstviolent protest against a nickname which seemed to me to savor ofsacrilege served only to fasten it to me more securely. Resigningmyself to it, I came to regard it lightly, and the longer I bore it injest the less I desired to earn it in honor. It was a far cry from Mr. Pound to Boller of '89, but I doffed the vestment and donned the motleythat September day, for Boller became my mentor and in all things mymodel. I was flattered by his condescending treatment. Before a weekhad passed my engrossing ambition was to wear trousers as wide as hisand to crown myself with a "smoky city" derby. Having accomplishedthis ambition by going into debt, I realized a greater, and pinned tothe lapel of my gayly checked coat, the pearl and diamond-studded pinof Gamma Theta Epsilon. That, of course, was Boller's fraternity, andI think he could have persuaded me to join whatever he asked, so whollywas I captured by his kindness. 

In the study of Doctor Todd to which he led me, in the presence of thegreat man, he did not venture any airy presentation. Boller of '89inside of the study door was quite a different person from the Bollerwithout it. The bold manner fled. He was suppressed, obsequious; evenhis clothes seemed to shrink and grow humbly dun. We entered soquietly that the doctor, bending over his desk, did not hear us, and wehad to cough apologetically to apprise him of our presence. 

"David Malcolm, sir--a new freshman, " Boller said. 

The doctor rose. I saw a little man with a very large head coveredwith hair which shot in all directions in scholarly abandon. His neckseemed much too thin to carry such a weight, but that, I think, was theeffect of a collar much too large, and a white tie so long that itsends trailed down over an expanse of crumpled shirt. The doctor'sblack clothes looked dusty; the doctor himself looked dusty, yet thesmile with which he greeted me was as warm as the sunshine breakingthrough the mist. 

"This is splendid, " he cried, shaking my hand fervently. "Mr. Malcolm, you are welcome. You make the thirty-ninth new man this year--a recordin our history. McGraw is growing. Have I not predicted, Mr. Boller, that McGraw would grow?"

To this Boller very readily assented, and the doctor, rubbing his handswith delight at his vindication, placed a chair for me at his side andbegan talking rapidly, not of me, nor of my plans, but of theuniversity. He did mention incidentally that he had heard of methrough his dear friend, Mr. Pound--a man of whom the university wasproud--yet, though I was sure Mr. Pound had spoken well of me, he madeno mention of it. I was of interest to him simply because by my comingI had broken the records of McGraw's freshman class. Last year itnumbered thirty-eight; this year, thirty-nine. Through me theuniversity had taken another stately step onward. He showed me theblue-print and explained it in detail. He spoke so earnestly that in amoment he had abandoned the subjunctive mood, and was describing thebuildings as though they actually existed--here the new dormitory, there the chemical laboratory, the gymnasium, the chapel. So potentwas his imagination that when I was dismissed and stood again on thesteps, I found myself sweeping the campus in search of the beautifulstructures which he had pictured for me. Not finding them, I was preyto disappointment, so small did the McGraw that was appear beside theMcGraw that should be. I began to suspect that those otheruniversities upon which Mr. Pound looked with such contempt mightresemble the creation of Doctor Todd's imagination, that there might bemore behind those foot-ball scores than my old mentor had cared todisclose. Distrust of him was rising in me, but I was not allowed toremain long pondering over these things, for Boller had been waitingfor me and I was quickly in his possession. 

Had the murmurs of rebellion risen to a point where I was planning toabandon McGraw, my new friend must have blocked me. He regarded me ashis property. He installed me in the bare little room which for fouryears was to be my home. He took me to his own quarters and there gaveme such a glimpse of my new life as to make me forget my momentarydisillusionment. While he dressed, arrayed himself more impressivelythan ever in evening clothes, I divided my eyes between him and thepictures on the wall. Here Boller, in foot-ball clothes, sat on afence, wonderfully dashing, with a foot-ball under his arm; there hewas in base-ball toggery, erect with bat lifted, ready to strike; hereholding a baton, a conspicuous figure in a group of young men, lookingexceedingly conscious and uncomfortable in evening clothes--the gleeclub, he explained, taken on their last tour of the State. And whilehe dressed, he painted such a glowing picture of life at McGraw as tomake it of little moment to me now whether or not Doctor Todd's dreamever came true. That I should grow to Boller's size and fashion wasall I asked. 

As I watched him soaping and brushing his hair, struggling a half hourwith his tie and setting that hair all awry again, soaping and brushingonce more and at last emerging flawless from the conflict, my ownself-confidence ebbed away and the sense of my own rusticity andawkwardness oppressed me. I was to go with him to the first importantsocial event of the year, the reception to the new students, and seeinghow my friend arrayed himself for it, I wanted to crawl away to my ownroom and hide there. But he would not let me. He laughed at myexcuses. To be sure my clothes were not the best form, but it was notto be expected that a man new to university life should be--here Bollersurveyed himself in the glass and I understood the implication. So Ipolished my shoes, wetted and soaped my own hair to rival his and wentwith him. Had he been leading me into battle I could not have beencolder with fright. Had he not had a fast hold on my arm I am surethat when I came face to face with the formidable array of faculty andfaculty wives waiting to receive me, I should have beaten a precipitateretreat. I had never before been received; I had never before been aguest at any formal social function, and it was appalling to have tocharge this battery of solemn eyes. But there was no escape. Bollerpushed me into the hands of Doctor Todd, who gave another heartyhandshake to the thirty-ninth and presented him to Mrs. Todd. Sheassured me that it was a great pleasure to meet me, a statemententirely at variance with the severity of her countenance and thepromptness with which she passed me on to Professor Ruffle, whocombined the chair of modern languages with the business management ofthe college. He with a dexterous twist consigned me to his good lady, and thus I passed from hand to hand down the dreaded line. 

The ordeal was over. I had had my baptism of social fire. Fear leftme, but not embarrassment. I forgot that thirty-eight other young menwere being received and were undergoing numberless bewilderingintroductions. It seemed that the whole college was there simply tomeet me, and I returned its greeting in a daze. If I lost Boller inthe press, I felt the need of his supporting arm and peered longinglyamong the jostling crowd to find him. He was continually going andcoming, but he never forgot me for any time. He was wonderfully kindabout informing as to whom it was worth my while to be agreeable. . . . Don't trouble with Brown; be pleasant to Jones, but look out forRobinson, the fellow with a Kappa Iota Omega pin. He had hardly warnedme against Robinson, before that young man was addressing me with greatcheerfulness. I saw nothing whatever repulsive about him; but toBoller I was evidently in danger. 

"There's a young lady here who is dying to meet you, " he whispered inmy ear as he drew me from the sinister clutches. 

Oh, subtle flattery! This was the first time I had ever had a younglady dying to meet me. Of course I understood that Boller had spokenfiguratively, and yet I did not question that the young lady had seenme, and I was vain enough to hold it not at all unlikely that somethingin my appearance had interested her. Had not vanity overcome myembarrassment, curiosity would have done so. I wanted to see what shewas like who had been so affected by the sight of me. And when I didsee her, when I stood before her on shifting feet, I would have giventhe world to be somewhere else, yet, by a curious contradiction, nothing could have dragged me from the spot, so fair was she to look on. 

"Miss Todd--Mr. Malcolm, " said Boller of '89. Then he mopped his browwith a purple silk handkerchief and added that it was very warm. Isaid that it was very warm, and Miss Todd smiled quite the loveliestsmile that I had ever seen. 

I realized that this Miss Todd was the doctor's daughter, of whom I hadheard Boller speak in the most extravagant terms, and now it seemed tome that his praise had quite failed to convey an adequate idea of hercharms. She was very fair, very pink and white, with a Psyche knot ofshimmering hair; a tall, slender girl, clad in clinging, gauzy blue. To my mind came the picture of Penelope Blight, the only girl to whom Ihad ever given a thought; I remembered her tanned cheeks, her brownarms, and hard little hands, and it seemed to me that even she couldnever grow to such loveliness as this. 

I loved Miss Todd. Had she offered herself to me at that moment, Ishould have married her on the spot, and now there was shattered myboyish contempt for all that was weak and gentle, however beautiful. The ideas which composed my mind rattled and tumbled about like thebits of colored glass in a kaleidoscope, and in a flash they formed asofter and more harmonious design. The world was something more to methan a happy hunting-ground, life more than an exciting adventure. Theworld was the home of Gladys Todd; life was to win her love; happinesswas to sit at her side. 

And now I was sitting at her side in a seventh heaven; in one of thesilent places of the seventh heaven, for we had little to say to eachother. We were tyros in the art of conversing, and our promising ideasborn of long mental struggles were stilled with bludgeons of assent anddissent. We knew not how to nourish and embellish them, and yet, though there were long stretches of embarrassed silence, we were notunhappy. Even Boller found his subterfuges to drag me away quitefutile, and Miss Todd herself seemed content, for she met a dozen likeefforts with a quiet and unpenetrable smile. 

So Gladys Todd and I sat the evening through as on a calm cloud, looking down to earth and the antics of little men. They crowded closeto us, laughing and talking; they called up to us and we did not hearthem; they jostled one another and they jostled us, but they could notentice us into their restless social game. They offered us coffee, sandwiches and cake, and we brushed them away. The very thought offood was repulsive to me, and this was not because I had reached thatpoint where the immeasurable yearning of the heart dwarfs all meandesire. I was really hungry, but I had no mind to spoil the impressionwhich it was evident I had made; I had no mind to let Miss Todd see mewith a half-eaten sandwich poised in one hand and scattering crumbsuntidily, and in the other a cup of muddy, steaming fluid. She seemedto have a like conception of the undignity of eating, for when shedeclined the proffered feast it was with the air of one who never ateat all, who never knew the pangs of appetite, but lived on somethinginfinitely higher. She even spurned the cake, and I was glad to lether deceive me. I liked to coddle myself with the belief that shenever ate. I knew that she did not want me to see her eating, for thenI must have classed her with the mass of women--with Mrs. Ruffle, whomI heard choking on a bit of nutshell; with her mother, who was standingnear us talking in a voice muffled in food; I must have slipped off thecloud to earth. 

But Gladys Todd was wise, with that innate wisdom of her sex in mattersof appearance when appearance is to be considered, and we held insilence, loftily on our cloud. And looking back on that evening, myrecollection is of misty, nebulous things; not of a passing flow ofincident, but of a welling up of new thoughts as I sat awkwardlypulling at my fingers and caressing my collar. Yet there wereincidents, too, of high importance to McGraw. Doctor Todd declaredthat the evening was historical. Standing in the centre of a hushedcompany, he announced that the year had broken all records formatriculation; McGraw was growing; McGraw could not long be containedwithin her present walls, and the world must soon realize that insimple justice something must be done for her. The doctor was not castdown by the fact that nothing had been done and that there was no signof anything being done. Hope was his watchword, and so hopefully didhe speak of the future that the collegiate Gothic quadrangles began torise in the imaginations of the company as dreams almost accomplished, and so infectious was his confidence that his hearers caught the highpitch of his enthusiasm, and when he had finished Boller sprang to achair, and, waving a coffee-cup, struck the first deep tones of "Here'sto old McGraw, drink her down!" and everybody joined in as fervently asthough it were a hymn. They were not satisfied with it once, butDoctor Todd himself cried, "Again, " and, waving an imaginary cup, ledus off once more into the bibulous and inspiring song. 

I remember joining in the first bars, but not because I was undulystirred by the love of my alma mater. It was rather to give GladysTodd a hint of the rich depths of my voice. To make an impression onGladys Todd had become the business of my life. I was glad that I hadcome to McGraw, because here I had met her. McGraw's past and futurewere of no moment to me; her growth was nothing. She might shrivel upuntil I was the only student, yet I should still be happy in mynearness to Gladys Todd. And what of Penelope? I did think ofPenelope that night as I sat alone in my room, cocked on two legs of mychair, gazing blankly at the ceiling. I remembered the foolish, childish promises which I had made to her that I should never forgether. Of course I should never forget her, no more than I should forgetthe moon because I had beheld the sun's dazzling splendor. 

But a man's ideas change, I said; his view broadens. And I rememberedPenelope as I first saw her, in her tattered frock and with the fadedribbon tossing in her hair. I liked Penelope. I thought of her withbrotherly affection. But I said to myself that she could never grow tothe wonderful beauty of this Miss Todd. 

CHAPTER IX

I was not long at McGraw University before I had attained my ambition tobe like Boller of '89. I draped my legs in wide folds of shepherd'splaid; the corners of a purple silk handkerchief protruded from my toppocket; and as long as the "smoky city" was the proper form I crownedmyself with one of them, and as promptly discarded it for the newertourist's helmet, and that in turn for a yachting cap. Must I confessit?--before Boller left McGraw I had quite surpassed him as a model offashion. But my ambition did not end here. The very conceit which hadmade me such an insufferable youth in my last days at home was the spurwhich drove me to win every honor that could come to an undergraduate. As Boller stepped out of offices I stepped into them--in presidencies andsecretaryships almost innumerable, into editorships, and evencaptaincies. Physically timid, I endured much pain in winning these lasthonors. The stretch of rolling turf which we called the foot-ball fieldbecame the arena in which I suffered martyrdom daily. I hated the game. When I donned my padded toggery it was with the secret spirit I shouldhave felt in preparing for the rack, yet I played recklessly for the_éclat_ it gave me. To-day I have an occasional reminder of thosestruggles in a weak knee, which has a way of twisting unexpectedly andcausing excruciating pain, but I consider that these twinges are fairpayment for the pleasure with which I contemplated my picture years agoin the Harlansburg _Sentinel_, showing me in my foot-ball clothes, poisedon a photographer's fence. The subject, the _Sentinel_ explained, wasCaptain Malcolm of McGraw, who had made the winning touch-down in theThanksgiving-Day game with the Northern University of Pennsylvania. Thephotographer's fence, you might think, was the summit of my career atMcGraw, reached as it was in my last year there. To the admiring eyes ofmy fellows it was, but the McLaurins of Tuckapo and the Malcolms of WindyValley were above all a practical people and to them I am indebted for alittle common-sense, which told me that I could not play foot-ball all mylife, nor would the heavy bass voice, so effective in the glee club, support a family, and deep in my heart I admitted the possibilities of afamily. I might strive to keep that thought in the background, but itwould rise when I dreamed of a home. That home was not a plain stonefarm-house, hidden among giant trees. My view had broadened. I dreamedof a Queen Anne cottage, with many gables, and a flat clipped lawn, witha cement walk leading over it to an iron gate. I looked back withaffectionate contempt to the art I had known in my youth, to the Rogersgroup, Lady Washington's ball, Lincoln and his cabinet, the lambrequinand the worsted motto. On my walls there would be a Colosseum, Rembrandt's portrait of himself, a smattering of Madonnas, a WingedVictory, and a Venus de Milo. To preside with me over such a house, tosit at the piano of an evening and play accompaniments while I sangsentimental songs, to fly with me over the country in a side-bar buggy, behind a fleet trotter, I thought only of Gladys Todd. She wasaccomplished, highly trained, it seemed to me, in all the finer arts oflife. In our valley the women never rose above their petty householdproblems. They could talk, but only of recipes and church affairs, andif they left this narrow environment at all it was to fare far--to Indiaand China, the foreign mission field. My view had broadened. GladysTodd had her being in higher airs. She painted. Pastels of flowers andplaques adorned with ideal heads covered the walls of the Todd parlor. She wrote. Doctor Todd assured me, speaking without prejudice, that hisdaughter's essay on "The Immortality of the Soul, " which she had writtenout of pure love of the labor, equalled, if it did not surpass, the bestwork of the senior class. She sang. Perhaps I see her now in the samewizard lights of distance that glorified the mountains in my boyhood, butI always recall her as a charming old-fashioned picture, sitting at herpiano and babbling her little songs in French and German. Of the qualityof her French and German I had no means of judging, but that she coulduse them at all was to me surpassingly enchanting. 

So Gladys Todd had her part in completing the wreck of my worthyambition. What Boller had begun, she unconsciously finished. YesterdayI had planned to make self-sacrifice the key-note of my life. To-day Icould not picture her contented to move in the narrow sphere of a Mrs. Pound, cramping her talents in the little circle of the Sunday-school andthe Ladies' Aid. Her influence for good must be a subtler one than this. To wield it, she must have her being in higher airs, in an atmosphere ofColosseums, of Rembrandts, and Madonnas. Remember, she was no longer theshy girl whom I had met on the first night of my university life. Thenshe was only in her fifteenth year. I was a junior when she produced herlauded essay on "The Immortality of the Soul, " and it revealed to me theprofundity of her mind. To match her, I must sit many a night driving myway through difficult pages of the classics, and often when my heart wasin some smoky den with a few choice spirits, my body bent over my tableand my brain wearied itself with abstruse equations. 

If Gladys Todd unconsciously wrecked my early scheme of life, sheunconsciously spurred me to the hard task of learning. I flatteredmyself that in the new calling which I had chosen I should be able to beeven a greater power for good than in the old. Having attained toBoller's perfection, as I had abandoned Mr. Pound for him, I nowabandoned him for ex-Judge Bundy. As Harlansburg was far aboveMalcolmville, so ex-Judge Bundy was above Mr. Pound. He was not thecreator of Harlansburg, but he was its providence. He owned the bank andthe nail works, he was a patron of its churches, the leading figure atthe bar, and a man of wonderful eloquence. Every year he delivered thegraduation address at the university, and mentally I modelled my futureappearance on the rostrum from his benign demeanor, his forcefulgestures, his rolling periods. Yet deep as was my admiration, he heldviews on which I differed with him. I felt that I had gone deeper thanhe into the logic of things. To him, for example, the high tariff wasthe source of all good, of life, health, food, clothes, and even morals. My view was broader. I brushed aside the beneficent local effect of anysystem and went on to study its relation to all mankind. He was prone toforget mankind, and yet his faults were those of his generation and heremained a heroic figure in my eyes, and it seemed to me that in settingmyself to reach the mark he had made I was aiming very high indeed. Perhaps I should have gone on, striving to attain to the Bundianperfection had not the ex-judge himself been the instrument by which Iwas awakened and shaken out of my self-complacence. Among thebenefactions which had brought him such high esteem in our collegecommunity was "the Richardson Bundy course of lectures on the activitiesof life. " He paid for the services of orators whom Doctor Todd delightedto call "leaders in every branch of human endeavor. " In my last year atMcGraw we heard the Fourth Assistant Secretary of the Treasury on"Finance, " the art critic of a Philadelphia paper on "Raphael, " and as afitting climax to the course we were to listen to the famous Armenianscholar and philosopher, the Reverend Valerian Harassan in a discourse on"Life. " The adjective is not mine. I had never heard of the famousArmenian until Doctor Todd in chapel announced his coming, and made itclear that it was a special privilege to listen to the eloquent preacher, and that we owed a tremendous debt to our friend and benefactor, JudgeBundy. 

The picture of the Reverend Valerian Harassan, which was posted on thebulletin-board, gave promise of a realization of the hopes which the gooddoctor had raised. It showed a man in evening clothes, impressivelymassive, with a clean-shaven face and Roman features, a broad, lowforehead from which the hair rolled back in glistening black folds, curling around his ears to the line of his collar. The deep-set eyesseemed to look out from a mind packed with knowledge, and the firmly setmouth to hold in check a voice of marvellous power for eloquence. 

In high spirits I went one evening to hear this eastern philosopher. Itwas cold and raining, but in those days the worst of weather could castno shadow over me. It was a pleasure even to battle with the elementswith no other weapon than an umbrella, and multiplied a hundred-fold wasthat pleasure when with that weapon I was battling also for Gladys Todd. Though as yet I had said nothing to her of my cherished hope, I know thatwhen we stepped out together into the night, we both believed that weshould face many another storm under the same umbrella. I was consciousthat she clung more closely than usual to my arm, and, with spirits keyedhigh with the sense of protecting her, my feet hardly touched thedripping pavement which led from the doctor's house to the collegebuilding and the chapel. We said little on the way. We had long sincepassed the point where idle chatter is needed in communing. I rememberthat I did ruminate pleasantly on my good fortune in having found thissympathetic spirit to share with me the intellectual pleasure of ascholarly discourse, whose heart could beat quicker in time with mine atthe inspiration of some fine thought. I remember that she broke thecurrent of these meditations to ask if I had decided to make Harlansburgmy home after my approaching graduation. She asked it with a tone ofdeep personal interest. At that moment I should have proposed to GladysTodd had not the wind been tugging at the umbrella, and had we not comefrom the shadow of the trees into the glare of the college lights. So Ianswered affirmatively. Of course I should remain in Harlansburg. Atthat moment my resolution was fixed unalterably, if only for the sake ofGladys Todd; and if I had settled in my mind that I should walk in theway of Judge Bundy till, like him, I dominated the town and the countyand my name was known in the farthest corners of the State, that, too, would be for the sake of this gentle, clinging girl whose nearness to memade my umbrella seem like the sheltering roof of home. But in thiscalculation I left out of my equation one important element--the throatof the Reverend Valerian Harassan. 

The source of the Armenian's flowing eloquence would have seemed as farfrom affecting my life as the source and flow of the sacred Ganges, andyet it was some trivial irritation of it that kept us from hearing hisphilosophy that night, and, more important to me, that sent another toexpound ideas far different than could ever have come from the famousthinker. All the college, all in Harlansburg who were well-to-do andwise, watched for his coming expectantly; but when the door on the chapelplatform opened and Judge Bundy stepped forth, he had on his arm, not themonumental preacher of the clean-shaven face and rolling black hair, buta man who in no line met the hopes raised by the impressive picture. Amurmur of disappointment ran through the hall. Doctor Todd, followingthe great men in the humble capacity of beadle, stilled it with a raisedhand. 

To Judge Bundy's mind, as he expressed it to us, there was no cause fordisappointment. While the Reverend Valerian Harassan's bronchialaffection was unfortunate for us and for him, yet for us it was in a way, too, a blessing, for he had sent in his place to speak to us on "Life" noother than the famous journalist and traveller Andrew Henderson. Thejudge paused to give time for a play of our imaginations, and such a playwas needed. I do not think that a soul in the audience had ever heard ofthe famous journalist and traveller, but we should not have admitted it, and set ourselves to looking as though his name were a household word. It was enough that Judge Bundy declared him to be famous. It wasdecreed, and for Harlansburg, at least, he became a celebrity. Havinggiven us time to imagine the deeds which had won fame for the lecturer, Judge Bundy saw no need to trouble himself with specifications. Therolling periods of his speech would have been rudely halted by facts, sohe spoke in general terms of the inspiration it would give to the youngmen before him to see such a man face to face--a man who knew life, a manwho had lived life, who had ideas on life. It seemed as though the judgehimself was about to deliver the lecture on "Life, " but he paused, out ofbreath, and Andrew Henderson, mistaking the moment of rest for the end ofthe introduction, rose from the chair about which he had been shiftinguneasily and came to the rostrum's edge. 

He came with a shambling gait. The tall, thin, loose-jointed man, resting with one hand on the pulpit at his side, in every way belied thepompous tribute which had just been paid him. 

I watched him. I studied the face masked in a close-cropped gray beard. I studied the angles of the loosely hung limbs and the swinging body cladin unobtrusive brown. For a moment I doubted. Then he spoke. I heardhis voice, and it seemed as though it were threaded with a sharp, shrillnote of bitterness. His eyes were not turned to us. Gladys Todd musthave thought them fixed on a spot in the ceiling, but to me they werewatching a flake of cloud hovering just above the tall pine across theclearing. Gladys Todd must have thought me beside her, sitting uprighton the very edge of my seat, but I was back in the mountains; I couldfeel Penelope's brown hand in mine and I could see her proud smile as shelooked up at me and said: "That's father; he's studying"; I could see herfather as he leaned on his hoe, beaten in his fight with theever-charging weeds; I could see him in the murky light of the cabin, atrembling hazy figure in the gun smoke; and again, with the devils ofretribution at his heels, flying for the bush. Now the worthless, shiftless man, after long years, stood before me, a professor in truth, aprofessor of life, and perhaps he would give belated expression to whatwas in his mind that day as he studied the flake of cloud. 

Unrolling a portentous manuscript on the pulpit, the lecturer began toread in a mechanical voice. The restless shuffling of feet and a volleyof dry coughs soon spoke the hostile attitude of the audience, a longingfor the coming of Valerian Harassan. The Professor did not heed them. He read on, pompous phrases such as might have come from the lips of Mr. Pound. He was unconscious of the increasing hostility of his hearers. When he stopped suddenly, it was not because the feet in the rear of thehall were shuffling a rising chorus of protest, despite the franticsignals of Judge Bundy and Doctor Todd's upraised hand. What he saw inhis own manuscript checked him, for stepping back from the desk, hefrowned at it. The corners of his mouth twitched in a passing smile, andpouncing upon his handiwork, he held it at arm's length, dangling beforethe astonished eyes of the company. 

"What rot!" he cried. "What utter rot!"

A shout from the rear of the room evidenced the approval of his youngerhearers. The elders glowered at what they thought a trick to catch theirattention. But trick or not, he did catch their attention, and he heldit; he ceased to be the utterer of pompous platitudes; dropping his paperto show that he had done with it, he leaned across the pulpit and broughthis long arms into action. He became the caustic iconoclast of thevalley. 

"We all agree that what I have been reading is nonsense, " he said in asharp-edged voice. "But I am here in the place of Valerian Harassan, andit seemed to me that I must give you what you were paying him for. Ihave been trying to say the kind of things he would have said. If youhad been able to stand it a little longer, I should have told you thatall the world's a stage and men and women but the players. I might evenhave attacked your risibles by anecdotes about my little boy at home andthe southern colonel. Of course, I should have given you some inspiringthoughts, convinced you that life was a wonderful gift, something to betreasured and joyously lived, that work was a pleasure, that happinesscame from accomplishing a set task. It's all here in this paper. Iwrote it--and it was easy enough to do--because that is the kind of stuffyou pay for. But it is one thing to write what you don't believe; quiteanother to speak it face to face. And yet if I am to speak the truth asI see it on such a simple little subject as life, I guess I am here on afool's errand. "

Doctor Todd and Judge Bundy seemed to be of the same mind, for they werewhispering together; debating, I suspected, whether it were better to lethim go on and try to talk fifty dollars' worth or to break abruptly intohis discourse and end it. For so harsh a measure as the last they lackedcourage, and the Professor hurled on, unconscious of the hostile stareswith which they were stabbing him in the back. 

Now, optimism was the foundation on which McGraw strove to build upcharacter. Optimism permeated every part of our life there. From anarrow environment we looked out hopefully into broadening distances. Every year some confident youth told us from the college rostrum inrounded sentences that life was worth living; that sickness, poverty, disappointment, the countless evils which dog our footsteps, were nothingin the scale against the boon of opportunity. Every morning in chapelthe doctor voiced our gratitude for the privilege of living and working. And now over heads that moved in such charged airs the Professor cast hispall of pessimism. He took his text from Solomon, and found that all wasvanity. It mattered little whether or not what he said was true. Hebelieved it to be true, and for the moment at least his incisive voiceand long forefinger carried with them conviction. He railed at the olddictum that man was God's noblest work. The ordinary dog, he declared, was more pleasing to the eye than the ordinary man, and the life of theordinary dog more to be envied than that of the ordinary man. Knowledgeonly lifted us above the animal to be more buffeted by a complexity ofdesires. The greatest thing in the world was self, and even the roots ofour goodness burrowed down into the depths where the ego was consideringits own comfort either in this world or the next. The proud man for whomthe universe was made was nothing but a fragile thread of memorieswrapped in soft tissue, packed away in a casket of bone, and made easilyportable by a pair of levers called legs. After countless ages spent onearth seeking the true source of happiness men were still countless agesfrom agreement. One half sought by goodness to attain happiness inimmortality; the other in Nirvana. One half found the shadow ofhappiness in inertia, in stupefaction, a mere satisfying of physicalneeds; the other in motion, joining in the mad procession which we callso boastfully Progress. By accident of birth we were of the progressivehalf and we paraded around and around, puffed up with pride of our littleaccomplishment, until we fell exhausted and another took our place. 

Judge Bundy nudged Doctor Todd again. Doctor Todd shook his head andlooked at the ceiling, as if to show that he found more of interest therethan in the speaker's words, and he held them there defiantly as theProfessor went on to controvert the optimistic philosophy which had beentaught at McGraw for so many years. That knowledge was the greatestsource of unhappiness was a bold dictum to hurl at a company of seekersafter it, but Henderson Blight had little respect for mere persons. Theignorant animal did not exist, he argued; it was with knowledge that theplague of ignorance came to man. A draught of knowledge was like a cupof salt-water to the thirst, and the more we learned the less value wecould place on the things for which we labored. A man worked a lifetimeto obtain a peach-blow, and it crumbled to dust in his hands. What, then, should we strive for?

At this question Doctor Todd brought his eyes down from the ceiling andJudge Bundy lifted his from the red rug of the platform. The judge wasour great authority on striving. He had qualified himself by years ofsuccessful labor. To us he was a living example of the rewards whichcome to endeavor, and so it was with evident self-consciousness that henow sat very erect, thinking, perhaps, that he would hear some views akinto his own. 

"I was born in a narrow valley, " the Professor pursued, "and perhaps Imight have dozed there like the dogs, but I learned that beyond themountains there was another valley, broader and richer. I longed to livethere. One day I crossed the mountains to it and I found it all that Ihad heard. But it, too, had its wall of mountains and my eyes followedthem, and I learned that beyond them was still another valley, broaderand richer. And I went on. So it will be with you. There is a big nailfactory down by the river--I saw it as I came in, and I am sure that tosome of us to own that factory might be a life's ambition. How fine itwould be when our work was ended to fold our hands peacefully and say: 'Ihave fought the good fight, I have run the race, I have made a millionkegs of nails!'"

Judge Bundy half rose from his chair. Through the hall sounded asmothered murmur of applause, for it is always satisfying to hear a truthwhich hits another. Judge Bundy would have wholly risen from his chair, but he was checked by a hundred covert smiles and Doctor Todd laid a handupon his quivering, indignant knee. All unconscious of the cause of thisstifled mirth, and fired by it as in the old days he was fired when StacyShunk leered beneath the shadow of his hat, the Professor leaned far overthe desk with both hands outstretched. 

"I have failed utterly in my own living, " he cried. "I have loafed andlagged. At times I have worked hard until I wearied myself chasingshadows. But in my failure I have learned a few things. We may live anddoze in our little valley, but still we shall long for the broader andricher valley across the mountains. The yearning for that somethingbetter is born in us all. Shall we call it simply something more; shallwe measure our service in kegs of nails or shall we seek for somethingreally better? If we listen we can hear in the depths of our souls thedivine drumbeat, and it is strange what cowards we are when we come tomarch to it. But we can march to it. We may not know why we go, norwhere, but we can go straight. The country we travel may seem waste, butwe cross it under God's sealed orders, given to us when we opened oureyes on life, and only when our eyes are closed again will they be openedto us. "

So it was that the Professor carried me again from my little valley! Thegreat Judge Bundy standing at the platform's edge, brusquely dismissingus, had dwindled to pygmy height. He was a mere maker of nails. Life amoment since had been very simple, very concrete, a mere game in whichthe stake was food and clothes, a Queen Anne house, a clipped lawn andtrotting horses. Now it was a mysterious expedition into the unknown. With the Professor's last word I rose, ready to march, not knowingwhither, but sure that it would not be to a conquest measured in kegs ofnails. In this exalted mood Gladys Todd could have no part, for I knewthat I could go faster and farther in light marching order, unhampered byimpedimenta of any kind. Gladys Todd suddenly took her place withimpedimenta. Her first act was to confirm this judgment of her, for as Iwas forcing my way down the crowded aisle, intent on reaching my oldfriend, she kept tugging at my sleeve and entreating me not to hurry. Her remonstrances aroused my antagonism. Inwardly I was calling downmaledictions on her head, for I saw the Professor's tall form recedingthrough the door. I would have rushed after him; there were a thousandthings I wanted to know, a thousand questions I had to ask him. But Iwas checked. I could not abandon Gladys Todd; nor had I the courage topresent myself to him after so many years in the light of a youth givento sentimental dalliance. He would remember the boy who had come to him, cold and wet, from the depths of a mountain stream, the boy who had runmiles in the early morning to warn him of the approach of the terribleLukens, the boy whom he had called his only friend. He would see medignified by a tail coat and beautified by a mauve tie, a white waistcoatand gleaming patent-leather shoes. He would remember me as I stood bythe cabin door, a strong, rugged lad. He would see me a devotee offashion, a dawdler after a pretty face. So it was with a feeling ofrelief that I saw the study door close after my friend. I intended tofind him, but not until I was as free as on that day when I first cameupon him in the clearing. 

Gladys Todd was inclined to lag. There were a dozen persons to whom shewished to speak, but with rude insistence I hurried her away. Outsidethe rain fell heavily. I held my umbrella at arm's length now andabandoned my fine feathers to the storm. She feigned not to notice mychanged demeanor and tried to talk pleasantly, but I answered only inmonosyllables, and brusquely, I fear. The interminable journey ended. From the steps of the president's house, with all the graciousness shecould command, she asked me not to hurry away when we had so many thingsto talk over. My answer was a quick "good-night, " and I ran as I had runyears before to the mountains, with my heart in every stride. 

When I entered the doctor's study I found him alone. Mr. Henderson, heexplained, had gone to Judge Bundy's. Judge Bundy always entertained thelecturer, and he was too generous a man to make an exception even in thiscase. In speaking of the lecturer the doctor made a wry face. He couldnot understand how a man of Valerian Harassan's reputation ever allowedsuch a mountebank to take his place. At McGraw we believed in life; webelieved in ambition, and it was terrible--terrible, sir, to have to sitin silence and hear our dearest traditions assailed by one who admittedthat he was a failure. Did Mr. Malcolm hear the brutal cut at JudgeBundy? Judge Bundy, sir, was----

I did not stop to hear the eulogy, nor did I consider how I might beprejudicing myself with the president by so rudely breaking from him. But the Professor had come back to me. I cleared the college steps witha bound, and ran over the campus and down the hill into the town. I ranwith all a boy's reckless waste of strength, so that when I had coveredmy half-mile course I had to lean for support against the iron fencewhich guarded the Bundy home. The great stone pile, with many turretsand a dominating cupola, with wide-spreading verandas and marble lions onthe lawn, in the daylight comported itself with dignified aloofness, andnow, when night exaggerated its size and a single lonely light flickeredin all its vast front, it was forbidding. With something of that forcedboldness with which years before I had braved the dark mountains, I madethe gate ring a proper notice of my approach and groped my way about thedoor until I found the bell. The answer came from over my head. Stepping back and looking up, I saw framed in a lighted window a whitefigure, coatless and collarless, not the distinguished jurist, but aportly man who had been interrupted in the act of preparing for bed. Clothes go a long way toward making a man, and the lack of them broughtthe judge down to hailing distance. 

"What do you want?" he demanded of me, addressing me as any disrobedplebeian might have done. 

"I'm Malcolm, sir, David Malcolm, " I returned apologetically. "I wish tosee Mr. Henderson. "

"Henderson, eh?" The judge leaned over the window-sill, and he spoke lesssharply. "You'll find him at the station waiting for the night trainout. I tried to persuade him to stay, but he wouldn't. How in theworld, Mr. Malcolm, could Harassan have sent such a fool in his place?Did you ever hear such utter nonsense? I forgive him about thenails--that was inadvertent, but that stuff about ambition----"

I did not wait to hear the judge controvert my friend's pessimisticphilosophy, but with a brusque "good-night" hurried away. The windowbanged behind me, a sharp commentary on my rudeness. The iron gateclanged again, and I was off down the hill, running toward the lower town. 

A shrill whistle stopped me. Looking into the valley I saw a chain oflights weaving their way along the river. They wound through the gap inthe mountain, and I saw them no longer. I heard the whistle again, faroff now, and it seemed to mock me. 

CHAPTER X

I listened to hear the divine drumbeat. I set myself to march undersealed orders. 

To most of us the Professor's speech had been pessimism compact; to meit was inspiring, though wofully lacking in details. I seemed to bemarking time. The duties which lay at my hand were unchanged, and Iwas plodding along as I had plodded before through a commonplaceroutine. I sought to give to my duties some of the glamour ofconquests, but they soon failed to lend themselves to any simulation ofromance. After all, marching to the divine drumbeat was simply tofollow the precepts ingrained in me as a child, but it is much easierto make a quick charge amid the blare of bugles than to plod along dayafter day to the monotonous grumble of the drum. I wished that theProfessor had been a little more explicit, and yet his last words werealways with me. It was as though they were intended for me alone, andI coupled them with his admonition to me that day long ago in thecabin: "Get out of the valley. Do something. Be somebody. " My greatdesire was to see him, for I believed that he could help me to set mycourse. I wanted help, and my father, my natural adviser, was oflittle service to me. To him my opportunity was the small one that layat home. Mr. Pound had washed his hands of me that day when I was boldenough to renounce my purpose of entering the ministry, and now, whenin the exultation of the moment my mind reverted to that abandonedplan, I found my own ideas too nebulous to permit me to set myself upas a teacher of divine truth. The law had taken its place with themaking of nails, and I did not believe that when my race was run, whenI had counted up the wills I had drawn, the bad causes I had defended, the briefs I had written in useless litigations, I could content myselfwith the thought that I had fought a good fight. For there is a goodfight, and to the weakest of us must come a sense of futility in thosemoments when we awaken from our sloth and hear the distant din of thebattle. I thought of medicine, of all professions in itself the mostaltruistic, and then I found myself face to face with that distressingcommonplace, the need of money, for though my father was accounted arich man in the valley, his wealth was proportioned to the valleystandards. A commercial life alone seemed left to me, and then Iremembered the million kegs of nails, and I recalled Rufus Blight'sachievement of giving away a prize with every pound of tea. Hereindeed was a march through waste-lands. 

You will think that I was a dreamy, egotistical youth for whom not onlythe ways of home but the ways of the mass of his fellows were not quitegood enough. Perhaps I was. But you must remember a boyhood passed inloneliness; long days when my feet followed the windings of the creek, but my eyes were turned to the distant mountains; the evenings whenfrom the barn-bridge I watched the shadows fall and saw the valleypeopled with mysterious shapes. I was ambitious, and I coddled myselfwith the belief that my ambition did not spring from selfishness, fromwhat the Professor had called the yearning for something more, but fromthe desire for something better. I did not drag up the roots of mymotives to light. Had I, the cynical philosopher must have found thatthey were nurtured in the same soil that nurtured the ambitions ofJudge Bundy. 

I had faith in the Professor and I wanted to find him. I could see theinconsistency of his practice and his preaching, but truth is truth nomatter by whom uttered. I believed that he could help me, and I wroteto him in the care of Valerian Harassan. The writing of this letterwas an evening's labor, for in it I had to tell him what had passedafter that day when he had fled into the mountains, of the coming ofRufus Blight and the disappearance of Penelope out of my life; I hadmuch to ask him of her and of himself, and then to lead on to mypresent quandary. The labor was without any reward. Weeks passed andhe did not answer. I wrote to Valerian Harassan and was honored with aprompt reply--his friend Mr. Henderson had returned to San Franciscoand he had forwarded my letter there. "But you had as well try tocorrespond with the will-o'-the-wisp, " he wrote. "When last I talkedwith him, he spoke rather vaguely of going to China and making a tripafoot to Lhasa. " Nevertheless, I wrote again, and it was a year laterwhen both of my letters came back to me bearing the post-marks of manycities from coast to coast, to be opened at last by the dead-letteroffice. 

The Professor was silent. Within a week of my graduation I foundmyself still in a quandary as to my course, and then it came about thatit was set for me by the last man in the world whom at that moment Iwould have chosen for a pilot. This was Boller of '89. 

Boller's father was the owner of a daily newspaper in a small inlandcity, and in the two years since he had left McGraw the son had risento the chief editorship. His return to college that year was in thenature of a triumphal progress. He sat with the faculty in the morningchapel service, and Doctor Todd took occasion to refer to the presenceof a distinguished alumnus who had made his mark in the profession ofjournalism. In two years Boller had matured to the wisdom and mannerof fifty. He had abandoned the exaggerated clothes of his college daysfor careless, baggy black. His hair had grown long and was dishevelledby much combing with the fingers, and the mustache, once so carefullytrimmed and curled, now drooped mournfully, and he had added a tinygoatee to his facial adornments. Drooping glasses on his nose, with abroad black ribbon suspended from them, gave him an appearance ofintellectuality, so astonishing a transformation that it was hard forme to believe that this was the same Boller who had greeted me fouryears before on the college steps. The next morning after hisreappearance Doctor Todd announced that our distinguished alumnus hadbeen induced to speak informally to the students that evening onjournalism and its appeal to young men. In the rôle of a very old man, Boller from the chapel rostrum descanted learnedly on what he termedthe "greatest power for righteousness in modern times and the dynamicforce through the operation of which the race is to attain its ideals. "To my mind Boller's view of the power for righteousness troubled itselfchiefly with the opposing political party, as was shown by the instancehe cited where his own paper had exposed the corrupt Democratic ring inPokono County and had put in its place a group of Republican patriots. Doctor Todd, however, said afterward that Boller had treated thesubject in masterly fashion and that he was proud that McGraw had hadits part in forming such a mind. While I had listened to Boller in allseriousness, the Professor's diatribe was too vividly in my memory forme to accept without reservation everything that our distinguishedalumnus said. But he did bring to my mind the idea that here possiblywas the opportunity which I sought, and long before he had finished mythoughts had wandered far from the chapel and I was picturing myself inan editorial chair and with a caustic pen attacking the devils of whichpoor man is possessed. 

I met Boller in the hall afterward, and as he took my armcondescendingly and walked with me a little way I summoned up courageto invite him to my room and there to open my heart to him. 

He lighted one of his own cigars after having declined that which Ioffered him, and this little evidence of his superior taste served toconfirm my opinion of his importance. He crossed his legs carelessly, leaned back and watched a long spire of smoke rise ceilingward. "Soyou are thinking of journalism, eh, Malcolm?"

"You have set me thinking of it, " I returned. "Somehow the law doesn'tappeal to me any more. The truth is--" I hesitated, recalling howBoller's subtle ridicule had shaken the purpose so carefully nourishedby my parents and Mr. Pound. Though his talk that night had beenfilled with high-flying phrases about ideals of citizenship and usefulmanhood, I still had lingering doubts of his entire sincerity, and Icast about for some way of expressing my thoughts without making myselfludicrous in his eyes. 

"The truth is--" Boller repeated. 

"That I want to take up work that means something more than bread andbutter, " I responded. "I don't want to be a big fish in a small pond. "

"And you think that journalism offers a chance of becoming a whale in abig pond. It does, Malcolm, it does, " said Boller. "Journalism is thegreatest power in the country to-day. We used to call you the ReverendDavid. Well, if you still have any lingering desire to be a preacher, the paper is the place for you, not the pulpit. The editorial is thesermon of the future. If you would become a preacher, by all meanstake up journalism. If you have red blood in your veins you will be ajournalist. "

Having delivered this advice, Boller sat in silence, regarding methrough his drooping glasses and pulling at his goatee, and at thatmoment I decided to be a journalist. It was the picture which Bollermade that settled my mind. There was something attractive in hiscareless attire--the baggy clothes, the flowing tie; and the glasseswith the broad ribbon gave an air of dash and intellectuality which Ihad never seen in the stiff uniform of the bar, even as worn by thatleader, Judge Bundy. It is often such absurd impressions on ourunsophisticated minds that set the course of our lives. It was so withme. I compared Boller with Doctor Todd, with Mr. Pound, and in theyounger generation with Simmons of his own class, who had becomeprincipal of a high-school, and I said to myself that the professionwhich in two years had made him this confident, masterful man offeredthe opportunity that I sought. 

"If you have red blood, Malcolm--" Boller went on as he polished hisglasses. There was a suggestion in his careless manner that he wadedin red blood set flowing by his pen. "Journalism is one long fight. If you have ideals, Malcolm--" He looked at me, and then my cheeksflushed as by an inclination of the head I confessed to the possessionof ideals. "If you have ideals, you can make a fight for right. Injournalism we stand aloof from the play itself, but we endeavor to makethe actors perform their parts properly. You remember my descriptionof how we exposed the Pokono County ring. It's a fight like that allthe time, but you make yourself felt, you know. "

Thoroughly pleased with the militant side of the profession, and havingdecided that I should enter it, I lost no time inquiring how I shouldbegin. This question took some thought on Boller's part, and he combedhis hair with his fingers while he gave it consideration. 

"I could put you on the _Sentinel_, " he said at last. "You will haveto start at the bottom, as a reporter, you understand. "

He evidently believed that I should jump at such a prospect, but he didnot know that the Professor had filled me with the hope of biggerthings. I had taken what Boller had said, and I enlarged it to a widerscale of life. I had no intention of exchanging the opportunities ofHarlansburg for those of Coal City. Even the Pokono County gang wouldbe small game for me. But before I could thank Boller for his interestand decline it, he hurried on to fix my salary and to explain thenature of my work. He nettled me, and I protested with heat that Iwished to start in a broader field. 

"That's all right, Malcolm, " said my mentor, undisturbed by thereflection on his own city. "But you can get an invaluable experienceon the _Sentinel_. If you start right for New York how are you goingto get a job? On the other hand, look at Bob Carmody. He learned withus--three years--and now he has a splendid place on the New York_Record_, making forty a week--covered the Douglas murder trial. Lookat Bush, James Woodbury Bush--he went to Philadelphia after two yearswith us, and he is literary editor of the _Gazette_--landed it easily. He has already published one book--'Anna Virumque'--a charmingly cleverstory of early Babylon. "

The success of Bob Carmody and James Woodbury Bush, while theyconfirmed me in my respect for the profession of journalism and in myresolve to enter it, did not shake my purpose to waste no time indesultory skirmishing. That I decided so promptly that New York was tobe my scene of action was due to Boller's casual mention of BobCarmody's salary, which by rapid calculation I found to equal DoctorTodd's and to surpass my father's income. The figures were large. Iflattered myself that I found no appeal in the money, but regarded itsimply as the measure of the power and importance which Bob Carmody hadattained. The value of his brain labor was nearly double the value ofthe foodstuff produced on my father's farm. The figures wereimpressive. I knew, however, that I could not argue with Boller, supported as he was by experience, and my way with him lay in anobstinate declaration of my purpose. 

"It's good of you to offer me a place, " I said. "But I'm not going towaste any time. A few days at home, and I am off to New York. "

If Boller felt any irritation at my rejection of his offer, he did notshow it. Doubtless he laid my refusal to the ignorance of youth, forhe stood over me, regarding me through the drooping glasses, as myfather would have regarded me had I declared to him some recklesspurpose. 

"You make a mistake, David, " he said. He stood at the door, with onehand fumbling the knob. "Still, I wish you success. Suppose I giveyou a letter to Carmody. It would be a great help, you know. And I'llwrite for you a general recommendation--to whom it may concern--on ourletterhead; it will be of service. " He opened the door and steppedout. He hesitated and came back. "I might tell you, Malcolm, that Ihope soon to launch into New York journalism, when I have exhausted thepossibilities of Coal City. A man can't sit still, you know--that is, if he has red blood in his veins. "

Boller said no more that night, but his manner in parting made it clearto me that if he came to New York it was his purpose to be of greatservice to me, to lift me up with him. His assumption of superiorityfilled me with a desire to outrun him. Vanity is a great stimulus toaction, and the inspiring note of my life was forgotten as Icontemplated David Malcolm in his sanctum, at a table littered withpages, every one of which would stab some devil of corruption orbrighten some lonely hour, pausing at his labor to blow spires of smokeceilingward while he gave kindly advice to the man who sat before him, respectfully erect on his chair, regarding him through drooping glasses. 

The college lights were out. I moved to the window and stayed therefor a long time, looking into the summer night. The street lampscheckered the slope below me, but my eyes went past them; in the depthsof the valley the nail-works were glowing, piling up their tale ofkegs, but I looked beyond them to the mountain which rose from theriver and travelled away like a great shadow, cutting the star-lightedsky. Where mountain and sky mingled, indefinable in the night, my eyesrested, but my mind plunged on. My arms lay folded on the window-sill, and into them my head sank. I crossed mountain after mountain, andthey were but shadows to my youthful strength. What a man DavidMalcolm became that night! He won everything that the world holdsworth striving for. He won them all so easily by always doing what wasright. He travelled far because he marched so straight. Then hemounted to the highest peak--a feat so rare that even his great modestycould not suppress a cry of exultation. He heard the crunching of ahoe, and, following the sound, saw the Professor battling with theever-charging weeds. The gaunt man regarded him quietly; then said:"David, you have come far. " He raised the hoe and pointed to the sky. "And I suppose they have heard of it off there--in Mars and Saturn. "He turned to the ground, to an army of ants working on a pyramid ofsand. "And down there--I suppose they have heard of it. " DavidMalcolm looked about him. The world seemed waste as far as his mindcould carry. The Professor saw the disappointment clouding his face, for he stepped closer to him and, laying a hand upon his shoulders, said: "Remember, David, sealed orders. "

CHAPTER XI

In those last days at college, when in moments of contemplation Isketched with free imagination a long and unbroken career of success, whether I would or not, Gladys Todd was always gliding into my dreams. She had been too long a central figure in them for me to evict hereasily. I knew that I had best begin my march unhampered byimpedimenta of any kind, but I found it no easy task to get myself intolight marching order. While I had never made a serious proposal forher hand, I had in sentimental moments said things which implied thatat the proper time I should offer myself formally. That the offerwould bring her prompt acquiescence I never for a moment doubted. Butmore embarrassing was the attitude of Doctor and Mrs. Todd. Theytreated me as though I were a member of the family. Mrs. Todd's eyesalways beamed with a peculiarly motherly light when they rested on me, and now I recalled with something akin to terror an evening when Gladysat the piano was accompanying me as I sang "The Minute Guns at Sea. "Her mother entered the parlor. It did her good, she said, to see us, for it brought back the dear days when she and Doctor Todd had sung aswe were singing at that very same piano. Doctor Todd never expressedhis thoughts with quite such frankness, but now I could remember manytimes when he had treated me with fatherly consideration. To endabruptly such a friendship seemed not alone a gross abandonment ofGladys Todd, but of Doctor Todd and Mrs. Todd. The sensible thing todo was clear to me in my saner moments. During the few days thatremained to me at college I should continue the friendship, but itwould be friendship and nothing more. Then I would go away, politely, as hundreds of other young men before me had left Harlansburg, with aformal parting handshake to hundreds of other young women who hadplayed soft accompaniments while they sang "The Minute Guns at Sea"; asfor Doctor and Mrs. Todd, another young man would soon be standing bythat same piano awakening their cherished memories. 

It was in this other hypothetical young man that I found thestumbling-block whenever my mind was settled to do the sensible thing. The trouble was that I loved Gladys Todd. When I fixed my purpose tomarch to the strife unhampered by any domestic ties, I felt that I wasmaking myself a martyr to duty. I began to compromise. In a fewyears, when my feet were firmly set in the road and I had grown strongenough to march with impedimenta, I should come back and claim GladysTodd, and my return would be a triumph like that of Boller of '89, onlyin a degree far higher, for from her hands I should receive thevictor's garland. 

I might have struggled on with such confused ideas as these had it notbeen for the hypothetical other man. He haunted me. The hypothesisbecame a fact. It found embodiment in Boller of '89. When after threeinterminable days of self-denial I presented myself one evening at thepresident's house, a look of annoyance with which Gladys greeted meseemed connected in some way with the presence of Boller. In my stateof mind I should have suspected any octogenarian who smiled on GladysTodd as plotting against my happiness. That she was essential to myhappiness I realized as I watched her, in the shaded lamplight, herface turned to him as she listened intently to an account of his recentvisit to Washington. They did not treat me as though I made a crowd. That, at least, would have given me some importance. My rôle was ayounger brother's. Boller's greeting was kindly, but he madeunmistakable his superiority in years and wisdom as he lapsed into anarm-chair and toyed with the broad black ribbon adorning his glasses, while I was condemned to sit upright on a spindly chair. When headdressed me it was to explain things of which he presumed that I wasignorant, and he gave no heed to my vehement protests to the contrary. When Gladys Todd addressed me it was to call attention to somepeculiarly interesting feature of Boller's discourse. They did notdrive me to despair, though I was sure this to be their aim. Theysimply aroused my fighting blood. All other thoughts for the futurewere forgotten, buried under the repeated vow that I would repay GladysTodd a thousand times for this momentary coldness and would deal astinging blow to Boller's self-complacency. 

Boller announced to us in confidence that, having seen Washington, itwas now his intention to go abroad. I could not understand why we werepledged to secrecy as to his plans, for the country would not beentirely upset by his departure; but it was clear to my suspicious mindthat his revelations had a twofold purpose--to lift himself to greaterheights of superiority over the humble college boy and to make himselfa more desirable _parti_ for Gladys Todd. In his words, in the quietsmile with which he was regarding her, I read his secret hope that whenhe went abroad she would be with him as Mrs. Boller. Restless, uncomfortable, and angry as I was, I had been at the point of leaving, but this disclosure changed my purpose. I realized that I was in nomere skirmish and I dared not give an inch of ground. I stayed. Boller talked on. The clock on the mantel struck the hour, then thehalf. He looked at me significantly, but I did not move. The clockstruck the hour again, and Boller rose with a sigh. He suggested thatI go with him, but I shook my head and stood with my hands behind myback, tearing at my fingers. He smiled and stepped to the door, withGladys Todd following. They paused. He spoke in an undertone, and Icaught but two words, "At three. " He raised his voice and bade megood-night, calling me "Davy" as though I were a mere boy. Again hesaid, "At three, " jotting the hour indelibly in his mind. 

Gladys Todd from the shaded lamplight looked at me with a face cloudedwith displeasure. I, sitting on my spindly chair, very upright, heardthe cryptic number three ringing in my brain. What was going to happen"at three"? At three to-morrow they would walk along the lane whichwound around the town and down to the river. I thought of it now as"our lane, " a sanctuary that would be desecrated by Boller's merepresence. The plausible theory became a fact. I must act, and act atonce. For me to act was to avow my love. I must propose to GladysTodd. In that purpose all else was forgotten--even Boller. Over andover again I declared to myself that I loved her, but the simple wordshalted at my lips. A thousand protestations of my undying love pushedand crowded and jostled one another until they were strangling me. Without a tremor in my voice I could have told Gladys Todd that someother man loved her to distraction, and yet, when it was so vital to myhappiness that I speak for myself, the simple words halted at my lipsand checked the whole onrush of passionate avowal. 

Thinking that distance might have some part in my unnerving, I joggledmy chair a few feet nearer, grasped a knee in each hand, and leaningforward fixed a determined gaze upon her face. I had abandoned allidea of saying those three words as they should be said for the firsttime. To say them at all, I must blurt them out, but I believed thatwith them said the floodgates would be opened and the true lover-likeappeal burst forth. Gladys Todd must have thought that I was angry, for she asked me what was the matter. Some inane reply forced its waythrough the press of unuttered avowals. Now, I said, I will tell herwhat the matter really is, and I have always believed that I shouldhave done so at that moment had not the front door banged, heraldingthe coming of Doctor Todd. 

He entered the room, and I numbered him with Boller among the enemiesof my happiness. He took the very chair which Boller had occupied, andmade himself comfortable for the rest of my stay. 

"Well, David, you will soon be leaving us forever, " he said, bringinghis hands together and smiling at me over his wide-spread fingers. Inthat word "forever" I saw a hidden meaning, and behind my back Iclinched my hands and registered my unalterable will. "You are goingout into the world to make your name, David, " the doctor went on, growing grave. "I do hope that you will succeed as well as Boller of'89. Boller, David, is a man of whom McGraw is proud--a remarkableyoung man. He dropped into my study for a few minutes this evening andit was a pleasure to listen to him. Such a breadth of view! Suchnobility of purpose! He will rise high--that young man. We shall hearmuch of Boller. "

It had been my intention to try to sit out Doctor Todd, but I was in nomood to listen to these praises of Boller from one whom I now regardedas his confederate. I took my leave as quickly as I could, but it waswith the inwardly avowed purpose of returning as quickly as I could. Then, I said, the three words would be spoken, not rudely blurted out, but spoken as they should be for the first time. The mention of Bollerhad brought back to my mind the haunting "three, " to echo in everycorridor of my brain, and before I fell asleep that night, exhausted byover-thinking, I lifted my hands into the blackness and whispered whathad so long hung unuttered on my lips. To-morrow, I said, I shall sayit--at two. 

At two in the afternoon I found Gladys Todd in the little vine-coveredveranda in the rear of the house, painting. I am sure that had I seenher for the first time as she sat there at her easel beautifying ablack plaque with a bunch of tulips, every wave of her hand as sheplied the brush would have struck the divine spark in my heart. Marguerite at her spinning was not more lovely. The place was idealfor my purpose. We were above the town, hidden by height from itssordidness, and we looked far into mountain-tops where white cloudsloitered on the June-day peace. The fresh green of early summer wasabout us, and the only sound was the drum of bees in the honeysuckle. The time, too, was ideal, for it was a whole hour until "three. " Myposition was ideal, for I placed my chair very close to her and leanedforward with one hand outstretched to support my appeal. Thus Istayed, mute, like an actor who has forgotten his lines. The threewords came to my lips, only to halt there. 

Fortunately Gladys Todd did not notice my embarrassment, for her eyeswere on her work, and while she painted she was telling me of a game oftennis which she had played that morning with the three Miss Minnicks. To the three Miss Minnicks I laid the blame of my silence. Had shebeen talking of any one else or of anything else, I said, I could haveuttered the vital fact which hung so reluctantly on my lips, but tobreak in rudely in a recitation of fifteen thirties, vantages in andvantages out, with an announcement that I loved her would be quiteridiculous. I dropped my hand and stretched back in my chair. GladysTodd talked on and painted. 

The college clock struck the half-hour, and for me the one clangingnote was a solemn warning. I sat up very straight, I grasped the sidesof the chair, and the words were uttered. But to me it seemed thatsome other David Malcolm had spoken them--mere shells of words thatrattled in my ears. 

"David!" The voice and tone were like my mother's. Gladys Toddstopped painting and, turning, looked at me strangely. I could nothave faced that gaze of hers and said another word, but she quicklyaverted her eyes, abandoned brush and palette, and sat studying herclasped hands. 

There was nothing now to hold back the flood of passionate avowal. Perhaps my voice was a little weak, but it grew stronger as I tookheart at the sight of her listening so quietly. I told her that I hadloved her that evening when we first met; that since then, in all mywaking moments, she had been in my thoughts; I had never loved anotherwoman; I never could love another woman. With my outstretched armhovering so near to her I might have taken her unawares, taken her intomy possession and throttled any rising protest; but to touch her withmy little finger would have seemed to me a profanation. I expected herto sink into the embrace of that solitary arm. 

But she did not. She looked up at me and said: "David, I am sorry--sosorry. "

"Sorry?"

There was a ring of indignation in my voice. I was not prepared forsuch an enigmatic answer. Indeed, I had expected but one response, theone that was mine by right of four years of devotion, by right of thosebeacon-lights which I had seen so often in her eyes. Sorry? If shewas sorry, why had she led me to spend so many hours in her company, why had she walked with me in "our lane, " where the very air seemed tobrood with sentimental thought? I doubted if I heard her rightly. 

"Very, very sorry, David, " she repeated. "I never dreamed that youcared for me in this way. I thought you were a good friend. I nevercould think of you as anything else than a good friend. "

I was too much stunned to speak. For days I had been rehearsing in mymind what I should say to her when her hand was in mine, but I had notprepared for a contingency like this. I was helpless. I could onlylean back in my chair and gaze at her reproachfully. 

"You will forget me very soon, " she said, looking up after a moment. "You are going away in a few days. You must forget me, David. Promiseme you will. "

She took up her brush and palette and began to touch the plaquelightly. As I remember her now, Gladys Todd's face was loveliest inprofile. "Promise me, " she said, tossing her head and focussing hereyes on the tulips. 

Poor David Malcolm! You were young then and little learned in the waysof women. You did not know that to a woman a proposal is a thing notto be ended lightly with consent. You did not know that when thegentlest woman angles she is as any fisher who plays the game with rodand reel and delights in the rushes of the victim. You made no madrushes. You sat stupidly quiescent. You saw the fair profile dimly asthough it were receding into the mists beyond your reach. Your pridewas hurt. You were angry and would have flung yourself out of herpresence, but you could not endure the shame of defeat. 

The college clock struck three. It aroused me from my stupor, and Idid make one mad rush, in my confusion acting with more acumen than Iknew. 

"I never will forget you--I never can forget you, " I said brokenly. 

The door creaked and I arose, but it was not to face Boller. Knittingin hand, Mrs. Todd bustled out. She made no apology for her intrusion. The veranda was the coolest place in the house, and as she sank into achair I numbered her with Boller and Doctor Todd, with the enemies ofmy happiness. Her round, innocent face seemed to mask a grim purposeto sit there for the rest of the afternoon. Gladys Todd talked of thethree Miss Minnicks again as she plied her brush, and Mrs. Todd of Mr. Minnick and Mrs. Minnick as she worked her needles. They crushed thestruggling hope I had for one moment more in which to make a lastappeal. Boller did not come. The college clock struck four and stillthere was no sign of him. I was sure that he had some knowledge of mypresence, and perhaps waited for a signal from the house announcing mydeparture. In that case it was useless for me to stay longer listeningto idle chatter about the Minnicks, and so, utterly unhappy, smartingwith the sense of defeat, humiliated, I made my departure, and fledacross the campus to the college and my room. 

I took no supper. The mere idea of food was nauseating. I paced thefloor with my thoughts in chaos. Of consolation I had but one unsteadygleam--at least I should be burdened with no harassing financialproblem. Sometimes the question of my meagre resources had beenamazingly persistent, but I had fought it down as unworthy to have aplace with nobler thoughts. Now it rose again, and for a moment itseemed that I had escaped a heavy burden. Then I remembered Boller. Ipictured Boller sitting in the vine-clad veranda while Gladys Toddpainted; Boller in the Todd parlor, standing under a bower of clematis, while Gladys Todd moved toward him in step to the wedding-march playedby the eldest Miss Minnick. In the sleepless hours that followed, onepurpose fixed itself in my mind. I should leave McGraw next day at thesacrifice of a useless diploma. So I wrote to Gladys Todd. I wrotemany notes before I was satisfied, and the one I despatched had, Ithought, a manly, sensible tone. I did not wish to spend another weekin sight of her home and yet banished from it, I said; I had cherishedcertain hopes, and now I could not stand idle in their wreckage; I hadmy work to do and was away to do it, but I could not leave without afriendly good-by to her and without expressing a wish for herhappiness. This last was a subtle reference to Boller. Having madeit, the words which followed were astonishing, but they were born of afaint hope that after all I might not have to go. I told her that sheknew best and I would forget her, and now I was going for a last walkin the lane where we had spent so many happy hours, and then to takemyself to new scenes, bearing with me the memory of her as just afriend. 

The afternoon found me in the lane, on a knoll where the leafage brokeand gave a vista of rolling country. My eyes were turned to the hills, but my ears were quickened to catch the sound of foot-falls. In myheart I said that I should never hear them; my dismissal had been tooperemptory for me to cozen myself with so absurd an idea. But the hopewhich had brought me there would not die. Sometimes the wind stirredthe leaves and grass, and I would start and look up the lane. Timeafter time I was the victim of that teasing wind, and with recurringdisappointments my spirits sank lower. Then when an hour remainedbefore my train left, and I was standing undecided whether or not tokeep to my vigil, I heard a sharp crackle of dry twigs behind me. 

Gladys Todd had come. She was carrying her sketch-book, and dropped itin confusion when she saw me emerge from behind the trunk of a greatoak. I seized it and held it as a bond against her retreat, affectingnot to see the hand which she held out commanding its return. I hadplanned exactly what I should say did she appear in just this way, andnow my well-turned phrases scattered and I stood before her, silent, regarding her. It was just as well. My solemn eyes must have saidmore than any wordy speech. 

"I did not expect to find you here, Mr. Malcolm, " she said, droppingher hand as a sign of momentary surrender. 

Her tone was one of genuine surprise, and though the statement wasastonishing I could not conceive a woman of her character deviatingfrom the straight line of truth, and the hope which had soared high ather coming in answer to my subtle call now sank away. I held out thebook mutely. 

She did not see it. "I was on my way to the river to sketch, " shesaid. "I had no idea--" She dropped down on the bank and began topick vaguely at the clover. "Please go. Good-by. "

The brim of her sailor hat guarded her face, so that she really did notsee the book which I was holding toward her. I placed it on the grassbeside her and turned to obey, intending to march away in militaryfashion, perhaps whistling my defiance. 

"You'll promise to forget me, " I heard her say. 

I looked down at her, but the hat screened her face. 

"Yes, " I answered, with a steadiness that was surprising, for my throatwas parched and my knees had become very weak, so weak that I gave upall thought of marching in military fashion and gathered strength todrag myself out of her sight. I went up the lane slowly. I lookedback and saw her sitting very still, one hand on her big portfolio, theother listless on the clover. I reached the bend in the lane. Passingit, I should march on to my conquests, unhappy, wofully unhappy, butgoing faster because alone. 

"David, " she called. 

I stepped back, hardly believing my ears. She was sitting very still, looking over the lane and the hills. I went nearer. She was likestone. I sat down at her side and somehow my hand touched her hand onthe big portfolio, and her hand did not move. And somehow my handclosed on hers. 

"David, " she said, looking up, "you won't forget me, will you?"

Forget you! I swore to Gladys Todd that I had been idly boasting. Iwould have carried her image to the grave, burned on my heart. Thememory of her would have been the only light in all my life ofdarkness. But now there was no darkness. For us there was onlyglorious day. The astonishing thing, the incomprehensible thing, wasthat Gladys Todd could love me; that it was really true that she lovedme that first night we met; that she loved me yesterday when she sat onthe vine-clad porch painting tulips so carelessly. 

"But I did, David, " she protested. 

"Then why didn't you say so?" I returned reproachfully. 

"Because I wanted to make you say so, " she answered. 

"But, Gladys, " I cried, "I was sure you were in love with Boller. "

She stared at me with eyes full of wonder. 

"With Boller, " I exclaimed. "Boller of '89. "

"Why, David Malcolm, you poor, dear child, " she cried. "How could youhave been so foolish. He left yesterday--yesterday at three. "

A cloud suddenly hurled itself across the brightness of my day. Itseemed that after all I had hurried unnecessarily, for the financialproblem forces itself even into the seventh heaven of love, and now itcame like a ghoul to devour my happiness. It assumed concrete form ina picture of Doctor Todd when I went to him empty-handed, and I couldnot help feeling that it would have been better had I not let suspicionand jealousy hurry me to the attainment of what could have been mine ayear later under less embarrassing circumstances. 

My moment of abstraction was quickly noticed. Gladys Todd wanted toknow my troubles. They were hers now, she said, for thenceforth wemust share our burdens. I rose, for I was young. I laughed, and withmy laugh the clouds were swept away, for no cloud could veil thesunshine from my heart when the big sketch-book was under my right armand her small hand was under my left arm as we walked together downthat clover-carpeted lane. 

CHAPTER XII

I have travelled far in my life, travelled the seven seas by sail andsteam, and on horse and camel crossed plain and desert. The Pacific, the Indies, the Arctic--I count over the coasts where my ships havecast anchor; I go back in my memory to the first foreign shores onwhich my eyes rested, and you perhaps will smile when I tell you thatthey were the Jersey meadows. I saw them from a car window on a Juneevening. The train had crossed the bridge at Newark, and below me inthe river lay ships--tiny coasters, I know now, but then in the duskmagnified for me to the dignity of world-wanderers. In the salt vaporsof the marshes I scented the sea and the far-borne aroma of thetropics, the lands of palm and spice, and I looked away to theencircling hills and their scattered lights with something of theexultation of Columbus when he spied the blazing torch which marked theNew World. This was a new world to me. I had known only the inland, little valleys where life moved as placidly as the little rivers whichthreaded them. Now the sight of mast and spar, the salt vapors, thefar-spread lights told me that I had come to a strange land, and I waseager to reach its heart and to see its mysteries. I was keyed highwith the hope of conquest. With the salt marshes behind me, I leftbehind me, too, the Old World, the little valleys, the placid streams, and very straight I was, and very self-confident, when at last I lookedacross the dark river to the towering shadow of the city, pierced byits myriad stars. I felt neither fear nor loneliness. This city hadbeen building for these hundreds of years for just this hour. Itwaited to receive me. 

But the David Malcolm who stood bewildered in the streets was not theconqueror who had stepped ashore from the ferry-boat. The life amoment ago so precious had suddenly lost its value in the eyes of theunknowing. Yesterday he had walked through Malcolmville, and everyman, woman and child in its straggling length had come out to bid himfarewell. His departure was an event. His arrival in these strangestreets was an event, but to him alone. His very existence was notrecognized save by those churlish souls with whom his awkwardnessbrought him into physical contact. A belt-line car charged at him asthough it mattered little if he were ground beneath its wheels. Atruck hurled at him as though it were a positive blessing could theworld be rid of him. Plunging to safety, he bowled over a man who madeit perfectly plain that he regarded himself as just as important asMalcolm of '91. Pausing on a corner with his shining suit-case at hisfeet, he looked about him. Then he became in his own mind but anotherant in a giant hill. 

I was lonely now, but I had no fear. I watched the unceasing flow oflife around me, and I said that I could move in it as boldly as anyman, and perhaps a little better than most men, and if the time camewhen I must at last be caught beneath a belt-line car my removal fromthese mad activities would at least be dignified by a notice in thepapers. The shrinkage to my self-importance added fire to my ambition. More carefully but resolutely I threaded my way up Cortlandt Street, and at every step my sense of my unimportance increased. Even my hotelseemed to be a hotel of no importance. Mr. Pound had stayed there in1876, and his account of its magnitude and luxury had led me to believethat I could find it merely by asking. Three men met my simple inquirywith shakes of the head and hurried brusquely on, and yet they wererespectable and intelligent-looking. The policeman at the Broadwaycorner had at least heard of my hostelry; he remembered having seen itwhen he first came on the force, but he was inclined to believe that ithad long since been torn down. This was discouraging, but I did notabandon my search, for Mr. Pound had advised me to make myself known toMr. Wemple, the head clerk, a friend of his, who would doubtless be ofservice to me. And now in my great loneliness I wanted to find not thehotel, but Mr. Wemple, for I knew that with him I could talk on termsof friendship, however frail. From the horse-car jogging up Broadway Iwatched for the corner where the policeman told me the hotel had been;I reached it and saw a tall building adorned by many golden signs, inviting me not to the comfort of bed and board but to the purchase oflinens and hosiery. It was growing late. The part of the town throughwhich I was passing had put out its lights and gone home to bed, so Ihad to abandon hope of finding Mr. Wemple, and turned into the firsthotel I saw, an imposing place with a broad window in which sat asolemn, silent row of men gazing vacantly into the street. 

Here at last I ended my journey, weary and lonely, without even Mr. Wemple to welcome me to the city where I had cast my fortunes. Beforelong I joined the solemn line and sat watching the street, and Broadwaybelow Union Square at night, even in those times, was not an enliveningscene. My conquest was forgotten; my mind wandered back to the valleyat home. Here I sat listlessly, in a hot, narrow canyon through whichswept a thin, sluggish stream of life; above me was just a patch ofsky; before me was a tall cliff of steel and stone, pierced bynumberless dead windows. As I sat in the glare of electric lights, insmoke-charged air, my ears ringing with the harsh medley of the street, I fancied myself on the barn-bridge again. The moon would be risingover the ridges and the valley would lie at my feet with its checkeredfields of brown and gray rolling away to the mountains, and the musicof the valley would be no harsh clatter of bells and hoofs; I shouldhear the wind in the trees, the rustle of the ripening grain, thewhippoorwill calling from the elm by the creek, and the restlessbleating of sheep in the meadow. Thinking of these things, I askedmyself if the life I had left was not far better than the one I hadchosen; if the highest reward for my coming years of labor would not bethe right to return to it. But for pride I could have abandoned all mymighty plans at that moment and gone back, even, as the Professor hadsaid, to doze like the very dogs. I dared not. My parents' joy at myreturn might over-balance the loss of their high hopes for my fame, andhad they alone been in my thoughts I should have taken the night trainhome. But I could not go back to Gladys Todd beaten before I had evencome to blows with life. 

The last picture I had of her was the heroic one of a woman speedingher knight to battle. Gladys had an embarrassing way of calling me"her knight. " She stood on the platform of the Harlansburg station, and I leaned from a window of the moving train. Beside her was DoctorTodd waving his hat, and behind her the three Miss Minnicks withhandkerchiefs fluttering. She was very straight and very still, but Iknew what was in her thoughts. She had faith in my strength; when shesaw me again my feet would be firmly set on the ladder by which menclimb above the heads of their herded fellows. In the hours of thelong journey the picture of her was very clear to me; I seemed to bewearing her colors as I went to the conflict; with her spirit watchingover me, I could strike no mean blow nor use my strength in anyunworthy cause. 

How glad I was that she could not see me now, as I sat in the hotelwindow on two legs of my chair, with my feet on the brass rail, afigure of dejection. The glamour of my great adventure was gone. Ihad come quickly to the waste places of which the Professor had spoken. When I closed my eyes to the noisome street and the clamor, when I sawthe pines on the ridge-top clear cut against the moonlit sky, when Iheard the whippoorwill calling from the elm and the sheep bleating inthe meadow, I believed that I was marching to barren conquests andfighting for worthless booty. But I dared not turn back. 

In the morning, however, I looked at that same street with differenteyes. The thin, sluggish stream of life had swollen to a mightycurrent. The raucous little medley of the night was lost in thethunders of the awakened city. The towering canyon was swept by thebrightest of suns. I seemed to be standing idle in the midst of theconflict, and I was eager to plunge into it. So at noon that day Ibegan my fight. I presented myself at the editorial rooms of _TheRecord_ and asked for Mr. Carmody. In my hand I held a letter to himfrom Boller, recommending me in such high terms that it seemed highlyimprobable that he could refuse me his good offices. To supportBoller's assertions as to my acquirements I had also letters fromDoctor Todd and Mr. Pound. According to Doctor Todd, the journal whichsecured the services of David Malcolm was to be congratulated; herecited my high achievements, my graduation with honors in the largestclass in the history of McGraw, my winning of the junior oratoricalcontest with a remarkable oration on "Sweetness and Light. " Mr. Poundwas less fulsome in his praises, for he was by nature a pessimisticman, but he could vouch for my honesty, though, to be frank, he hadbeen disappointed by my abandoning my purpose to enter the ministry;yet he had known me from infancy, he had had a little part in thedevelopment of my mind, and he was confident that I needed but theopportunity to make my mark in any profession. 

With such support, my air when I asked for Mr. Carmody was naturallyone of assurance. The office-boy, an ancient man in the anteroom, handed my card and Boller's letter to a very young assistant, and wheremy eyes followed him through a door I saw a number of men seated atbattered desks. Some were writing; some were reading; some merelysmoking; some had their heads together and talked in low tones. Allwere in their shirt-sleeves; and none presented the dignifiedappearance of my conception of a journalist, and especially of sosuccessful a journalist as Mr. Bob Carmody. I was confident that thevery young office-boy would pass them and go to the doors beyond, whichmust lead to the true sanctum. No; where he stopped I saw awide-spread paper; over the top of it a mop of flaming red hair, andbulging from the sides of it the sleeves of a very pink shirt. Thecurtain was lowered, disclosing a round, red face heavily blotched withshaving-powder. There was nothing of dignity in Mr. Carmody'sappearance; there was nothing in his rotund features to suggest anyhigh purpose or distinguished ambition; indeed, it seemed that he wouldbe content to sit forever on that small chair at that battered desk. 

He dropped the paper, looked at my card, and read Boller's letter. Evidently it amused him, for the half-burned cigarette in his mouthmoved convulsively, and as he came toward me there sprang up in my minddoubts as to Boller's estimate of him. But he proved a good-naturedyoung man and certainly very modest. Sitting on the ancientoffice-boy's desk, he addressed me in low tones, as though he feared tobe overheard. He was glad to know any friend of Boller's, butevidently Boller was laboring under a misapprehension as to hisimportance. He disavowed having any influence. Had he the power, nothing would delight him more than to give a friend of Boller a job. I had never thought of myself hunting anything so commonplace as a job, but as I listened to him and looked past him into the editorial room myideas of my chosen profession were rapidly readjusting themselves and Iwas casting about for a way in which to continue my quest without theinfluence on which I had counted so heavily. I protested that I hadnever dreamed of him giving me a job; I had come to him simply foradvice, and perhaps an introduction to the real powers. 

Mr. Carmody gave an uneasy glance over his shoulders to a large desk inthe corner, where sat a tall, thin man who seemed absorbed in a game ofcheckers played with newspaper clippings. Mr. Hanks, the city editor, he explained; nothing that he could say would have any influence on Mr. Hanks. On my insisting, however, he at last consented to sound Mr. Hanks on my behalf; he approached him with something of the caution hewould have used in confronting a tiger; he waved his hand to me toassure me that all was well, and when I stood by the big desk hedisappeared, and it was many days before I saw him again. 

There was nothing repelling in Mr. Hanks. Indeed, he seemed rather amild man, but when he turned on me a pair of large spectacles I feltsuddenly as though I were a curious insect being examined undermagnifying-glasses. Mr. Hanks, with his thin, pale face anddishevelled hair, appeared more an entomologist than a militant editor. In a moment, however, I saw him in action. He shot his bare arm acrossthe littered desk, he seemed to try to destroy his brass bell, and withevery ring he shouted, "Copy--copy!" Office-boys sprang from the floorand dropped from the ceiling; they tumbled over one another in theirhurry to answer the summons. He reprimanded them for being asleep. Ithought that they would be ordered to bring Mr. Malcolm a chair, butinstead one received from a waving hand a bunch of paper, and theyretired as they had come, into the floor and the ceiling. I was underthe magnifying-glasses again. 

"Well, Mr. Malcolm, " said Mr. Hanks, leaning back in his chair andclasping his hands behind his head, "ever done any newspaper work?"

"No, sir, " I answered boldly. "I have just graduated from McGraw. "

"And where in the devil is McGraw?" he asked in a slow, wondering voice. 

How I wished for Doctor Todd! In five minutes this self-confidentjournalist would blush for his own ignorance. But Doctor Todd notbeing here to confound him with facts, there was nothing better for meto do than to hand him the letter. His face lighted with a smile as heread it. The effect was so good that I followed it with Mr. Pound's. The effect of Mr. Pound's was so good that I was confident that Ishould soon be a journalist in fact, for Mr. Hanks read it over twice. 

"My boy, " he began, regarding me through his spectacles benignly. Atthat familiar address my heart leaped. "Let me give you some advice. "My heart fell. "Take those letters and lock them up to read when youare ten years older. Then start out and go from office to office untilyou get a place. Don't be discouraged. Some day you'll break insomewhere. "

"But I want to work on _The Record_, " I cried. "It's politics agreewith mine--it is Republican. It is a respectable paper. It----"

Mr. Hanks was leaning over his desk. "Pile, " he said, addressing thefat man who sat across from him, "that was a good beat we had on theWorthing divorce--I see all the evenings are after it hard. We musthave a second-day story. "

"I am ready, " I said a little louder, "to begin with any kind of work. "

Mr. Hanks looked up as though surprised that I was still there. "You've come at a bad time, " he said brusquely. "Summer--we areletting men go every day. But don't get discouraged. I worked fourmonths for my first job, and I didn't come from McGraw either. Keepgoing the rounds. "

Then he seemed to forget my existence and resumed his game of checkers. 

His dismissal was a terrible blow, but I had read enough of great mento know that they had to fight for their opportunities, and I wasdetermined not to be a weakling and go down in the first skirmish. Fora moment I stood bewildered at the entrance of _The Record_ building, stunned by the unexpected outcome of my visit there. I was indignantat Boller for having raised my hopes so high. I was indignant at Mr. Carmody for not measuring up to Boller's estimate. I was indignant atMr. Hanks for not making a searching inquiry into my attainments, forhis ignorance of McGraw and his amusement over my precious letters. Ivowed that some day Mr. Hanks should be put under my magnifying-glass, to shrivel beneath my burning gaze. 

To break in somewhere proved a long task. From Miss Minion'sboarding-house on Seventeenth Street, where I established myself, Iwent forth daily to the siege of Park Row. I was shot up to heaven toeditorial rooms beneath gilded domes, and as quickly shot down again. I climbed to editorial rooms less exaltedly placed, up dark, bewildering stairways which seemed devised to make approach by them aperil. I soon knew the faces of all the city editors in town, and allthe head office-boys were as familiar with mine. At the end of thefirst round I began to look more kindly on Mr. Hanks and to realize thewisdom of his advice that I lock away my letters. I recalled thevaried receptions they had met, and when I started on my second roundthey were hidden in my trunk. Repeated rebuffs had a salutary effect. My egotism was reduced to a vanishing-point, my pride was quickened, and with my pride my determination to accomplish my purpose. Even hadI lacked pride, I must have been nerved to my dogged persistence by thememory of Gladys Todd with Doctor Todd and the three Miss Minnicksspeeding me to my triumphs. Every evening when I came home, tired anddiscouraged, to Miss Minion's, I found a letter addressed to me in atall, angular hand--a very fat letter which seemed to promise a wealthof news and encouragement. But Gladys Todd could say less on morepaper than I had believed possible. Encouragement she gave me, butnever news. News would have spoiled the graceful flow of hersentences. Yet she was wonderfully good in the way she received myaccounts of my disappointments. She was prouder than ever of "herknight"; her faith in him was firmer than ever; as she sat in theevening, in the soft light of the lamp, she was thinking of me withlance couched charging again and again against the embattled world. 

At first in my replies I found a certain satisfaction in recounting mydefeats; for in fighting on I seemed to be proving my superior worthand strength, and I became almost boastful of my repeated failures. But the glamour of defeat wears off as the cause for which one fightsbecomes more hopeless, and after a month I seemed farther than everfrom attaining my desire. I became depressed in the tone of myletters, but as my spirits sank Gladys Todd's seemed to soar. 

One particularly fat epistle I found on my bureau on an evening when Iwas so discouraged that I was beginning to consider heeding my father'sappeal that I return home and study for the Middle County bar. Iopened it with dread. I wanted no comfort, but here in my hands weretwenty pages of Gladys Todd's faith in me and her pride in me. She wassure that I should have the opportunity which I sought, and, having it, would mount to the dizziest heights. She likened me to a crusader whowore her colors and was charging single-handed against the gates of theHoly City and shouting his defiance of the infidels who held it. Itwas an exalted idea, but I remembered my tilt that afternoon with theancient office-boy of _The Record_, and his refusal to take my seventhcard to Mr. Hanks. The comparison was so absurd that I laughed as Ihad not laughed in many days, and with the sudden up-welling of mymirth, lonely mirth though it was, the blood which had grown sluggishquickened, the drooping courage rose, I saw the world through clearereyes. The next afternoon when I faced the ancient office-boy theremembrance of Gladys Todd's metaphor made me smile, and so overcomewas he by this unusual geniality that he did take in my card to Mr. Hanks. 

"Again, " said Mr. Hanks, leaning back in his chair and surveying methrough his magnifying-glasses. "Young man, are you never going togive me a rest?"

"Never, " said I, smiling. "You advised me to go the rounds and not tobe discouraged. "

"Have you got your letters with you?" he asked mildly. 

"They are locked away in my trunk, " said I. 

"You certainly have taken my advice with a vengeance, " said he. "Isuppose I shall have to do something to protect myself. "

He leaned over his desk and became absorbed in his everlasting game ofcheckers. The smile left my face, for I thought that he had forgottenmy presence, as he had forgotten it so many times before. But after amoment he slanted his head, focussed one microscope on me, and said:"Do you think you could cover Abraham Weinberg's funeral thisafternoon?"

So it was that Gladys Todd's crusader at last broke down the gates ofthe Holy City. But I fear that it was to become one of the defendinginfidels. Doctor Todd, in his letter to whom it might concern, announced that David Malcolm was about to launch himself intojournalism. And now, after long waiting, David Malcolm was launched. Just when he was despairing of ever leaving the ways he had shot downthem suddenly into the Temple Emanu-El and the funeral of AbrahamWeinberg. 

CHAPTER XIII

You can well understand the elation with which I announced my successto Gladys Todd. It was magnified by the month of disappointment, andto her I felt that I owed a debt. Though I had come to look with ironyon her high-flown expressions of faith in me, I realized that the fearof her equally high-flown scorn had more than once kept me fromabandoning my project. With pride I enclosed in my letter my accountof the funeral of Mr. Weinberg, though I refrained from marring thetrophy with an explanation that this first public production of my penhad been allowed to attain the length of a column because his storecovered half a block and his advertisements many pages of _The Record_. As a trophy Gladys Todd received it. Declaring that she lacked wordsin which to express her pride in her knight, she flew to greaterheights than ever before. She had placed my first journalistic effortin a scrap-book, and all that I wrote was to be preserved in likemanner. I must send her every published line that came from my pen. Her knight had triumphed in his first real passage at arms, and shesent to me a chaplet of victory. It came--not a wreath, but a cushionworked with her own hands, mauve and white, the colors of McGraw, with'91 in black on one side and on the other the word "Excelsior. "

The scrap-book grew rapidly to alarming proportions, for having now myopportunity I worked hard, and Mr. Hanks was fond of telling me that Iwas rapidly outgrowing the reputation Doctor Todd and Mr. Pound hadmade for me on Park Row. Accounts of murders, suicides, yacht-races, robberies, public meetings, railroad accidents--all the varied eventswhich make up a day's news--followed the funeral into Gladys Todd'sarchives. You can readily imagine that my views of life soon underwenta change. They became rather distorted, as I see them now; and was ita wonder when my day began at noon and ended in the small hours of themorning, carried me through hospitals, police-stations, and courts, from the darkest slums to the stateliest houses on the Avenue, from thesweatshop to the offices of the greatest financiers. To me all menwere simply makers of news, and by their news value I judged them. Aman's greatness I measured by the probable length of his obituarynotice. Indeed, greatness itself was but the costume of a puppet, sooften did I see the sawdust stuffing oozing from the gashes in thecloth. When I met one bank cashier simply because he had stolen, Iforgot the thousands of others who were plodding away through lives ofdull honesty. Because one Sunday-school superintendent sinned, Iclassed all his kind as sinners. Becoming versed in the devious waysof statesmen, I began to doubt the virtues of my old heroes whosespeeches I had often declaimed with so much unction. I became a cynic. At twenty-two my thoughts matched the epigrams of Rochefoucauld and myphilosophy that of Schopenhauer. All my old ideas as to the importanceof the work I had chosen and of my own value to the world were quicklydissipated. Often I had cause to remember the Professor and hisargument that even of our good actions selfishness was the main-spring, and accepting it as true, and laying bare the roots of my own motivesand of those around me, I should have moved confusedly in the darknesshad I not come to see more clearly what he meant by marching undersealed orders and to realize that I had a duty and that it was to liveby the light I had. I did try to do this. I had a conscience, andthough I might believe that it was but a group of conceptions as to thenature of right and wrong poured into my mind by my early instruction, it protested as strongly against abuse as did my digestive organs. Sometimes I had to effect strange compromises with it. Sometimes, inmy never ceasing search for facts, I found myself causing pain andtrouble to those who were innocently brought under the shadow of crimeand scandal, but I justified myself by the theory that they sufferedfor the good of the many. To me the old dictum that the end justifiesthe means became a useful balm. 

You might think that, with so radical a change in my ideas, I shouldsee Gladys Todd in another light than that of my college days. Indeed, looking back, those college days did seem of another age and anotherworld, but in them Gladys Todd had become linked to me by ties asindissoluble as those which bound me to my father and mother. To whatI deemed my broader view of life, their ways of living and their waysof thinking were certainly exceedingly narrow, but none the less Ithought of them only with reverence and affection. So it was withGladys Todd. That mirthful outburst over her effusion about thecrusader was followed by many of its kind as her daily letters came tome, but this meant simply that I was growing older than she, and she tomy mind became a child, but was none the less lovely for herunsophistication. In the turmoil of my daily work, in the unlovelyclatter of Miss Minion's boarding-house, I often recalled the vine-cladveranda and our walks in the grass-grown lane, looked back to themregretfully, looked forward yearningly to the renewal of such hours. 

Sometimes when my evening was free from my routine duty, and I wasworking harder than ever I had worked in my college days, I wouldforget my task to dream of the time when Miss Tucker's piano would nolonger be clattering beneath me, and I should be no more disturbed byMrs. Kittle, who had a habit of jumping her chair around the room nextto mine, when somewhere in the city's outskirts I should have a houseof my own, a little house in a bit of green, where I could find quietand peace and Gladys Todd. For the realization of that dream all thatI needed was money. By the lack of it I was condemned to MissMinion's. Even when I had attained to the munificent salary of Mr. Carmody, a figure which Boller had announced to me with so much awe, Iwas still far from having an income to keep two in the simplestcomfort. It was difficult to make this clear to Gladys Todd. Herfather and mother had married on eight hundred dollars a year, and evennow my salary equalled the doctor's as president of the college. Toher my salary read affluence, and in my letters I began to havedifficulty to convince her that I had not grown exceedingly worldly andwas not putting material comfort in the balance against unselfish anduncomplaining love. On my third biannual visit to Harlansburg I wentarmed with facts and figures as to house rents and flat rents, theprices of meats per pound, the cost of fuel, light, and clothing. Having in my pocket such a tabulated statement which showed forincidentals a balance of but fifty dollars, I could not but smileironically at the manner in which Doctor Todd presented me to hisfriends. Boller was forgotten. Boller's achievements were outshone bythose of David Malcolm. Malcolm's success demonstrated the highcharacter of McGraw's system of training. Malcolm was already beingheard from!

Malcolm, with the problem which confronted him, was inwardly gauginghis success by his bank account, and even the pride of Gladys Todd wasa little clouded when she was called upon to use the same measure. 

Sitting in the very chair in the shaded lamplight from which she hadlooked so admiringly on Boller two years before, she now studied theprospectus of our contemplated venture. She was very lovely, but Iremember noticing what I had never before noticed, the wisps of hairwhich floated a little untidily about her ears. And I did what I hadnever done before--I compared her with another woman, with Miss Tucker, whose piano had so often disturbed my evening labors. Miss Tuckertaught mathematics in an uptown girls' school. She was not as prettyas Gladys Todd, but I remembered how wonderfully neat she was, withnever a hair blowing loose, and I remembered too that, though she haddisturbed me with her music, I never complained of it, for the sake ofthe picture which she made every morning when she descended the stoopbeneath my window, going to her work as cheerfully and daintily as manyof her sisters would to a dinner or a dance. 

"We shall only have a hundred dollars left for doctor's bills andcar-fare then, David, " said Gladys Todd, looking up from the paper. There were tears in her eyes, but they did not affect me as much as herway of doing her hair. How I longed for the courage to tell her thatit was decidedly bad form!

"But we shall only have to wait a little longer, Gladys, " said I, and Imoved my chair beside her chair. 

"I know, " she returned more bravely, putting her hand in mine. "Butyou don't realize how lonely I am without you. I want to be with you, helping you--to be at your side comforting you when you are tired, cheering you when you are discouraged. "

For that moment I forgot the stray wisps and the Langtry knot. 

"But it is only a little while longer, " I pleaded. "Let us say inJune. I shall come for you in June. You will wait for me till June?"

Her hand was on my shoulder, and I forgot all about Miss Tucker. Forthat moment I was the happiest of men. 

"Wait for you till June?" she cried. "Why, David, I'd wait for you toeternity. "

"You need not, " I replied, laughing. "In June I am coming to take youto a little house on a green hill, with a veranda where we can sit onmy holidays, you painting tulips on black plaques, and I--well, I withyou, just thinking how wonderful it all is and----"

"How wonderful it will be in June!" said Gladys Todd. 

CHAPTER XIV

Fifth Avenue was in those days a favorite resort of mine. Everymorning I plunged into the rush downtown I dived from the elevatedrailway station into the tatterdemalion life of Park Row, and when Iraised my head above that ragged human maelstrom and climbed to theeditorial room of _The Record_ it seemed as though I lifted my body outof a little muddy stream and plunged my mind into a Charybdis whichembraced the whole world. Its centre was the same desk which I had sooften approached with trembling in the days when I was breaking spearswith the ancient office-boy and Mr. Hanks. I was fixed now in a chairopposite Mr. Hanks. I had become an editor. But I was not hurling myspears against the devils that possess poor man. My principal dailytask was to read the newspapers with a microscopic eye, to glean fromthem every hint of news to come and to be covered, to present theclippings to Mr. Hanks ready for his easy perusal, and though in ourprovince we had to do only with events of a local character, the lifeof the city was so interwoven with that of the whole world that to meour desk seemed a high lookout tower from which we kept an eye on thevery corners of the globe. Did I look from the smutted window at myside, it was into the struggling throng on the pavement below or, overthe line of push-carts displaying tawdry wares, into the park where theriff-raff seemed to reign, because the riffraff was always there, dozing on the benches. Did I look to the other hand, it was throughthe great murky room, through air charged with tobacco smoke and ladenheavily with the fumes of ink, molten lead, and paper which filteredfrom the floors below through every open door. In a distant corner, agloomy figure in the light of a single lamp, I could see the keeper ofthe "morgue" cutting his way through piles of papers, filing away hisprinted references to Brown, or Jones, or Robinson, against that daywhen Brown might die, Jones commit some crime, or Robinson, perchance, do something virtuous. I could see, in nearer prospect, the rows oflittle desks and the reporters at them, some writing, some reading, some smoking wearily; some young men fresh from college and keyed highwith ambition; some old men shabbily dressed and carelessly groomed whohad spent their lives at those little desks and asked nothing more thanthe privilege of ending them there; some of more corpulent minds, likethe great Bob Carmody, who were happy in the attainment of a life'sambition to become authorities on base-ball, foot-ball, or rowing. Wherever I looked I seemed to see nothing but the titanic tread-milland to hear the clatter of its cogs: within, where the presses rumbleddeep in the ground below me, where the telegraph clicked in theadjoining room and overhead the typesetting-machines rattledincessantly; without, in the medley of the street, the cries of thehawkers, the clang of car gongs, and the never-ending shuffle of feet. Uptown life seemed on its surface to be lighter, and the curse of Adamto rest more easily on the shoulders of his children. 

Of Fifth Avenue this was especially true. It was not a canyon of brickand stone in those days. Trade had just begun its invasion and hadgained a foothold only in the few blocks above and below Twenty-thirdStreet, and for the rest it was still a street of homes, where peoplemoved in a more leisurely fashion than in the crowded thoroughfaresdowntown. The very air was charged with a healthier life, and hereamid the opulence one could forget the near presence of the squalidalley. So it had become a habit of mine always to begin my day with awalk uptown, as a gentle tonic for my body and to give my mind a briefbut more cheerful outlook than through the smutted office windows. Inever tired of the life which I saw about me. And it was about me andI not of it, for though I might pause at a tailor's to examine hisfabrics, it was always through his plate-glass window; beyond thewindow I could afford to go only in the cheaper Nassau Street; and Imight stop in front of a picture-shop, but only to o select prints forthat dream-land house on the hill, set on the bit of green. Smartcarriages rolled by me, manned by immaculate, haughty servants, drawnby horses stepping high in time with the jingle of their harness. Atone time I had planned an equipage such as these for myself; but now, computing, from past experience, my future possibilities in finance, Isaw them fascinating as ever, yet as far from me as though they dashedthrough some Martian city, and their occupants as removed from my kenas the inhabitants of the farthest planets. Indeed, even in thecommoner throng about me I knew no one. It was seldom that I wascalled on to doff my hat, and then to some of the queer old women whowere moulding away in the corners of Miss Minion's boarding-house or toMiss Tucker hurrying to her school. 

One morning in May, as was my custom, I set out for work by mycircuitous route, with the intention of walking to Fifty-eighth Streetand taking an elevated train downtown. The day was one of theloveliest of spring. The brightest of suns swept the Avenue. InMadison Square the fresh green had burst from the trees overnight, andI should have liked to drop down on one of the benches there, to lookupward through the branches into the clouds and forget the enclosingwall of buildings and the tumultuous streets. But I was late, and Ihad no mind to hurry on such a day. The languor of the spring was inmy veins, and I strolled on, almost unconscious of the life about me. Ahead, at the crest of Murray Hill, the city seemed to end, and I tolook through a great gate-way into the blue sky, and I fancied myselfstanding there in that gate-way, with the valley lying at my feet, myvalley awakened from its winter's sleep, its hill-sides decked withblossoming orchards, its mountains carpeted with the soft shadows ofthe clouds. I saw the ridge, its green slope slashed by the whitewinding road which crossed it. That was the same road up which I hadclimbed on a May morning long ago, when I hurried to the Professor'said, and I followed it now to the clearing; I saw the clearing with theProfessor leaning on his hoe studying a fleck of cloud, and Penelopewatching him silently, fearing to disturb his important meditations. In these busy years Penelope had been rarely in my thoughts; if at all, it was as a little girl with a blue ribbon in her hair, the companionof a few brief weeks of my boyhood. I dared not picture her as growingup, for I had no faith in the influence of Rufus Blight, whom I hadalways associated with packages of tea and prizes. Penelope grown, Ifeared, might have become fat and florid, might speak with a twang andwear gaudy hats and gowns. My life in New York, even though I was buta quiet observer, had made me critical of women, and when I could broodunhappily over Gladys Todd's stray wisps of hair I could have littlesympathy with the type of the imaginary Penelope Blight. But thismorning, when the far-borne freshness of the woods and fields was inthe air, and I longed to feel the soft earth beneath my feet, to breakfrom the enclosing walls and to stride over the open fields, I recalleddays like this when the wine of spring was in my veins and I had runthrough the meadows in a wasteful riot of energy; and then a particularday like this when Penelope and I had ridden out of the woods, had cometo the ridge-top and looked over the smiling valley. I seemed to feelPenelope's arms drawn tightly around me as I pointed across thefriendly land and promised to take care of her. I had had no fear thenthat she would ever grow corpulent and florid, and now I found myselfasking if my boyish intuition might not have been right, and shefulfilled entirely the promise of her girlhood, defying the insidiousgenerosity of time and the vulgar influence of Rufus Blight. Should Iever know? Should I ever see her?

I must have been looking at the clouds as I asked myself thesequestions, for I walked right into an elderly woman, a tall, buxomwoman who carried in her arms a tiny Pomeranian. The force of ourcollision made her drop her pet, and for an instant he hung suspendedby the leash and choking. I apologized humbly, bowing; but myvictim--for such she seemed to think herself--the victim of mypremeditated brutality, lifted the frightened dog back to the refuge ofher arms, glared at me, turned, and swept on to a modiste's door. Herhaughtiness angered me. I held the fault as much hers as mine, for thepavement was not crowded and she seemed to have risen from it just toobstruct my passage. I looked about me to discover whence she had comeso suddenly, and in a carriage standing at the curb I found anexplanation. I said to myself that if she had emerged from so smart anequipage I had indeed committed _lèse-majesté_, for it was such aturnout as I had dreamed of in my days of opulent dreaming; it was sucha turnout as a poor poet could have used without offending his sense ofthe beauty of simplicity. The high-headed horses with their shiningharness, the smart brougham, so spotless that it was hard to imagineits wheels ever touching the street, the men in their unobtrusivelivery, spoke of unostentation in its most perfect and most expensiveform. The woman of the Pomeranian, I said to myself, must be surelysome _grande-dame_, a leader in that mysterious circle which I knewonly by its name "society. " My view of that circle in those days wastinged with the cynicism of one who knew nothing of it; and though atthe boarding-house table I was prone to rail at it, secretly I had toadmit that my raillery was born of envy. So now it was with a mindfilled half with awe and half with envy that I turned to look after theimposing woman with the dog. 

For the first time I noticed that she had a companion. First, thecompanion was but a slender figure in black, smartly clad. I could seeonly her back, and yet as I carried my eye from the dainty boot whichrested on the lowest step to the small gloved hand on the railing, tothe small black hat with its blue wings airily poised, I found myselfmaking comparisons between this daintiness and the untidy loveliness ofGladys Todd. I was almost angry with Gladys Todd because she did notdress with such simplicity, not knowing that all her wardrobe costhardly as much as this unobtrusive gown, this masterpiece of a tailor'sart. 

Gladys Todd was not long in my mind. It was as though the memory ofher was swept away by the turn of the blue wings on which my eyesrested. They moved with a majesty that sent my thoughts hurling downinto the past to match them. I matched them with a bit of blue ribbon. It had moved as majestically as they. I almost laughed outright. Itwas absurd to compare the forlorn child of the clearing with thissmartly groomed young woman, and remembering Nathan, the white mule, Ilooked again to the perfectly turned-out carriage at the curb. Youmust suspect that there was in my mind, born of a wild hope, asuspicion that I was seeing Penelope Blight. True. But from Nathan, the white mule, to this perfect carriage with the haughty footman atthe door was so far a cry that I was about to go on. The girl hadturned also, and I found myself halted and staring at her. I was surethat she had been studying my back at that moment when I was looking atthe carriage, but being discovered in such interest she gave a start, recovered herself, and with an angry toss of her head sprang up thesteps and through the door. 

In that moment when our eyes met I was sure that I was face to facewith Penelope Blight. 

The old Florentine writer, Firenzuola, commends nut-brown as theloveliest color for a woman's eyes, declaring that it gives to them asoft, bright, clear and kindly gaze and lends to their movement amysteriously alluring charm. These eyes were blue, but in thatfraction of an instant when I looked into them, their light was softand bright, clear and kindly; I was sure that they were the samemysteriously alluring eyes that I had first known years before when Ihad crawled, wet and cold, from the depths of the mountain brook. Knowing no more I should have spoken her name, my hand was rising to myhat, but the soft and kindly light changed suddenly to hostility, andshe was gone. 

I hesitated, not knowing what step to take next. With hesitation doubtcame. I began to argue. The hostile flash of her eyes angered me. She had tacitly charged me with impertinence, with the manners of acommon Broadway lounger. Then I said, had this really been Penelopeshe must have recognized me, for twelve years could not haveobliterated all outward traces of the boy whom she had once known asher only friend. Remembering that time, remembering the forlorn cabinin the mountains and the brown, barefooted girl, remembering thepromise of later days given by the sleek vulgarity of Rufus Blight, Isaid that she could not have grown to this faultless picture of youngwomanhood. Yet the forlorn hope that I might be mistaken would haveheld me there awaiting her return had it not been for the haughtyfootman by the carriage door. He had been a silent observer of whathad passed, and seeing me now loitering, staring at the modiste's shop, he cast off his expressionless mask and assumed a very threatening andscowling appearance. Evidently he, too, thought me a street loungerwho, not satisfied with nearly killing madam, was bent on thrusting hisimpertinent attentions on the young mistress. I could not explain tohim that I had known the young mistress years ago when she lived in alog hut in a mountain valley. His own perfection as a servant madesuch an explanation the more incredible; and though loath to abandonthe opportunity to convince myself that I was mistaken, I saw nothingleft for me but to go my way downtown. 

As I sat at my desk I was so distrait that Mr. Hanks accused me ofbeing in love, speaking as though I were the victim of a mentalderangement which unfitted me for serious labor. After the way of men, I boldly denied his charge. He paid no attention to my protest, butexpressed himself freely on the unwisdom of a man allowing himself tofall under the influence of delusions which cost him his mental poiseand might disarrange his whole life. Hearing Mr. Hanks, it wasdifficult for me to believe that he had ever been in love himself. Watching him at his work, with his sharp, restless eyes always alert, and listening to his voice as incisive as his shears, he seemed a manwhose whole mind was possessed by the pursuit of news, a man whosebrain and body worked with such machine-like accuracy that he couldnever fall into the puerile errors of his fellows. Now when he wasmisusing his authority to browbeat me into what he termed sanity, Ifound comfort in recalling that after all he had once in a moment offorgetfulness confessed to having a home at Mentone Park, with a wifeand four daughters of whose accomplishments he spoke almost withboasting. So I troubled no longer with denials, but sat listening tohim with a smiling face. Whereupon he brought his fist down on thedesk and called me a soft-brained idiot. 

"Of course, Malcolm, " he said, "I don't know who she is, but my adviceto you is, whoever she is and whatever she is, get her out of yourmind. "

At that very moment Malcolm's mind was occupied with just thesequestions: Who was she? What was she?

With a sense of duty to Gladys Todd I strove hard to put PenelopeBlight out of my thoughts, but I could not. Sometimes I would recallthe face of the girl whom I had seen in the morning, and every featurewould bring back the child of the mountains. Then I went todirectories and searched them for the name of Rufus Blight, but I couldget no trace of him. I evolved a theory that Penelope was the guest ofthe woman with the Pomeranian. The carriage must belong to either theelder or the younger woman. Granting that the younger was Penelope, then the elder could not be her mother. As I had examined manydirectories and found none that gave her uncle's name as living in thecity, I had to conclude that the owner of the Pomeranian was herhostess and that I was the victim of a trick of fate which had allowedher to flash across my path and disappear, which had allowed me to havebut this tantalizing glimpse. Then I found consolation in the thoughtthat after all a glimpse was enough for my peace of mind. Indeed, ifthis really were Penelope, then it had been best that I had never seenher at all, grown to such loveliness. 

Considering myself as I sat in my shirt-sleeves amid grimy workadaysurroundings, remembering the frayed environment of my life uptown, this Penelope, stepping, daintily booted and gloved, out of thatperfect equipage, was indeed a being who moved in higher airs than I. Here was an insuperable difficulty. In the valley, David Malcolm, withthe blood of the McLaurins in his veins, might look with contempt onthe Blights and their kind. But we were no longer in the valley, and aBlight driving down the Avenue in a brougham, drawn by high-headedhorses and manned by haughty servants, would see me not as the head ofa wealthy patrician house, but as a young man on his way from hisboarding-house to labor for a petty wage. Such a reversal of ourrelative conditions was so incredible that I found myself arguing thatI could not have seen Penelope Blight, and I tried to return to loyaldevotion to Gladys Todd. 

We were to be married in June. There was no reason why we should notbe married in June if we were content to begin our venture in a modestfive-room flat in Harlem, abandoning for a while the house on the bitof green. Gladys was not only contented but was enthusiastic over theprospect. In my pocket was her last night's letter asking if I had yetrented the apartment. She had already planned it in her mind--here thepiano on which she would play soft accompaniments while I sang "TheMinute Guns at Sea"; there by the window her easel, and near it thetable where her brilliant husband was to sit at night writing novelsand plays and poems which would carry us not only to the green hill butto the Parnassian heights. When in the quiet of my room I had firstread her letter, I had been lifted on the wave of her ardor, but now, struggle though I might to look forward to June with contentment, downin my heart I had to confess a strange uneasiness. It seemed to methat we were rushing into matrimony. With my mind revolving suchproblems over and over, was it a wonder that Mr. Hanks noticed mydistraction and pounded the desk and spoke cuttingly of the effect oflove on a man's mental balance! All that day I neglected my tasks forthe study of my own engrossing business, but when evening came and Istarted home I was able to say to myself that I had reached a definiteand unchanging conclusion--I loved Gladys Todd; like all of us, she hadher peccadilloes, and yet I was not worthy of her, but I would try tobe; the girl with the blue wings bobbing so majestically in her hat wasnot Penelope Blight. 

Having reached this unchangeable decision, the very next morning, andevery morning after that, I walked up Fifth Avenue with but one thoughtin my mind, and this was to see again a small black hat with bluewings. I became argus-eyed. I peered boldly into passing carriages, watched the foot traffic on both sides of the street, scanned thewindows of dwelling-houses, and even developed a habit of lookingbehind me at fixed intervals that my vigilance might be still moreeffective. One day I went boldly into the shop which I had seen thestranger enter that day with the woman of the Pomeranian, and asked ifI could have Miss Blight's address. A saleswoman, a very blond andvery sinuous person who was standing by the door revolving a large hatabout on one hand while she caressed its plumes daintily, replied thatno Miss Blight was known there. I described her hat with the bluewings, her companion with the Pomeranian, the very hour of her visit, but my persistence brought only the information that hundreds of theshop's patronesses wore blue wings and thousands carried Pomeranians. The sinuous young woman became so cold and biting in her tone that Iwas sure that she believed that I had been fascinated by her own charmsand was using a ruse for the pleasure of this brief interview, so Imade a hasty retreat. My only clew to the owner of the blue-winged hathad failed me, and all that was left to me was to patrol the Avenue dayafter day, forever hoping and forever being disappointed. 

June came. The five-room flat was still unrented. My daily letterfrom Harlansburg breathed devotion and happiness over the approach of aday as yet unset--unset because I had been rather procrastinating aboutarranging leave of absence from the office. Doctor and Mrs. Todd hadwanted a college wedding in the chapel. They had even gone so far asto suggest appropriate music by the glee club and the seniors asushers, but when that proposal was made to me I had found to mydistress that I could not leave New York before the summer vacation hadbegun. June brought me, too, the very last good fortune I should haveasked at that moment, an unexpected increase in my salary, and unless Ilowered myself by an act of despicable cunning I could not withholdnews of such good import from the future companion of my joys andsorrows. So I went uptown one night struggling hard to imagine myselfsupremely happy. I knew my duty--it was to be supremely happy. Ishould write that night to Gladys Todd and announce my coming on the29th; to-morrow I should find the flat; the next day I should order newclothes and look at diamond pins. 

I opened Miss Minion's front door with my pass-key, and as I climbed tomy room I seemed to emphasize with my feet the fact that I loved GladysTodd and was in an ecstasy of happiness. I slammed my hat down on thebureau as I vowed again that I loved Gladys Todd. Then I drew back andstared at my pin-cushion. The usual corpulent letter was not leaningthere; its place had been taken by an emaciated telegram. 

"Do not rent flat. Have written explanation. " Such was the message tome that day. 

At that moment I loved Gladys Todd, and I did not have to stamp thefloor to prove it. I was sure that I had lost her, and it was thesense of my loss that made my love well up from unfathomable depths tooverwhelm me. I was angry. My pride was hurt. I counted over theyears of my untiring devotion to her, and they seemed to sum up thebest years of my life. That the telegram foreran a more explicitstatement there could be no doubt. After all she had written about theflat, her instructions that the furniture which she had inherited fromher aunt must fit in, that my table must be near her easel--after allthese evidences of her thought--her command could mean only that ourromance was at an end and our dreams dissipated into air. There wassome other man, I thought--perhaps Boller of '89--and remembering him, his picturesque garb and ridiculous pose, my own vanity was deeply cut. Until late that night I sat smoking violently and turning over in mymind the problem and all its dreadful possibilities. In bed, Sleep, the friend of woe, was long coming with her kindly ministrations, andyet held me so long under her beneficent influence that when I awoke Ifound lying beside my bed, tossed there through a crack in the door, the corpulent letter addressed in the tall, angular hand. 

The first line reassured me. Strangely enough, being reassured, knowing that all the night's fears were silly phantasies born of ajealous mind, I fell back on my pillow and, holding the letter above myeyes, read as I had read a hundred of its fellows. Strangely enough, Isaid over and over to myself with grim determination that I lovedGladys Todd. From what she had written it was evident that I need haveno fear that her love was not altogether mine. She believed that wheretwo persons loved as we did, two persons who possessed each other insuch perfect happiness, it was our duty to sacrifice ourselves a littlefor those less blessed than we were. As we gave so we received, and ingiving up our summer of happiness for the happiness of others ourwinter would be doubly bright. I must confess that while I agreed withher as to the duty of self-sacrifice I was a little irritated when Ifound that our happiness must be deferred for Judge Bundy's sake. Hewas the last person in the world whom I had expected could have anyinfluence on a matter so personal as the date of my marriage. NowGladys called to my mind the recent death of his wife, and she spoke ofhis being ill, inconsolable, and miserably lonely. His life was atstake unless he could have a change of air and scene. His physicianshad ordered for him three months' travel abroad, and he simply wouldnot go unless Doctor and Mrs. Todd went with him. Unfortunately, Doctor and Mrs. Todd could not go without their daughter. SurelyDavid, always self-denying, would understand. On one side was her ownhappiness; on the other her duty to her parents to whom had come thisopportunity to see Europe, their life dream, as guests of this generousfriend. It was very hard for her to have to choose. David knew, ofcourse, what she would say were she really free to choose, but, afterall, it was only for four months, and all that time I should know that, though she was far away, her eyes were turned over-sea. 

I did not read the last five pages. They fluttered to the floor frommy listless fingers, and I turned again to my pillow and sought thefriend of woe, and again Sleep came to me with her kindlyministrations. And again I walked the Avenue, and by a modiste's doorI saw a slender figure, a little, spotless, booted foot upon the step, a little, spotless, gloved hand on the rail, and a small black hat withlong blue wings moving majestically. 

CHAPTER XV

"Penelope!" I exclaimed, holding out both hands as though her joy atthe meeting must match mine and she would spring forward to seize them. Then I checked my ardor, for it was the highest presumption for me toaddress so familiarly this woman grown, even though in years gone byshe had raced with me over the fields and had ridden behind me on sucha poor charger as Nathan, the white mule. "Miss Blight, " I added, witha formal bow. 

"I beg your pardon, " she returned, implying that she had not theremotest idea who the man could be who had so boldly spoken, haltedher, barred her passage from the brougham to the modiste's door. 

"Don't you remember David Malcolm?" I said. 

The frown fled from her face. She regarded me a moment with wide eyes. "Of course I remember David Malcolm, " she cried, and, smiling, she heldout a small gloved hand. "And I have seen you before at this veryspot--I was sure it was you. But why didn't you speak to me then?"

"Because I was not sure, " I returned, laughing aloud for the joy ofthis meeting. "You have changed since I saw you last, Penelope. It ishard even now to believe----"

Again I checked myself. I was looking past Penelope to the woman withthe Pomeranian. Disapproval of me was so plainly evident in her eyes, she seemed in herself so far removed from mountain cabins, and ifPenelope had grown worthy of such distinguished company, discretionbade me be silent. 

Penelope divined my thoughts. "And it is equally hard for me tobelieve that this tall man is the boy I pulled out of the water. " Halfturning, she addressed her companion. "This is David Malcolm, Mrs. Bannister--an old, old friend of mine. "

Mrs. Bannister probably had her own ideas of Penelope's old, oldfriends, but she was fair enough to examine me from head to foot beforeshe condemned me with the mass of them, and then finding that, to theeyes at least, I presented no glaring crudities, she accepted me onsufferance, inclining her head and parting her lips. 

"But tell me, David, " said Penelope eagerly, "where have you been allthese years and how do you happen to be here?"

Had I told Penelope the truth I should have replied that I happened tobe there because for four long months I had been looking for her, whenever I could, walking the streets with eyes alert, even onmidsummer days when I had as well searched the Sahara as the desertedtown. Perhaps in thus surrendering to the hope that, after all, Ishould find her, I had laid myself open to a self-accusation ofdisloyalty to Gladys Todd; but she was far away in those months, andthe daily letter had become a weekly and then a semimonthly budget, andthough their tone was none the less ardent I had begun to suspect thatEurope was a more attractive abiding-place than the little flat withthe easel by the window. In one letter she spoke of her longing to behome; she knew that there would be music in every beat of the ship'spropeller which carried her nearer me. In her next she announced herparents' decision to prolong their stay abroad on Judge Bundy's accountand her regret that she could not leave them. There was somethingcontradictory in these statements, and yet I accepted themcomplacently. Then postcards supplanted the semimonthly budget, andonly by them was I able to follow the movements of the travellers allthat autumn. One letter did come in October. It covered many sheets, but said little more than that it had been simply impossible to writeoftener, but she would soon be following her heart homeward. Enclosedwas a photograph of the party posed on camels with the pyramids in thebackground, and I noticed with a twinge of jealousy that Judge Bundy'scamel had posted himself beside the beast on which Gladys wasenthroned, while Doctor and Mrs. Todd had less conspicuous positions tothe left and rear. Studying the judge, I laughed at my twinge ofjealousy, for knowing him I could not doubt that Doctor and Mrs. Toddkept always to the left and rear, which was but right considering thegenerosity with which he treated them; but he looked so little thedashing Bedouin in his great derby and his frock-coat, so hot anduncomfortable that even the burning sands, the pyramids, and thecurious beast which he straddled could not make of him a romanticfigure. 

Young Tom Marshall, who honored Miss Minion's with his presence, studying the photograph on my bureau one evening, asked me who was "thebeauty with the pugree. " And when I replied with pride that she was my_fiancée_ he slapped my back in congratulation. 

"And Julius Caesar, " he went on--"Caesar visiting his African dominionsis, I suppose, her father, and the little fellow in the top-hat hisfavorite American slave, and----"

With great dignity I explained to young Marshall the relations of themembers of this Oriental group. At his suggestion that I had best takethe first steamer for Egypt I laughed. The implication was so absurdthat I even told Gladys Todd about it in my next letter to her, for Istill sat down every Saturday night and wrote to her voluminously ofall that I had been doing. Yet I was growing conscious of a sense ofher unreality. I seemed to be corresponding with the inhabitant ofanother planet, and when I looked at the girl on the camel, with thestrange pugree flowing from her hat, and the pyramids in thebackground, it seemed that she could not be the same simple girl whohad painted tulips on black plaques. 

Penelope Blight was a much more concrete figure. At any moment as Iwalked the Avenue she might come around the corner, or step from abrougham, or be looking at me from the windows of a brown-stonemansion. Was it a wonder that my eyes were always alert? One morningthree lines in a newspaper convinced me at last that the girl with theblue feathers was Penelope Blight. They announced that Rufus Blight, the Pittsburgh steel magnate, had bought a house on Fifth Avenue andwould thereafter make New York his home. That night the city seemedmore my own home than ever before and the future to hold for me morethan the past had promised. The drawn curtains of this house might behiding Penelope from me; she might be in the dark corner of that smartcarriage flying northward; even the slender figure coming toward methrough the yellow gloom, with her muff pressed against her face toguard it from the November wind, might be she. And when on the nextafternoon--by chance, it seemed, as by chance it seems all our livesare ordered--when at last by the same modiste's shop the same smartbrougham drew up at the curb, the same haughty footman opened the door, and I saw the very same blue wings, I knew that I had found Penelope atlast and I spoke without fear. 

She asked me what I had been doing all these years. I laughedjoyfully, but I did not tell her. For all these years I had beenworking for this moment!

"What have I been doing?" I said. "Why, Penelope, it would take meforever to tell you. "

"You must begin telling me right now, " she returned quickly. "You mustwalk home with me to tea and I can hear all about it as we go. To meit seems just yesterday since we went fishing in the meadow. Mrs. Bannister won't mind driving back alone--will you, Mrs. Bannister?"

Mrs. Bannister did mind it very much. She was, I learned afterward, introducing Miss Blight to the right people, and it was a violation ofher contract with Rufus Blight to allow his niece to walk in the publiceye with a man who might not be the kind of a person Miss Blight shouldbe seen with at a time when her whole future depended on her followingthe narrow way which leads to the social heaven. Of course she wouldnot mind driving home alone, but what about the hats? Mr. Malcolmwould pardon her mentioning such intimate domestic matters, but MissBlight had been away all summer and had not a hat of any kind fit to beseen in. 

"Bother the hats!" said Miss Blight. 

She laid a hand on her chaperon's arm and pushed her gently into thecarriage. Mrs. Bannister made feeble protests. Penelope was the mostwilful girl she had ever seen and knew perfectly well that she had nota thing to wear to the Perkins tea; if she had to go home she objectedto being arrested this way and clapped into a prison van. The last washurled at us as the footman was closing the door, and when Mrs. Bannister fell back in the seat, angry and silent, the Pomeranianprojected his head from the window and snapped at us. 

"Mrs. Bannister is a good soul, " Penelope said when, side by side, wewere away on that wonderful walk uptown. "She has to be properlyhandled though or I should be her slave. Her husband was a broker, orsomething like that, and died during a panic, and as she was instraitened circumstances she came to us. You see, she knows everybody, and is awfully well connected. You must be very nice to her, David. "

She called me David as naturally as though it really had been yesterdaythat we went fishing in the meadow. My heart beat quicker. I laughedaloud for the sheer joy of living in the same world with her. I vowedthat I should be very nice indeed to Mrs. Bannister. Had Penelopeasked me to be very nice to her friend Medusa I should have given hermy pledge. Subtly, by her admonition, she had conveyed to me thepromise that this walk was to be but the first of many walks, therambles of our childhood over again, but grown older and wiser and moresedate. Under what other circumstances could I be nice to Mrs. Bannister?

Having settled my line of conduct toward the martial woman with thePomeranian, I began my account of the years missing in our friendship. It was very brief. It is astonishing in how few words a man can sum uphis life's accomplishment if he holds to the essential facts. Sincethat day when she had left the farm with Rufus Blight I had studiedunder Mr. Pound, spent four years in college and three years working ona newspaper. Was I successful in my work? she asked. Fairly so, Ianswered modestly. I might have told her that I had gone ahead alittle faster than my fellows, but even then seemed to advance at asnail's pace to petty conquests, for if at the end of years I attainedto Hanks's place, I was beginning to doubt that it was worth the painswhich I was taking to win it. I did not tell her of the ambitionswhich had led me into my profession, nor how all my fine ideas had beenearly dissipated and I had settled down to a struggle for mereexistence. On one essential fact, too, was I silent. It arose to mymind as I told my brief story and it spread like a cloud darkening thisbrightest of my days. You know what the shadow was. By her absence, by her remoteness, Gladys Todd had for me a shadow's unreality. Atthis moment the tie between us was so attenuated that it was hard forme to believe that it existed at all. I knew that it did exist, but Icould not surrender myself to be bound by so frail a thread. I wassilent. Childlike, I wished the clouds away. Royally, I commanded thesea to stand back. 

"And you--what have you been doing all these years?" I asked, turningsuddenly to Penelope. 

"Just growing up, " she answered, laughing. "It's very easy to grow upwhen one has such a kind uncle as mine. You remember the poverty inwhich he found me. I was a mere charity child, and he took me----"

"To his lively, pushing town, " said I. 

"Yes, " Penelope went on, "to a big stone house with a green lawn aboutit dotted with queer figures in iron and marble. They were the mostbeautiful things I had ever seen--those statues. Now they are allstored in the stable, for we grew up, uncle and I, even in matters ofart. But it was like heaven to me then, after the mountains and thesmoky cabin, after the clearing and the weeds----"

"After our farm, " I broke in with a touch of irony, "and to ride behindthe fast trotters compared with our farm wagon----"

"David, " returned Penelope in a voice of reproach, "I have neverforgotten the mountains, or the cabin, or the farm. In the first daysaway from them I was terribly homesick for them all. My uncle sufferedfor it. His patience and his kindness were unfailing, and he softenedme at last. There is nothing in the world that I have wanted that hehas not given me. "

I was silent. The old boyish dislike of Rufus Blight had never died. I could think of him only as a sleek, vulgar man who by the force ofhis money had taken Penelope from me. His money had raised her farabove my reach, and even the cloud which shadowed this day which mighthave been my brightest seemed to have had its birth in vapors of hisgold-giving furnaces. That I had forgotten Penelope and entangledmyself in the cords of a foolish sentimentality I charged to him, andPenelope, seeing how I walked, silent, with eyes grimly set ahead, divined that I still nourished the aversion to which in my childishpetulance I had given vent so long ago. 

"You are still prejudiced against poor Uncle Rufus, I see, " she said, smiling. "I remember how badly you treated him that day when he cameto take me away. "

"Yes, I never have forgiven him, " I snapped out. "He may have reason, and justice, and saintliness on his side, yet I never can forgive him. "

"Oh, yes, you can, " said Penelope with an indulgent laugh. "You willwhen you come to know him as I do. You must, for my sake. "

"Perhaps, for your sake, " said I, relenting a little. 

"I knew you would for my sake, David, " said Penelope. "Why, I oweeverything I have in the world to him. Since he has retired, sold hisworks to a trust, I think they call it, his whole life seems to be tolook after me. Pittsburgh isn't much of a place for a man who has nobusiness; so we thought we should try New York for a while, and webought the house last spring and spent the summer in Bar Harbor. Nowwe are just settling down. "

I was hardly listening as she spoke, for my mind was occupied by RufusBlight. He had reason and justice on his side. That much Isurrendered to him, but I clung obstinately to my dislike. I thoughtof the Professor flying over the clearing to the hiding of themountains; I remembered him in the college hall, with his bitter wordspointing the way from which his own weakness held him back, the manwhose imagination ranged so far while his hands were idle. I picturedhis brother grown fat and happy at the trough of gold at which he fed, and even had I not felt a personal feud with Rufus Blight, my sympathyfor the under-dog must have aroused my antipathy. But I hated him formy own sake. For every foolish step that I had taken since that daywhen he had carried Penelope away the fault seemed to have been his asmuch as mine, and yet I was wise enough to see that if I would holdPenelope's regard it would be very rash to show by word or deed that Inursed any resentment. 

"For your sake I will, Penelope, " I said. 

So soft and satisfied was the smile with which she rewarded me that Ivowed to myself that I really would forgive my old archenemy. A momentbefore it had been on my lips to speak of my confiscated letters, for Ihad no doubt that Rufus Blight had intercepted them. Now I realizedthat in them was a mine which I might fire only to shatter ournew-found friendship. That treachery, too, I said, I should forgive. When Penelope set the light to the fuse, I with rare presence of mindstamped out the flames and prevented a disaster. 

We had passed Fiftieth Street, and I was telling her of my last visithome, of my father and mother, of Mr. Pound, and of all the friends ofour younger days, when she suddenly turned to me. It was as though thequestion had for some time been hanging on her lips. "David, why didyou never answer the letters I wrote you?"

"Because. " I was playing for time. To carry out my plan of silence, it seemed that I must deceive her, and I hesitated to tell her anuntruth. 

"Because why?" she insisted. 

"Because I never received them, " I answered, cheered by the thoughtthat thus far I could tell her the truth. "Did you really write to me?"

"Many times, " she said; "until I got tired of writing and receiving noanswer. You made me very angry. "

"The letters must have been lost in the mail, " said I, bent on keepingthis disagreeable subject in the background. "Country post-offices arevery careless in the way they handle things, and mine to you--myletters--must have gone astray too. "

"Then you did write to me as you promised, David?" she exclaimed. 

"Until I got tired of receiving no answer, " I returned, laughing. "Butof course it is too late to complain to the government now. "

Penelope was not satisfied. Her brows were knitted. I believed thatthere lurked in her mind a suspicion that not the government alone wasconcerned in the interruption of that early correspondence, but I wasdetermined to ignore a subject which, if too closely pressed, mightbring about unpleasant consequences. The easiest way was to turn thetrend of her thought with a bold question, which had been hanging on mylips through many blocks of the walk. And so, as casually as though Iinquired of her about some distant friend or relative, I spoke of herfather. 

Penelope stopped short and laid a hand upon my arm. Then as suddenlyshe strode ahead. 

"I know nothing of him, David, " she said in a voice almost harsh. "Ihave not seen him since that dreadful day in the clearing. Once Iheard from him--a few lines--but that was so long ago that at times Ialmost forget that I ever had a father. "

"What did he write to you, Penelope?"

She seemed not to hear my question, for she was walking very fast, withher eyes set straight ahead of her. "He might pass me at this minute, David, and I should not know him. That might be he, standing by thatwindow, and I should be none the wiser, yet the fault is his. I tryalways to think of him as I should, but at times it seems as though hehad disowned me, abandoned me on his brother's doorstep and then runaway. You ask of the letter. It came to me soon after I left thefarm. He said that it was best that my uncle should have me, betterthan to condemn me to shift about the world with him; he said that hehad been a lazy, worthless creature, but he was going to do something, to be somebody--those were his words; and some day, when I could beproud of him, he would come back and claim me, and, David, he has nevercome. Will he ever come, do you think?"

"I think he will, " I answered. "For I have seen him. "

"You have seen him!" The hand was on my arm again, and, forgetful ofthe hurrying crowd around us, we stood there face to face, while I toldher of the brief glimpse I had had of him four years before. Shelistened, breathless, and, when I had finished, walked on in silence. 

We were crossing the Plaza when she spoke again, half to me, halfruminating. "Poor father! He must have tried and failed. He wasgoing to Tibet, David, you told me; that was four years ago. Where canhe be now? Wandering around the world alone, in want, perhaps, and Ihave everything. Do you suppose he believes that I have forgottenhim--as if I could forget those evenings when we sat together andpainted pictures of the times when we should be rich! He called me theprincess and planned great houses in which we should live, and he wouldtalk of our travels and the wonderful places we should see together. Even then I had faith that our dreams would come true, though it didseem that we were getting poorer and poorer all the time, and fatherdoing nothing to help our plight. The dreams came true, David--for me. Why doesn't he come and share them with me, with me and Uncle Rufus?That is what troubles me; that is what I can never understand. "

I said to myself that Rufus Blight, were he so minded, could clear themystery away. I thought of him as a selfish, arrogant man, who was, perhaps, too well satisfied not to have an undesirable third person inhis household to undertake any sincere search for his brother. Butthese thoughts I concealed. There was something behind it all that wetwo could not understand, I said, and Penelope looked up to me withclouded eyes. 

"But we will find him, Penelope!" My stick hit the pavement as Iregistered a vow. "We will find him--you and I. "

"How like the little David you are, " she cried, and then smiling lightbroke through the clouded eyes. "We shall try to find him, anyway, shall we not--to bring father home. For look, David!" She had halted. The small gloved hand was lifted, and the blue wings in her hat movedwith an old-time majesty. "There is the palace we dreamed of!"

CHAPTER XVI

Penelope and I were standing before a great gray-stone house. Icarried my eyes from the doors of iron grill-work over the severebreadth of wall, broken only by rank above rank of windows so heavilycurtained that one might have suspected those within to live indarkness, fearing even to face the sunlight. I laughed. When I hadbeen searching for the girl with the blue feathers in her hat, I hadnever given this house more than a passing glance, deeming italtogether too palatial in its size and too severe in its aspect toshield a man of so garish a mind as I attributed to Rufus Blight, judging him from memory alone. I should have placed him rather nextdoor to it, behind the over-ornate Moorish front and had him look outon the world through curtains of elaborately figured lace. But within, I now said to myself, I shall find the expression of the man in a riotof color in walls and hangings and in ill-assorted mobs of furniture. Here again I was wrong. We passed the grilled doors into a place sogray and cold that it might have led us to a cloister. We mountedbroad stairs, our footfalls muffled by a heavy carpeting of sounobtrusive a color that I cannot name it. We crossed a white panelledhall, so sparsely furnished that the untutored might have thought thatthe family were just moving in or just moving out. Penelope pushedthrough heavy portières and we stood at last in a room that seemeddesigned for human habitation. But it was the design of an alien mind, not of the owner. The owner had not been allowed to fit it to himselfas he would his clothes. The alien mind had said: You do not know; youmust allow me to arrange your habitat. Here I have placed thewonderful old fireplace which I bought for you in France, and above itthe Reynolds for which you paid forty thousand dollars; here in thecentre is the carved table which I got for you in Florence, andgeometrically arranged about its corners are books of travel; with itsback to it, a great divan covered with most expensive leather, so thatyou can lounge in its depths and watch the fire. Around it I havearranged sundry other chairs done in deep-green velour to tone in withthe walls, and along the walls are bookcases, fronted with diamondpanes and filled with leather-bound volumes--for this, sir, is yourlibrary. 

The room was so perfect that Mrs. Bannister, seated before the fire, brewing herself a lonely cup of tea, seemed a jarring note. She wouldhave been as much in place in a corner of the _Galerie-de-Glace_ atVersailles, and but for her presence and her domestic occupation Imight have said to myself after a languid survey, "So, this is wherethe king lounged"--then waited to be led on. 

Mrs. Bannister was expecting us. She spoke as though in having teawaiting she had acted in the forlorn hope that some time we mightreturn, and as though for hours she had been a prey to the gravestapprehensions, for Penelope's safety. In bringing Penelope back at allI had in some degree allayed the hostility with which she at firstregarded me, but though she was now outwardly quite cordial, I wasconscious that over the top of her cup she was studying me closely as Isat on the divan stirring my tea and striving to be thoroughly at home. Her subtle scrutiny made me very uncomfortable. She asked me questionswith an obvious purpose of putting me at my ease, and I answered inembarrassed monosyllables. Whether I would or no, I seemed constantlyto slide to the perilous edge of my seat, and no matter what care Iused, I strewed crumbs over the rug until it seemed to me that my bitof cake had a demoniacal power of multiplying itself. 

I was angry--this hour, this formal passage of inane conversation, wasso different from what I had pictured my first meeting with Penelope tobe. I was angry at my weakness in letting this perfect room overpowerme, and this woman of the world, with no other weapon than theknowledge of the people one should know, transfix me, silence me, transform me into a dull, bucolic boor. Penelope was annoyed. I knewthat she was chagrined at my lack of _savoir faire_, for in one of thelong pauses following an abrupt response of mine I caught a glance ofmute despair. She seemed to accuse me of falling short of herexpectations by my lamentable lack of the social graces. 

I was for flight then. I rose to go. I paused to dispute in my mindwhether I must say farewell first to the older or the younger woman, and from the hopelessness of ever solving the question I might havestood there for an hour pulling at my hands had not the portièresopened and Rufus Blight come in. 

I should not have known him as Rufus Blight but for Penelope's joyoushail. I had expected to see him as I saw him that day when he came tothe farm to take Penelope away--a short, fat, pompous man with abristling red mustache and a hand that moved interminably; a sleek manin spotless, creaseless clothes who might have stood in his ownshow-window to inspire his fellows to sartorial perfection. I saw, instead, a small man, rather thin, and slightly bald. The bristlingred mustache had turned to gray and drooped. His whole figure drooped. His black clothes hung in many careless creases, and as he came forwardit was not with his old quick, all-conquering step, but haltingly, asthough Mrs. Bannister owned the room and he doubted if he were welcome. I lost my embarrassment in wonder. I recalled my old fond pictures ofRufus Blight when he should have grown older and fatter, more pompousand more all-commanding. I watched the little dusty man drawPenelope's head down to him and kiss her. I looked around the room, atthe great fireplace, at the Reynolds, at the carved table and thecostly empty spaces, and I lost myself in the marvel that he shouldhave attained them. 

"Uncle Rufus, " Penelope said, drawing him toward me, "here is some oneyou will be glad to see. It's David Malcolm, my old friend DavidMalcolm. "

"Why, David Malcolm--my old friend, too, " cried Mr. Blight, his facelighting genially as he took my hand. "The boy who wouldn't let mehave Penelope. Upon my word, David, I didn't blame you. "

He laughed and shook my hand again and again. He asked after my fatherand mother as though they were his dearest friends, and I contrastedhis cordial mention of them with his once cavalier treatment, but whenhe made me sit beside him on the divan and meet and answer a rapid fireof questions as to myself and my occupation, the old prejudices beganto disappear before his simple, unaffected kindness. Penelope was onhis other side, and her hand was in his. I forgave him. I forgot theneglect of long ago. I forgot even the mystery of the letters. Iforgot the fat, pompous, all-commanding man. This was a meeting ofthree rare old friends. Mrs. Bannister, too, had gone from mythoughts. If she still regarded me over the top of her cup, I wasunconscious of it, for I was telling how I had come to meet Penelopeagain, and he was recalling the day when, as a small boy, I hadresisted him so vigorously. 

"It has all turned out well, eh, David?" Rufus Blight said, laying ahand upon my knee. "Here we are--the three of us--just as if we hadnever quarrelled--good friends; and it is good to find old friends. Wehaven't many old friends, Penelope and I. Indeed, but for Mrs. Bannister"--he bowed to the majestic woman--"we should have few newones. An old one recovered is too precious to lose; and we are notgoing to lose you again--are we, Penelope?"

The color shot high on Penelope's cheeks as she laughingly assented, and I flattered myself that she had forgotten the boor who a fewmoments before had shown to such disadvantage under Mrs. Bannister'scritical eye. 

"You must come to us often, " Rufus Blight pursued. "I shall be glad tosee you any time. It is good to have an old friend about when timehangs so heavily on one's hands as it does on mine. Never go out ofbusiness, David. Take warning from me, and don't let yourself bestranded, with nothing to do but to play golf. Golf is a pooroccupation. I was out to-day--couldn't find a soul around theclub--had to take on the professional--spoiled my score by getting intothe brook on the tenth hole, and came home utterly miserable anddissatisfied with life. But when you get well wetted you appreciatethe kitchen stove, as old Bill Hansen, in our town, used to say--eh, Mrs. Bannister?"

From this I surmised that Mr. Blight as well as the ball had gone intothe brook, and in the homely aphorism I divined a subtle purpose tobait Mrs. Bannister, which showed an astonishing courage in somild-mannered a little man. Such was the awe in which I held Mrs. Bannister that I could have loved any one who dared in her presence toacknowledge an acquaintance with old Bill Hansen. If Mrs. Bannisterdid disapprove, she was careful not to show it. Her lips parted in ahalf smile and she observed to me that Mr. Blight had a jovial way ofquoting Mr. Hansen, as though Mr. Hansen were his dearest friend. 

"He is, " declared Mr. Blight. "To be sure, I haven't seen him foryears, but I always remember him as the wisest man I ever knew. Why, if it wasn't for Penelope I should go back to the valley, just to benear him. It would be better than golf--to sit with him on the storeporch on a sunny day listening to the mill rumbling by the creek andthe killdee whistling in the meadow, to watch the shadows crawl alongthe mountains, and now and then to hear Bill Hansen say something. That would be living--eh, David?"

Rufus Blight touched a train of thought which had been often in mymind. Here was a man who had won in the great fight and he seemed tobe camping now on the field which he had taken. About him were thespoils--the Reynolds, the fireplace, the perfectly bound books, and thecostly spaces of the great room. Yet he was voicing the same longingthat I, whose fight was just beginning, had often felt--the longing tostep aside from the struggle for vain things, the longing to turn fromthe smoke and grime of the conflict to the quiet and peace of thevalley. Now I voiced that longing too, forgetting Mrs. Bannister andher evident creed that man's chief end was to know the right people. 

"It would be living, indeed, " I said with enthusiasm. "More than onceI have been on the point of going back to stay. I don't suppose youever knew my old friend Stacy Shunk, did you? When it comes to realwisdom I'd rather talk to Stacy Shunk than----"

Mrs. Bannister had half risen--I thought in horror. It was really thebutler who had brought my eulogy of Stacy Shunk to a sudden close, for, appearing in half-drawn portières, he announced: "Mr. Talcott. "

The mere entrance of Mr. Talcott carried us far from the valley andsuch rude associates as old Bill Hansen and his kind. I think thateven Rufus Blight would have been too discreet to refer to them in hispresence--for Penelope's sake, if nothing else. He was a slender youngman of medium height, clean-shaven, perfectly groomed, and perfectlymannered. He was as much at ease as I had been ill at ease, and Ienvied him for it. He declined tea because he had just come from theclub, and I envied him this delightful way of avoiding cake andembarrassing crumbs. Mrs. Bannister addressed him as Herbert, and Iknew at once that he was Edward Herbert Talcott, whose name I had oftenseen in my paper-reading task. His claim to distinction was descentfrom the man whose name he bore, a member of the cabinet of one of ourearly presidents. A dead statesman in a family is always a valuableasset, and the longer dead the better. Statesmen, like wines, must behidden away in vaults long years to be properly mellowed for socialuses. I think that Mr. Secretary Talcott would have been astonished, indeed, could he have measured his influence after a century by thenumbers, collateral and direct, who were proud to use his name. Therewere Talcott Joneses, and Talcott Robinsons, and Talcott Browns by thescore in town, but one and all they acknowledged the primacy of thisEdward Herbert Talcott, and never lost an opportunity of speaking ofhim as their cousin. He had written, I learned afterward, a monographon his great-grandfather, which had given him a certain literarydistinction in his own set, and it was generally understood that, whilehe might easily have earned a livelihood by his pen, he had beenrelieved of the necessity of doing it by his ancestors' investments inHarlem real estate. 

Talcott looked perfectly inoffensive, and yet he had hardly been seatedbefore I conceived a profound aversion to him. Mrs. Bannister'streatment of him did much to arouse it. Here, she seemed to say, is ahuman being, a sentient creature with ideas in his head, a finished manwith an appreciation of the finer things of life. She asked him if hewas going to the Martin dance. 

Mr. Talcott did not know--he might--he hadn't made up his mind. 

"There will probably be a rather mixed crowd, " he said, with his lipstwitching into a cynical smile. 

Rufus Blight, who had moved to a chair by the fire, shook his head indisapproval of mixed crowds, and Mrs. Bannister said that, nevertheless, the Martins were getting along and certainly would get in. 

"And sometimes, you know, mixed crowds are rather fun, " said Talcott;and turning to Penelope: "I suppose you are not going?"

"I certainly am, " Penelope answered heartily. "I love dancing so. "

"Well, I shall, then, " said Talcott. "You see, I was up awfully lateat the Coles's last night--three o'clock when I left. Why did you goso early? I looked for you everywhere. I rather thought I should layoff to-night and rest up for a dinner, the opera, and the Grantsto-morrow evening. But I'll go to-night anyway. We'll get up a littlecrowd of our own for supper. That's the thing about mixed crowds: atleast you can have your own little set for supper. "

Having settled this problem and taken possession of Penelope for thatevening, Talcott went on to outline a jolly little plan of his to takepossession of her for an entire day in the near future--as soon asthere was skating at Tuxedo. Quite a large party were going up, BobbyThis and Willie That, to all of which Penelope assented, while Mrs. Bannister laughed merrily. She understood that Bobby This was notgoing anywhere this year. Between them they drove me quite mad. Amoment ago I had been so much at home; now I should have been more atease in a company of astronomers talking of the stars, though I knewnothing of the heavens. I could only smile vaguely in a pretence ofentering into all that they were saying; and when Talcott looked at me, when he pronounced his dictum that mixed crowds were a bore, I gave afeeble assent. When, to make my presence felt, I boldly asserted thatI had never been to Tuxedo, Talcott replied that some time I must gothere--I should like it--he was sure that I should like it, though thecrowd was getting rather mixed. Having thus quieted me, he reverted toBar Harbor and the summer, to various persons and events concerningwhich I was supremely ignorant. I left abruptly perhaps. I hadforgotten the problem as to whom I should say my farewell last. Penelope said that I must come again and often. Mrs. Bannister gave mea pleasant but, I thought, a condescending smile, and Rufus Blightfollowed me down the stairs, talking platitudes about the weather whilehe called a man to bring my coat and hat. 

The grilled door closed behind me, and I walked down the darkeningstreet. I had found Penelope grown lovelier than the loveliest figureof my boyish dreams. Yet it was as though I had found her in anotherworld than mine, and moving among another race. She might remember theboy whom she had dragged from the mountain stream, the boy whom she hadcarried to the desolation of her humble home; could she long rememberthe awkward man who sat on the edge of his chair and scattered crumbs, who when he talked could talk only of old Bill Hansen and Stacy Shunk?The longing for the valley was gone. Had the world been mine I wouldhave given it for a card to the dance that night, however mixed thecrowd, for then I should be near her. If I would be near her, then herfriends must be my friends, and, whether they would or no, I swore thatday they should be. 

The hall of Miss Minion's house smelled terribly of cooking that nightas I passed through it. Standing at last in my own narrow room, Ibrought my clinched fist down on my table as I registered my vow that Iwould attain to her world. Then I sank down and covered my face withmy hands, for out of the little frame Gladys Todd was looking at me. 

CHAPTER XVII

When I sat again on the great divan, I said to myself that, after all, the alien mind who designed this room had worked with cunning; he musthave seen in his fancy the very picture that was now so delightful tomy eyes--the gray old fireplace with its tall columns wound with vineswhose delicate leaves quivered as the firelight fanned them; before itPenelope, a slender figure, softly drawn in the evening's shadow, bentover the low tea-table as she worked with the rebellious lamp; fromabove, looking down kindly, half smiling, Reynolds's majestic lady, frilled and furbelowed; at her feet a giant white bear, its long clawsgripping the polished floor, its jaws distended fiercely as though itstood guard, ready to spring at him who dared to cross the charmedcircle drawn by the glowing coals. I sat in the half-darkness, for itwas late in the day, and but a single shaded lamp burned in a distantcorner. What was new in the room grew old under the wizard touch ofshadows. The mahogany bookcases stretched away on either hand, andthere were cobwebs on the diamond panes and dust on the ancient tomes. Penelope was in her home! A hundred years ago that majestic lady infrills and furbelows sat by this same fireplace, in that same oldcarved chair, making tea, and now she smiled with great content as fromher frame she looked down on this child of her blood and bone. And theancestor who had gathered those dusty volumes--what of him? Twohundred years it was, perhaps, since he had burrowed among the cobwebs, now caressing his rare old Horace, now turning the yellow pages of hislearned treatise on astrology. He was a distinguished figure in hiswig, his velvet coat and smallclothes, and something of his features, refined by intellectual pursuit, I read in the face that now was turnedto mine. For blood does tell. Father Time is a reckless artist, clipping and cutting and recasting incessantly, and producing anappalling number of failures; but now and then it would seem that hedid take some pains and, studying his models, combine the broad, lowbrow of this one with another's straight and finely chiselled nose, andstill another's smoothly rounded cheek; and sometimes, in his cynicalway, he will spoil it all with a pair of coarse hands borrowed from oneof his rustic figures or the large, flat feet of some study of peasantlife, which we should have thought cast away and forgotten. InPenelope we were offended by none of these grotesque fragments. Theymust have been long since cleared out of her ancestral line. When sheraised herself after her battle with the rebellious lamp, it was withthe grace of unconscious pride, with the majesty of the lady in theframe, but finer drawn, thanks to the thin old gentleman of the books, who had overfed his mind and bequeathed to his descendants a legacy ofnerves. 

This Penelope Blight, daintily clothed in soft black webs woven for herby a hundred toiling human spiders, was not even the Penelope Blight ofmy wildest boyish dreams. Our dreams are circumscribed by ourexperience, and in those days it had been inconceivable to me that sheshould grow more lovely than Miss Mincer, the butcher's daughter, and Ihad pictured myself walking proudly through the streets of Malcolmvilleat the side of a tall, slender girl, her head crowned by a glazed blackhat, her body incased in a tight-fitting jersey. This Penelope Blightin the carved chair where generations of her grandmothers had made teabefore her, by the stately fireplace at which her forebears had warmedtheir hands and hearts, could have no kin with the barefooted girl whohad stood with me at the edge of the clearing and, pointing over theweeds to the forlorn cabin, called it home. 

Was it a wonder that my tone was formal; that, overcome by a sense ofestrangement, I talked of the weather as I sipped my tea; that I askedher if she had enjoyed last night's dance, speaking as though dancingwere my own favorite amusement; that when I pronounced her name it wasin a halting, embarrassed undertone? Even speaking, it thus seemedgross presumption. How unlikely, then, that I should refer to by-gonedays in her presence when it was incredible that there had ever beendays like those! In all probability she would draw herself up andreply that I must be thinking of some other Penelope Blight, that toher I was nothing more than a formal creature whom she had metsomewhere, where she could not remember, a man like hundreds of otherswhom she knew, lay figures for the tailor's art, who spoke only alanguage limited to the last dance and the one to come. Believingthis, I finished my tea, and, putting down my cup, I abandoned my oneresource when conversation lagged. Why had I come at all?

I had come to sit with Penelope, just as we were sitting now, in theshadows, in the firelight. At home we had often sat together on theback steps, in the shadows of the valley, in the firelight of theclouds glowing in the last sun flames. Now we should be, as then, goodcomrades, and freely as I had talked to her then as from our humbleperch we watched the departing day, so freely could I talk to her nowin the statelier environment. In that short walk uptown I had left athousand things unsaid. But one special thing I had left unsaid, onevital fact in my life unrevealed, that was of paramount importance. Inthe excitement of our first meeting my silence had been discretion, butdiscretion became deception as time passed, and every day was adding toits sum. Sometimes I could forget the vital fact. Sometimes at nightin my room, sitting with my book at my side neglected, I would starevacantly at the wall and treat myself to a feast of dreams, contentedlymunch the most delicate morsels of the past and present. And by rightof that past and present it was almost fore-ordained that Penelope andI were to go down the years together. Then I would remember. I wouldstart from my chair with a despairing laugh and pace up and down mynarrow room, restless and unhappy. I knew that I could not long delayrevealing to Penelope the paramount fact, and in revealing it to her Iseemed to say that after all she was only a casual friend, that all mylife's interest was bound up in Gladys Todd, and my life's ambitionexpressed in a room with an easel by the window, a bird's-eye-maplemantel, and around the walls a rack for odd lots of china andblack-framed prints. It was hard to tell her that, but I knew that Imust, and I said that I should talk freely as in the old days ofbrotherly confidence, as though of all others she would be happiest inhearing of my good fortune. With my mind made up to face boldly thisbad situation, I could not crush the consoling hope that in hearing shewould give some sign of the pain of the wound that I was making. Whata fatuous illusion! In her presence, in an environment which made thatwhich I planned for myself seem so narrow and commonplace, she became aspirit thoroughly alien. I could as easily have talked to some foreignprincess of the blood of Mr. Pound or Stacy Shunk. I could as easilyhave announced to Mrs. Bannister that I was engaged to Gladys Todd. And I must have gone away, fled ignominiously after one cup of tea, hadnot Penelope, with a sudden impatient movement, turned her chair andleaned forward with her chin cupped in her hands, as she used to sit inthe old days on the back steps, with her eyes fixed on mine. 

"David, " she said, "did you really come here to talk to me about theweather or to tell me things I really want to know--of Mr. Pound, ofMiss Spinner and Stacy Shunk. Who drives the stage now?"

I was on the edge of the divan, my hands playing an imaginary game ofcat's-cradle when she spoke, and now I pushed back into the comfortabledepths and stared at her in surprise. I was amazed at hearing thisprincess of the blood descend to an interest in such plebeians. She, seeing that I was silent, leaned back too, each small hand gripping anarm of that throne-like chair. 

"Well?" she said; and when still I was silent she repeated moreinsistently: "Well, David?" Then raising her voice a little to a toneof command: "I asked you who drives the stage. "

I forgot the carved chair and Reynolds's majestic lady. I forgot theimposing fireplace and the old gentleman in wig and smallclothes. Ilaughed with the sheer joy of being with Penelope again. I forgot eventhe great divan and made a futile effort to jump it nearer her in myburst of enthusiasm for our new-born friendship. 

"Why, Joe Hicks, " I said. "You remember Joe Hicks, Penelope?"

"Joe Hicks, " she said, pronouncing the name as though it were that ofsome dear friend suddenly dragged out of the by-gone years. "Surelynot the same Joe Hicks who used to let us ride with him sometimes fromMalcolmville out to the farm?"

"The same Joe Hicks, " said I, and with a strange disregard for formsand effects I gave way to a natural desire of hunger and dived at thecurate's delight, forgetting entirely the crumb-begetting habits ofcake. "Try one of those, " I went on, indicating the topmost plate, andto my delight she helped herself, almost with avidity. "You remember, Penelope, how we used to loiter near the kitchen when we smelled cakein the oven?"

Then Penelope laughed as though in the sheer joy of casting years awayand living over her childhood. 

"Indeed I do, " she returned. "But we were speaking of Joe Hicks. Yousurprised me. He was an old man when we knew him. "

"He was seventy then. He is still seventy, " I returned. "Stage-driving, you know, is conducive----"

"I used to think I'd like to be a stage-driver when I grew up, " sheinterrupted. "You would see so much of the world with so littletrouble, just holding the reins as the horses ambled along. How ourideas change, David!"

It was on the old and unchanged ideas that I wanted to dwell. The newwould bring me back all too quickly to ancestral portraits, to imposingfireplaces and costly bear-skin rugs. I assented readily to herself-evident proposition and brushed it aside for the most interestingmatter of Joseph Hicks. 

"You used to love to drive, " I said. "I can see you now wheedling Joeinto letting you have the reins. Don't you remember his telling youthat no self-respecting woman was ever seen driving more than onehorse?"

"How shocked he would be could he see how I handle four, " she said. 

Should we never get out of the shadow of costly things, out of theclutch of changed ideas? For a moment I had a picture of Penelope onthe box of a coach, ribbons and whip in hand, with four smart cobsstepping to the music of jingling harness, with bandy-legged grooms onthe boot, and beside her some perfectly tailored creature in aglistening top-hat. It was a gallant picture, and one in which therewas no part for me. Metaphorically I hurled at it a missile of thecommon clay of which, after all, we were both made. Surely fishing wasa subject on which her ideas could not change. 

"Do you remember the great expeditions we used to have along thecreek?" I said. 

"Remember them? Why, David, I never could forget such days as those. "She leaned forward, with her hands clasped in her lap, as though tobring herself into closer touch with the kindred spirit on the divan. "I often laugh over the time I caught the big turtle on my hook. Youremember--we were on the bridge at the end of the meadow, and I thoughtI had captured a whale, and when I saw it I was so astonished that Iwent head-first into the water. "

"And I dived after you, " I cried excitedly, "into two feet of water andthree feet of mud. "

"And we both ran home soaking wet and covered with green slime, " shewent on rapidly. "Will you ever forget her look when mother----"

"Mother?" There was in my exclamation a note of surprise in which wasalmost lost the delight I felt in her use of that word. 

She caught the surprise alone, and spoke now as though offended at whatshe thought my protest. "Yes, mother. Why, David, don't you rememberI always called her mother? And she was the only mother I everknew--even if only for a brief summer. "

"I was glad, Penelope, " I said. "Yet you surprised me just a little, because I feared that so much had come into your life you might haveforgotten----"

"Forgotten?" she returned with a gesture of impatience. "You do notgrant me much heart if you think I could ever forget those who took mein when I was homeless, the mother who tucked me into bed every night, who taught me the first prayer I ever uttered. " She paused for amoment, and sat with her eyes fixed on her clasped hands. I, too, wassilent. Suddenly she looked up. "You are right, David; I hadforgotten. I was ungrateful, too; but seeing you again and talkingwith you has brought those days very near to me. When I have thoughtof your father and mother it was as though they lived in another world, as though, if I would, I could never see them, they were so far away. "She leaned back in her chair and broke into a little laugh. "Howfoolish of me! Why, David, we shall go to see them--you and I andUncle Rufus. We shall go very soon, David. " Her slender figure wasclear-cut in the firelight and a hand was held out to me in invitation. 

Had the world been mine to give, how gladly would I have lost it forthe right to answer her as she asked; to go with her and to walk by thecreek to that deep sea of our childhood where she had caught theturtle; to ride with her again over the mountain road where we hadcareered so madly on the white mule; to sit with her on the humble backsteps and watch the sun sink into the mountains, and listen to thesheep in the meadow, the night-hawk in the sky, the rustle of the windin the trees--to the valley's lullaby. From this I was held by thevital fact still unrevealed. I folded my arms and looked at the floor, to shut from my eyes the idle vision of the days to which Penelopewould lead me, to shut from them Penelope herself sitting verystraight, with head high, so that I had fancied the blue bow tossingthere. 

"We'll go in May, " she said with a sweep of a small hand, as though ourgreat adventure were settled. "We will go when the orchards are inblossom, David. The valley is loveliest then. "

To go in May! To go when the hills were clad in the pink and white!To sit with her on the grassy barn-bridge in the evening as we had satin the old days watching the mountains sink into the night, listeningto the last faint echoes of the valley as she turned to restful sleep. Had the universe been mine to give, I would have bartered it for thepower to answer her as she asked. Such joys as these I dared not evendream of now, but still I had not the strength to cut myself foreverfrom the last faint hope of them. I looked up into her face aglow withprospect of a return to those simple, kindly days; into her eyes, kindled with that same light that glowed in them in the old time whenshe would slip her hands so trustingly in mine as we trudged togetherover the fields. I could say nothing. 

"Why, David!" she cried, and again a hand was held out to me in appeal. "Don't you want to go with us?"

I laughed. And what a struggle I had to force into that laugh a noteof happy gayety! I sat on the edge of the divan, very erect, pullingat my fingers, for I was no longer David Malcolm, a dreaming boy; I wasa man with a vital fact to meet. Meeting it, I must become to her asany other man she knew--a formal creature, a lay figure for thebarber's and tailor's art, with a gift of talking inanities. 

"It's not because I don't want to go, " I said. I was glad that I wasin the shadow, for though my voice was steady I felt the blood leave myface. "But you see--there is something I have been wanting to tellyou. I'm to be married. "

"Oh!" she exclaimed. 

If I had hoped to hear more of a cry of pain than that one exclamationof surprise, I must have been disappointed. But I cherished no suchhope now. I was utterly miserable. I was awkward and ill at ease. The Penelope Blight I had known lived in another world, and thisPenelope Blight who was regarding me so quietly, meeting my covertglance with a friendly smile, could, after all, never be more than acasual acquaintance. 

"How splendid!" she said. Mrs. Bannister, I think, would have spokenin that same way, as though the news were quite the most delightfulthat she had ever heard. "Who to? Quick--I must hear all about it. "

"To a Miss Todd, " I answered, and, though I struggled against it, Icleared my throat dryly. "A Miss Gladys Todd. "

The name sounded harshly in my ears. I was conscious that I had usedit in the manner of the select circles of Harlansburg, and I was angrythat, though knowing better, I had let myself lapse into the ways of amanikin. When I had spoken of Joe Hicks it was from my heart; I hadforgotten my hands, and Penelope and I had laughed together. When Ispoke of Gladys Todd my voice was tainted with apology. Inwardly I wascalling myself a cad, for it mattered little whether or not I lovedher. I had won her trust, and my first duty was to speak her name withpride. But I had had that brief glimpse of Penelope Blight, thecompanion of my boyhood; I had walked with her, grown lovelier than mydreams, through visionary woods and fields. She was before me, adainty woman of the world; behind her the firelight fanned the leavescarved for her long ago by the old Italian artist; from aboveReynolds's majestic lady looked down at her kindly, at me with ahaughty stare, as if she read presumption in my mind. Never could Iimagine her photographed on a camel's back by the side of ex-JudgeBundy. For this alone, it seemed to me as though I were unfolding toher the love story of a Darby and Joan, adorned with a chaos of easelsand camels, bird's-eye-maple mantels and gayly painted plaques; asthough I had come to tell the great lady of it, because she had alwaystaken a kindly interest in my affairs. 

Against this absurd humiliation I was fighting when again I cougheddryly and said: "She is the daughter of Doctor Todd, the president ofMcGraw. "

"Oh, I see, " returned Penelope brightly. "She must be very learned, David. But of course I knew that you would marry a clever woman. " Tothis gentle flattery I raised my hand and shook my head in protest. "And I see, too, how it all came about--at college. How romantic!Just like you, David. And yet I can hardly think of you as a marriedman. It was only yesterday that I pulled you out of the creek;to-morrow you are to marry a charming woman--an accomplished woman, Iknow. She must sing and play the piano and do all kinds of things likethat. How proud you should be!"

"I am, " said I in a sepulchral tone, much as I might have answered tomy name at roll-call. 

"When she comes to town you must let me know--I shall call on her. "There was no note but one of kindliness in Penelope's easily modulatedvoice, nothing but friendliness in the smile which parted her lips. Asshe leaned forward again, grasping the carved arms of her chair, shewas speaking with queenly condescension, and it nettled me to findmyself reduced to the level of the herd. 

So there was in my voice a faint ring of pride when I said: "Gladys isabroad now. " At least in this august presence a fiancée abroad soundedmore impressive than a fiancée in Harlansburg, and I wanted it knownthat mine was a woman of the world and not simply the accomplisheddaughter of a small country town. 

I think that the point struck home, for a hopeful "Oh!" escaped fromPenelope's lips, as though she were giving vent to bottled-up doubts asto whether or not she could ever more than call on Gladys Todd. Ithink that she divined what I wanted her to understand--that thoughGladys Todd had painted tulips on black plaques, she had acquired thedignity that comes with travel and the grace of a widened view. 

"You must both come and dine with me when she gets home, " Penelopesaid, with a manner of increased interest. "I suppose she is studying, David, music or painting. "

"Travelling, " I answered, encouraged to nonchalance by the impression Iwas making, for to travel merely sounded much more prosperous than tobe working at the rudiments of an art. "She has been over since lastMay--just travelling around. "

"And gathering together a trousseau--how delightful! You must becounting the days till she comes home, David?"

I nodded. I tried my best to look as though at that very moment I wasbusy with the fond calculation. 

"And who is with her--some friend?" Penelope asked. 

"Her father and mother, " I answered. That sounded still moreprosperous: the family of three--the learned doctor, his wife andaccomplished daughter--wandering where they willed about the world. Ishould have stopped there, but I am one of those unfortunate personswho in telling anything must tell it all. My better judgment made mehesitate. My habit carried me on. "And Judge Bundy, " I added. 

"Judge who?" she exclaimed. 

I fancied that I detected a strange note in her voice. 

"Bundy--Judge Bundy, " I replied, my own voice rising to a pitch ofirritation. 

Would she go on and make me spell the name that sounded so strangelywhen spoken in her presence? I was angry. It was at myself for myuncalled-for frankness. For one brief moment I had almost raisedmyself again to the level of the dainty creature in the old carvedchair, to the approval even of the majestic lady above the greatfireplace; speaking so nonchalantly of my friends who could wanderwhere they willed over the face of the globe, I had almost made myselfone with those for whom Italian sculptors drove the chisel and Reynoldsplied his brush. But that name, so unwisely given, called to my mindthe figure on the camel, and I was sure that by some strange freak ofconjury Penelope must see it too; and worse, that other, the girl inthe pugree, and behind them, discreetly placed, Doctor Todd, uncomfortably balancing on his giant beast, and Mrs. Todd takeninopportunely as she was mopping her brow. Well might Penelope look atme with quizzical eyes. I had tumbled again among the common herd. Inmy desperation I might have gone on to the whole truth recklessly; toldher what an absurd man Judge Bundy really was, and how the Todds werebeing dragged over Europe on a glorified Cook's tour, captives at thewheels of his chariot; told her how I appreciated her sweetcondescension in offering to call on the woman I loved. The woman Iloved? For that moment I think I did love Gladys Todd, for I wasstanding to her defence against the crushing weight of millions ofmoney and the bluest of blood. Yes, I am sure that I should have goneon and told her all, but Fate, wiser than I, intervened, and the butlerannounced Mr. Talcott. 

As usual, Mr. Talcott did not wish tea--he had just come from the club, but he could not see why we were sitting in utter darkness. WithPenelope's assent, he turned a button, showing thereby an exasperatingfamiliarity with the room, and, seating himself comfortably before her, expressed his wonder that he had not seen her last night; he had huntedfor her everywhere to join his party at supper. And now the lightswere on and I a mere spectator at the play; I was having a glimpse ofthe stage on which I could never move. The lights burned high; theyswept the dust and cobwebs from the diamond panes; they drove theflames to hiding in the ashes; their touch turned the leaves of thefireplace to dead stone. But Penelope they could not change. In thesoft black webs, woven for her by a hundred toiling human spiders, sheheld still the heritage of the proud woman in frills and furbelows andthe fine old man in wig and smallclothes. She was more radiant, asthough her blood ran quicker in the joy of the part she played. Enterthe butler. Enter Mr. Grant, a tall young man in business clothes, agood-natured fellow who laughed joyously at nothing. He had justdropped in on his way home after a beastly day downtown--a horribleday--a new attack on the trusts and a smash in the market. He fixedhimself close to the curate's delight and beginning at the bottomworked upward, fortifying himself, as he explained, for a late dinner. Talcott thought that he had heard Grant say that he was going to theopera. Grant had never said any such thing. Didn't Mr. Malcolm agreewith him that more than one act of opera was a bore? Mr. Malcolm quiteagreed. Mr. Talcott wondered if Miss Blight had heard that Jerry Whitewas engaged. Miss Blight was at once dying to know to whom. Mr. Talcott admonished her to think. Mr. Grant wanted to know if Mr. Malcolm had heard. But Mr. Malcolm had a strange unappreciation ofimportant news. He moved in another world than this and he wanted toflee from it. He was homesick for familiar scenes and faces, for MissMinion's and the long table in the basement to which the wizened oldwomen would soon be crawling down for their evening nourishment, forMiss Tucker and his neighbor, Mr. Bunce, who by day made tooth-powderand by night talked Pater. He rose and held out his hand to theprincess of the blood. Graciously she rose from her throne. 

Graciously she said: "Good-by, David. It was good of you to drop in. "

And graciously she added, as he backed awkwardly away: "Remember, youmust let me know when Miss Todd comes. I shall call. "

CHAPTER XVIII

I dined with the Blights. It had been a month since the afternoon whenI talked with Penelope, and this evening in December I went to thehouse with hope high that in seeing her again I might have anopportunity of regaining a little of our lost friendship. Theinvitation had come from her, over the telephone, to dine with themmost informally, and though she cleared herself of any charge ofinterest in the matter by adding that Mr. Blight wished to see me, Iflattered myself with the hope that she might be speaking morepersonally than she cared to admit. How soon was that illusionwrecked! I entered the great library. Mrs. Bannister was standing bythe fireplace, her eyes fixed on the opposite wall, her mind occupiedwith a struggle to suppress a yawn of boredom. Rufus Blight wasreading a newspaper, but when I was announced he came forward andgreeted me cordially. With his arm in mine he led me to Mrs. Bannister, and she allowed me to raise her hand and drop it. She saidsomething, made some conventional remark on the great pleasure it gaveher to see me; the yawn almost forced itself into view, but she set herlips firmly and drove it back. As I made my response to these friendlyexpressions of welcome my eyes swept the room and rested at last on thedoor through which I had come. There they held expectantly. 

Mrs. Bannister read my thoughts. "Penelope is so distressed that shecannot see you to-night, " she said, drawing her scarf across her baredand massive shoulders, so that I wondered if my entrance had suddenlychilled the air. "She had expected to be here, but this afternoon theRuyters called up and insisted that she dine with them and go to theopera. It's 'Tristan. ' She is mad about 'Tristan. '"

So faded the last vain hope! Had Penelope spent hours in devising away of making it plain to me that the link between the past and thepresent was broken, she could not have been more adroit. Had DavidMalcolm, the boy, been coming to dine that night I know that she wouldhave been standing there at Mrs. Bannister's side, her own eyes fixedexpectantly on the door. But between the company of such excellentfolk as these Ruyters, with the glorious music of "Tristan, " and thisawkward man whose people were not her people, who found content in thelodges of the Todds and Bundys, there could be but one choice. I washumiliated. The good-natured grace with which I expressed mydisappointment to Mrs. Bannister belied my angry mind, and as we movedtoward the dining-room, she chattering incessantly, she must havebelieved that I was entirely satisfied with just her company. Fortunately I had only to smile my responses, while my thoughts werebusy with the cavalier way in which I had been treated. I was incensedat Penelope, but had it been any balm to my wounds to make her feel theweight of my anger, I knew well enough that she was far beyond thereach of my reproaches. But hopelessly I repeated over and over tomyself that I never could forgive her. Then, by a sudden weakreversal, I did forgive her and let my anger evaporate into a silentprotest against the unkind fate which had decreed that her peopleshould no longer be my people. 

It was when I saw her that I forgave her. As we three sat at dinner, Mrs. Bannister chattering on, Rufus Blight meditative but offering amono-syllable now and then as evidence that he listened, I smilingresponsively, Penelope came in. How could I not forgive her when I sawher thus, gowned in the daintiest art of the Rue de la Paix, cloaked insoft white fur, capped with a scarf of filmy lace, and one small handheld out to mine. 

The fault, I said, was my own, mine and the Fates which had orderedthat the orbits in which we moved should meet but rarely. The fault, too, lay with my forebears, who, had they considered me, would havesettled on the shores of the Hudson instead of pushing westward sorecklessly. Then I might now be going to the Ruyters', to sit atdinner at her side, to sit behind her in the shadow of an opera-box andwhisper in her ear the ten thousand things which I had to say. Iforgave Penelope. I called down maledictions on the robust Malcolmsand McLaurins who had carried me out of her world and abandoned me tothe garrulous Mrs. Bannister and the taciturn Rufus Blight. 

Penelope was exceedingly sorry to be going out, but she knew that Davidwould understand and would come some other night. David understoodthoroughly; there was no reason for her to apologize, and, of course, he would come again. Penelope was immensely relieved to find him socomplacent; she even wished he were to be of the company to which shewas going. She had just come in to have a glimpse of him, and now shemust be hurrying. And so she went away to take her bright place inthat social firmament of which the abandoned Mr. Malcolm thought withso much envy and longing while he dallied again with sweetbreads andpeas. 

"It was very late when I got home, " said Mrs. Bannister, taking up thethread of her narrative, "and who should I find here, as usual, butHerbert Talcott!"

The emphasis which she put on the words "as usual" aroused Mr. Blightfrom his placid interest in his glass of claret. "And who, " said he, "is Talcott, anyway? What does he do?"

"Herbert Talcott is a remarkable man, " replied Mrs. Bannister. "Hedoes nothing. "

It should have mattered little to me that Herbert Talcott refused teafrom Penelope's hands every day of the week because he had just comefrom the club. Had Mrs. Bannister announced that he was calling dailyon Gladys Todd, then I should very properly have been startled. Yet Isat up straight now as though she had named an archenemy of myhappiness and my ears were keen to hear every word. 

"He does absolutely nothing, " she continued. "He has absolutelynothing, in spite of the reports that he is quite well off. I knowpositively that his father left him only ten thousand a year, and yethe knows everybody and goes everywhere. He is undeniably clever andwas a great favorite at Harvard. "

"Doesn't he work at all?" said Mr. Blight with a rising inflection ofastonishment. 

"Why, no, " replied Mrs. Bannister. She saw the disapproval in myhost's face and was quick to bring herself into sympathy. "That iswhat I can't understand. Now, there is Bob Grant, who is very rich inhis own right, and yet goes religiously down to the Stock Exchangeevery day because he feels an obligation to be of some use in theworld. But of the two men, Herbert Talcott is the more sought after. "

"Sought after?" said my host inquiringly. 

"Yes, sought after, " repeated Mrs. Bannister. "He is asked everywhere. I suppose his name has something to do with it, but in these days, whenname counts for so little and money for so much, it is remarkable. "

"It is remarkable, " said Rufus Blight, with a return to the spirit ofthe day when I had known him as a bustling, pompous man. "It isremarkable that he can be happy doing nothing. Look how restless I amwith nothing to do but to play golf and read magazines. I can'tunderstand him. And yet he seems a decent young man. "

"But, you must remember, he is going out all the time, " said Mrs. Bannister. "A man simply couldn't go out as he does and do anything. He is always in demand. Why, I know a dozen families into which hewould be heartily welcomed. Last year it was reported that he wasengaged to marry Jane Carmody, the mine man's daughter; but she wasrather plain--to be truthful, very plain--and I will say for HerbertTalcott that he is not the kind who would marry solely for money. "

Mrs. Bannister went on chattering her praise of Herbert Talcott, with asubtle purpose, I suspected, of impressing on me the utter absurdity ofmy entering the lists with him and of bringing Rufus Blight to a keenerappreciation of the man whom he might be called on any day to welcomeinto his own family. With me her efforts were quite unneeded. WithRufus Blight the impression which she seemed to create was alone one ofastonishment that any man could be happy doing nothing. Again andagain he interrupted her to express his doubt on that point, and whendinner was over and Mrs. Bannister had retired, and we were smoking inthe room which he called his den, he unmasked to me a mind weary ofworking over nothing. He should never have sold out to the trust, hesaid; in the mills he had been happy; every hour had its task and everyday its victories in orders for rails and armor-plate. Now in a singleday every month he could cut coupons and attend to dividends, and theothers he must pass with golf and magazines. 

His den? How quickly does this bourgeois phrase call up before us ahodgepodge room, an atmosphere of stale tobacco smoke, a table coveredwith pipes, books and magazines, littered with tobacco, walls burdenedwith hideous prints, a mantel adorned with objects dear to their ownerfrom their associations, to the visitor hideous. The alien mind whichhad conceived the great library had evidently been held at bay whenRufus Blight was fitting himself into this den, his real home. 

Over the fireplace was a great steel plate of the regretted mills, aworld covered with immaculate smokeless buildings and cut with streetsin which women were taking the air in barouches as though in a park;before the fireplace two patent rockers, and behind them a tablelittered with magazines and novels; in the corners golf sticks ofinnumerable designs, and wherever the eye turned it met coldly coloredprints showing trotting horses in action. I had one of therocking-chairs and Rufus Blight the other, and he was looking up at themills when he spoke so regretfully of them. He referred again toTalcott. 

"I can't understand it--a man happy doing nothing. I suppose I am asort of machine--I must have work fed into me. Here I am at fifty-fiveand not a wheel moving. It was the power of the mills that kept merunning. Now I have lost that. " For a moment he was silent. Then heleaned toward me and said in a wistful voice: "David, you remember mybrother. He could be happy just sitting thinking. Now if my energycould have been combined with his mentality, what----"

I finished the sentence. From the past came the picture of theProfessor at the bare table in the cabin, pointing a long finger at me. "What a man we would have made. "

Rufus Blight's eyes opened wide. "How did you read my thoughts sowell!" he exclaimed. 

"The conclusion was simple, " said I. "Years ago I heard your brothersay the same thing. "

"Oh! Well it does express the case exactly. Henderson was always awonderful man for thinking, David. In his young days he was perfectlyhappy with a book. There were not many books in our valley, but heread them all and it was very interesting to hear the ideas he formedfrom them. He was a wonderful talker. " Rufus Blight nodded his headreminiscently. "A wonderful talker. But when it came to practicalthings he was quite helpless. It wasn't that he was lazy. If therehad been at hand anything big to do, anything that appealed to him, hewould have done it. What he needed was an opportunity. He reallynever had half a chance. He did try working in the store with me--andhe tried hard, but a mind like his could not be happy measuring outsugar and counting eggs. Such work seemed to lead to nothing--I knowit did to me. But I had a different kind of a mind. I had to feed it, like a machine, with figures and facts. But to him it was of noimportance that butter had gone up a cent a pound. He would say thatthe ants weren't worried about it, nor the birds, nor the people ofother planets. Do you know, David, I really used to envy Hendry hisway of seeing things. "

For a few moments Rufus Blight was silent, and my eyes were on thepicture of the great mills to which the counting of sugar and eggs hadled. From the mills they wandered to what they had given the man whobuilt them, from the golf sticks to the prints of trotting horses andto the litter on the table. This den measured the true extent of hisconquest. I looked at him. With a movement of weariness he stretchedhis feet toward the fire and leaned back and gazed at the ceiling, witha whimsical smile playing around the corners of his mouth. 

"I had to work, David, " he went on. "Hendry could earn a livingteaching school, but I hadn't the brains, so I toiled away in the storefrom early morning until late at night. Teaching school was easier. He used to say that if the sluggard did actually go to the ant he wouldprobably find him a most uninteresting creature to talk to. I guessHendry was right. I do know that he had little of the virtue of theant, but he was one of the most interesting men I ever heard talk. When I was behind the counter it was my main pleasure to listen to him, perched on a chair in front of it. " Rufus Blight laughed. "Really, David, in those days I was proud of having such a distinguishedbrother. I had always looked up to him. He was older than I, fouryears, and he was my protector against the assaults of other lads--myready compendium of universal knowledge. I never dreamed but that if Iprospered he would prosper; and if he, then I. Why, David, I can feelhim now clapping me on the back and calling me his grub-worm. 'Someday, ' he would say, 'I'll come and ask a bed in your garret. ' And Iwould laugh at him and talk of the time when we--I always said'we'--when we should have a pair of fine trotters, and should goskimming over the country together instead of crawling along behind ourblind mare. " Rufus Blight paused. The whimsical smile was gone and hewas looking at me through narrowed eyes. "Then the break came. " Andquickly, as he said it, he turned from me and began to smoke very hard. 

"The break?" said I in a questioning tone; for I believed that at lastI was to know the mystery which lay behind the Professor's conduct ifonly I could lead him on. 

"Yes, " said he in an even voice, "the break. The break came and I hadto leave the valley. I wouldn't stay after that, David. There wasnothing left for me there, but I had my work; I could go on weighingbutter and counting eggs. " Rufus Blight's voice was low and he spokerapidly. He seemed to have it in his mind that I knew the story ofthose early days, had heard it, perhaps, from the lips of his brotheror from common report, for men are prone to think their fellows wellinformed of the conspicuous facts of their lives. I dared notinterrupt again for an explanation, lest my question should betray meto him as nothing more than a curious stranger. I know the story nowin all its detail, but it came to me only from Rufus Blight, and fromhim in a few scattered threads, dropped for me to weave while in hisden that night; feeling that he had found one whom he could trust, heunburdened his heart. Doubtless he had no such thought when he led meinto the room, but there might have been in my eyes, when he spoke ofthe valley, some light of sympathy. And when he turned from that greathall, from his heavy table and his liveried servants, to speak ofcounting eggs and weighing butter, I had not even smiled at theincongruity. Then the dam broke, and memories backed up in years ofsilence broke forth in a quick and troubled flood. 

"It was my fault, David, as much as his. I was a grub--a dull, toilinggrub. But those long hours that I was toiling came to be good hoursfor me when it was for her sake. Why, it seemed that every pound ofsugar I sold, that every little profit I made, was for her. I plannedthe finest house in the country as I stood all day at the counter, andit was for her. She was to have it all, and I only asked to be allowedto grub away--for her. She didn't understand me, David. She used totaunt me with being sordid, and said that I stayed at the store earlyand late because I loved a dollar most. I didn't understand women. Iguess at least I should have closed up the store for an evening or twoa week, and yet"--Rufus Blight hesitated--"and yet it wouldn't havemade any difference. Hendry was a tall fellow. I was short and ratherfat. Hendry could talk in a wonderful way. I was always silent exceptwhen it came to a trade. It had to be as it was, David, but it washard--very hard. I don't think I said any more than most men wouldhave said to him--perhaps less, because I never was a talker. And, after all, I couldn't blame them. Why, I remember, as I was leavingthe valley, I said to him that if they ever needed a home they mustcome to me. He was offended. He drew himself up and said proudly thatwhen I needed help I must come to them. Poor Hendry! It wasn't longbefore he did need help; but could you imagine him taking it from anyone? He lost the school--he had become not quite orthodox in his ideasand was inclined to rail at church doctrine. He never was intended formanual labor; he worked hard when he could get work, but everythingseemed against him. Then Penelope came, and he was left alone withher, and it made him bitter. I tried to get him to come to me; butcould you imagine a man as proud as he, David--a man of hismind--coming to me after what had happened! Why, he called my offercharity. Then he left the valley, too, and I wrote to him fromPittsburgh, where I had bought a little mill. I wanted them to come tome--him and Penelope--for I was lonely. I had nothing but the mill;why, only in the mill was I happy. But could you imagine a man asproud as he, David, taking help from me? He answered rather curtly;said that some day I should see what he was worth; that he was not theidler he seemed. He said that again to me face to face, that once whenI have seen him in all the years since the break. "

Rufus Blight left his chair and stood by the fireplace, a hand on themantel, his eyes watching the flames. 

"Could I have done more, David? That night when I saw him I had comein from the mills late, and the servants would not let him wait for meeven in the hall. He told me how he had shot the constable. He fearedhe had killed him, but he did not know, not daring to turn back to findout. He had walked the whole way, travelling day and night. I wantedhim to stay, but he said that in Mary he had taken from me everything Ihad ever had; he could take no more. He had come not to beg, but togive me Penelope; and when he came again it would not be as a brotherwho could be turned from my door by the servants; when he came again itwould be as a father of whom Penelope could feel no shame. I could notmove him. I did my best, David, but he laughed and slapped me on theback and called me his old grub; said that some day I should really seewhat was in him. Then he went away--God only knows where. "

"To the West, " said I. "To the East, to Tibet. "

"Yes, " said Rufus Blight. He was standing before me, his hands claspedbehind him, his eyes intent on the ceiling. 

"And you came to us for Penelope, " I said. The last trace of myantipathy to this man, once to me so fat and pompous, was gone. 

He looked at me with a faint smile of embarrassment. "And what anungrateful brute I was!" he exclaimed. "David, did you remember thepromises I made that day?"

"I used to remember them, " I answered, "and to wonder. "

"You had the right, " he said. "But remember what I was--just a lonelygrub. Till Penelope came to me I had nothing but the mills. Havingher, I wanted her entirely. " He held out his hand. "She was only thathigh, David, and I was getting gray. I never looked at her but therecame into my mind another just that high who had a desk in school infront of mine, and sometimes I seemed to be looking again over the topof my spelling-book at the same bright hair and the same bobbing bit ofribbon. Can't you see what she meant to me, David? She hated me atfirst--she spoke always of her father and of you--and I was jealous. "

"I understand, " said I. 

He had not spoken of the letters. There was no need of it. I knewthat they were in his mind and that he was perfectly conscious of thepettiness of his action. But for me his simple confession had absolvedhim. 

"I wanted her entirely, " he went on, throwing himself into a chair atmy side. "I wanted something to live for beside the mills. InPenelope I found it. What the mills gave me was for her. Every hour Iworked was happier because it was for her good. Sometimes I have tofight against a dread that Hendry will come back and take her from me, and yet when I think of him, tumbling around the world alone, I wanthim too--want him in that very chair you are sitting in. It would beso good just to hear him talk, and it wouldn't make any difference tous now if he did just talk. " Rufus Blight brought a fist down on thearm of his chair. "David, I must find him!"

"He went to Tibet, " said I. 

"To the South Seas, to the Arctic, to Tibet--everywhere, David. Histrail has led me all over the world. I can never catch up to him. ThePhiladelphia man you told me of--Harassan--dead three years. Mysecretary, Mallencroft, has found that in San Francisco a man namedHenderson worked on _The Press_ there, but only two men remembered him. They said he was erratic, always in trouble by writing things contraryto the paper's policy, and gave up in disgust, to ship as supercargo ona vessel trading in the South Seas. He wrote a book after that, butthe publishers failed, and Mallencroft couldn't even find a copy of it. That must have been about the time you saw him--when he lectured on'Life. ' Poor old Hendry! It's his pride, his confounded pride--that'sthe trouble. "

I had risen. Rufus Blight came to me and laid a hand on each of myshoulders. What a change since that day long ago! He had to reach upto me, and I looked down into his face. 

"You'll think me a strange fellow, David. I didn't mean to tell you somuch, but it just would come out when I saw that you understood. Wemust find him--you and I. We may find him any day; at this very minutehe may be going by the Old Grub's door. Watch for him. "

I promised. I must come often, he said; it was good to have such afriend as I was, one who could understand, to whom he could talk of olddays in the valley. He had never really been at home since he left thevalley. He had lived in strange places, among strange people. We mustall go back--back to the valley, he and Penelope and I--we should go inMay--Penelope had talked of it--in May, when the orchards were inblossom. 

Rufus Blight laughed at the joyous prospect. And I? I closed my eyesto it. I turned away, through the great hall, but he, with unwelcomekindness, followed me to the stairs. What a great expedition it wouldbe--to the valley--just he and I and Penelope! I laughedironically--at myself. I plunged down the deep-carpeted steps. Thegrilled door closed behind me. I paused a moment to turn up my collaragainst the cold, to button my gloves and collect my scatteredthoughts. How the wind bit!

Across the Avenue a dark figure leaned against the wall of the park. As I stepped over the pavement the man seemed to think that I wasmoving toward him, for he roused himself quickly and walked rapidly upthe street. I laughed at his fright and turned on my way downtown, forI was thinking of myself and of what I had lost, and I had no care forshivering tramps. I reached the corner. Rufus Blight's words cameback to me. Had that man been watching the Old Grub's door? I turnedsharply, but I saw nothing, no sign of a living thing save the lightsof a retreating cab. 

CHAPTER XIX

I have spoken casually, in this rambling story of mine, of youngMarshall, a fellow-lodger at Miss Minion's. He was the Brummel of theboarding-house. The fact that he occupied the smallest rearhall-bedroom, with the minimum of daylight, in no way affected hisstanding, for everybody knew that he went out in society. Indeed, forhim more spacious quarters were hardly needed, as he was seldom at homeexcept to dress and to sleep. By day he hurried about Wall Street, buying and selling bonds. On the winter evenings he stepped forth fromhis cell a splendid figure, realizing, as nearly as possible, thosespotless and creaseless young men whom the illustrators draw with somuch unction. Then we might have imagined that he would step on, intohis brougham, to be whirled away to some smart dinner. Alas! hisequipage was not even a cab. His pair of prancing blacks were only hisgaloches, and his protection against the weather a long ulster, achest-protector of thickly padded satin, and an opera-hat. The greattrouble which Marshall had on these nightly expeditions was gettinghome. I do not mean to insinuate that it was to find Miss Minion'sdoor. It was to pass Miss Minion's door. There were severalabsent-minded old gentlemen living in the house who had a way offorgetting that they were not its sole occupants. Coming in from theirweekly or monthly trip to the theatre, the hour would to them seemhorribly late and they would catch the chain. Occasionally I wasmyself their victim, and had to stand shivering outside, ringing thebell with one hand and with the other playing a tattoo on the panels. More generally it was Marshall, for, though I was frequently held verylate at my work downtown, he was abroad at his pleasures even later. The lateness with which he pursued these pleasures was no evidenceagainst their innocence. Tom Marshall was one of the most innocent menthat I have ever known. He was not a New Yorker. He came, as he toldme, of the Marshalls of Pogatuck, in Maine. The way that he said itmade me understand that there was no bluer blood in the land than thatrunning in the veins of the Pogatuck Marshalls, and it explained whythe Knickerbockers were so willing to meet him as an equal. He hadcome from Pogatuck by way of Harvard, and one advantage which hiseducation had given him was an acquaintance that he could turn to use, inasmuch as his great ambition was to "go out. " To him a card to theRuyters would have been an olive-wreath of victory. It was a trophythat he hoped to win, and to that end he worked patiently, sellingbonds all day, and at night as patiently setting forth in his galoches, his ulster, and his opera-hat to storm the outer works of society. Hebelonged to innumerable dancing-classes. Indeed, it seemed to me thathe kept himself poor meeting their dues, for I remember more than oneoccasion when he appealed to me in distress because he had to sendfifteen dollars to the treasurer of the Tuesdays or the Fridays and thepater had forgotten to remit his allowance. Tom Marshall's father wasthe most forgetful of men. 

I liked him. You could not help liking him. He was so thoroughlygood-natured and affable. His conversation was by no meansinstructive, but there was an airiness about his views and ambitionswhich was restful to one who was taking life as seriously as was I inthose days. I got to know him by having constantly to let him in. Ofall the lodgers in the house, I was the most likely to be up late, andif one of the forgetful old gentlemen fastened the door-chain, to mewould fall the duty of answering the signals of distress from the stoop. 

Tom Marshall has played but a small part in my life. Like that ofBoller of '89, his place in the cast is a minor one. He is one ofthose who fall in near the end of the line when the company joins handsto sidle across the stage, bowing and smiling, after the second act. Yet without him I wonder sometimes how my own play would have ended. It seems to me now as though he must have been born in Pogatuck, asthough his whole life had been ordered, his love of going outdeveloped, so that at the proper moment he might enter the stage whereI was playing the hero to an empty house. He entered it at one o'clockin the morning. The door was chained. At the moment I was sitting inmy room, on my one comfortable chair, my book on the floor at my side, my pipe in my mouth, and I was smoking very hard. What countless pipesI had smoked in this same way since the night, a month before, when Ihad dined with Rufus Blight! What countless nights I had sat in thissame way, in this same month, with my book on the floor and my mindrevolving ceaselessly in a circle! This night I had come to that partof the circle where I thought of Penelope, the lovely, the formal, thedistant Penelope, when down in the depths of the house I heard themuffled clatter of the bell and faint rat-tats upon the front door. Iwent to the window and put out my head, to see on the stoop the muffledblack figure of Tom Marshall. 

"It was old Ransome again, I'll bet you, " he said, when I had unchainedthe door and we stood in the dimly lighted hall. "This is the thirdtime this month that he has locked me out, confound him!"

I raised my finger to my lips, cautioning Marshall not to arouse thewhole house. But he would not be silenced--it was early yet, anyway--he had been to a Friday cotillon and it was a beastlybore--even the supper was poor--he wanted something to eat. His footwas on the stairs when he discovered that he was hungry. He discoveredat the same time that he was indebted to me for having let him in, notalone this time but many others, and he insisted on showing hisappreciation by taking me out to a late supper. I demurred. Marshalltalked louder. I insinuated that he had been drinking, to which hereplied that the Fridays never served anything but weak punch. Ishould have protested further, but Mrs. Markham's door opened at thehead of the stairs and I heard her breathing indignantly. For the sakeof quiet I consented, and so it happened that at one o'clock in themorning I found myself in the street, with my arm tucked underMarshall's and our faces set toward O'Corrigan's chop-house. 

O'Corrigan's has been torn down these many years, but you can see ascore of replicas of it on upper Sixth Avenue and Broadway. Itsplate-glass windows were adorned with set pieces of lobsters andoysters, celery and apples, and you entered through a revolving doorinto an atmosphere laden heavily with kitchen fumes, into a room whichmultiplied itself in many mirrors. When you went there for the firsttime the man who took you, if he knew his New York, would tell you ofO'Corrigan's rise from waiting at a downtown lunch-counter to theownership of these glittering halls. 

Of course, Tom Marshall knew O'Corrigan. He hailed him cordially, andit seemed to me that he had no little pride in the privilege. He evennodded to the bartender as we passed him, leading me to the archwaywhence we could survey the adjoining room to see what was going onthere. But nothing was going on there. These late-night restaurantsare at their best in colored pictures. There they seem to own anatmosphere of light and joy. There lovely women sip champagne, thatgayest of wines, from dainty glasses, and gallant men seem to say to usthat if you would have health and wealth and happiness you would nevergo home until morning, but would live with them in this bright world ofwine and women and song. Really, they are melancholy places, especially in their gayest hours. If vice really were attractive, howvicious most of us would be! I do not say that O'Corrigan's was avicious place. At certain hours its patronage was of the dullestrespectability from the suburbs. Dull respectability is not supposedto be abroad in the early hours of the morning, but it does seek attimes to hover on the edge of disrespectability with something of theroguish curiosity of childhood. And now the respectables and theunrespectables, a motley gathering in that garish room, amid the uglydebris of their feasting, made an unattractive picture from which Iturned with a sense of relief to the quieter place behind us. 

As we moved to a table in a secluded corner, I saw Talcott and BobGrant sitting with their heads close together over a litter of platesand glasses. Grant spoke to me. As he rose and offered his hand, Inoticed in his eyes that watery brightness which comes in certainstages of conviviality. The effusiveness of his greeting might haveflattered me had I not realized that his heart was unduly expanded byalcohol. To see such a great, good-natured animal as young Grant thusexhilarated was not surprising to me, but with Talcott it wasdifferent. I had known him only as a quiet, self-possessed man who, from policy if nothing else, I believed must be as circumspect in hislife as in his clothes. Now he spoke to me. His greeting wasperfunctory. In his eyes was that watery dulness which comes with thelater stages of conviviality. His hair was tousled, his collarcrushed, his tie awry; for whiskey muddles the clothes as well as thebrain. He nodded to me; he wondered what I was doing out so late; hesnapped his fingers and called loudly for Andrew. The summons to thewaiter was for me a hint to be gone. 

Tom Marshall was greatly impressed by the fact that I knew Talcott andGrant. When I rejoined him he seemed to treat me with greater respectthan hitherto, for he had been rather patronizing. It was surprisingto him, always so busy storming the outer works, to know that I, thedrudge of the fourth floor front, who never "went out, " was so intimatewith these gallant cadets who lived in the citadel. He had come togive me beer. Now in a faltering voice he suggested champagne, rubbinghis hands and smiling as he named it, as though it were his habit toindulge nightly in so expensive a beverage. Remembering that he hadowed me five dollars for many months, I deemed it unwise to make anunnecessary inroad into his pocket-book. With my refusal he grewinsistent, and at last consented, only with reluctance, to a modestrepast of welsh-rabbit and beer. 

"And the beer at once, " he commanded the waiter. 

Then, unfolding his napkin on his knees and lighting a cigarette, helooked over my shoulder to the distant table where the two heads wereclose together over the litter of plates and glasses. "So you knowTalcott and Grant, " he went on. "I'm sorry you didn't introduce me, Malcolm. I've seen them around, of course, but, strangely, have nevermet them. They are a great pair--stacks of money--Grant especially. Talcott was in Harvard with me--was rather a snob and went with therich crowd--very smart now. He was one of Willie Ruyter's ushers. "

I smiled with compassion at this broken discourse. It brought to mymind Mrs. Bannister. Tom Marshall and Mrs. Bannister looked at lifefrom the same view-point and I from one entirely different. To my mindthere was nothing very remarkable in having my existence acknowledgedby two very muddled young men, who in their present state acknowledgedalso their brotherhood with the _roué_ whom I had seen in the next roomor the cabman sitting outside on his box in a half-stupor. I mightenvy the good fortune which allowed them to move in the same world asPenelope Blight, but to disavow intimacy with them, even to one sostrangely ambitious as Tom Marshall, called for no loss of pride. Withsome show of temper I avowed that I hardly knew them. I had only metthem once or twice at the house of friends. But the sincerity withwhich I disowned them served only to heighten the new-born respect withwhich Marshall treated me. He did not know that I "went out. "Laughing, I retorted that I never did go out. He said that I must;that he would take me out; he would present me to the right people. Helaunched into the delights of going out and the necessity of going outif a man was to be anybody at all; then suddenly stopped at the thoughtthat the beer ordered at once was very slow in coming. 

"That waiter is always confoundedly slow, " he said. "I should haveinsisted on having Andrew. I apologize, Malcolm--I should have thoughtof Andrew. You would have enjoyed Andrew. "

"Andrew?" I repeated, questioning. 

"Yes, Andrew, " replied Marshall. "Here's the beer. Now, George, hurrythose rabbits--I'm famished. Andrew, " he went on, lighting a freshcigarette, "is a remarkable character. He is full of philosophy. Hequoted Herbert Spencer to me the other night. He has a sly way--and asomewhat disconcerting one--when you order a drink, of trying to induceyou to take mineral water, and if he can, and O'Corrigan is not withinhearing, he serves a temperance lecture with every Scotch and soda. "Marshall tapped his forehead. "A little queer, " he said sagely, "butshrewd. By Jove, there he is now arguing with Bob Grant--a temperancelecture, I'll bet--trying to persuade him to take plain soda. "

I looked over my shoulder to see this philosophic waiter who servedtemperance lectures with whiskey. His back was to me. I saw only atall, loose-jointed figure clad in a waiter's jacket, a long, black armoutstretched, a napkin draped over it, a long, thin hand clutching abill-of-fare, and a head of dark hair shot with white. Thebill-of-fare struck the table in emphasis, the napkin waved like a flagof battle, both arms were stretched out wide in appeal. Grant laughedagain--uproariously. 

"I'll bet he is trying to uplift those fellows, " said Marshall. "Hehas a good chance to get in a word, as O'Corrigan is in the next room. "

I turned to my companion. At that moment I was more interested in thenon-arrival of the welsh-rabbit than in the scene behind me, forwaiters are by nature inclined to be voluble when the opportunity isgiven them, and to me there was nothing particularly amusing in thepicture of young Grant, with that graciousness which comes with toomuch drink, condescending to argue with this crack-brained fellow whomoved with his head in the clouds while his weary feet shuffled in andout of O'Corrigan's kitchen. At the moment there was nothing familiarto me in the tall, thin figure, nothing more than I should have seen inany other lank, shambling waiter waving a napkin and a bill-of-fare. Iwas growing tired. I was regretting that I had even allowed TomMarshall to inveigle me out so late, to breathe heavy air and to eatheavy food at this hour, when I should be refreshing my body with sleep. 

But Tom Marshall's spirits grew higher as the night grew older. He wasimmensely comfortable with his beer and cigarettes, immensely amused atthe argument which was going on behind my back. 

"You really must meet Andrew. You will enjoy him, Malcolm, " he said. "I'll call him over when he is through with those men. He is acharacter worth knowing. "

"You speak of him as if you had known him for a long time, " I returned, and I think my lips must have curled a little; but if I wasunappreciative of the hospitality which I was enjoying, my excuse wasmy great weariness. 

"Oh dear, no, " he demurred; "I've been coming here for years--late atnight, you understand, for a bite occasionally. I never saw him untillast fall--got talking to him--I always like to talk to waiters, to gettheir ideas. I found him a curious chap, better educated than most ofthem and surprisingly well informed--surprisingly. He seemed to haveknocked around a good deal. "

"Had been a waiter in Hoboken, I suppose, " said I, "and inPhiladelphia----"

"In Hoboken!" My sarcasm nettled Marshall. "He told me that he hadnever been a waiter at all until he came here; he was simply lookingfor an opportunity to find something really congenial. He was freshfrom Canton. In Hoboken!" Tom Marshall leaned toward me aggressively. "Why, man, he has been everywhere--through the South Seas, in----"

There _was_ something familiar in the tall, thin figure, something thateven the waiter's jacket and the waving napkin could not hide. 

"What's up now?" Marshall cried. 

I had half risen from my chair and turned. Talcott and Grant wereleaning over their table, elbows resting there, heads close together. And behind Talcott's chair the black figure was bent until the handscould touch the floor. He was brushing up scattered crumbs. As Ilooked, he raised his head, and it seemed to me that he had forgottenhis menial task, had forgotten his menial place, for he was very still. He was no longer dusting. The napkin fell from his outstretched hand. He was listening to the muttered, maudlin conversation as though fromthe chaos of it he gathered some sober words of truth. 

I looked at my companion. "In the South Seas, you said, Marshall. Hashe spoken of San Francisco? Do you know his name?"

Marshall sprang from his chair. I was up too, and it was to see theProfessor with a hand on Talcott's collar, shaking him, holding him atarm's length as he shook him, as though this man were some contemptiblething that he would touch as little as he could and yet must hold toand shake until it was cleansed of its vileness. 

CHAPTER XX

For myself I should have chosen the hut where I first met the Professorabove the home to which he led me in the early morning. If the old wastumble-down, dark and ill-furnished, its air was the pure air of themountains and the way to it through things green and lovely. To thenew we went through squalid streets, westward, toward the river; weturned into a dilapidated tenement; we climbed three flights of ricketystairs into a room which compared to mine as mine to the house of RufusBlight. The lighted gas revealed hardly more than a narrow cell, withdirty, torn paper on the walls, a narrow bed, a cheap table, and asingle chair. Giving me the chair, my host seated himself upon thebed, so close to me, of necessity, that our knees touched. To my eyeshe was little older than that day fifteen years before when we had met. He was old then to my youthful view. Thinner he could not have been, and now only the scattered white hairs and the deepened lines of hisface marked his increased years. He had laid aside his overcoat, andsat before me clad in his waiter's clothes, but the waiter's mien wasgone. With his legs crossed, his hands clasped over one knee, his headdrawn down between his shoulders, he seemed the languid, weary man ofthe store-porch, whose eyes quickened only at the trumpet-call todebate. Clearly his attitude toward me was one of antagonism. This Isaw in his quiet gaze and in the restless twitching of fingers, impatient for the cut and thrust of argument. 

On our way from O'Corrigan's to his squalid room, the Professor hadspoken little. For the most part, as he plodded along at my side, hehad contented himself in expressing opinions not complimentary toHerbert Talcott, in voicing his regret that he had not thrashed himinstead of merely shaking him. That he had not thrashed Talcott washardly evidence of the mildness of his attack. It was rather because Ihad interposed; and then O'Corrigan, in the character of the outragedproprietor of a highly respectable restaurant, had intruded himselfinto the quarrel, even going so far as to threaten to call the police. But I was first in the _mêlée_, and on me fell the blame of savingTalcott from merited chastisement. For this the Professor upbraidedme. He spoke as though Talcott had been the aggressor. Had notTalcott struck him a blow under the eye? Yes, but it was feebly given. But the sting of it was to the Professor's pride, and he would regretto his dying day that I had withheld him from giving the youngscoundrel his just deserts. 

Poor Talcott! I confessed to myself that it would have given mepleasure to have had some part in his chastisement, and as we ploddedwestward through the empty streets I pictured him driving home in ahansom, trying to gather his scattered wits and to discover some reasonwhy a quiet, respectful waiter should have assailed him without cause. Poor muddled Talcott! He did not know that his betrayer had beendistilled in far-off Scotland, and had lain away in vats a score ofyears awaiting that very moment to make him speak his honest thoughtjust as the quiet, respectful waiter was bending behind him to pick upcrumbs. Perhaps he could not even remember what he was saying when hewas stopped by the long fingers which were thrust down the back of hisneck. Did he remember, what he was saying could be none of thewaiter's affair, anyway. It could matter nothing to that humblecreature if he did speak of Rufus Blight as a vulgar little brute andof Penelope as "a bit raw, but worth marrying for her money alone. " "Awoman's millions never grow _passé_, " was an aphorism which fitted thelips of the half-drunken cynic. To be sure, the things which he hadsaid were not such as a man would give expression to were he coldsober, even if he thought them, and much less would he apply them toparticular persons, yet when you are sitting late at night with such agood fellow as Bob Grant over your fifth Scotch and soda, you arelikely to be a little unguarded. For who would think of a waiterobjecting? Poor, muddled, drunken Talcott! He did not know that hereally had given the first blow, had changed the obsequious waiter intoa fury by striking him in the heart of his pride. And to such a furyhad the Professor been wrought, and so firmly did anger hold his mind, that my own sudden interference was received by him as quite in theordinary, though he protested against my good offices. He remonstratedindignantly when I acquiesced in O'Corrigan's assertion that my humblefriend must be demented, a plea which opened a way out of thepredicament. Fortunately, the Professor's own wisdom in refusing anexplanation of an apparently unprovoked assault gave color to thistheory, and as Talcott's one clear thought was to escape without anyunpleasant notoriety, O'Corrigan satisfied his ire by ordering his mademployee out of the place. 

So the Professor came into my charge. Had we met after a separation ofonly a day, his treatment of me could not have been more casual. Heconsented to my accompanying him home, but this seemed less from adesire to see me again than to protest against my having publiclyhumiliated him by treating him as demented. He had always thought thatDavid Malcolm would understand him under every circumstance; thatwhatever his condition and whatever mine, when we met again it would bewith mutual esteem. Yet David Malcolm had judged him by his clothes, had given him a waiter's heart and mind with a waiter's garb! He wasbent on proving to me that, however low he might have fallen in theworld's eye, he was as sane as he ever had been, and that in acceptingO'Corrigan's opinion so readily I had done him a wrong. 

Now when we were sitting in his room, so close that our knees touched, he seemed by his silence to tell me that he had spoken, and that mypart was to excuse and to explain what he deemed a reflection onhimself. I saw him in his shabby waiter's garb. This was the uniformin which he marched, moved night after night with shuffling feet andeyes alert lest he break the dishes--marched to the divine drumbeat, marched under God's sealed orders. His own high-flowing phrases cameback to me, and I could have laughed, seeing him, but I remembered thatthose phrases had been the sabre cuts which drove me into action, thatbut for them I might be dozing like the very dogs, dozing with theunhappy restlessness of enforced inaction. Perhaps I was moving tobarren conquests, but barren conquests are better than defeat. He hadmoved to defeat, and I pitied him. He asked of me excuse andexplanation. I, having none to give, was silent. But I think he musthave seen in my eyes something of the same light which he found in themthat morning in the smoky cabin. Then he had reached down, taken me inhis arms and called me his only friend. Now with a sudden movement heheld out his hand to mine. Anger was gone. He had forgotten Talcott. He had forgotten the stranger who seized his arm and thwarted his fury. He saw only the boy who yesterday had stood at his side when everyman's hand was against him. 

"Davy--Davy, " he cried, "you have come again to help me. "

"Yes--to take you home, " said I, "to your brother and Penelope. "

He made a gesture of dissent and his eyes narrowed. "No, " he returnedwith sharpness. "That cannot be. Don't you suppose that I should havegone to them of my own accord had it been possible?"

"But it is possible, " I said. "They want you. I have it from theirown lips. "

"I know--I know, " he replied. "Rufus would give me a home. Rufuswould give me money--all I need a hundred times over. But is that whatI really need? I want to do something myself, David--to be somebodymyself. I have it in me. All I ask is an opportunity. " He broughthis fist down on his knee. "And by heaven, I will find it! I willshow them I'm not the worthless fellow I seem. "

"But they don't think you worthless, Professor, " said I, addressing himas I might have, had we been in the cabin again. "They have beensearching for you everywhere----"

"But never expecting to find me as I am now, " he interrupted, spreadingwide his arms and inviting me to behold him as he was, a shabby waiter. "Rufus, who has made what the world calls a success, would be proud ofme; and Penelope, who has learned to think with the rest of the world, would be proud of me--proud to present me to her friends--to splendidfellows like Talcott and his muddle-headed companion. " He leanedforward and tapped me on the knee with his long forefinger, and hisface broke into a bitter smile as he spoke more quietly. "David, Ihave seen Penelope. I came to New York just to be near her, and many anight I have stood for hours across the street from her house only toget a glimpse of her. And sometimes as I see her stepping in or out ofher carriage I say to myself that she cannot be my daughter; and if Ispoke to her how high she would toss her head! Why, she would loseless caste by walking with Talcott drunk than with me as I am now. "

"But she need not see you as you are now, " I protested, half smiling atthe incongruous picture which he had drawn of Penelope walking down theavenue by the side of this shabby waiter. "They need not even know----"

I paused to grasp at some inoffensive phrase in which to describe hisforlorn condition. 

"That I have fallen so low, " he exclaimed. He had been quick to see mypredicament, and laughed. "I know what you are thinking of, David. You saw me an obsequious, tip-grasping fellow, with a spirit as heavyas his feet. You think me broken and down and out. " The hands spreadwide again. "I--down and out? Why, Davy, I've been like this a scoreof times, and I am still game. You must not think that because of alittle temporary embarrassment I am in prime condition to go crawlingto Rufus and tell him that I have failed and need his help. I toldRufus that I would come back and claim Penelope when she could be proudto own me as her father. " He brought his fist down on his knee again. "She couldn't be very proud now, but I'll show them!"

It was hard to combat so overwhelming a pride as this, a pride whichseemed to thrive in the ashes of hope. I tried to break it by speakingof his brother and daughter, giving him an account of my renewedacquaintance with them and of their talk of him. The effect was to sethim smoking a very black pipe. Rising and leaning over the foot-railof the bed, much as in the old days he leaned lazily over the storecounter, he held his eyes fixed on mine, and smoked while I argued. Hewas a patient listener. My own story was interwoven with his, and thathe might understand my relations with his brother and Penelope, I toldhim briefly all that had occurred with me since that day when we partedin the clearing. When I came to the college lecture, and my efforts tosee him then, and to find him, he made a motion as though to interrupt. I paused. He commanded me to go on, and the smile which came to hisface at my mention of his discourse on "Life" held there until I hadfinished. But my story, intended to give force to my arguments for himto surrender his pride, only served to put him in a reminiscent mood. 

"That was a lecture, wasn't it, David?" he said, laughing. "Why, doyou know that when I talked that night I almost imagined that I was asuccess in life. It was the introduction that did it--distinguishedtraveller--famous journalist. And you, I suppose, accepted it all astruth. Still, you may be thankful you didn't have to hear Harassan--agigantic windbag, if there ever was one. I fell in with him one day ina smoking-car and got to talking about my travels. He was preparing alecture on China, and as he had never been there, I was useful, so hetook me into his house until he had pumped me dry. I substituted forhim that night at your college for half the fee--was to read hislecture, but when I got started on it I couldn't stand it. Anastonishing man, Harassan! When he died he left a modest fortune madein spouting buncombe; and yet--" The Professor held out a hand inappeal. "How many men are called great because they succeed in talkingbuncombe and selling rubbish! That is what discourages me so; anddoesn't it make you a little bitter when you meet men surrounded byevery material evidence of success and go fishing in their brains andcan't hook up a single original idea of any kind? Why, I've methundreds of them, Davy. Now that night Harassan would have hurled atyou a lot of pompous commonplaces, and you would have hailed him as agreat and wise man. I broke from the beaten path. I told you plaintruth. Was I ever asked to lecture again? People won't pay to hearplain truth, Davy. I suspect that I should have done better had I notbeen trying all my life to drive plain truth into unwilling ears. "

"I suspect so, too, " said I mildly. 

He laughed at my ready acquiescence. "I started wrong at home, " hewent on. "Had I listened to Rufus and plodded along in his humdrumway, I suppose I'd be rich now. But I couldn't. After I left thevalley I went to Kansas and really settled down, got a school to teach, and for a time I was quite in the way of becoming a successfuleducator--principal of a high-school, perhaps. I might even havebecome president of a college, but to die the head of a fresh-watercollege did not seem a very glorious end; nor did teaching a lot offoolish young men to live what are held successful lives seem veryinspiring living. So I went on west to San Francisco and triednewspaper work. It seemed just the vocation for me. Here I could usemy sword against the dragons of untruth and corruption. The beaststalks forth brazenly enough, and without considering the moral side atall, it is sport to attack him. To get myself into a position toattack him, I had to serve an apprenticeship. You know what thatmeans--the daily digging for ephemeral facts. But I stuck to it. Isaw the day when I should be the most feared man on the coast, wieldinga pen as efficacious as a surgeon's knife. Unfortunately, my knifefirst struck a politician named Mulligan, who owned some stock in thepaper. You know the result. I could direct my caustic pen againstO'Connor or Einstein, but from Mulligan came my living. I took to thesea to breathe purer air, sailing as supercargo on a trading vessel. For two years I knocked about the South Sea Islands and along the coastof Asia, and it seemed that I was gathering a vast amount ofinformation which would be of service to the race if preserved in abook. How I worked over that book! When I got back to San Francisco Isaw my fame and fortune about to be made by it. At last the power todo something worth while was in my reach. "

The Professor paused. He spread wide his arms in a gesture to expressfutility. "I had as well stood on the highest peak of the Rockies andread my manuscript to space. The distinguished traveller and author!"With a hand upon his heart, he bowed gravely. "The author of onethousand volumes of uncut leaves. Useless! Well, I suppose Harassanfound the one I gave him of some service, for he got most of his famousChinese lecture out of it. There was some pretty good stuff in thatbook, too, but Harassan was the only man I ever heard of who agreedwith me; and he--well, he was a successful idiot. "

"And of course you never shared the benefits he reaped, " said I. 

"Benefits from Harassan?" The Professor laughed. "Why, David, youmight have thought that I had ruined Harassan from the way he talkedwhen he received a letter from Todd, that president of yours. Toddsaid that I would subvert the morals of the country. So the ReverendValerian and I parted with words--he to go to China in his mind, I towork my way there in the body. " The Professor rested himself on thebed, and between puffs at his pipe continued: "I had an idea of goingto Tibet. That seemed to be really doing something--to go to Lhasa andunveil its mysteries to the world. I started from Peking, afootmostly, and so you see I didn't make very rapid progress, and whilewalking I had plenty of time to think. When I was about half-way tothe border, the absurdity of the thing came to me--spending years toget into Tibet, only to find there a filthy land ruled by a madreligion. I got almost to Shen-si, and turned back. Somehow Chinasuited me. I fell into the Chinese way of thinking, and might havegone on satisfied with a daily dole of rice and fish had it not beenfor Penelope. I never could forget Penelope. Always, it seemed to me, she must be waiting for me to come back with my promises fulfilled, toreturn a man she could be proud to own her father. It looked prettyblack for me then, David. China isn't a place to accomplish much, andI might as well have gone on to Lhasa as to do what I did--work threeyears in the consulate at Che-Foo as interpreter and useful man, eyes, arms, and brains for a politician from Missouri. But my one purposewas to get home, to see Penelope, to see her a woman grown, andperhaps--I would say to myself sometimes--to speak to her. "

"And you have found her a woman grown, " said I. "Now you have only tospeak to her. "

He shook his head. "I've been here three months now, David, and I haveseen her perhaps a score of times; and when I see her, sometimesentering that great house, sometimes driving in her carriage, alwaysthe very picture of the ideal princess, she seems a creature of anotherworld than mine, and I laugh at myself for trying to believe that thereever was a time when she sat on my knees and talked of days to comewhen we should have a house like that and drive in such a carriage!Would she understand me now? Would temporary necessity condone mydescending to this uniform? I tried to do better when I came here, butI couldn't. I tried even your profession, but they wanted young men. I came to this only to be near her. But I am away again, David. Imust be up and doing. " He had risen, and was speaking rapidly as hepaced the narrow limits of the room. "Money is what I need and I willhave it. Money has always seemed to me a paltry thing to work for, butnow it is for Penelope's sake. There has been a plan in my mind forsome time, David, only I have delayed starting on it--for Penelope'ssake, you understand. I'm going to Argentina. There was a man on myship coming out from Yokohama who was bound for Argentina, and he toldme----"

The Professor launched into a glowing account of the promise of thesouthern country. To his mind, he had only to reach it to acquire thewealth which he wanted. The man who had failed in every undertaking, who had turned back from every goal to which he had set his eyes, wouldwin there in a few years that for which men in other parts of the worldstrove a lifetime. I pointed out that the opportunity lay right at hishand, and his answer was to spread wide his arms that I might see thewaiter's jacket. He had the better of the argument, but the reason layin his own character. Then I had recourse to pleading, and my plea wasmade not for his sake, but for Penelope's, for only when I spoke of herwould he listen. I tried to show him Penelope's danger, as it had beenrevealed to us that very night in Talcott's drunken talk. His replywas a laugh. He had so idealized Penelope that it was inconceivablethat she should fall a victim to the attentions of such a vapidcreature. He had not seen, as I had, Talcott sober and correct indeportment. He had not fallen, as I had, under the spell of Talcott'seasy manner when he had just dropped in from the club to talk of lastnight's dance and to-morrow's opera. He did not know, as I did, thatthe whole company from whom Penelope might choose a mate were to theoutward eye just such commonplace men whose power of fascination lay incommonplace deeds and words. The Professor, whose whole life had beenspent pursuing shadows, was naturally of a romantic turn of mind, andit was even difficult for him to conceive of Penelope marrying at all. That she could be inveigled into so grave a step with a man whose soleclaim to merit was well-cut clothes and a command of social _patois_was quite beyond his comprehension. In vain I argued that most womenmarried just such men, and perhaps it was because the sex had attainedwisdom with experience, had discovered that a brilliant mind on parademight be amusing, but that, like its duller fellows, it retired tobarracks and found contentment in the same humdrum existence as they. The birth of eternal, enduring love was but a matter of propinquity. Sitting on the front doorstep of an afternoon talking and strollingdown to the drugstore every evening for soda-water, Darby and Joandiscovered that existence apart was worse than death. And so mightJoan's richer sister in the old carved chair, under the eyes ofReynolds's majestic lady, grow accustomed to the coming and going ofDarby's richer brother, confirm herself in the habit of taking narcoticconversation, talk of last night's dinner and to-morrow's dance, untilhe seemed to become essential to her existence. All this I explainedto the Professor. He retorted that I had grown cynical. Perhaps I hadgrown cynical, but my cynicism was born of experience--bitterexperience, I called it then. Perhaps, imbittered by my own thwartedhopes, I exaggerated the danger in which Penelope stood. Perhaps, inmy own vanity and jealousy, I magnified Talcott's sins, knowing wellenough that, after all, he was no worse than most of his brothers. Yetthere was a danger, and its avoidance was simple could I only inducethe man before me to abandon his foolish pride. At least, said I, hisbrother should know of the night's occurrence. 

"Know that, after all my boasts, I had come to waiting in a restaurantand quarrelling with drunken boys?" he cried, shaking his head andwaving an arm to deny my demand. "Of course, if there were anypossibility of Penelope marrying that fool it would be different. But, David, I know Rufus. He is not brilliant, but he is shrewd, and I'lltrust him to find out if anybody is after his money. And Penelope?Haven't I seen Penelope many a night stepping into her carriage--don'tyou think I can trust her to look higher than that?"

I could not change him, though we argued until dawn came. Then wewalked together, in the gray of the early morning, from the poorquarter where he lived to Miss Minion's, a house that had grown in myeyes, by contrast, palatial. The street was still deserted, andstanding by my door I made a last appeal. But he shook his head. 

"Davy, can't you understand?" he said, as he took my hand in parting. "I admit that I have been a failure up to date, but Rufus and Penelopeare the last people in the world that I want to know it, and I'll trustyou to be discreet. Some day it may be best to tell them, but atpresent, no. Silence, David; I have your promise. I'm to have onemore chance in Argentina, and if I fail you have your way; but I won'tfail. "

He turned from me and stood very straight. His overcoat collar wasbuttoned to the neck, hiding the uniform of his adversity. For amoment, as I watched him, he seemed to be in the gulch again; we lookedover the towering walls of brick and stone, and to me they were theridge-side, dark and sombre in the gray light; we looked beyond thecrest of it, beyond the chimneys, the tall pines which pierced thesky-line, and our eyes rested on a flake of cloud. I think it musthave been there. I felt the pressure of his hand. 

"I'll not be gone long, Davy, " he said. "I'm coming back very soon, and till then you will take care of Penelope; won't you, boy?"

CHAPTER XXI

Spring came and with it the Todds. All that winter they had been sofar from me, often so far from my thoughts even, that the remembranceof them would bring a shock like a sudden consciousness of sin or therecollection of a duty left undone. My fiancée's communication with mehad dwindled to a weekly post-card. At first these had carried to mesome little hint of affection, but latterly Gladys had contentedherself with commonplace scrawls announcing that this was where theywere staying for a few days or that the window in the hotel marked witha cross was hers. And my replies, so conscientiously written everySaturday night, had become rather brief and formal statements of facts. I had long since ceased to take Miss Minion's stairs two steps at atime in my eagerness to secure the portly epistle from abroad; thepost-card which had filled its place I regarded with languid interest. You can imagine, then, that it was with surprise that I found, oneevening in May, a fat letter directed to me in the tall, angular hand. The reading of it was like a blow which restored me to my senses. Ihad awakened to find myself not only engaged but on the verge ofmarriage. The Todds were coming home!

If my fiancée had neglected me for many months, she now overwhelmed mewith sixty closely written pages of devotion. It was as though oncoming face to face with steamer tickets she, too, had awakened from adream and found herself engaged. It might well be true that the fewweeks in London before embarking on the homeward stage had been herfirst opportunity to sit down with pen and paper to have what shecalled "a talk" with me. A year before that talk would have beenhighly gratifying and flattering, but now I read with a critical eye, and while I could find no fault with the sentiments expressed, the formof the expression irritated me. It was natural that the sentiment pentup in those months of hurried sight-seeing should break forth in thismoment of leisure, but to me, grown practical, the form would have beenmore effective if direct and simple. In those days Penelope was sodistant from me, so cold and implacable, that I might have turned toGladys Todd with a thought that here at last was peace, an end ofabsurd and inordinate ambition, and perhaps content. Had she writtento me simply that she was coming home, I might have soothed myself withthe idea that I, too, was going home, back to the simple ways to whichI was born, back, after all, to my own people. But Gladys Todd, grownmore cultured than ever in the grand tour and revealing her mind inpoetical phrases, was as much a being of another world than mine as wasPenelope set in her frame of costly simplicity. I should go to thepier to meet her, I said. I knew that it could not be gladly, but Iwas bound by a sense of honor, by the remembrance of four years throughwhich she had waited for me so patiently, always cheerful and firm inher faith in my power to win a home for us both. Because I was sobound, I vowed that she should never know the change in me, and then ifI set myself to the task I might fan into flame the dead embers of myboyish infatuation. 

So I stood on the pier that May morning when the Todds came home. Sogrim was my determination that I might have stood there with a smiling, expectant face had I not in that very hour seen Penelope. I had heldto that cherished custom of mine to begin my day with a walk up-town, for always there was a bare chance that I might have a glimpse of her. There was poor consolation in her passing bow; but I could not let hergo altogether out of my existence, and even her distant greeting servedto keep me in the number of her acquaintances. This day I wanted totake a formal farewell, as if in doffing my hat I renounced all myclaims, abandoned all my idle dreams, and set myself to the right path. Of course, I met her, and for a time I had cause to regret that I hadnot taken the direct way to the pier, for Penelope that morning, as shedrove by me rapidly down the avenue, was the embodiment of loveliness, a loveliness beyond the reach of him whom fortune held to the sidewalk. Her horses seemed to step with pride at being a part of such a perfectturnout, and the men on the box to have turned to statues by thecongealing of their self-importance. Seeing her, erect, a slender, quiet figure in filmy black, with a white-gloved hand on her parasol, you forgave the horses for lifting their feet so mincingly and the menfor staring before them with such hauteur. She whirled by me in allthat costly simplicity. I doffed my hat. She saw me and, strangelyenough, smiled at me more kindly than in many days. I watched untileven the men's tall hats were lost in the maze at Twenty-third Street, and as I watched I said my silent farewell to Penelope Blight. 

On the pier, in the cheering, expectant throng that watched the steamerturning into her dock, I leaned on my cane and fixed my eyes withresolution on the ship which was bringing me a life of happiness. ButI was silent as I pondered over the radiant smile with which I had beengreeted as the carriage swept by. A week ago Penelope had given herhead just a tilt of recognition; this morning she had seemed genuinelyglad to see me, as though it were a pleasure to know that I lived inthe same world. This afternoon, I said forgetfully, I would call uponher again--I had not called for so long. Then I heard my name. I cameback to the pier and the cheering crowd, and, looking up, saw GladysTodd. 

Beside me there was a young man who brandished his cane to the peril ofhis neighbors' heads while he shouted again and again to his inamorata. My duty was to evince just such joy, but when I tried to call her namemy lips refused to form it, and I only raised my hat and smiled. Gladys, standing by the ship's rail, waved her hand at me. Then sheseemed to forget me entirely, and turned to a youngish-looking, stoutman at her side. 

The stout man began to interest me, because Gladys had written to methat she would be on deck this day straining her eyes to the shorewhere her knight would be waiting. Now it seemed as though a briefglance at her knight was sufficient, and that she found more charm inthis portly fellow traveller. 

Ex-Judge Bundy had small side-whiskers, and always wore a large derbyand a frock coat, sometimes black, sometimes pale gray. Thisyoungish-looking stout man was clean shaven, and he had the ruddy skinof the out-of-doors. His hat was brown felt, with its crown woundaround with a white pugree--a rather affected hat, but it harmonizedwith his rough gray tweeds. His appearance was English; he might be, Ithought, the governor of some island colony. But when he raisedhimself from the rail on which he had been leaning, slipped one handinto the breast of his coat, and turned to address Doctor Todd, speaking as though he were Jupiter and the doctor Mercury disguised indingy clerical clothes, I recognized the patron of my alma mater. 

They came down the gangway one by one, the ex-judge leading; thenGladys Todd, rather mannish in a straight-cut English suit and a sailorhat, slung from her shoulder a camera, and nestling in one arm aYorkshire terrier; then Doctor Todd, unchanged, in the same clothes inwhich he had sailed, for he was one of those men who could go twicearound the world and collect nothing but statistics and postcards; thenMrs. Todd with her two greatest acquisitions in bold evidence, alorgnette and a caged paroquet. 

For a moment I felt that I had come solely to welcome ex-Judge Bundyhome. He was first to get my hand, and he held it while he told me howkind it was of me to take so much trouble; it was good to be home; hewas always glad to get back to America--speaking as though theseexpeditions were annual events. He might have gone on and presented meto his friends the Todds had I not disengaged myself and turned to myfiancée with a hand outstretched. 

"Look out for Blossom, " she warned me, hardly more than touching myfinger-tips. "Blossom always snaps at strangers. "

Blossom justified the statement by barking viciously at me. 

"I am so glad to have you back again, Gladys, " I said, speaking in alow voice, for I had an instinctive feeling that ex-Judge Bundy hadturned his head, though ostensibly he was busy with porters. 

"And it's so nice to see you, " she replied, and her gaze wanderedvaguely about the pier. She had written that it would be so good justto let her eyes rest on me, but now their appetite was quicklysatisfied, and it nettled me. 

I spoke to her again, louder, reiterating my delight, and she raisedher eyebrows and answered that she was glad that I was pleased. DoctorTodd and Mrs. Todd, however, were not so casual in their greeting. Thedoctor took both of my hands and declared that this was a happy familyreunion. Mrs. Todd kissed me on both cheeks and gave me the paroquetto carry. As we made our way through the crowd, she asked me if I didnot think that Gladys had improved, but to myself, as I watched herstriding ahead of us in her mannish clothes, I said that she certainlylooked quite trim and smart, and I found myself wondering if she stillpainted tulips on black plaques or would deign to sing "Douglas, tenderand true"? Perhaps, to her mind, broadened by a year of travel, I wasbut a provincial fellow, whose musical education had not gone beyond"The Minute Guns at Sea, " who, never having seen the galleries ofEurope, could have no appreciation of art. 

I was irritated. I wanted to set myself right in her mind, to show herthat I, too, had grown broader and wiser. But there was noopportunity. She was busy either with the trunks or in keeping Blossomquiet. During the drive to the hotel the situation was little better. We were in an ancient barouche, piled high with luggage, Mrs. Todd, Gladys, and I, ex-Judge Bundy having tactfully suggested that he takethe doctor with him in a hansom. 

Mrs. Todd was voluble. She was artfully sentimental. She spoke of theday when, as a young girl, she had left home for six weeks, and sherecalled her emotions as she came back to find the doctor waiting forher at the station. They were married shortly afterward. How historyrepeats itself! But Gladys was not impressed by the coincidence. Shemerely said that she was glad to have Blossom ashore again, for attimes the dog had been fearfully sea-sick. I could have strangledBlossom. Nothing is more humiliating to a man than to discover that awoman's love for him is waning. Here is a reflection on his power offascination. But it is doubly humiliating to find himself supplantedby a little woolly dog, to see the caresses which he would claim as hisshowered with ostentation on a diminutive animal. At that moment itseemed that Blossom had supplanted me. He nestled in her arm, and whenfor the tenth time I expressed my delight in having her home, sheturned from me and stroked the creature's silky back. Time and againI, striving to do my duty, charged against the steel points of herindifference. Even Mrs. Todd noticed my plight. As we were leavingthe carriage at the Broadway hotel whither Judge Bundy had led the wayshe whispered to me that evidently three was a crowd, and acting onthat belief, she contrived to leave the two of us alone in the greatparlor of the hotel while the doctor and the Judge held a colloquy withthe clerk. 

This Gladys Todd, sitting amid the faded grandeur of the hotel parlor, this handsome mannish woman in a tweed suit, with a snappy dog in herarm, was not the same girl beside whom I had sat ages ago, watching herpaint tulips and sprays of wisteria, not the same whose voice hadjoined with mine in the sentimental strains of "Annie Laurie. " But Ifelt that I had a duty, and I sat down on the sofa and held out my handand in a voice of pleading asked her again if she was not glad to seeme. 

"No, David, " she said, turning her eyes downward to Blossom. 

I was quite unprepared for such a frank admission, and it came like ablow. In all my thought of Gladys Todd I had quite accustomed myselfto the confession that I did not look with pleasure to her home-coming, but that she might regard me in the same light never occurred to me. This knowledge was humiliating. I had been holding myself to thestrict line of duty and honor, but I had never suspected that she mightbe impelled by exactly the same motives. Now I was hurt. As I satstaring at her I cast about for the reason of the change. In my caseit was another woman, but a superlatively wonderful woman. In hers itmight be another man, a superlatively wonderful man. The idea was notpleasant. In my case there was at least the excuse of oldacquaintance. In hers the change must have come in a single week atsea, where miles of walking on the deck and hours leaning on the railwith elbows close together might have revealed some kindred spirit. There flashed to me her action in turning from me, the watcher on thepier, to ex-Judge Bundy, and in him losing all thought of me. Butex-Judge Bundy was not a superlatively wonderful man. He was only arich widower with two married daughters, and was old enough to be herfather. My estimate of my own worth was not so modest that I couldconceive of my interests ever being seriously jeopardized by thispompous maker of nails. It was pleasanter to think that the fault layrather in my own unworthiness than in another's worth, and my prideurged me to combat her, to prove that while I might not be all that awoman of her ideals could ask, yet my shortcomings were those of myfellows in mass and not of the individual. 

"I do not understand, Gladys, " I said, and I held out my hand to takehers and to reassert my old ascendancy, but I was foiled by Blossom, who darted at me with such fierceness as to compel me to draw back. 

"David, I'm so sorry, " she said. She looked me in the eyes and spokewith the even voice of one who had entire command of herself. "Theplain truth is that I have made a great mistake. I really thought Icared for you. "

"And now you think you don't, " I said, brushing aside such an absurditywith a wave of my hand. "Nonsense! After four years, you can not tellme that you have suddenly discovered that you never cared for me. Ican not give you up for some absurd whim. "

She shook her head. "It is not a whim. I see clearly now. We werevery young when we became engaged, and I didn't understand how seriousthe step really was. In the last week at sea I have had time to thinkit all over, and now I know it best that after this we be justfriends--nothing more. You will forget me. You will find anotherwoman worthier of you. "

Little as I knew of women, I realized that while these last twostatements might be perfectly true, to accept them as true would severthe last strand of the cord which bound us. At that moment I did notwant to lose Gladys Todd. She was very lovely as she sat there, withher eyes downcast, caressing her dog. She was the promised reward ofmy years of work. For her I had labored, scrimped and saved, crampedmyself in a narrow room in a boarding-house, and almost shunned myfellows, to realize our dream of the little house on the bit of green. At that moment the dream was very dear to me and I could not see itwrecked for some whim. I grew belligerent. I reached out my handagain, as though by mere physical power I would prove my unchangingmind, but again Blossom was on guard. 

"I shall not forget you, " I said, and I folded my arms with grimdetermination and fixed my eyes on her face to break her by merewill-power. And then to what untruth did pride drive me? "I have notchanged. I shall never change, Gladys. I love you now more than ever, and I will not give you up. "

The light in her eyes was not quite so cold, nor was her voice so evenand at her command. "I am sorry, David, but you must. "

"But I won't, " I returned. 

"Oh, why do you drive me to it?" she cried with a gesture of despair. "Can't you see, David, that there is some one else to be considered?"

"Some one else?" I exclaimed. 

"I didn't think you would be so ungenerous--so selfish, " she said in alow voice, while her hands played rapidly over Blossom's head. "I havetried to be honorable and fair to you. But he was so kind, so good--heis so lonely----"

"He--who is he?" I demanded, in my anger abandoning all effort to holdto the honorable course to which I had set myself. 

"You should not ask me, " she replied, her voice growing hard. "After Ihad come to know him, to know how fine he was, I really tried to keepon caring for you, David, but I simply couldn't. I am fond of you, ofcourse, but not in the way I thought. You are too young. It is amistake for a woman to marry a man of her own age. She should marryone whom she can look up to, honor and respect. Love in a cottage iswell enough to read of, I suppose, but enduring love must be built onsomething more. "

I wanted to laugh at myself for the fool I had been. I arose. It wasuseless to sit longer with folded arms and determined eyes fixed on herface, to break her will by hypnotic power. I knew that I was defeated, and however better defeat might be than victory, judged in wisdom, itwas not pleasant to a man of spirit. I stood before her pulling on aglove and she looked up at me with a suggestion of defiance. I was notheart-broken. I felt that I should be, but I knew that I was sufferingonly in my pride. I wanted to sit down again in friendly fashion andtell her how hard I had tried to do my duty, that I too loved another, and that now she had made the way easy for me, but I refrained fromsuch petty revenge. 

I held out my hand. "I wish you all happiness, Gladys, " I said. "Youmust not trouble about me. No doubt you have chosen wisely. "

"You are a dear, good boy, David, " she said, rising and addressing mein a motherly tone as though she had suddenly attained twice my years. "You will find another woman more worthy of you--I know you will. Andwhen you come to Harlansburg you must bring her to see us. We shall besuch good friends. "

To Harlansburg? The whole story was clear in my mind. I rememberedthe Egyptian picture, the pyramids, the camels, and young Marshall'swarning. And I had been so blind that a moment since I was saying thatif another man had wrought this changed mind in Gladys Todd he must bea superlatively wonderful man. After all, the superlatively wonderfulman was ex-Judge Bundy. Now the blow to my pride was fairly crushing. It did seem that I had a few natural qualities which should haveweighed in the scales against such a rival. But if I had youth, he hadwealth; if I had promise, he had the same promise of youth fulfilled ingiant nail works; if I offered a vine-clad cottage on a bit of green, he could give the big gray-stone house with many turrets, the lawn withthe marble lions and perfect terraces sloping down to the ornate fence. The very absurdity of the situation saved me from regret. 

Gladys Todd was looking at me with narrowed eyes. I think she expectedsome outburst of emotion. Perhaps she felt sorry for the pain that shehad caused me. But as I looked at her and remembered the past, as Ithought of the judge, the house, and the marble lions, even my woundedpride was forgotten. I checked the smile which was threading my lips. I took my congé as a man should, gravely, with head bowed under thecrushing blow, with eyes downcast as though they would never again lookup into the joyous sunlight. I turned and left the room. 

By the rule, I should have looked back, hesitated, and gone on. But mymind was filled with the fear of meeting Doctor Todd or Mrs. Todd, orworse, Judge Bundy. How to treat Judge Bundy, did I meet him, was notclear--whether to pass him with a haughty stare, or to stop andcongratulate him, or even thank him. Discreetly I followed the darkwindings of the hall and left the hotel by a private entrance. In thestreet I looked up into the sunshine. I was free. I could notdissemble with myself any longer, and I turned to the avenue with aquick and joyous step. A new life had opened to me and I was steppinginto it unburdened, and with a prize to fight for. In those fewmoments Gladys Todd had gone into the past. She was hardly more than ashadow to me now, hardly more real than Mr. Pound or Miss Spinner orany other of the dim figures in my memory. Before me was Penelope--thefuture and Penelope. Her world was not my world, but I vowed that Iwould make it mine. 

Perhaps, I said, I shall see her again this very morning and perhapsshe will greet me again with that same kindly, glorious smile. Andsurely she would smile did she know that I was free from the yoke towhich I had bent myself in a moment of forgetfulness. My duty had beento Penelope since that day when we rode from the clearing, and fromthat day my heart had always been with her. Reading from the past, herdestiny and mine were written before me in clear, bold letters. Howgood the world was! How bright the day! How quick my step as I turnedup-town!

And I saw Penelope. She bowed to me from a hansom, and I answered, beaming. I halted. Herbert Talcott was sitting at her side. Hestared at me, tipped his hat brusquely, then turned to her and madesome laughing remark. 

I stood looking after the receding hansom until it disappeared in themaze of traffic. I took my congé as a man does sometimes, with my headbowed under the crushing blow, and my eyes downcast, knowing in myheart that for me the sunshine could nevermore be joyous. 

CHAPTER XXII

There was no doubt in my mind that Penelope Blight was engaged to marryTalcott. They announced the fact when they rode the length of theAvenue together in a hansom. But had I questioned the meaning of theirappearing thus in public I could not long have cheered myself with vainhope, for the papers next morning blazoned the news to all the world. That they printed it under great staring head-lines was not surprisingto me, for to me this fact transcended all others in importance. Beside it the rumblings of war in the Balkans, the devastating flood inChina, or the earthquake which wrecked a southern city were trifles. So to my distorted view the papers were filled with the announcement ofmy overwhelming misfortune. Only by the greatest effort could I dragmyself from reading and rereading to my humdrum task. Before me inblack and white was the last chapter in my own story, the story whichhad begun that day when I went fishing. Every line of it, couched inthe hackneyed phrases of the business, was a cutting blow, and yet Imust return again and again to the beating. Had Rufus Blight been apoor man, a worthy man whose sole claim to consideration lay in hishaving discovered some balm for human ills, then a paragraph would havesufficed for the announcement of his niece's engagement. But he was amillionaire; he lived in one of the largest houses in town, and hisniece was the greatest catch of the day, measured in dollars;therefore, the coming marriage was worthy of columns. The existence ofHerbert Talcott became also of prime importance, not because he hadever done anything, but because he was to marry the heiress of theBlight fortune. How many a worthy Jones or a poor but noble Robinsonhas to descend to an advertisement to make his happiness known to thecareless world? How many a lovely Joan goes to her wedding unread-ofbecause her forebears were lacking, not in those qualities which openthe gates of heaven, but in acquisitiveness?

To the public it could matter little that Rufus Blight was a simple, kindly soul who was as contented years ago when he stood behind hiscounter as to-day when he sought on the golf-links that sense of actionwhich is necessary to a man's happiness. The vital fact was that thetrust had paid him millions for his steel-works; not that Penelope wasa simple, lovely woman like thousands of her sisters, but that herwedding-gifts would be worthy of the daughter of Maecenas. Accustomedthough I had become in the routine of my work to just such a judgmentof vital facts, now that the story told was my own last chapter I madea silent protest against the manner of the telling. 

I thought of Rufus Blight as a quiet man, happiest not in the statelylibrary, but in his den surrounded by a medley of homely things. Thinking of Penelope I turned to those vagrant dreams, now forbidden. In them Penelope and I were to go back to the valley, to ride againover the mountain road, to stand again as we had stood that day whenshe led me over the tangled trail into the sunlit clearing. Those werejoys in which millions had no part. But as I read of the Blightmillions, and of that blue-blooded Talcott line which traced back ahundred years to a member of the cabinet, it was hard for me to believethat I knew these exalted beings, that I had sat with Rufus Blight andtalked of days in the valley, that Penelope and I had galloped over thecountry astride the same white mule, that I even had engaged with oneso distinguished as Herbert Talcott in a brawl in a restaurant. Gildedby those who report the comings and goings of those whom one shouldknow, as Mrs. Bannister might put it, they seemed aliens, manikins thatmoved in a stage world. As such I tried to think of them, for it wasbest, but I had as well set myself to efface my memory. 

The last chapter of my own story was written by unknown hands. Theepilogue remained, in which I was to go on seeking what contentment Icould find in action. But my whole story was not written on theseflimsy pages. It was before me always and always I was turning to it, always asking myself how it would have run had this not happened or hadthat occurred. Studying it over and over again in my room at night andon my long walks up-town, I found that I could not think of PenelopeBlight as an alien creature for whose happiness I had no longer anycare. What of her story which was in the writing? Did she know thisTalcott whom she had chosen to fill its last pages? She knew him as Iknew him first, as a quiet, gentlemanly man with pleasant manners. Wasit not her right to know him as I knew him now, as a drunken brawler, who in his cups had betrayed the unworthy motive of his devotion?These questions troubled me for many days. I was not a prude. I knewthat all men have their foibles, that many great men have over-indulgedin liquor, that a man's whole character is not to be damned by a singleslip. I knew that did all women see the men whom they choose formarriage as others see them we should have a plague of spinsters. ButI feared for Penelope Blight. This was not because Talcott was worsethan the mass of his fellows, but because the best of his fellows wasnone too good for her. But how could I go to her and declare thatTalcott when drunk had avowed a purpose to marry her for her millions?It seemed the part of a tattler. The world would say that I acted fromjealousy. Indeed, it was hard at times to convince myself thatjealousy was not the basis of my fear for her. Yet I felt that I mustsave her from a disillusionment which might come too late. Were herfather here that disillusionment would be speedy; but he was far away, and always his last words were with me, as he spoke them that night inthe street: "You will take care of Penelope, won't you, boy?"

I had promised that. It was simply repeating my boyhood promise. Andnow I kept asking myself if I was not forgetting that trust when I keptsilent because I feared in my pride to place myself in the light of anintermeddler, a bearer of scandalous tales; I would remember thatmorning when we had stood by the cabin door and I told her not to beafraid for I was guarding her. Was I guarding her?

For two weeks I kept puzzling over my course of action. I felt thatthe knowledge I held was hers by right, and hers, not mine, to judge ofits triviality. Yet I could not bring myself to face her with it. Then came the time when I had to speak at once if I was to speak at all. 

Mr. Hanks sent for me. As I stood before him, he studied me throughhis spectacles with his cold eyes, as he had studied me in those dayswhen I was trying to persuade him to give me work, and I began countingmy sins, wondering if in the cataclysm of ill luck which had overtakenme, I was to lose my position also. 

After a moment he asked, as casually as he might have assigned me to anexpedition to Harlem a few years before: "Malcolm, how soon can youleave for London?"

"At once, " I said, and I spoke as casually as he, though my heartleaped at the mention of London, for here I sensed an opportunitybeyond my wildest hopes. 

"At once, " he laughed and rubbed his hands with satisfaction. "I toldthe old man you would say that. He said that you were too young tofill Colt's shoes. Colt is ill, Malcolm; has to come home for a year'srest and I have backed you to do his work awhile. Of course, you won'tdo it as well as he, but you will do it fairly well, I think. "

"I will do my best, " said I, smiling. 

"That is the way to talk, " he returned. "I need hardly tell you tokeep your head and work hard, and perhaps you will pull through tillColt gets back. He will be a little hurt when he sees his substitute. He has been there twenty years and feels himself quite a figure in theworld, but as he has cabled for relief at once, he can't complain if wesend him the one man who is always ready to go anywhere at once. Really, you have three days; you sail on Saturday. "

I could have gone that day, had Hanks commanded it. The trust which heimposed in me was my reward for always having obeyed him withoutquestion, and in my state of mind that morning, between walking fromhis office to the steamer for years of absence and staying as I was, Ishould have chosen the former alternative. I wanted to get away. Theonly place where I could find even the shadow of contentment was at mydesk. There imperative tasks filled a mind at other times occupiedwith unwholesome brooding. I seemed to move through waste places, withno object to catch the eye and thought and to drive away theconsciousness of my unhappiness. Even my walk on Fifth Avenue had beenabandoned lest at any moment Penelope might pass me with Talcott at herside; Miss Minion's had become a place of terror, for by ill chance TomMarshall had been introduced to Talcott and he had developed a habit ofdropping in on me and telling me what he had said to Bert Talcott andwhat Bert Talcott had said to him. He seemed to think that Talcott hadconferred knighthood on him by knowing him. There were times, even, when I had gravely considered abandoning my chosen career and retiringto a bucolic life of loneliness in the valley. And at other times, into such depths of despondency was I plunged that I could seriouslyconsider abandoning self entirely and devoting the remainder of mywrecked life to doing good, though just what trend my saintliness wouldtake I never determined. In monkish days, I suppose, I should havegone into a cloister. But Hanks aroused me. Of course he did not knowmy thoughts. With his clear eyes he did not see that my life was aruin. He regarded me rather as a fortunate man to whom opportunitieswere opening wonderfully well, and I accepted his view; though I wassure that I was taking a road which led to nowhere, yet travelling wasbetter than sitting still. Looking at Hanks, I forgot that he had awife and four accomplished daughters over in Jersey, and I said that Ishould take life as he took it, with a cynical interest in the game, with all thought on the run of the cards and little for personalwinnings. 

When I had cleared my desk for my successor and had bidden good-by tomy old known tasks, I found myself turning to the new and unknown withmore interest than I had believed myself capable of showing. So muchwas to be done in those three days that I had little time forself-condolence. One day had to be taken for a farewell to my parents;and what a day it was, with my father and mother driving down toPleasantville in the late night to meet me that they might not lose onemoment of my visit! Only when I slept were they from my side, for mymother's mind was filled with all the stories of shipwreck that she hadever read, and my father had doubts as to whether or not the moralenvironment of London was such as he would ask for his son. My fathernever had much faith in my moral strength. Then Mr. Pound came up tosee me, having, as usual, commandeered Mr. Smiley's comfortable phaetonfor the transport of himself and Mrs. Pound. His hair was white now, and he bent a little, and his voice had lost some of its pompous roll, but his phrases were as round as ever. He insisted that I owned thepaper. He placed his hand on my head and for the information of MissAgnes Spinner named my good points much as a jockey would those of afavorite horse. He congratulated himself on the success of his methodof training and called on Judge Malcolm to admit that his effort tohave his son go to Princeton had been based on a misconception of theunderlying merits of the McGraw system of education. 

The Pounds stayed to supper, much to my mother's suppressedindignation, for she had invited them, never thinking that under suchunusual circumstances they would accept so promptly, so that by thetime they drove away I had begun to feel that I must have made thishurried journey just to say good-by to my old mentor. In the hour, alltoo brief, that remained to me my mother broached the subject of mybroken engagement, for in that she saw the reason of my melancholy, which I had been at pains to conceal. It could not be hidden from herquick eyes. She was convinced that Gladys Todd was not in her rightmind; no woman in her right mind would deliberately refuse to marrysuch a man as her son. Was it a question of blood? Surely there wasnone better in the land than that which flowed in the veins of theMcLaurins. Was it money? There was no finer farm in all the valleythan the one which some day would be mine, with the bridge stock andthe Kansas bonds. Was it character? Recalling the Sunday afternoonswhen she and I had worked together so patiently over the catechism andBible lessons, she was sure that she had done her duty toward me andcould never dream of my having failed in mine. So, to my mother'sthinking, the loss was Gladys Todd's, a consoling view of my plightwhich she endeavored to make me take, and she sought to cheer me with ahighly uncomplimentary estimate of the frivolous character of myquondam fiancée. It could serve no purpose for me to enlighten her asto the real truth, for did she know the truth she might be haunted bythe dread spectre of self-destruction. So her last words as we partedwere an admonition to me not to think that all women were as blind andas faithless as Gladys Todd. 

Her arms were around my neck and she whispered in my ear, that even myfather might not hear her: "Davy, take Penelope. We McLaurins alwayslooked down on the Blights, but that makes no difference, Davy--takePenelope. "

CHAPTER XXIII

But one day was left to me before I went to my new life, and yet I wasstill asking myself if I was taking care of Penelope. I had set myselfto go through life alone, regarding all women with cynicalindifference. But of her I could not think with cynical indifference. Her one act which might have fed my cynicism was her choice of a man ofthe character of Herbert Talcott. Then, after all, I reflected, shedid not know his true character. And yet did I? Was it my place tobecome a bearer of tales? Over and over I asked myself the question, and I could find no other answer than that of affirmation, for it washer right to know what had occurred between her father and Talcott. And she should know it, I said at last decisively; she should know it, not from me, but from Rufus Blight. And, telling it, I must give up mylast hope of her. 

So I went to Rufus Blight on the afternoon before I sailed, and I wentnot without misgivings as to the part that I was playing. Many timesin the walk up the Avenue I turned back, doubting, and then I wouldrepeat my old-time promise to Penelope and the Professor's injunctiongiven to me that early morning as we stood together on the street. Andso at last I found myself before the great house, and the grilled doorclosed behind me, leaving no retreat. 

Mr. Blight was in his "den, " resting after his day's golf in a deepchair by an open window, and he rose from a litter of evening papers togreet me. 

"Well, David, we thought that you had forgotten us, " he said. "Penelope remarked just this morning that it was high time you appearedto offer your congratulations. "

"I have been very busy, " I returned. "To-morrow I start abroad for ayear at least, and I came to say good-by and to tell you----"

In my eagerness to have my story over I should have plunged right intoit, but he interrupted me. 

"Abroad, eh? Well, we may see you after the wedding. We are all goingover after the wedding. "

The calm way in which Mr. Blight spoke of the wedding chilled me. Itwas so absolutely settled that there was to be a wedding that in methere seemed to be embodied that mythical person who is commanded sosternly to speak or forever hold his peace. For a time I did hold mypeace, but it was only because Rufus Blight evinced such a livelyinterest in my affairs that I had no opportunity to speak of thosematters which touched him so intimately. 

"Well, we certainly shall hunt you up in London in September, " he said. "We shall be over in September. The wedding is to be in July atNewport. We have taken a house there, or rather Mrs. Bannister has forus. " He saw that I could not restrain a smile at the mention of Mrs. Bannister, and he laughed heartily. "I don't know how we should getalong without Mrs. Bannister. You see, David, all I know anythingabout is the steel trade, and being out of that I have to have ageneral manager for this social business. She certainly does manage. Why, if it wasn't for her I doubt if we could arrange a wedding. Indeed, I sometimes even doubt if there would be an engagement. "

This same doubt had been tenaciously present in my own mind for somedays, and much as I should have liked to express it with heat and tojoin to it my opinion of the masterful woman's manoeuvres, I simplylaughed formally and said, "Indeed!"

"I can talk to you confidentially, David, " Rufus Blight went on, leaning toward me with his cigar poised in the air. "It is good tohave an old friend to whom you can unburden your mind, and it has beenon my mind that Mrs. Bannister has had too large a finger in thismatrimonial pie--not, of course, that I am not pleased. I am gettingold, and it is a relief to think of Penelope settled in life with athoroughly respectable, steady young man like Talcott; but, do youknow, I suspect sometimes that Mrs. Bannister had more to do withPenelope making up her mind than is altogether wise? She has talkedabout him continually, and between his coming to the house continuallyand Mrs. Bannister talking of him continually, Penelope didn't have afair chance. "

Rufus Blight smoked thoughtfully, and I remarked that I had no doubtthat Penelope knew her own mind. 

"Oh, yes, " he returned. "Understand that I have nothing whateveragainst Talcott. She might fare far worse. He is unapproachable asfar as character goes, but sometimes he seems to me rather dull. Isuppose that is because he doesn't do anything, and I wonder how longPenelope will be satisfied with a man who doesn't do anything but whatMrs. Bannister calls 'go everywhere. ' Will she not soon weary of goingeverywhere? I couldn't stand it myself. The other night I had to goto Talcott's uncle's to dine, and how I wished that I was home! Theuncle is a respectable old man, too, who has never done anythingeither, and all he talked about was terrapin and gout. When he hadfinished with them in the smoking-room, his mind seemed exhausted, andhe left me to the mercy of another man who tried to pump me aboutInternational Steel common. Is that pleasure?" Rufus Blight waved hiscigar with a gesture of contempt. "I suppose Penelope would beperfectly safe with such people if anything happened to me; but wouldshe be happy? Mrs. Bannister says that I should be satisfied to haveher marry into a family so eminently respectable, and I suppose Ishould. "

He looked at me, asking my opinion. 

"Undoubtedly the Talcotts are highly respectable, " said I. "They areone of the few old families who have succeeded in maintaining theirposition in New York. "

"That is just what Mrs. Bannister says, " he returned. "They arecertainly very kindly, and could not have treated Penelope better thanthey have. Talcott's aunt has Penelope with her all the time. Isuppose I should be satisfied. " He hesitated a moment. "But, confoundit, David, don't you see, I am not? Sometimes I think it must bebecause I am jealous, and I try to put that feeling away and to lookimpartially at Penelope's happiness. Then I must agree with Mrs. Bannister. Here is Talcott, a young man of good family, of exemplaryconduct. The only thing against him is an idle life; but if he doesn'thave to work, why should he? Yet it seems to me that Penelope is notthe kind of woman who would be satisfied with a husband who sat aroundthe house all day and found his main interest in terrapin and gout. Can't you see my predicament, David?"

He rose and paced the room. Twice he circled the table, while I sat insilence watching him. Then he halted at the fireplace and stood there, forgetfully warming his hands at an imaginary blaze. After a moment hefaced me. "I know about making steel, David, but in matters like thisI am utterly lost. How I wish Hendry were here to advise me!"

My opportunity had come more easily than I had expected. "I can helpyou, perhaps, " said I, "for I have seen him. "

"You have seen him?" cried Rufus Blight, and he crossed the room to mein great excitement. "When, David, and where?"

"Here in New York. "

"Splendid! And he is coming to us, eh? I know he is at last. "

"In two years. He has promised to come home in two years. "

Rufus Blight sat down in his old chair and stared at me. "In twoyears? Why, David, we need him now. He must come now. We will bringhim home--you and I. "

"But we can't, " said I. "He is far from here now; he went away lastwinter. "

"You saw him and did not bring him home!" Rufus Blight's voice rose toa pitch of indignation. "I don't understand. Did you tell him how wewanted him--Penelope and I--how we had searched for him everywhere?" Inodded. "You told him that and he would not come?" He leaned towardme angrily. "Well, why didn't you let me know about him?"

"Because it could have done no good, " I answered. "I had to promisehim that I would not, yet because he feared that I should break mypromise, he slipped away. I saw him but once. When I went to see himagain he was gone--to Argentina. "

"I see, " said Rufus Blight more gently. "You must pardon my losing mytemper, but it was hard to think that he was near us and yet we neverknew it; strange that you did not tell us of it earlier. "

"I should not tell you now were there not certain circumstancesconnected with my meeting with your brother that it is best that youknow, " I returned. 

I went on with my story very quietly, as if it were one in which I hadlittle personal concern. I knew that Rufus Blight was not quick tocatch the hidden meaning of a word or tone, so that it was not from anyfear of him discovering my biassed mind that I made my statement sounimpassioned. It was because I wanted to satisfy myself that I wasacting alone for Penelope's good and disclosing the truth, uncolored, for her to judge. Slowly I told it all, in a dry, unvarnished sequenceof facts. I told him of my visit to O'Corrigan's; of the fight and myinterference; of my hours with his brother and his account of hiswanderings and trials; of my vain plea to bring him back to Penelopeand his refusal to surrender his search for that chimerical prize forwhich he had struggled so futilely. To me the vital part of my storyhad to do with Herbert Talcott. But for its apparent effect on RufusBlight I had as well discovered his brother thrashing Tom Marshall. Tohim that incident was trivial. What he wanted to know was howHenderson looked. Was he well? Was he in absolute poverty? Did hespeak as though he really meant to come home in two years? When I hadfinished he asked me these questions again and again. He thrashed thewhole story over, all but the essential part. He leaned back in hischair and stared at the ceiling. Henderson in want? To think of hisbrother in want and he so willing to share with him the fruits of hisenormous prosperity. Henderson going afoot to Tibet? What a man hewas! That was just the kind of thing he would do--some wild chase likethat. And the South Seas? How I should like to hear him tell aboutthem, David! He will come back--he has promised--in two years. Hewill fail. Poor old Hendry always fails, but it will be good to havehim--he in that chair, I in this--and to hear him talk of it all. 

So always was the essential fact missed. I was angry with RufusBlight. I wanted to shake him, to shout into his ear, to drive intohis dull brain the real purpose of my story. But I held my temper andreverted to the fight with quiet but meaning emphasis. 

"Hendry was always a handy man with his fists, David, " said RufusBlight. "In his younger days he was hard to arouse, but get him angryand he was the devil himself. He wasn't afraid of anything. It wasjust like him to start alone to Lhasa--just like him, David. "

I had begun to suspect that Rufus Blight was not so obtuse as I judgedhim, but was passing over that part of my story which had to do withTalcott, because he really liked Talcott and was inclined to lightenthe shadow which his conduct that night had thrown on his exemplarycharacter. I had told him all. I had repeated the exact words whichthe Professor had given me as the cause of the assault, and now in hisbrother's mind they were lost in a rapt interest in his adventures. Ifwith design, then my mission had been futile, and it was wisdom toretreat. If without design, I could not bring myself to the rôle of aprosecutor, and to argue was to tread on dangerous ground. I had donewhat I believed right. I had kept my promise. So I rose to go. Imust have given Rufus Blight a strange look as I held out my hand. Iwas furious at him for his obtuseness or his cunning, and I must haveshown it, for he returned my gaze with a puzzled stare. Then a gleamof light filtered into that brain, so competent to deal withsteel-works, so hopelessly dull on other matters. 

"David, " he said, "you have delayed a long time in telling me this. Now, why?"

I answered him, speaking no longer in cold, business-like tones. Iheld out my hands wide apart and took a step toward him to bring myeyes nearer his, for every nerve was set to drive the truth into him. 

"I tell you now because your brother's last words to me were, 'Takecare of Penelope. ' How can I take care of Penelope? She has gone farfrom me. It is for you that his words have meaning. Can't you see?"

His hands were groping vaguely in the air behind him. He found thearms of his chair and sat down weakly, and with his head thrown back helooked up at me with an expression of wonder on his face. 

"I leave to-morrow, " said I. "It will be a long time before I see youagain. Will you say good-by to Penelope for me?"

"I see, David, " he exclaimed. His voice snapped, as I fancy it didsometimes when affairs in the steelworks were awry. "I was sointerested in Hendry I forgot all about that fellow Talcott. Now, tellme this--did he----"

"I have told you everything, " said I. "There is nothing left for me tosay except good-by. "

 * * * * * *

Far, indeed, had Penelope gone from me. So I had said to RufusBlight--almost my last word to him. So I said to myself as I stood bythe steamer's rail and looked back to the towering mass of the lowercity. That very morning I had seen her: she driving down the Avenue, alone, sitting very straight and still in her victoria; I on thepavement, taking my last walk up-town in the never failing hope to havea glimpse of her. Now, what would I have given not to have yielded tothat temptation? She had seen me. I halted sharply and raised my hat, thinking that she might stop to say good-by, for she knew that I wasgoing away. She did see me. She looked straight at me, coldly, andnot even by a tremor of her eyebrows did she give a sign that to her Iwas other than any stranger loitering on the curb. 

CHAPTER XXIV

Time, the philosopher said, takes no account of humanity. "Theactivest man sets around mostly, " I once heard Stacy Shunk remark as hesat curled up on the store-porch, nursing a bare foot and viewing theworld through the top of his hat. Did the most active man calmly andwithout egotism dissect the sum of his useful accomplishment, he wouldbe highly discouraged, for time is a relentless destroyer. But a mancan not take so disdainful a measure of his own value. He must live. To superior minds like the philosopher's or Stacy Shunk's he may beliving his tale of years happy in constantly hoodwinking himself withthe idea that he is an important factor in some great purpose. Now incertain moods I might attain to the lofty view of the philosopher andStacy Shunk. Then I would be confronted by my friend the Professor, who would have been dissatisfied had he been the author of Plato'sdialogues or the victor of Waterloo. Then it seemed to me that thewise man would allow himself to be hoodwinked, and would walk hard andfast without too critical an eye on the results of his journey. It iswhen he sits around that Stacy Shunk's active man is discontented, andthis is not because he accomplishes much when working, but because heaccomplishes less when idle. Here I had the example of Rufus Blight, brought at last to expending his restless energy in chopping golf-ballsout of bunkers. So work became to me the panacea for my ills. Iplunged into the struggle harder than ever, and in working found thatself-forgetfulness which is akin to contentment. It was indeedmarching under sealed orders. 

Those nights at sea the Professor's words were often in my mind. I wasterribly lonely, and I could stand by the hour at the ship's raillooking into the heavens, and beyond them into the limitless spaceswhere our vulgar minds have placed the home of the Great Spirit whosemysterious purposes we fulfil. How infinitesimal seemed my own part inthat purpose, though I played it as best I could. I turned in vain tothose limitless spaces to ask why and for what I lived? Did I ask howI should live, the answer came from the limitless spaces within me asclearly as though written on this page. My mother had written itthere, unscientifically yet indelibly, in my boyhood days, and Mr. Pound had added his few words, almost hidden beneath a mass of verbiageabout Ahasuerus, and before them my forebears had every one of themleft imprinted some sage injunction gained from their experience inliving. So I gathered my strength to do my best. But there was a lackof definiteness in my purpose. There was no goal at which I aimed. Inmy younger days I had had instilled into me the necessity of aspiringto a particular height, to something concrete, to become a leader atthe bar, in politics or commerce, a Webster, a Clay, or a Girard. Butnow I cared little if I never owned the paper for which I worked. Thetask at hand alone interested me, and to that I bent every energy. 

One task lay at my hand that year when I was in London, beside theroutine of my office, and now I undertook its completion for thepersonal pleasure which it gave me to gather into concise form theresult of some years of study and patient digging for facts inforgotten volumes and manuscripts. The result was surprising. Thebook, offered to a publisher with diffident apology, raised a storm ofdiscussion in a half-dozen languages. To me it had been only apleasant intellectual exercise to trace "the habit of war" back to thesimple animal instincts of our ancestors; to follow the changingmethods of fighting from the days when men assailed one another withstone axes to the modern expression of fighting intelligence in thebattleship; to show how, with every step which we had taken toeradicate disease and alleviate suffering, we had taken two in refiningand organizing our power of destruction. I had facts and figures tomark the steps in this twofold human progress, and to show the cost tothe race of a single century not only of warring, but of following thesage injunction to be prepared for war in times of peace. Had I closedmy labor there, the book would have been lost on the shop-shelves; butwriting ironically, I went on to argue on the benefits of war and ofthe necessity of the race continuing in the exercise of this elementalpassion. I had always abhorred preaching, and here to preach I used amethod of inversion, peppering my argument with platitudes on war as aneeded discipline for the spiritual in man by its lessons in fortitudeand self-sacrifice, and on the softening influences of peace. But whatI had intended as subtle irony was discovered by a great conservativejournal to be an unassailable argument, supported by facts and figures, demonstrating the futility of the movements for international amity. Iwas hailed as a bold, clear thinker who had pricked the bubble ofunintelligent altruism, who at a time when philanthropists werepreaching disarmament had proved that men could never disarm as long asthey were born with arms, legs and healthy senses. 

So David Malcolm was quite unexpectedly raised to some eminence by aconservative English journal which was clamoring for increased navalexpenditure; and once discovered, he found himself not without honor inhis own country, for he was assailed from the platform of Carnegie Hallby the advocates of a gentle life, and in Congress his work was used asa text-book by those who were fighting for a larger militaryestablishment. The _Morgen-Anzeiger_, in Berlin, printed a translationwith the purpose of quelling the opposition to army service, while thereading of a chapter in the French Chamber resulted in an appropriationfor experiments in submarines. Such was the effect of my well-intendedirony. To-day, of course, the true purport of the facts, figures andargument are better known, but then I had the chagrin of seeing myprojectile explode in the wrong camp, and I did not try to rightmyself, because I feared that to explain the error might nullify theultimate effect of the explosion. To my mother alone did I trouble topoint out my real meaning, and then because she had been shocked to seeme assailed in her favorite journal, the _Presbyterian Searchlight_, asa notable example of the result of philosophy unwarmed by religion. 

That I should have to make my peace with my mother was not surprising, but my old professional mentor, Mr. Hanks, loved a paradox; if hewanted to call a man a fool, he praised him for his wisdom; if hewished to disprove a proposition, he argued for it, adroitly exposingits weakness, and yet he wrote to me indignantly. 

"I can not understand how from the mass of facts you have gathered youcould calmly advance to so cruel an argument, " he said. "Your ownfigures protest against your bloodthirsty philosophy. Machiavelli'sPrince is a mollycoddle beside your ideal modern statesman. And yet, Malcolm, you could as easily have produced a work which would havestood for years as a reproach to the diplomacy of our time. "

Dear old Hanks! It was from his suburban heart that he spoke thus, asthe father of four accomplished daughters, and not as the sceptic ofthe office who was always quick to prick the bubbles of pretence. Butit was not long before he had an opportunity to turn ironical himself, and I could fancy the grim smile with which he wrote the despatch whichsent me from the academic discussion of war to the study of war atfirst hand. 

"Join the Turks at once. "

It was laconic. To me it said more. It was addressed to DavidMalcolm, suddenly become known as an advocate of wholesale humanbutchery, and told him to follow the camp and see how sufferingbenefits the race, to stand by the guns and watch them take the tollthat nations pay for their aggrandizement. To-day, when the book isunderstood, when peace conferences invite me to address them and navyleagues condemn me in resolutions, Hanks wonders why I accepted hiscommission with such hearty acquiescence. He deems me inconsistent. 

The truth was that my heart leaped at this opportunity for realadventure. I was years older than in the days when I dreamed ofwearing a cork helmet and carrying the Gospel and an elephant gun intodarkest Africa; but few of us, when we become men, really put awaychildish things. Here was my boyhood's dream come true and glorified. And what a week I had buying my toys! The cork helmet became areality, and with it I equipped myself with smartly fitting khaki, andin the quiet of my lodgings viewed myself with ineffable satisfaction. I bought equipment enough to have lasted me through a three years'campaign, as I have since learned from experience, for the exigenciesof transport made me abandon most of it at the very outset of my newcareer. But the loss was more than compensated by the delight which Ihad in the brief possession of so much warlike paraphernalia. 

For two years after that I lived in the midst of armies. It wasaction, and to me inaction was a dreadful sickness. Even when we layin camps for weeks and months there was the never-ending preparationfor the struggles which lay ahead, and though there were hours as quietas Broadway in mid-August, days could not be dull when you could seethe smoke of hostile fires on distant mountains or a wild scouthovering on the fringe of the desert. For me the happiest days werewhen I could ride with the marching columns, when the distant barkingof the guns called me to a hard gallop, when at night by the scantlight of a candle I sat in my tent cross-legged, with my pad on my kneeand my pencil in hand. 

In war man strips himself of the unessential things which make up themuseum of superfluities that he calls his home. At home he hascountless troubles. Here he has few, but though they are simple, theyare vital. I faced these elemental problems for the first time whenwith my little caravan I set out to join the Turkish army where it laycamped near the Greek frontier. As I rode my vagrant thoughts mightturn back to home, and in my heart I might feel the old dull pain andlonging, but when a pack-horse was running away with half mycommissariat on his back such moody meditations had to be broken short. Some days the question of mere bread for a crying stomach became vital, or a flask of water for a parched throat. There were nights when Ishould have given all I possessed, not for the folding-bed long sinceabandoned, but for a blanket in which to wrap myself as I slept in atrench. Within a week it was hard for me to believe that I had notspent all my life in the wake of an advancing army. London, NewYork--they were of another age. Home to me was a tent pitched by theThessalian roadside, with my shaggy horses picketed about and myshaggier attendants chattering their strange jargon. This was luxuryto one who had slept the night before in the rain, or worse, perhaps, in some shamble in a filthy Greek village. This was hardship, but Icame to love it for the action and the forgetfulness. In the briefweeks of an opera-bouffe war I had my first taste of great adventure, and once knowing the joy of it I forgot for a time my academic ideas onthe absurdity of international quarrels, and was happy only when I rodewith the marching columns. 

I came even to love the Turks, and I rode almost a Turk at heart overthe plain of Thessaly. For they were strong men, these sturdy brownfellows who slouched as they marched, but always went forward, neverfaltering when the bullets snapped around them and the red fezzes oftheir comrades were dropping in the dust. It angered me to see myfellow-Christians shoot them down and then run toward Athens and theprotecting skirts of the powers, for I knew that the powers wouldrender their battles futile and their conquests empty and send themback with ranks depleted to their distant hills. They fought, most ofthem, hardly knowing why, save that in some mysterious way it was fortheir faith. They were dirty and ragged, but they were patient andbrave. Ill-fed and ill-clothed, they could march all day in thescorching sun, uncomplaining, shiver all night in chilling winds, andthen shamble on in the face of death. 

The Greeks fought a little and ran. They would stand and fight alittle again--then run. I thought that we should chase them to Athens. I had visions of riding into the city in the wake of Edhem Pasha andpitching my ragged camp by the Acropolis. But I never passed Pharsala. 

It was there that I met the Professor again. 

He lay at the foot of a roadside shrine which had been wrecked by ashell and hardly cast a shadow. But he had been dragged out of thenoonday heat into that bit of shadow by some kindly enemy and thereleft to die. The war had finished with him and had swung on. He washardly worth even an enemy's glance. 

Riding by with my eyes intent on the moving fight ahead, I should havepassed him but for my dragoman. To Asaf there was nothing unusual inthe pitiful figure by the roadside, propped against a stone, with thehead fallen on an outstretched arm and a still hand clutching an emptywater-flask. It was the clothes that called a second glance. Save thecartridge belt around the waist there was nothing to mark the man as asoldier. The kindly hand which had placed him there had drawn over hisface a soiled gray hat; his suit was a worn blue serge, dyed now withdark stains, and his feet were encased in patent-leather shoes, crackedand almost soleless. The plain ahead was filled with the clamor ofbattle; a pack-train clattered by me, hurrying to the front, and butfor these and for Asaf, the ragged Turk at my side, pointing mutely tothe still dark heap, I might have thought myself at home, in my ownvalley, come suddenly on a mountain tragedy. And now I dismounted, and, raising the hat, looked into the thin brown face that I had firstseen years ago so wistfully watching the little flake of cloud whichhovered over the ridges. 

CHAPTER XXV

I had thought this morning that at last I was to see a pitched battle, for the Greek army was well intrenched in the hills north of Pharsalaand made some show of a stand there. At noon I stood on the crest ofthe same hills watching the usual retreat. A few miles away, its grayhouses blotched against the mountains which guard southern Thessaly, was the town, and in the valley, drawing in toward it, the Greeks, withthe enemy on their rear and flanks enclosing them in a narrowingsemicircle of fire. Before me stretched the road, a white band acrossthe undulating green of the plain. In that road, a mile away, I sawthe rear-guard as it retired swiftly but steadily, facing again andagain to deliver its volleys into the lines of the advancing foe. Oncebefore I had seen that same small company fighting bravely as they werenow, checking the advance of a whole division. I knew them for theForeign Legion. Little black patches were left in the road as theyfell back, and it made me sick at heart to think of these men throwingaway their lives in so futile a cause. That little black patch hadbeen perhaps a student filled with fervor for Pan-Hellenism, a collegeboy out for an adventurous holiday, or perhaps a soldier of fortune whoheld his life cheaply and was ready to give it for the brief joy of abattle. Now I stood by one of those little black patches, by the firststill outpost which marked the fight down the road. 

Had the horse which I had bought from a dealer in Ellasona been four orfive years younger, I might never have noticed my friend as he laythere by the ruined shrine. In the ride out from Larissa, on the daybefore, I had found the animal a very unsteady framework on which toload two hundred pounds. At the first gallop I put him to he went downon his knees and rolled over on me, so that thereafter I had to contentmyself with going more cautiously, keeping as close as I could to thecloud of dust raised by the general staff. So it happened that I wasambling along at a gait regulated only by my beast's vagrant will, whenAsaf's exclamation checked me. 

I stood now, gazing stupidly at the figure beneath me. He lay so stillthat I thought him dead. Then his fingers tightened on the water-flaskand his arm trembled as he tried to draw it to him. 

This was no time to stand idly by, wondering how and why he had come tothis useless sacrifice. It was enough that he was here and living. Iknelt at his side, and though my surgery was rough, it stopped the flowin which his life was draining away; his parched lips drank theproffered water, and when his head was on my knees he turned his facefrom the light and clasped his hands almost with contentment. Heseemed to know that a friend was with him. The friend who had boundhis wound and given him drink would find him a better bed than theserough stones and a kinder shelter than this bit of shadow, swept by thedust of endless pack-trains. 

In such a place a friend could avail little. We carried him back fromthe turmoil of the road into the trampled wheat and there made him arude tent of my blanket and a pillow of my saddle. Then I looked aboutme for help. The pack-trains clattered along the road and through themwounded men were threading their way, painfully hobbling to thefield-hospital, miles away. Of ambulances there were none. I knewthat when night came they would stagger back from the fighting frontwith their loads of wounded, and that so few were they in numbers thechance of finding a place in them was of the smallest. The Turk doesnot trouble much with the wounded. When a man is hit and he can hobblemiles to the hospital, then Allah be praised! If not, he lies where hefalls till night comes and his comrades find him and tie him like a bagof grain on a pony's back and send him on a journey that would be deathto any Christian. If a surgeon finds him he is lucky. Rememberingthis, I looked back over the road by which I had come, measuring themiles we must cross before we reached help, and then at the Professorlying at my feet hardly breathing. I knew that we stayed where wewere. Then I looked to the front. There was help there. There weresurgeons working in that wide-spread wreath of smoke. I pointed overthe plain and called to Asaf to hurry and bring me a surgeon. Hedemurred, for he was always chary about entering the zone of fire. Ipromised him a hundred pounds, a farm, a horse, a flock of sheep, ifonly he would go and bring me a surgeon. Malcolm Bey was mad, he said;no surgeon would come at such a time, miles for a single wounded man. I knew that he was right, but I could not sit idly watching my friend'slife ebb away. I doubled the prize, and with a shrug of the shouldersAsaf mounted and galloped off. 

I sat by the wounded man and waited. It was for hours. To me itseemed days. Thousands passed by--the men of the trains, stragglers, wounded, troops of the reserve. There were among them hands willingenough to help, were there any help to be given, but between them andme there was the inseparable gulf of language. One officer, a tallAlbanian, rode over, and in French asked if he could be of anyassistance; the man was a Greek; it made no difference, if he was afriend of Malcolm Bey; he could spare a pony and men to take him backto Larissa. I pleaded for a surgeon and an ambulance, pointing overthe plain as though there they could be had for the asking. He bowedgravely--my request was a simple one; he would send them at once. Andhe rode forward toward the smoke and the clamor. 

I sat watching. My hand held the Professor's. My eyes were turneddown the road to catch the first sign of Asaf and help. 

"Davy!"

He was looking up at me from beneath half-raised lids. How long he hadbeen watching me I did not know. His voice was very low, but in itthere was no note of surprise. To him it was quite right that I shouldbe there. That was enough. His sickened mind could not trouble itselfwith wherefores. 

"I am here, Professor, " I said. The old nickname of the valley soundedstrangely, but I could not call him Mr. Blight when he lay this way, looking up at me with eyes that seemed to smile with contentmentdespite his pain. 

"You will be all right, Professor, but you must lie here quietly tillthe surgeon comes. "

"I will be all right, " he repeated slowly, and closed his eyes. 

I looked over the plain. Would Asaf never return? The dusk wasgathering and the wide-spread wreath of smoke mingled with it and waslost. I could see the flash of the Greek guns as they made their laststand to hold back the enemy till night came with its chance of escape. Even the near-by road had its moments of quiet and the moving figuresgrew blurred. Every clatter of hoofs might be Asaf coming, everyrumble of wheels the ambulance. But Asaf did not come. 

"Davy!"

I looked down. He was indistinct in the shadow of the rough tent. Hehad brought his other hand to cover mine. 

"It was a good fight, wasn't it, Davy?"

"It was a grand fight, " said I. 

"And you'll tell them at home, Davy?"

"Yes, you and I will tell them together, " I said with forcedcheerfulness. "But you must be quiet till the surgeon comes. "

It was growing dark. Over the plain the bark of heavy guns and thecrackle of rifles had stopped. Camp-fires were lighting, a circle ofthem hemming in the town. Even the near-by road had grown quite quiet, like any country road where the stillness is broken by the rare clatterof hoofs or the curses of some stumbling pedestrian. 

His hands were pulling at mine and I leaned down over him in thedarkness. He could only whisper those last few words. 

One hand slipped from mine; from the other life seemed to have gone, itwas so still and listless. 

I leaned so close over the dark form that my face touched his. I knewthat he was going from me, and I wanted to hold him back. It was soterrible for him to die this way, in this lonely field with no wisehand to help him. My useless hands would have shaken him to arouse hislife again, but I stayed them. 

I knew that it was futile to speak, that my voice was falling on dulledears, but what else could I do to stir him to fight for life?

"I'll tell them--we will tell them together, " I cried. "We will gohome to Penelope, you and I, and they shall know how you fought. Andthey will be proud of you, Professor; I know they will. And how gladthey will be to see you--how glad Penelope will be! Can't you hear me?"

I looked up, straining my ears for the sound of hoofs, but the road wasas quiet as any country lane before dawn. I leaned over the dark formand listened, and I knew that his march was ended. 

CHAPTER XXVI

Through what quiet lanes of trivial circumstance do we move toward themomentous events of our lives? We go our way, whistling thoughtlessly;we turn a corner and stand face to face with the all-important. In myboyhood I went fishing and tumbled into a mountain stream; I overheardBoller of '89 speaking to Gladys Todd; I walked the Avenue at half pastthree in the afternoon and met Penelope Blight. How finely spun is thethread which holds together my story! A firmer foothold on the bank, an ear less quick to catch an undertone, a moment's delay beforesetting out on my daily airing, and there might have been no story totell you; the valley might have been all the world I know and the wallof mountains my mind's horizon. 

Then I come to the matter of Philip Bennett's motor. It was alwaysbreaking down. The delays that it caused as we journeyed north fromNaples were annoying, but at the time these were trivial events, as weusually found a comfortable inn where we could wait while Bennett's manlay in the dust and peered up into the vitals of the machine. It wasan adventurous thing to trust one's self to the mercy of the Italianhighway in the untrustworthy little cars of those days, but StephenBennett insisted on our joining his brother, and as I was travellingback to England with him after a hard year in the Sudan I consented. 

Bennett's brother met us at Naples, where we landed from the steamer, and, after pointing out to us the marvels of his self-propellingvehicle, put us into it, and took us puffing and rattling northward. We broke down twice a day, but we did not mind it, for after the tripfrom Khartum, the saddle over the desert, and the uncomfortableEgyptian rail, this new invention was to us the height of luxury intravel. 

Stephen Bennett was in the Egyptian army, in the camel corps. I hadridden many a long march with him, and was beside him at Omdurman whenhe was struck through the body by a Remington. We got in a nastycorner that morning on the heights of Kerreri, and were so hard pressedby the dervishes in the retreat that the wounded were saved with thegreatest difficulty. Bennett was so badly hurt that it took two of usto hold him on my horse; but we got him back to the river and thehospital, and after Khartum fell I picked him up at Fort Atbara. ToCairo by rail, a week at sea, and in the October days we were rattlingnorthward and homeward over the white Italian roads. We reached Rome. I had one day in the Eternal City while François replaced a brokengear, and then we went on to Foligno, where we paced the Corso for anafternoon and the Frenchman fixed up his brakes. Late that night atPerugia we broke down at the foot of the hill and we had to climb toour hotel. At this last mishap Bennett began to show annoyance, for hehad not as yet recovered his full strength, and the next morning, overour coffee and rolls, he proposed that we go by rail to Florence, wherehe knew people, and wait there until the car caught up with us. ToBennett's brother this suggestion was a reflection on the power of hisbeloved machine. He resented it, and I, not wishing to inject myselfinto a fraternal argument of some heat, went out to see the town, promising to return when they had amicably settled our plans. 

From the rampart, where I paused that morning, as I strolled out socarelessly, leaning over the wall and looking over the Umbrian plain, there is a fair prospect--the fairest, I think, that I have ever seen, save one--and I hung there drinking in its peace and ruminating. Across that plain, and I should take another step toward home. But itwas my boyhood's home alone, and yet I was going happily to sit againon the horse-hair sofa in the parlor, with my father on one hand and mymother on the other, and before me, perhaps, Mr. Pound, giving me hisblessing. I saw it all: the valley clad white in snow, the house onthe hill amid the bare oaks, the windows bright with potted plants, anddown the path my father and mother running to meet me. I thought, withlove in my heart, of that boyhood home and of my coming to it. Yet inthat same heart there was a longing unfulfilled. Where was mymanhood's home? Once I had had a tantalizing glimpse of it. That waswhen I sat at Penelope's side by the carved mantel, under the eyes ofReynolds's majestic lady. That for which I yearned so vainly was thespot which she made sweeter by her presence. Were she here at my side, looking with me over the Umbrian plain, this would be home. Butwherever I travelled, east or west, north or south, my journey couldhave no such satisfying ending. Even in the valley, in the presence offamiliar, homely things, I knew that I should look away vaguely, as Ilooked now, at distant mountains, wondering where Penelope was and howthe world went with her. 

After two years of absence from her and utter silence, I could drag outof my memory no pictures of her save old ones, and one by one I broughtthem forth, my favorite portraits, and saw her sitting in the carvedchair pouring tea or driving down the Avenue, very still and verystraight in her victoria. She must be in New York, I said, for in lateOctober she would be hurrying back to town for the old futile routine. I went on, recklessly fancying Penelope leading that life, dancing, dining and driving, as though this were all in the world she couldpossibly be doing. I knew that she had not married Talcott. I hadlearned this much of her from a stray newspaper which announced thebreaking of the engagement. I knew that it could make no difference tome if she had married some one else. That was highly possible, yet itwas not a possibility on which I cared to dwell in my moments ofrumination. This day my mind dwelt on it, whether I would or not. Over the plain, just beyond the mountains, I saw Penelope in myvisionary eye, and I asked myself if I should find another in thatcoveted place from which I was barred. A bit of land, a bit of sea, and there was home. In a few hours the same sun would be smiling onit. At that moment I dreaded to go on. It was my duty, yet, could I, I would have turned back to the Sudan, to ride again over the yellowsands in the dust of marching regiments. I wanted action. Poor, pitiful action it was to walk, but with every fall of my feet and everyclick of my cane I could say to myself that I was going home, to myboyhood's home, and it mattered little if I had no other. The clatterof the Corso jarred on me. My mood demanded quiet places. The littlestreets called to me from their stillness, and I answered them. Theyled me higher and higher to the summit of the town. I crossed adeserted piazza, and by a gentle slope was carried down to the terraceof the Porta Sola. 

There was in this secluded spot a soothing shade and silence. Oldpalaces, ghosts of another age, cast their shadows over it. Stepswound from its quiet, down the hill into the clatter of the lower town. A rampart guarded the sheer cliff, and with elbows resting there andchin cupped in my hands I looked away to the Apennines. Below me twoarms of the town stretched out into the plain, but their minglingdiscords rose to my ear like the drum of insects. Beyond them, in thenearer prospect, the land seemed topsy-turvy, a maze of little hillsand valleys. A pink villa flamed against the brown, and its flat, squat tower, glowing in the sunlight, called to its gaunt neighbor, rising from a deserted monastery, to cheer up and be merry with it. Distance levelled the land. It became broad plain, studded with grayvillages and slashed by the Tiber; it rose to higher hills; then liftedsharply, the brown fading into the whiteness of massed mountain peaks. 

This is my fairest prospect. And yet at that moment it offered me nopeace. I was so infinitely lonely. With Penelope at my side, I said, I could stand here for hours feasting my eyes on so lovely a picture. To me, alone, it gave nothing. I should be happier with the Bennetts, forgetting self and self's vague longings in a plunge into thefraternal dispute. 

I turned away into a narrow alley, but I was unaccustomed to Perugianstreets and had not solved the mystery of their windings. Suddenly, passing a corner, I found myself again in the deserted piazza, and, looking down the slope, saw the same picture framed by palace walls. First my eyes grasped the panorama of plain and mountain. Then I sawonly the terrace. 

It was not mine any longer to hold in loneliness. I brushed my handacross my eyes to sweep away the taunting image. But she held there bythe wall, leaning over it, her chin resting in her hands, wrapped incontemplation. Her face was turned from me, but there was no mistakingthat still, black figure. If she heard my footfalls and the click ofmy cane, she gave no sign of being aware of my approach, but lookedstraight out over the plain. I checked an impulse to call her name andstood for a moment watching her. Would she greet me, I asked, withthat same chilling stare with which she had said good-by? I feared it. But I tiptoed down the slope to the wall, and, leaning over it insilence, enjoyed the stolen pleasure of her presence. Whether shewould or not, we looked together over the fair land. And what aprospect it was with Penelope at my side!

"David!" she said. 

She took a step back, and stood there, very straight, surveying me, asthough she were not quite sure that it could be. I searched her eyesfor a hostile gleam, but found none, and when her hand met mine it waswith a friendly and firm grasp. 

"Penelope, " said I, "as I came down the hill there and saw you, Ithought that I dreamed. "

"And I, " said she, "when I turned and found David Malcolm beside me. Ihad heard that you were in the Sudan. "

"Much as I should have liked to bury myself in the Sudan, there werecalls from home, " I returned. 

"From Miss Dodd--what are you laughing at, David? From Miss Todd, Imean. How could you talk of burying yourself when you have suchhappiness before you? But, David, why do you laugh?"

With this reproof she tilted her head. That did not trouble me. I hadso often seen her tilt her head in the same scornful way in the olddays. And I laughed on joyfully at her calm assurance that I was goingback to Gladys Todd. 

"Gladys Todd is now Mrs. Bundy, " I said. 

"Oh!" Penelope exclaimed, and her voice changed to one of sympathy. "Iam sorry, David. I see now what you meant by the Sudan. "

"Didn't you know that Gladys Todd had jilted me years ago?" I asked. 

"Why, no, " she answered. "How should I? You never told me. "

"I was on my way to tell you one day, " said I. "And then----"

I stopped. Remembering why I had not told Penelope, I deemed it wiserto be evasive. I remembered, too, that in my joy at seeing her again Ihad been taking it for granted that she was still Penelope Blight. Thegulf between us, which had been closing so fast, yawned again. "Tellme, " said I in undisguised eagerness, "are you married, Penelope?"

Then she laughed, and in the gay ring of her laughter, I read heranswer. She stepped back to a stone bench and seated herself, and Itook a place beside her, watching as she made circles in the sand withthe point of her parasol. There were a thousand commonplace questionsthat I might have asked her, but I was contented with the silence. Itmattered little to me how she came there. It was enough that she wasat my side. It mattered little to me that Bennett and his brothermight have settled their dispute long since and be hunting for me, forI had made my farewell to them. I was home. I intended to stay athome. So I, too, fell to making circles in the sand, with my stick. 

Then Penelope looked up and asked me: "David, how do you come to behere, in this out-of-the-way Italian town? I thought you were in theSudan. Uncle Rufus told me that you were in the Sudan. That is how Ihappened to hear it. He always insists on reading to me everything ofyours he can find--rather bores me, in fact, sometimes--not, of course, that I haven't been interested in what you were doing. "

She spoke so coldly that I feared that, after all, I had best go my waywith Bennett and his brother. I told her how I had travelled withthem, and how the motor had broken down, and how my finding her was bythe barest chance, for in a few hours I should have been on my way toFlorence. 

"It's strange, " she said. "Our motor broke down, too, last night--justas we reached the gates; but this afternoon we hope to be off again toRome. "

"We?" I questioned. 

"Uncle Rufus and I, " she said. 

"And Mrs. Bannister?"

"Married a year ago to a rich broker, " she answered, laughing. 

"How long I have been away!" I exclaimed. 

I glanced covertly at Penelope. Despite the tone of formality in whichshe addressed me she seemed quite content to sit here weavinghieroglyphics with the point of her parasol, for I noticed that she wassmiling, unconscious, perhaps, that I was studying her face. A whileago I had stood a little in awe of Penelope, but it was an awe inspiredby her surroundings rather than by her. Going from Miss Minion's toface the critical eye of her pompous English butler was itself anordeal; to Mrs. Bannister I was a poor young man whom it was a form ofcharity to patronize; the great library, the carved mantel, theportrait, the heavy silver on the tea-table, these were emblems ofanother world than mine. But here in this piazzetta, with the broadItalian landscape before us, those days of awkward constraint were inthe far past. This quiet Penelope at my side contentedly tracingcircles in the sand was, after all, the simple, kindly Penelope of thedays in the valley. I had no fear of her. If she tossed her headdisdainfully, I could fancy the blue ribbon bobbing there again andsmile to myself as I recalled the morning when we had galloped togetherout of the mountains on the mule. There were questions which I wantedanswered, and I dared to ask them. 

"Penelope, " I said, "I am glad to hear that Mrs. Bannister is happilymarried. Now tell me of my friend Talcott--what of him?"

Penelope sat up very straight and her head tossed. "David, I shouldthink that one subject which you would avoid. "

"I confess myself consumed with merely idle curiosity, " I returned. "Talcott once made a great deal of trouble for me. Don't you rememberthe day on the Avenue when you cut me?"

"And if I had met you here a year ago, David, I should not have knownyou, " she said severely. "A woman resents being made a fool of, norcan she easily forgive one who exposes the sham in which she has apart. The fault was mine and Mrs. Bannister's, and back of it therewas something else. "

"Something else?" I questioned. 

Penelope did not answer. She had turned from me to the parasol and thesand. I repeated the question. 

"Herbert Talcott is married--a year now, " she said in a measured tone. "His wife was a Miss Carmody--the daughter of Dennis Carmody, who ownsthe Sagamore--or something like that--mine. " A pause. Her headtossed. "He recovered very quickly. "

"But the something else?" I insisted. 

"There are some things which you will never understand, " she answeredcarelessly. 

"There are some things which you must understand, " I cried. "Thehardest task that ever I had was to go to your uncle as I did, like abearer of idle gossip. It would have been easier to let you go on asyou were going, ignorant and blind. I knew that it meant an end of ourfriendship. That day when I spoke I believed that I was going out ofyour life forever. I was not surprised when, on the Avenue, you lookedat me as though I were beneath your notice. " I rose and stood beforeher. "Had I to do it over again, I would, a thousand times, for yoursake. And didn't I prove that it was for your sake, when I banishedmyself and gave up all claim to you?"

"Claim to me?" Penelope's lips curled defiantly. "I should havethought that you would have been occupied making good your claim toMiss Dodd, or Bodd, or whatever her name was. I suppose you did right, but none the less it was unpleasant. I thank you. You see I forgiveyou, or we should not be here now talking. " She raised her parasol asthough about to rise. "We must go. My uncle is waiting for me, and ifyou care to, you may come with me and see him before we start for Rome. "

She did not rise; but the matter-of-fact tone in which she made thethreat chilled me, and for a moment I stood silent, looking down at theblack figure. The brim of her hat hid her face from me, but she wasmaking circles in the sand. I asked myself if this was the time for meto speak of that claim, to speak my whole heart to her. 

She looked up. "David, " she said, "you need not stand there so long. It might be bad for your wound. "

"My wound?" I asked, and I took my old place at her side. 

"Why, yes, " she said. "Were you not wounded in the Sudan? Uncle Rufustold me that you were. He read about it in the papers. A MajorBennett, or somebody, ran out under a heavy fire and pulled you out ofthe hands of a lot of Arabs and saved your life. "

I laughed. I would have given all I owned in the world to have had atthat moment an interesting and conspicuous wound, for I knew howsympathy formed love, and how to a woman's mind a wound added interestto a man. A few weeks ago, though unwounded, I had at least been verythin and brown; but even of those mild attractions I had thoughtlesslyallowed myself to be robbed by too high living and a kinder sun thanthe desert's. How I envied Bennett with his sunken eyes and totteringgait!

"The telegraph evidently mixed the names, " I said. "It was Bennett whowas shot. "

"And you saved his life!" Penelope cried, forgetting herself. 

However modest the man may be who hides his light under a bushel, it isalways pleasing to him to have another lift the basket. As a matter offact, on that morning at Omdurman it was almost as uncomfortable in thedisordered and retreating ranks as it was in our rear, where Bennettlay crushed in the sand under his dead camel. If I did run back to himin the face of the oncoming horde of dervishes, a half-dozen of his ownblack troopers ran with me and helped to drag him to safety. It was anordinary incident of the heat of battle, yet I did wish that Bennettwere here to tell her about it, with his grateful exaggeration. To mefell the hard task not only of hiding my light, but of blowing it out. 

"We got him away, " I returned carelessly, accenting the pronoun asthough the whole corps were concerned. "A lot of his men ran back tohim and put him on my horse. I simply led him out of danger. "

"Oh!" Penelope exclaimed in a tone of disappointment. 

She looked over the plain; and I beside her, with my stick bent acrossmy knee, studied her face, trying to read in it some promise ofkindness and hope. But I found none. She seemed lost in the fairprospect. She had met an old friend and had spoken to him. That wasenough. Now it mattered little whether he went away or stayed. Itcame to me then to try an old, old ruse to test the quality of herindifference. 

"We had best be going, " I said, rising. 

To my consternation she rose, too, and began to move off carelessly, asthough she expected me to follow her to the hotel to see Rufus Blightand then to bid her a casual farewell. I did not follow. Indifferentshe might be, but my mind was made up that she should hear me. Therewas no longer any gulf between us. There was only the barrier of coolindifference which she had raised, and I would fight to break it down. 

"Penelope, " I said, "there are other things that you and I must speakof before we go. "

"What?" she asked, looking back over her shoulder. 

"Of your father, " I answered, stepping to the wall and leaning on it. 

I think that she saw reproof in my eyes. She hesitated, stirring thesand with her parasol, and then came to the wall beside me. 

"Is there anything that I do not know of him?" she asked, as she stoodwith her chin in her hands, looking over the plain. "You wrote sofully--to my uncle. You might have written to me, David--but still youwrote to my uncle. " There was no hard note in Penelope's voice. "Youcared for him, David, and he died in your arms. It was for that Iforgave you--everything. "

"Everything? What do you mean by everything?"

"There are some things that you will never understand. "

"But you speak as though I had done much that needed forgiveness. "

"We have been to Thessaly, David, " she went on, as though she had notheard me. "We found the very shrine where he died and the place whereyou buried him, and we marked it. It seemed best that he should liethere where he had fought so bravely--his last fight--as though hewould have it that way. How could I help forgiving you afterthat--everything?"

"Everything? Penelope, I do not understand. "

She laid a hand lightly on my arm. "Tell me, David, what were myfather's last words to you?"

"I wrote them to you, " I answered. 

"To Uncle Rufus--not to me. "

"How could I write to you after that day on the Avenue?"

"That was a small thing, and I was foolish. Now I want to hear it fromyou myself. "

I looked straight before me as I repeated the words which her fatherhad said that night as he lay dying on the plain of Thessaly. "Tellthem at home--it was a good fight. "

I felt her hand lightly on my arm again. I heard her quiet voice ask:"Was that all?"

"The rest I could not write, " I answered, turning to her, and shelooked from me to the mountains. "He said to me: 'David, take care ofPenelope. '"

For a moment Penelope was very still. It was as though she had notheard me. Then she half-raised herself from the wall. One hand restedthere; the other was held out to me in reproof. 

"And how have you done it, David? With a year of silence. "

"But that day on the Avenue?" I said. 

"There were other days on the Avenue which you could have remembered, "she returned. "There was that day when we met--after long years. Andthat day I remembered the valley and the boy who had come into themountains to help me; I remembered my father's last words to us, andfor a little while I was foolish enough to think that it must be forthat that I had found you again. "

I would have taken the outstretched hand, but she drew it away quicklyand stepped back. 

"And do you think I had forgotten the mountains that day?" I said. "Why, Penelope, I loved you that day as I love you now, as I have fromthe morning when you and I rode into the valley together. "

I took a step toward her, but she moved from me, and stood with herhands clasped behind her back and her head tilted proudly as she lookedup at me. 

"It sounds well, " she said, her lips curling in disdain. "But howabout Miss Dodd, or Miss Todd?"

"Why will you be forever casting that up at me?" I protested. "For atime I did forget. I was a plain fool. But, Penelope----"

"I must be going, " she said; but though she pointed toward the slopedown which I had come from the little piazza, she really went again tothe wall and stood there where I first found her, as though heldspellbound by the view. 

I was beside her. "Penelope, " I said firmly, "there are some thingswhich you and I must straighten out here and now. "

"There is nothing to straighten out, " she said. "Everything issettled. We are friends. " Lifting a hand, she pointed over the plain. "What does that remind you of, David?"

"A little of the valley, " I answered. Then I raised my hand too. "There are the mountains, Penelope, and just before them the ridge overwhich we rode that morning. Do you remember it? Do you remember howNathan ran away over the trail, how you clung to me and called to me tosave you? Home should be down there where you see the village. Do youremember----"

Penelope was looking from me, as though at the stone house, its roofjust showing in the green of giant oaks. 

Again she raised her hand. "And the barn, David--the big whitebarn--there!" she cried. Then she checked herself. She was verystraight and very still. "I was forgetting, " she said. 

A step closer and I said: "You do remember, Penelope!"

"I must be going, " she returned in a low voice, but she did not move. 

I feared to speak now lest I should awaken her from the revery in whichshe seemed to have suddenly forgotten my existence. 

"I must be going, " she said again, and still she did not move. 

She was looking across our valley! I knew that she saw it as on themorning when we rode in terror from the woods and it lay beneath us, afriendly land, in the broad day, under the kindly eye of God. Then Ibent nearer her, an arm resting on the wall, my eyes on her avertedface, patiently waiting until she should speak. And I could waitpatiently now, for I believed that in the silence the memory of thatday was fighting for me. 

After a long time Penelope spoke. "David, do you remember--" Shepaused. Her voice fell to a whisper. "What was it that you said to methat morning--don't you remember?--don't cry, little one!"

In all the world there is no fairer prospect than that on which Ilooked from the little terrace in Perugia. For I saw not alone thelovely Umbrian plain. Before me stretched a fair life itself, into theunending years, from that moment when Penelope spoke, turning as shespoke and looking up at me with a smiling face. What a blind, blundering creature I had been! The black-gloved hand was close tomine on the wall, and I took it. Then I leaned down to her and said:"I remember, Penelope, and I will--I will take care of you always. "

CHAPTER XXVII

"Yesterday, Harry, your mother laid a hand upon my arm, and, turning tome with a curious, far-away light in her eyes, said: 'How time flies, David!'"

And I looked down at her proudly, as though this were another of theinnumerable new and clever ideas which she has a way of discovering andexpressing so concisely. 

"What made you think of that, Penelope?"

She pointed over the tangled briers to the woods, to the very spotwhere the path breaks through the bushes and leads to the brook. 

"Yesterday, David--it seems but yesterday--I dragged you out of thedeep pool, and to-day--a moment ago--I heard Harry there, shouting. "

"He has probably caught a trout, " said I as I lighted a cigar. "Asmall boy always shouts when he lands a fish. "

Penelope laughed. 

"And if, " I went on, between critical puffs--"if he falls in, James iswith him and James will pull him out. You must not think that thesewoods are full of small girls with blue ribbons in their hair who arewatching for an opportunity to rescue drowning boys. "

"How stupid you are, David!" said Penelope, "And yet at times you havebeen monstrously stupid. Of course, I know that Harry is perfectlysafe with James; but what I meant was that it seems only yesterday----"

"Since you pulled me out of the brook?" I said. 

Then I tucked her hand beneath my arm, and, standing there in the deepweeds and briers, we looked about the clearing. Even the Professor'scare had long been missing. The roof of the cabin had fallen in yearsago, and the end of a single log, poking through a mass of green, marked the stable from which the white mule had regarded me socritically. Yet the mountains rose above us, the same mountains; thesame ridge sloped upward to the south, and above it was the same bluesky and a white cloud hovering in it. A crow cawed from the pines. Itmight have been the same crow that in other days called to me, nowcawing his welcome. It did seem but yesterday. How fast the weeds andbriers had grown, defying the Professor's languid hoe! How suddenlyhad the timbers snapped which held the roof! And doubtless Nathan'shome went down in a gust of wind. 

"Yesterday, Penelope, " I said, "you led me out of the woods, drippingwet--don't you remember? from my tumble into the pool. Right thereyour father stood, looking at that very cloud, wistfully. "

"And yesterday, " Penelope said, pointing over the clearing, "in themorning early, father and I were sitting by that very door, when weheard a shout and, looking, saw you running toward us through thebrush. Don't you remember, David? You fell down out there--why, ajuniper tree has grown up there since yesterday. "

Then Penelope was very quiet. I saw her glance to the bushes, and herhand gripped mine. I knew what was in her mind. I saw the samepicture; I could almost hear the brush crackling under the Professor'sflying feet, and leaning down over her I said: "Don't cry, little one;I'll take care of you. "

That was really yesterday, Harry, and really yesterday Penelope and Irode again over the trail along which the white mule had carried us atsuch a terrible pace. We climbed the ridge, and at its crest Penelopereined in her horse and pointed over the valley. I followed her raisedhand over the land, over the green of the fields and the white ofblossoming orchards, to the great barn, gleaming cheerfully in thenoonday sun, and to the dark roof nestling in the foliage of giant oaks. 

Penelope turned to me with smiling eyes and said: "It's all right, David. Yon's our home!"