A MAN AND A WOMAN

By STANLEY WATERLOO

[A NEW EDITION]

Published by

Way & Williams

Chicago

MDCCCXCVII

Copyright, 1892, by Stanley Waterloo

All rights reserved

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

 I PROLOGUE II CLOSE TO NATURE III BOY, BIRD, AND SNAKE IV GROWING UP WITH THE COUNTRY V GRIM-VISAGED WAR VI THE SPEARING OF ALFRED VII HOW FICTION MADE FACT VIII NEW FORCES AT WORK IX MRS. POTIPHAR X THE BUILDING OF THE FENCE XI SETTLING WITH WOODELL XII INCLINATION AGAINST CONSCIENCE XIII FAREWELL TO THE FENCE XIV A RUGGED LOST SHEEP XV A STRANGE WORLD XVI THE REALLY UGLY DUCKLING XVII "EH, BUT SHE'S WINSOME" XVIII THE WOMAN XIX PURGATORY XX TWO FOOLS XXI "MY LITTLE RHINOCEROS-BIRD" XXII TWO FOOLS STILL XXIII JUST A PANG XXIV "AS TO THOSE OTHERS" XXV NATURE AGAIN XXVI ADVENTURES MANIFOLD XXVII THE HOUSE WONDERFUL XXVIII THE APE XXIX THE FIRST DISTRICT XXX THE NINTH WARD XXXI THEIR FOOLISH WAYS XXXII THE LAW OF NATURE XXXIII WHITEST ASHES

A MAN AND A WOMAN. 

CHAPTER I. 

PROLOGUE. 

But for a recent occurrence I should certainly not be telling the storyof a friend, or, rather, I should say, of two friends of mine. Whatthat occurrence was I will not here indicate--it is unnecessary; but ithas not been without its effect upon my life and plans. If it be askedby those who may read these pages under what circumstances it becamepossible for me to acquire such familiarity with certain scenes andincidents in the lives of one man and one woman, --scenes and incidentswhich, from their very nature, were such that no third person couldfigure in them, --I have only to explain that Grant Harlson and I werefriends from boyhood, practically from babyhood, and that never, duringall our lives together, did a change occur in our relationship. He hastold me many things of a nature imparted by one man to another veryrarely, and only when each of the two feels that they are very closetogether in that which sometimes makes two men as one. He was proudand glad when he told me these things--they were but episodes, andoften trivial ones--and I was interested deeply. They added thedetails of a history much of which I knew and part of which I hadguessed at. 

He was not quite the ordinary man, this Grant Harlson, close friend ofmine. He had an individuality, and his name is familiar to many peoplein the world. He has been looked upon by the tactful as but one of atype in a new nationality--a type with traits not yet clearly defined, a type not large, nor yet, thank God, uncommon--one of the best of thetype; to me, the best. A close friend perhaps is blind. No; he is notthat: he but sees so clearly that the world, with poorer view, may notalways agree with him. 

I hardly know how to describe this same Grant Harlson. At this stageof my story it is scarcely requisite that I should, but the account isloose and vagrant and with no chronology. Physically, he was more thanmost men, six feet in height, deep of chest, broad-shouldered, strong-legged and strong-featured, and ever in good health, so far asall goes, save the temporary tax on recklessness nature so oftenlevies, and the other irregular tax she levies by some swoop of thebacilli of which the doctors talk so much and know so little. I meanonly that he might catch a fever with a chill addition if he laycarelessly in some miasmatic swamp on some hunting expedition, or that, in time of cholera, he might have, like other men, to struggle with theenemy. But he tossed off most things lightly, and had that vitalitywhich is of heredity, not built up with a single generation, thoughsometimes lost in one. Forest and farm-bred, college-bred, city-fostered and broadened and hardened. A man of the world, withexperiences, and in his quality, no doubt, the logical, inevitableresult of such experiences--one with a conscience flexile and seeking, but hard as rock when once satisfied. One who never, intentionally, injured a human being, save for equity's sake. One who, of course, wandered in looking for what was, to him, the right, but who, havingonce determined, was ever steadfast. A man who had seen and known andfed and felt and risked, but who seemed to me always as if his religionwere: "What shall I do? Nature says so-and-so, and the Power beyondrules nature. " Laws of organization for political purposes, begunbefore Romulus and Remus, and varied by the dale-grouped Angles or theNorthmen's Thing, did not seem to much impress him. He recognizedtheir utility, wanted to improve them, made that his work, andeventually observed most of them. This, it seemed to me, was hishonest make-up--a Berseker, a bare-sark descendant of the Vikings, in adress-coat. He had passions, and gratified them sometimes. He hadambitions, and worked for them. He had a conscience, and was guided byit. 

It was always interesting to me to look at him in youthful fray, moreso, years afterward, in club or in convention, or anywhere, and try toimagine him the country small boy. Keen, hard, alert in all the waysof a great city, it was difficult to conceive him in his early youth, well as I knew it; difficult to reflect that his dreams at night werenot of the varying results of some late scheme, nor of white shouldersat the opera, nor the mood of the Ninth Ward, nor of the drift ofbusiness, but of some farm-house's front yard in mid-summer with a boyaiming a long shot-gun at a red-winged poacher in a cherry tree, orthat he saw, in sleep, the worn jambs beside the old-fashionedfireplace where, winter mornings, he kicked on his frozen boots, andthe living-room where, later in the morning, he ate so largely ofbuckwheat cakes. He was a figure, wicked some said, a schemer manysaid, a rock of refuge for his friends said more. This was the man, nouncommon type in the great cities of the great republic. 

As for the woman, I write with greater hesitation. I can tell of herin this place but in vague outline. She was slender, not tall, brown-haired and with eyes like those of the deer or Jersey heifer, save that they had the accompanying expression of thought or mood orfancy which mobile human features with them give. She was a woman ofthe city, with all that gentle craft which is a woman's heritage. Shewas good. She was unlike all others in the world to one man--no, totwo. 

I have but tried to tell what these two people appeared to me. I cansee them as they were, but cannot tell it as I should. I have notsucceeded well in expressing myself in words. Even were I cleverer, Ishould fail. We can picture characters but approximately. 

CHAPTER II. 

CLOSE TO NATURE. 

The great forest belt, oak, ash, beech and maple, sweeps southwestwardfrom New England through New York and trends westward and even to thenorth again till one sees the same landscape very nearly reproduced inWisconsin wilds. Not far from where its continuity is broken by thesouthern reach of Lake Huron was a clearing cut in the wood. The landwas rolling, and through the clearing ran a vigorous creek, alreadyalder-fringed--for the alder follows the chopper swiftly--andglittering with countless minnows. In the spring great pickerel cameup, too, from the deep waters, miles away, to spawn and, sometimes, tobe speared. From either side of the creek the ground ascendedsomewhat, and on one bank stood a little house. It was a housepretentious for the time, since it was framed and boarded instead ofbeing made of logs, but it contained only three rooms: one, the generalliving-room with the brick fireplace on one side, and the others, smaller, for sleeping apartments. So close to the edge of the forestwas the house that the sweep of the wind through the tree-tops madeconstant music, and the odd, squalling bark of the black squirrel, thechatter of the red one, the drumming of the ruffed grouse, the pipe ofthe quail and the morning gobble of the wild turkey were familiarsounds. There were deer and bear in the depths of the green ocean, andan occasional wolverine. Sometimes at night a red fox would circleabout the clearing and bark querulously, the cry contrasting oddly withthe notes of whippoorwills and the calls of loons. The trees werelargely oak and beech and ash and birch, and in the spring there weregreat splashes of white where the Juneberry trees had burst into bloom. In summer there was a dense greenness everywhere, and in autumn a greatblaze of scarlet and yellow leaves. 

There was an outlined flower garden in front of the house, made invirgin soil, and with the stumps of trees, close-hewn, still showingabove the surface. Beside the door were what they called "bouncingBetties" and "old hen and chickens, " and on each side of a shortpathway, that led to what was as yet little more than a trail throughthe wood, were bunches of larkspur and phlox and old-fashioned pinksand asters, and there were a few tall hollyhocks and sunflowersstanding about as sentinels. The wild flowers all about were so closeto these that all their perfumes blended, and the phlox and pinks couldsee their own cousins but a few feet away. The short path ran througha clump of bushes but a few yards from the creek. In these bushessong-sparrows and "chippy-birds" built their nests. 

In the doorway of the little house by the forests edge stood, oneafternoon in summer, a young man. He was what might perhaps be termedan exceedingly young man, as his sixth birthday was but latelyattained, and his stature and general appearance did not contradict hisage. His apparel was not, strictly speaking, in keeping with the gloryof the general scene. His hat had been originally of the quality knownas "chip, " but the rim was gone, and what remained had an air ofabandon about it. His clothing consisted of two garments, a striped, hickory shirt and trousers of blue drilling. The trousers weresupported by suspenders, home-made, of the same material. Sometimes hewore but one. It saved trouble. He was barefooted. He stood with ahand in each pocket, his short legs rather wide apart, and looked outupon the landscape. His air was that of a large landed proprietor, one, for instance, who owned the earth. 

This young man under consideration had not been in society to any greatextent, and of one world had seen very little. Of another he knew agreat deal, for his age. With people of the sort who live in towns hewas unacquainted, but with nature's people he was on closer terms. Hehad a great friend and crony in a person who had been a teacher, andwho had come to this frontier life from a broader field. This personwas his mother. With his father he was also on a relationship offamiliarity, but the father was, necessarily, out with his axe most ofthe time, and so it came that the young man and his mother were moreliterally growing up together with the country. To her he went withsuch problems as his great mind failed to solve, and he had come tohave a very good opinion of her indeed. Not that she was as wise as hein many things; certainly not. She did not know how the new woodchuckhole was progressing, nor where the coon tracks were thickest along thecreek, nor where the woodpecker was nesting; but she was excessivelylearned, nevertheless, and could be relied upon in an emergency. Heapproved of her, decidedly. Besides, he remembered her course on oneoccasion when he was in a great strait. He was but three years oldthen, but he remembered all about it. It was, in fact, this occurrencewhich had given him his hobby. 

The young man had a specialty. He had several specialties, but to oneyielded all the rest. He had an eye to chipmunks, and had made mostinefficient traps for them and hoped some day to catch one, but theywere nothing to speak of. As for the minnows in the creek, had he notcaught one with a dipper once, and had he not almost hit a big pickerelwith a stone? He knew where the liverwort and anemones grew mostthickly in the spring and had gathered fragrant bunches of them daily, and he knew, too, of a hollow where there had been a snowy sheet ofwinter-green blossoms earlier, and where there would soon be anabundance of red berries such as his mother liked. At beech-nutgathering, in the season, he admitted no superior. As for the habitsof the yellow-birds, particularly at the season when they were feedingupon thistle-seed and made a golden cloud amid the white one as theydrifted with the down, well, he was the only one who really knewanything about it! Who but he could take the odd-shaped pod of thewild fleur-de-lis, the common flag, and, winding it up in the flag'sown long, narrow leaf, holding one end, and throwing the podsling-wise, produce a sound through the air like that of the swoop ofthe night-hawk? And who better than he could pluck lobelia, andsmartweed, and dig wild turnips and bring all for his mother to dry forpossible use, should, he or his father or she catch cold or be ill inany way? Hopes for the future had he, too. Sometimes a deer had comein great leaps across the clearing, and once a bear had invaded thehog-pen. The young man had an idea that as soon as he became a littletaller and could take down the heavy gun, an old "United States yager"with a big bore, bloodshed would follow in great quantities. He hadpersuaded his father to let him aim the piece once or twice, and hadconfidence that if he could get a fair shot at any animal, that animalwould die. Were it a deer, he had concluded he would aim from a greatstump a few feet distant from the house. If a bear came, he would shutthe door and raise the window, not too far, and blaze away from there. But in none of all these things, either present exploits or imaginingsfor the future, was his interest most entangled. His specialty wasSnakes. 

Not intended by nature for a naturalist was this youthful individualwhose specialty was snakes. Very much enamored was he of most ofnature's products, but not at all of the family _ophidia_. Snakes werehis specialty simply because he did not approve of them. All datedback to the affair of three years before. Snakes were abundant in thewood, but were not of many kinds. There were garter-snakes, dreaded ofthe little frogs, but timid of most things; there was a small snake ofwonderful swiftness and as green as the grass into which it darted;there were the water pilots, sunning themselves in coils upon thedriftwood in the water, swart of color, thick of form and offensive ofaspect; there were the milk-snakes, yellowish gray, with wonderfulbanded sides and with checker-board designs in black upon their yellowbellies. Sometimes a pan of milk from the solitary cow, set for itscream in the dug-out cellar beneath the house, would be found with itsyellow surface marred and with a white puddling about the floor, andthen the milk remaining would be thrown away and there would be awashing and scalding of the pan, because the thief was known. Therewere, in the lowlands, the massasaugas; short, sluggish rattle-snakes, venomous but cowardly, and, finally, there were the black-snakesranging everywhere, for no respecter of locality is _bascanionconstrictor_ when in pursuit of prey. Largest of all the snakes of theregion, the only constrictor among them, at home in the lowlands, onthe hill-sides or in the tree-tops, the black-snake was the dread ofall small creatures of the wood. There was a story of how one of themhad dropped upon a hunter, coiled himself about his neck and strangledhim. 

This young man of six remembered how, one day, three years back, beforehe had assumed trousers or become familiar with all the affairs of theworld, he was alone in the house, his mother having gone into thelittle garden. He remembered how, looking up, he saw, lifted above thedoorsill, a head with beady, glittering eyes, and how, after a moment'ssurvey, the head was lifted higher and there came gliding over thefloor toward him a black monster, with darting tongue and long, curvedbody and evident fierce intent. He remembered how he leaped for a highstool which served him at the table, how he clambered to its top andthere set up a mighty yell for succor--for he had great lungs. Hecould, by shutting his eyes, even now, see his mother as she camerunning from the garden, see her look of terror as she caught sight ofthe circling thing upon the floor, and then the look of desperation asthe mother instinct rose superior and she dashed into the room, seizedthe great iron shovel that stood before the fireplace, and begandealing reckless blows at the hissing serpent. A big black-snake isnot a pleasant customer, but neither--for a black-snake--is a frenziedmother with an iron fire shovel in her hand, and this particular snaketurned tail, a great deal of it, by the way, since it extended to itshead, and disappeared over the doorsill in a cataract of black and intothe wood again. 

From that hour the individual so beleaguered on a stool had been nofriend of snakes. Talk about vendettas! No Sicilian feud was everbitterer or more relentlessly pursued, as the boy increased in size andconfidence. Scores of garter-snakes had been his victims; once even amilk-snake had yielded up the ghost, and once--a great day that--he hadseen a black-snake in the open and had assailed it valorously withstones hurled from a distance. When it came toward him he retreated, but did not abandon the bombardment, and finally drove it into a coverof deep bushes. Come to close quarters with a black-snake he had neverdone, for a double reason: firstly, because stones did almost as wellas a club, and, secondly, because his father, fearing for him, hadthreatened him with punishment if he essayed such combat, and the firmold rule of "spare the rod and spoil the child" was adhered toliterally by the father and indorsed by the mother with hesitation. And, growing close to the house, were slender sprouts of birch andwillow, each of which leaned forward as if to say, "I am just the thingto lick a boy with, " and such a sprout as one of these, especially thewillow, does, under proper conditions, so embrace one's shoulders andcurl about one's legs and make itself familiar. But the feud was on, and as a permanency, though, on this particular afternoon, the youngman, as he stood there in the doorway, had no thought of snakes. Something else this summer was attracting much of his attention. Hehad a family on his hands. 

CHAPTER III. 

BOY, BIRD AND SNAKE. 

The young man's family was not large, but a part of it was young, andhe felt the responsibility. The song-sparrow is the very light andgladness of the woods and fields. There are rarer singers, and birdsof more brilliant plumage, but he is the constant quantity. His notesmay not rival those mellow, brief ones of the blue-birds in earlyspring, so sweet in their quaint inflection, which suggest all hope, and are so striking because heard while snow may be yet upon theground; he may not have the wild abandon of the bobolink with thattinkle and gurgle and thrill; he is no pretentious songster, like ascore of other birds, but he is a great part of the soul of earlysummer, for he is telling, morning, noon and night, how good the worldis, how he approves of the sunshine, and how everything is all right!And so the young man approved much of the song-sparrow, and wasinterested in the movements of all his kind. 

One day in May, the boy had noted something in the clump of bushes, between the house and creek, which very much resembled a smallbird's-nest, and had at once investigated. He found it, the nest ofthe song-sparrow, and, when the little gray guardian had flutteredaway, he noted the four tiny eggs, and their mottled beauty. He didnot touch them, for he had been well trained as to what should be therelations between human beings and all singing birds, but his interestin the progress of that essay in summer housekeeping became at onceabsorbing. He announced in the house that he intended to watch overthe nest all summer, and keep off the hawks, and that when the littleeggs were hatched, and the little birds were grown, maybe he would tryto tame one. He was encouraged in the idea. It is good to teach a boyto be protective. And when the birds were hatched, his interestdeepened. 

He was half inclined, as he stood in the doorway on this particularday, to visit the dense bushes and note the condition of affairs inthat vicinity, but, buoyant as he was, there was something in theoutlook which detained him. There was such a yellow glory to theafternoon, and so many things were happening. 

Balanced above the phlox, a humming-bird, green-backed and glittering, hung and tasted for a moment, then flashed to where the larkspurs were. A red-headed woodpecker swung downward on the wing to the white-brownside of a dead elm, sounded a brief tattoo upon the surface, then divedat a passing insect. A phoebe bird was singing somewhere. A redsquirrel sat perched squarely on the drooping limb of a hickory treeand chewed into a plucked nut, so green that the kernel was not formed, then dropped it to the ground, and announced in a chatter that he was aperson of importance. Great yellow butterflies, with black markingsupon their wings, floated lazily here and there, and at last settled ina magnificent cluster upon a moist spot in a mucky place wheresomething pleased their fancy, and where they fed and flutteredtremulously. There were myriads of wild bees, and a pleasant droningfilled the air, while from all about came the general soft clamor ofthe forest, made up of many sounds. 

The boy was satisfied with the prospect. Suddenly he started. Therewas a call which was not of peacefulness. He knew the cry. He hadheard it when some bird of prey had seized a smaller one. It was thecall of the sparrow now, and it came from his clump of bushes. Hisfamily was in danger. A hawk, perhaps, but he would have seen such afoe in its descent. It might be a cat-bird or a weasel?

With a rush, the boy was across the garden, and as he ran he snatchedup what was for a person of such inches an ideal club, a cut ofhickory, perhaps two feet in length, not over an inch in thickness, buttough and heavy enough for a knight errant of his years. He brokethrough the slight herbage about the place where the bushes grewthickest, and, getting into an open space, had a fair view of theparticular shrub wherein were the bird's-nest and his birdlings. Hestopped short and looked, then ran back a little, then looked again, and straightway there rose from his throat a scream which, thoughgreater in volume, was almost in its character like that other wild cryof the two sparrows who were fluttering pitifully and desperately abouttheir nest, tempting their own death each instant in defense of theirhalf-fledged young. He stood with his youthful limbs half paralyzed, and screamed, for he saw what was most horrible, and what it seemed hecould not check nor hinder, though a cruel tragedy was going on beforehis eyes!

Curled easily about the main stem of the bush, close to which, upon aforked limb, rested the sparrow's nest, its dark coils reachingdownward and its free neck and head waving regularly to and fro, was amonstrous black-snake, and in its jaws fluttered feebly one of theyouthful sparrows. Evidently the seizure had just been made when theboy burst in upon the scene. The snake's eyes glittered wickedly, andit showed no disposition to drop its prey because of the intruder. Itonly reared its head and swung slowly from side to side. Lying almostat full length upon a branching limb of the same bush, and on a levelwith the nest, was a second serpent, its head raised slightly, butmotionless, awaiting, it seemed, its opportunity to seize another ofthe tender brood. The parent birds flew about in converging circles intheir strait, clamoring piteously and approaching dangerously near tothe jaws of their repulsive enemies. The boy but stood and screamed. They were the greatest black-snakes he had ever seen. Then, all atonce, he became another creature. His childish voice changed in itskey, and, club in hand, screaming still louder, he ran right at thebush. At the same moment his frightened mother came running down thepathway, screaming also. 

As the boy leaped downward, both snakes, with wonderful swiftness, dropped to the ground and darted across the open space of a few yards, toward the creek. Side by side, with crests erect, they glided, andone of them still held between his jaws the unfortunate young sparrow. The boy did not hesitate a moment. Still making a great noise, buthoarsely for a creature of his age, he ran to head them off and barelypassed them as they touched the water. He leaped in ahead of them andthey were beside him in an instant. The water was up to his waist. Heplunged deeper recklessly. With a cry of rage he struck at the serpentwith the bird, and struck and struck again, blindly, still givingutterance to that odd sound, and with the fury of a young demon. Thewoman had reached the bank and stood, unknowing what to do, shriekingin maternal terror, while across the clearing a man was running. Andthen a fierce chance blow, delivered with all the strength of themaddened boy, alighted fairly, just below the head of the snakecarrying away the bird, and in a second it was done for, floating, writhing down the stream with a broken neck, and its tiny prey loosenedand drifting away beside it. 

The mother gasped in relief, but only for a moment. The boy cast oneglance at the floating reptile and the bird, and only one, then turnedto the other serpent. It had almost reached the shore, and betweenthat and the covert it might attain was a stretch of shrubless ground. Already its black length was defined on the short grass when the boyrushed from the water with uplifted club, just as his father came infull view of the scene from the other side. With cries like those ofsome young wild beast, the child ran at the snake, raining blows withthe stout club, and with rage in every feature. The black-snake, checked in its course, turned with the constrictor's instinct andsprang at the boy, whipping its strong coils about one of itsassailant's legs and rearing its head aloft to a level with his face. The boy but struck and gasped and stumbled over some obstruction, and, somehow, the snake was wrenched away, and then there was another rushat it, another rain of blows, and it was hit as had been its mate, andlay twisting with a broken back. The man dashed through the creek andcame upon the scene with a great stick in his hand, but its use was notrequired. The only labor which devolved upon him was to tear away fromhis quarry the boy who was possessed of a spirit of rage and vengeancebeyond all reasoning. Upon the heaving, tossing thing, so that hewould have been fairly in its coils had it possessed longer any power, he leaped, striking fiercely and screaming out all the fearful terms heknew--what would have been the wildest of all abandonment of profanityhad he but acquired the words for such performance. His father caughthim by the arm, and he struggled with him. It was simply a youngmadman. Carried across the creek and held in bonds for a brief period, he suddenly burst out sobbing, and then went to inspect the ravishednest where the two old birds hovered mourningly about, and where theremaining nestlings seemed dead at first, though they subsequentlyrecovered, so gruesomely had the fascination of their natural enemyaffected them!

What happened then? What happens when any father and mother haveoccasion to consider the matter of a son, a child, bone of their boneand flesh of their flesh, who has transgressed some rule they have setup for him wisely, thoughtfully, but with no provision for emotional orextraordinary contingencies, because it would be useless, since hecould not comprehend exceptions. They took him to the house. Thefather looked at him queerly, but with an expression that was farremoved from anger on his face, and his mother took the young man asideand washed him, and put on another hickory shirt, and told him that hissparrows would raise a pretty good family after all, and that itwouldn't be so hard for the old birds to feed three as four. 

Early that same evening a six-foot father strolled over to the place ofthe nearest settler, a mile or so away, and the two men walked back, talking together as neighbors will in a new country, though they do notso well in cities, and when they reached the creek one of them, thefather, cut a forked twig and lifted the black-snake to its fulllength. Its head, raised even with his, allowed its tail to barelytouch the ground. Evidently the men were interested, and evidently oneof them was rather proud of something. But he said nothing to his sonabout it. That would, in its full consideration, have involved alicking of somebody for disobedience of orders. It was a good thingfor the bereaved song-sparrows, though. Older heads than that of theboy were now considerate of their welfare. Lucky sparrows were they!

As for the youth, he had, that night, queer dreams, which he rememberedall his life. He was battling with the snakes again, and the fortunesof war shifted, and there was much trouble until daylight. Then, withthe sun breaking in a blaze upon the clearing, with the ground andtrees flashing forth illuminated dew-drops, with a clangor of thousandsof melodious bird-voices--even the bereaved father song-sparrow wassinging--he was his own large self again, and went forth conquering andto conquer. He found the murdered nestling stranded down the creek, and buried it with ceremony. He found both dead invaders, and punchedtheir foul bodies with a long stick. And he wished a bear would comeand try to take a pig!

This was the boy. This was the field he grew in, the nature of hisemergence into active entity, and this may illustrate somewhat hisunconscious bent as influenced by early surroundings, while showingsome of the fixed features of heredity, for he came of a battling race. 

CHAPTER IV. 

GROWING UP WITH THE COUNTRY. 

Have you ever seen a buckwheat field in bloom? Have you stood at itsmargin and gazed over those acres of soft eider-down? Have yournostrils inhaled the perfume of it all, the heavy sweetness tonedkeenly with the whiff of pine from the adjacent wood? Have you notedthe wild bees in countless myriads working upon its surface andgathering from each tiny flower's heart that which makes the clearestand purest and most wine-like of all honey? Have you stood at theforest's edge, perched high upon a fence, maybe of trees felled into ahuge windrow when first the field was cleared, or else of rails of oakor ash, both black and white--the black ash lasts the longer, for wormsinvade the white--and looked upon a field of growing Indian corn, thegreen spread of it deep and heaving, and noted the traces of theforest's tax-collectors left about its margins: the squirrel's daintywork and the broken stalks and stripped ears upon the ground, leavingsof the old raccoon, the small bear of the forest, knowing enough tobecome a friend of man when caught and tamed, and almost human in hisways, as curious as a scandal-monger and selfish as a money-lender?

Have you gone into the hard maple wood, the sugar bush, in earlyspring, the time of frosty nights and sunny days, and driven home thegouge and spile, and gathered the flowing sap and boiled it in suchpots and kettles as later pioneers have owned, and gained suchwildwood-scented product as no confectioner of the town may ever hopeto equal? Have you lain beside some pond, a broadening of the creekabove an ancient beaver-dam, at night, in mellowest midsummer, andwatched the muskrats at their frays and feeding? Have you hunted thecommon wildcat, short-bodied demon, whose tracks upon the snow arediscernible each winter morning, but who is so crafty, so gifted withsome great art of slyness, that you may grow to manhood with him allabout you, yet never see him in the sinewy flesh unless with dog andgun, and food and determination, you seek his trail, and follow itunreasoningly until you terminate the stolid quest with a discovery ofthe quarry lying close along the body of some eloping, stunted tree, and with a lively episode in immediate prospect? Did you ever chase awolverine, last of his kind in a clearing-overflowed region, strangecombination in character and form of bear and lynx, gluttonous andvoracious, and strong and fearless, a beast descended almost unchangedfrom the time of the earliest cave-men, the horror of the bravest dog, and end his too uncivilized career with a rifle-shot at thoughtfuldistance?

Have you seen the wild pigeons, before pot-hunters invaded theirsouthern roosts and breeding-grounds and slaughtered them by millions, exterminating one of the most wonderful of American game birds, sweepover in such dense clouds that the sun would be obscured, and at timesso close to earth that a long pole thrust aloft from tree or hillockwould stun such numbers as would make a gallant pot-pie? Have youfollowed the deer in the dense forest, clinging doggedly to his trackupon the fresh snow from the dusk of early morning, startling him againand again from covert, and shooting whenever you caught even so much asa glimpse of his gray body through distant interstices of tree andbrush, until, late in the afternoon, human endurance, which alwayssurpasses that of the wild beast, overcame him, and he leaped lessstrongly with each new alarm and grew more reckless before twilight, and came within easy range and fed his enemies on the morrow? Have youwatched for him beside the brackish waters of the lick, where, perchedupon a rude, high scaffold built beside a tree, mosquito-bitten anduneasy, you waited and suffered, preserving an absolute silence andimmobility until came ghost-like flitting figures from the forest tothe shallow's edge, when the great gun, carrying the superstitiousnumber of buckshot, just thirteen, roared out, awakening a thousandechoes of the night, and, clambering down, found a great antlered thingin its death agony?

Have you wandered through new clearings neglected for a season andwaded ankle-deep in strawberry blooms, and, later, fed there upon suchscarlet fruit, so fragrant and with such a flavor of its own that thescientific horticulturist owns to-day his weakness? Have you lookedout upon the flats some bright spring morning and found themtransformed into a shallow lake by the creek's first flood, and seenone great expanse of shining gold as the sun smote the thin ice made inthe night but to disappear long before mid-day and leave a surface allripples and shifting lights and shadows, upon which would come anoccasional splash and great out-extending circles, as some huge matingpickerel leaped in his glee? Have you stood sometime, in sheer delightof it, and drawn into distended lungs the air clarified by hundreds ofmiles of sweep over an inland sea, the nearest shore not a score ofmiles away, and filtered through aromatic forests to your senses, aninvisible elixir, exhilarating, without a headache as the price? Haveyou seen the tiger-lilies and crimson Indian-tobacco blossoms flashingin the lowlands? Have you trapped the mink and, visiting his haunts, noticed there the old blue crane flitting ever ahead of you throughdusky corridors, uncanny, but a friend? Have you--but there are athousand things!

If you have not seen or known or felt all these fair things--so jumbledtogether in the allusion here, without a natural sequence or thought orreason or any art--if you have not owned them all and so many othersthat may not here be mentioned, then you have missed something of thegifts and glories of growth in a new land. Such experience comes butto one generation. But one generation grows with the conquest, and itis a great thing. It is man-making. 

And from the east came more hewers of wood, not drawers of water, andthe axe swung all around, and new clearings were made and earlier onesbroadened, and where fireweed first followed, the burning of the logsthere were timothy and clover, though rough the mowing yet, and theState was "settled. " Roads through the woods showed wagon-ruts, nowwell defined; houses were not so far apart, and about them were youngorchards. The wild was being subjugated. The tame was growing. Theboy was growing with it. 

There was nothing particularly novel in the manner of this youth'sdevelopment, save that, as he advanced in years, he became almost ayoung Indian in all woodcraft, and that the cheap, long, single-barreled shotgun, which was his first great personal possession, became, in his skilled hands, a deadly thing. Wild turkey and ruffedgrouse, and sometimes larger game, he contributed to the family larder, and he had it half in mind to seek the remoter west when he grew older, and become a mighty hunter and trapper, and a slaughterer of the Sioux. The Chippewas of his own locality were scarcely to be shot at. Thoseremaining had already begun the unpretending life most of them liveto-day, were on good terms with everybody, tanned buckskin admirably, and he approved of them. With the Sioux it was quite different. Hehad read of them in the weekly paper, which was now a part of progress, and he had learned something of them at the district school--for thedistrict school had come, of course. It springs up in the UnitedStates after forests have been cut away, just as springs the wheat orcorn. And the district school was, to the youth, a novelty and a vastattraction. It took him into Society. 

Through forest paths and from long distances in each direction came thepupils to this first school of the region, and there were perhaps ascore of them in all, boys and girls, and the teacher was a fair youngwoman from the distant town. The school-house was a structure of asingle room, built in the wood, and squirrels dropped nuts upon itsroof from overhanging boughs and peeped in at the windows, andsometimes a hawk would chase a fleeing bird into the place, where itwould find a sure asylum, but create confusion. Once a flock of quailcame marching in demurely at the open door, while teacher and pupilsmaintained a silence at the pretty sight. And once the place wascleared by an invasion of hornets enraged at something. That was agreat day for the boys. 

The studies were not as varied as in the cross-roads schools to-day. There was the primer, and there were a few of the old Websterspelling-books, but, while the stories of the boy in the apple tree andthe overweening milkmaid were familiar, the popular spelling-book wasTown's, and the readers were First, Second, Third and Fourth, and their"pieces" included such classics as "Webster's Reply to Hayne" and"Thanatopsis, " and numerous clever exploits of S. P. Willis in blankverse. Davie's Arithmetic was dominant, and, as for grammar, wheneverit was taught, Brown's was the favorite. There was, even then, in therural curriculum the outlining of that system of the common schoolswhich has made them of this same region unexcelled elsewhere in all theworld. There were strong men, men who could read the future, controlling the legislation of some of the new States. 

The studies mentioned, and geography were the duties now in hand, andthere was indifference or hopefulness or rivalry among those of thelittle group as there is now in every school, from some new place inOklahoma to old Oxford, over seas. In all scholarship, it chanced thatthis same boy, Grant Harlson, was easily in the lead. His mother, anex-teacher in another and older State, loving, regardful, tactful, hadtaught him how to read and comprehend, and he had something of a tastethat way and a retentive memory. So, inside the rugged schoolroom, hehad a certain prestige. Outside, he took his chances. 

CHAPTER V. 

GRIM-VISAGED WAR. 

It has been said that there were some twenty children in the school. They were of various degrees and fortunes. There were the sons anddaughters of the land-owners, the pioneers, and there were the sons anddaughters of the men who worked for them, mostly the drifting class, who occupied log houses on unclaimed ground and got flour or meal orpotatoes for their services with the steadier or more masterful. Inthe school, though, there were no distinctions on this account. Therewere but two measurements of standing among girls and boys together, their relative importance in their classes, the teacher giving force tothis, and among the boys alone the equation resulting from the issue ofall personal encounter. Boys will be boys, and our fightingAnglo-Saxon blood will tell. 

There were Harrison Woodell and George Appleton and Frank Hoadly andMortimer Butler, among the older boys; and, among the second growth, though varying somewhat in their ages, were Alf Maitland and MauriceShannon and Grant Harlson, and three or four others who ranked withthem. The girls differed more in age, for there were some who aspiredto be teachers, who, if boys, would have been home at work insummer-time, and some who could come, while very young, since theirolder sisters came with them to exercise all needed care. And amongthe smaller ones, though not so young as some, was Katie Welwood, ablack-haired, black-eyed, evil-tempered little thing, who was the rageamong the boys. She had smiled upon Grant Harlson, and smiled uponyoung Maitland, so early in her years is the female a coquette, andthey looked askance upon each other, though they were the best offriends. Had they not together defied the big George Appleton, andvanquished him in running fight, and were they not sworn allies, comeany weal or woe! But woman, even at the age of ten, has ever been thecause of trouble between males, and those two had, on her account, amortal feud. It all came suddenly. There had been certain jealousiesand heartaches caused by the raven-locked young vixen with the winningeyes, but there had been no outspoken words of anger between thesevassals in her train until there came excuse in other way, for yourcountry lad is modest, and never admits that his ailing has aught to dowith the grand passion. But there had been a sharp debate over theproper ownership of a big gray squirrel at which they had shot theirarrows from strong hickory bows together, and, with this excuse forfuel to the fire already smoldering, there soon came a great flame. Neither would yield to one he knew in his heart addicted to winning, villainously, the affections of the young woman, and so they fought. Unfortunately for Grant, Napoleon was at least in a measure right whenhe remarked that Providence always favored the heaviest battalions, andequally unfortunate for him that Alf, as resolute as he, was just alittle heavier, was as tough of fiber at that stage of their youngcareers, and was, in a general way, what a patron of the prize ringwould term the better man. Grant went home licked as thoroughly as anycountry boy, not hyper-critical, could ask, and should have felt thatall was lost save honor. But he did not feel that way. He did notconsider honor at greater length than is generally done by any boy often, on the way to eleven, but he did want vengeance. To lose hissiren and a portion of his blood--"-'twas from the nose, " as Byronsays--together, was too much for his philosophy. He must havevengeance! He was no lambkin, and he knew things. He had read theSwiss Family Robinson. He resolved that on the morrow he would spearhis hated rival and successful adversary!

CHAPTER VI. 

THE SPEARING OF ALFRED. 

"The spears they carried, though entirely of wood, were dangerousweapons, " says the old writer in describing the armament of a tribe ofthe South Sea islanders. "Their points are hardened by being subjectedto fire, and, in the hands of those fierce men, they are as deadly asthe assegai of the African. "

This passage, which he had stumbled upon somewhere, was of deepestinterest to young Harlson. His armament, he felt, was not yet what itshould be. He had arrived at the dignity of a gun, it was true, butthat was quite another thing. What he needed was something especiallyadapted for personal encounter and for any knight-errantry whichchanced to offer itself. He had imagined what might occur if he werewith Katie Welwood and they should be assailed by anything or anybody. He had large ideas of what was a lover's duty, and was under theimpression, from what he had read, that a proper knight should goalways prepared for combat. So he had fashioned him a spear, aformidable weapon contrived with great exactitude after the South Seaisland recipe. He had gone into the woods and selected a blue beech, straight as could be found, and nearly an inch in thickness. From thishe had cut a length of perhaps ten feet, which, with infinite labor andrisk of jack-knife, he had whittled down to smoothness and towhiteness. Upon one end he left as large a head as the sapling wouldallow, and this, after shaving it into the fashion of a spear-blade, hehad plunged into the fire until it had begun to char. He had scrapedaway the charring with a piece of broken glass, and, as a result of hisendeavors, had really a spear with a point of undoubted sharpness andgreat hardness. He took huge pride in his new weapon, and carried itto school with him for days and on his various woodland expeditions, but there had come no chance to rescue any distressful maiden anywhere, and the envy and admiration of the other boys had but resulted inemulation and in the appearance of similar warlike gear among them. 

He had tired of carrying the thing about, and had for some time left itpeacefully at home, leaning beside the hog-pen. Now all was different. The time had come! He would have revenge, and have it in a gory way. As the South Sea islanders treated their foes, his should be treated. He would go upon the war-path, and as for Alf--well, he was sorry forhim in a general way, but all mercy was dead within his breastspecifically. He remembered something in the reader:

 "'Die! spawn of our kindred! Die! traitor to Lara!' As he spake, there was blood on the spear of Mudara!"

There must be blood, and he laid his plans with what he considered thevery height of savage craft and ingenuity. 

The father of Alf was a sturdy man and good one, but he had a weakness. He was the chief supporter in the neighborhood of the itinerantminister who exhorted throughout this portion of the country, and hehad imbibed, perhaps, too much of a fancy for hearing himself talk atrevival meetings, and for hearing himself in long prayers at home. Hispetitions covered a great range of subjects, and he was regular intheir presentation. The family prayers before breakfast every morningwere serious matters to the boys from one point of view, and not asserious as they should have been from another. Present, and kneelingat chairs about the room, they always were on these occasions, for theorder was imperative, and the father's arm was strong, and above thedoor hung a strap of no light weight, constituting as it had once donethat portion of a horse's harness known technically as the bellyband. So the boys were always there, each at his particular chair, and GrantHarlson, who had been present at these orisons many a time, knewexactly where Alf's chair was, and the attitude he must occupy. It wasclose beside an open window, and his back was always toward theopening, this particular attitude having been dictated by the father inthe vain hope of making his buoyant offspring more attentive if theirgaze were diverted from things outside. And all these circumstancesthe dreadful savage from the South Sea islands was considering withcare. They are very regular in their habits in the country, and heknew just the moment when the morning devotions would begin--somefifteen minutes before the breakfast hour. He knew about how long hewould be in traversing the distance between his own house and the sceneof the coming tragedy, and the morning after his resolve was made hebolted his own breakfast in a hurry, seized his spear, and scurrieddown the wood road until he approached the verge of the Maitlandclearing. Then began a series of extraordinary movements. 

Mr. Maitland's house stood close by the wood at one side of theclearing, and Grant could easily have walked unperceived until within afew yards of the place, had he but kept hidden by the trees; but suchwas not his course. Right across the clearing, and passing near thehouse, had been dug a great ditch a yard in depth, a year or twobefore, with the intent of draining a piece of lowland latelysubjugated. This ditch had been overgrown with weeds until it wasalmost hidden from sight, and now in summer time its bottom was but asandy surface. It was with the aid of this natural shelter that thewily invader proposed to steal upon his enemy. Already he was lurkingnear its entrance. 

Just why he had to "lurk" at this particular juncture Grant could notprobably have told. There was not the slightest necessity for lurking. There were no windows in the side of the house toward him, and no onewas visible about the place, but he knew what he had read, and he knewthat the savages of the South Sea islands were always addicted tolurking just previous to springing upon their unsuspecting victims, andhe was bound to lurk and do it thoroughly. His manner of lurkingconsisted, before he reached the clearing fence, in crouching very lowand creeping along in a most constrained and uncomfortable manner, occasionally dropping to the ground slowly and with utter noiselessnessand rising again with equal caution. All this time the face of theyoung man wore what he conceived to be an expression of most bloodypurpose craftily concealed. Upon reaching the fence, he shot his headabove it, and withdrew it with lightning-like rapidity, frighteningalmost into convulsions, in her nest, a robin whose home was betweenthe rails in the immediate vicinity. Of course he could have lookedthrough the fence with greater ease, but that would have involved nosuch dramatic effect. His sudden view of the landscape taken, the boyclimbed the fence, ran to the dry ditch, parted the overhanging weedsand leaped down. Once in the dry waterway, he was utterly concealedfrom view, even had any one been near; but that made no difference withhis precautions. He knew that after savages had lurked, they alwaysglided, and that what the writers describe as "a snake-like motion" wassomething absolutely essential. 

Spear in hand and creeping on his hands and knees, the destroyeradvanced along the drain, lying flat and wriggling with much patiencewherever a particularly clear stretch of sand presented itself. Halfway across the field he raised his head with a movement so slow that afull minute was occupied in the performance, parted the weeds gentlyand peered out to get his bearings and ascertain if any foemen were insight. There were no foemen, and his progress had been satisfactory. The remainder of the desperate advance was made with no less adroitnessand success. At last there fell upon the ear of the avenger the soundof a human voice. He was close to the house, and the morning exerciseshad begun!

Here was the moment for the exhibition of all South Sea island craft, and the moment was about at hand, too, for exhibition of the fullmeasure of a South Sea islander's ferocity! The islander glided fromthe ditch, crept to the house and slowly put forth his head until hecould see around the corner. There, within three feet of him, back tothe window, kneeling beside his chair, was Alf, ostensibly paying deepattention to his father's unctuous and sonorous sentences, thoughreally, as Grant could see, engaged in flicking kernels of corn at hisbrother in another corner. His jeans trousers were, as a result of hispresent attitude, drawn tightly across that portion of his body nearestto the window, and never fairer mark was offered savage spear! Not amoment did the avenger hesitate. He poised his weapon, took deadlyaim, and lunged!

Never was quiet of a summer morning broken more suddenly andstartlingly. A yell so loud, so wild, so blood-curdling, ascended fromwithin the farm-house, that even nature seemed to shiver for a moment. Then came the rush of feet and the clamor of many voices. Out of doorsran all the household, the father included, so appalling had been Alf'scry of apparently mortal agony, to learn the source of all the trouble. There was nothing to be seen. Not a living being was in sight. Itdawned upon the elders gradually that nothing very serious hadoccurred, and the father and the females of the household went in tobreakfast, the exercises of the morning not being now renewed, whileAlf and his brother scoured the wood. Upon one leg of Alf's jeanstrousers appeared an artistic dab of red. He had been wounded, and fordays the sitting down and the uprising of him would be acts of care. 

And where was the South Sea islander? Almost as he lunged he hadleaped backward around the corner of the house and run for the coveredditch. Once in that covert, he did not "lurk" to any great extent. Hecrawled away as rapidly as his hands and knees would carry him, reasoning that the boys would, upon finding no one near the house, runnaturally to the wood in search of the enemy. They never thought ofthe old ditch, though, later in the day, the thing occurred to them, and an examination of the sandy bottom told the story. The edge of thefield was reached, the islander lying very low until he could climb thefence in safety. Then he examined his fatal spear-point. It appearedincarnadined. There was certainly blood on the spear of Mudara!

A week later Alf caught Grant, and, despite another valiant struggle, licked him mercilessly. A year later the fortunes of war had turnedthe other way. As they grew, these boys, like race-horseswell-matched, passed each other, physically, time and again, one nowsurging to the front and then another, with no great difference at anytime between them. 

CHAPTER VII. 

HOW FICTION MADE FACT. 

What may become a streak of proper modern chivalry in the man is but afantastic imagining in the boy. Some one has said that but for thereading of "Ivanhoe" in the South, there would have been no war of therebellion, that the sentiment of knightliness and desire to upholdopinions in material encounter was so fostered by the presence of thebook in thousands of households that, when the issue came, a majoritywas for war which might have been otherwise inclined under morepractical teaching. This may or may not have been the case. Therewould be nothing strange in it were the theory correct; the influenceof great novels is always underrated; but certain it is that thereading of the age influences much the youth, and that many a bent ofmind is made by the books that lie about the house when some strongyoung intellect is forming. So with this boy. The same force whichmade of him a great savage marauder of the South Sea islands, thoughmodified by a keener perception and a broader intelligence, affectedhim as he grew older. There were a few books available to him; andwhat a reader he was, and what a listener! His father would sometimesread aloud at night from current weeklies, and then the boy wouldsprawl along the floor, his feet toward the great fireplace, his headupon a rolled-up sheepskin, and drink in every word. "East Lynne" wasrunning as a serial then, and he would have given all his worldlypossessions to have had Sir Francis Levison alone in the wood, and hadhis spear, and at his back some half-dozen of the boys whom he couldname. In some publication, too, at about that time, appeared the taleof the adventures of Captain Gardiner and Captain Daggett in antarcticwastes, seeking the sea-lions' skins, and the story of pluckiness andawful trial affected his imagination deeply. Years afterward, when hehimself was at death's portal once, because of a grievous injury, andwhen ice was bound upon his head to keep away the fever from his brain, he imagined in his delirium that he was Captain Gardiner, and calledaloud the orders to the crew which he had heard read when a boy, andwhich had so long lain in his memory's storehouse among theunconsidered lumber. 

The boy's reading included all there was in his home, and the smallcollection was not a bad one. "Chambers' Miscellany" was in theaccidental lot, and good for him it was. "Chambers' Miscellany" isbetter reading than much that is given to the world to-day, and the boyrioted in the adventure-flavored tales and sketches. Scott's poeticalworks were there, and Shakespeare, but the latter was read only for thestory of the play, and "Titus Andronicus" outranked even "Hamlet" amongthe tragedies. As for Scott, the stirring rhymes had marked effect, and this had one curious sequence. Tales of the lance and tilting haveever captivated boys, and Grant was no exception. Alf did not read somuch, was of a nature less imaginative, and his younger brother, Valentine, read not at all, but among them was enacted a great scene ofchivalry which ended almost in a tragedy. Grant, his mind absorbed injousting and its laurels, explained the thing to Alf and induced him toread the tales of various encounters. Alf was more or less affected bythe literature and ready to do his share toward making each of them aproper warrior fit for any fray. They considered the situation withmuch earnestness, and concluded that the only way to joust was tojoust, and that Valentine should act as marshal of the occasion, for amarshal at a tourney, they discovered, was a prime necessity. As forcoursers, barbs, destriers, or whatever name their noble steeds mightbear, they had no choice. There were but a couple of clumsy farm maresavailable to them, and these the knights secured, their only equipmentsbeing headstalls abstracted from the harness in the barn, while thecourse fixed upon was a meadow well out of sight from the houses andthe eyes of the elders. Valentine was instructed in his duties, particularly in the manner of giving the word of command. _Laissezaller_, as found in "Ivanhoe, " Grant did not understand, but a passagefrom "The Lady of the Lake":

 "Now, gallants! for your ladies' sake, Upon them with the lance!"

seemed to answer every purpose, and Valentine was instructed to commitit to memory, as the event proved, with but indifferent success. Hecomprehended, in a vague way, that the warriors were to do battle forthe honor of their true loves, but, at the critical moment, the linesescaped him and he had to improvise. The lances were rake-handles, and, as this was not to be a fray _a l'outrance_, about the end of eachformidable weapon was wadded and tied an empty flour bag. 

The unwilling, lumbering mares were brought upon the ground, andValentine held the headstall reins while a preliminary ceremony wasperformed, for your perfect knight omits no courteous detail. Gloveswere unknown about the farm, but Grant drew from his pocket a buckskinmitten, and with it slapped Alf suddenly in the face. It was to beregretted that the aggressor had somewhat exaggerated the mediaevalglove idea, and had not previously explained to Alf that to fling one'sglove in a foeman's face was one proper form of deadly insult precedingmortal combat, for, ignoring lances, steeds and all about them, theassailed personage immediately "clinched, " and the boys rolled over ina struggle, earnest, certainly, but altogether commonplace. It waswith the greatest difficulty, while defending himself, that Grant wasenabled to explain that his act was one rendered necessary by the lawsof chivalry and a part of the preliminaries of the occasion, instead ofan attack in cold blood upon an unwarned adversary. Alf accepted theapology gloweringly, and manifested great anxiety to secure his lance, and mount. It was evident the encounter would be deadly. 

Some hundred yards apart, with the perplexed, astonished old maresfacing each other, sat the warriors in their saddles, or, rather, inthe place where their saddles would have been had they possessed them. Each grasped the headstall reins firmly in his left hand, and with hisright aimed his top-heavy lance in a somewhat wobbling manner at hisadversary. It must soon be known to all the world of knighthood whichwas the grimmer champion! At middle distance and well to one side, stood Grand Marshal Valentine, racking his brains for the lines whichshould give the signal for the shock, but all in vain. Desperationgave him inspiration. "Let 'er go for your girls!" he roared. 

Never, even in the gentle and joyous passage of arms at Ashby, or onthe Field of the Cloth of Gold, was afforded a more thrilling spectaclethan when these two paladins rushed to the onset and met in mid-career. Each gave a yell and dug his heels into his charger, and whacked herwith the butt end of his lance, and forced her into a ponderous gallopfor the meeting. It matters not now what was the precise intent ofeither jouster, which of them aimed at gorget or head-piece, or atshield, for--either because the flour bags made the lances difficult tomanage or of some unevenness in the ground--each missed his enemy inthe encounter! Not so the two old mares! They came together with amighty crash and rolled over in a great cloud of dust and grass andmane and tail and boy and spear and flour-bag!

There is a providence that looks after reckless youth especially, elsethere would have been broken bones, or worse; but out of the confusiontwo warriors scrambled to their feet, dazed somewhat and dirty, butunharmed, and two old mares floundered into their normal attitude alittle later, evidently much disgusted with the entire proceeding. AndValentine, grand marshal, who had chanced to have a little difficultywith his elder brother the day before, promptly awarded the honors ofthe tournament to Grant on the ground that old Molly, the horse riddenby Alfred, seemed a little more shaken up than the other. 

Of course there were other books than those of chivalric doings whichappealed to this young reader so addicted to putting theory intopractice at all risks. "Robinson Crusoe, " and Byron, and D'Aubigne's"History of the Reformation, " and "Midshipman Easy, " and "Snarleyow, "and the "Woman in White, " "John Brent, " and Josephus, and certain oldreaders, such as the American First Class Book, made up the odd countrylibrary, and there was not a book in the lot which was not in timedevoured. There was another book, a romance entitled "Don Sebastian, "to which at length a local tragedy appertained. The scene was laid inSpain or Portugal and the hero of the story was a very gallantcharacter, indeed, one to be relied upon for the accomplishment ofgreat slaughter in an emergency, but who was singularly unlucky in hislove affair, in the outcome of which Grant became deeply interested, too deeply, as the event proved. Upon the country boy of eleven ortwelve devolve always, in a new country, certain responsibilities notunconnected with the great fuel question, --the keeping of the wood-boxfull, --and these duties, in the absorption of the novel, the youthneglected shamefully. A casual allusion or two, followed by a directannouncement of what must come, had been entirely lost upon him, and, one day, as he was lying by the unreplenished fire, deep in the pagesof the book, the volume was lifted gently from his hands, and, to hishorror, dropped upon the blazing coals against the back-log. Manythings occurred to him in later life of the sort men would avoid, butnever came much greater mental shock than on that black occasion. Stunned, dazed, he went outside and threw himself upon the grass andtried to reason out what could be done. Was he never to know the fateof Don Sebastian? It was beyond endurance! A cheap quality ofliterature the book was, no doubt, but he was not critical at that age, and in later years he often sought the volume out of curiosity to learnwhat in his boyhood had entranced him, but he never found it. It was asmall, fat volume, very like a pocket Bible in shape, bound cheaply ingreen cloth, and printed in England, probably somewhere in the '30's, but it had disappeared. The bereaved youth was, henceforth, in as sorea retrospective strait over "Don Sebastian" as Mr. Andrew Lang declareshe is, to-day, with his "White Serpent" story. 

Byron--"Don Juan, " in particular--had an effect upon the youth, and"The Prisoner of Chillon" gave him dreams. "Snarleyow" was the book, though, which struck him as something great in literature. The demondog tickled his fancy amazingly. He was somewhat older when he read"Jane Eyre" and "John Brent, " and could recognize a little of theirquality, but "Snarleyow" came to him at an age when there was nothingin the world to equal it. 

Meanwhile the whole face of nature was changing, and the boy wasnecessarily keeping up with the procession of new things. Broadmeadows were where even he, a mere boy still, had seen dense woodland;there were highways, and it was far from the farmhouse door to theforests edge. The fauna had diminished. The bear and wolverine hadgone forever. The fox rarely barked at night; the deer and wild turkeywere far less plentiful, though the ruffed grouse still drummed in thecopses, and the quail whistled from the fences. Different, even, werethe hunters in their methods. The boy, whose single-barreled shot-gunhad known no law, now carried a better piece, and scorned to slay asitting bird. Both he and Alf became great wing shots, and clevergentlemen sportsmen from the city who sometimes came to hunt with themcould not hope to own so good a bag at the day's end. Wise as to dogsand horses were they, too, and keen riders at country races. Andridges of good muscles stiffened now their loins, and their chests weredeepening, and at "raisings, " when the men and boys of the regionwrestled after their work was done, the two were not uncounted. Forthem the country school had accomplished its mission. The world'sgeography was theirs. Grammar they had memorized, but hardlycomprehended. As for mathematics, they were on the verge of algebra. Then came the force of laws of politics and trade, a shifting ofthings, and Grant strode out of nature to learn the artificial. Hisfamily was removed to town. 

Western, or rather Northwestern, town life, when the town has less thanten thousand people, varies little with the locality. There is thesame vigor everywhere, because conditions are so similar. It is odd, too, the close resemblance all through the great lake region in thelocal geography of the towns. Small streams run into larger ones, andthese in turn enter the inland seas, or the straits, called rivers, which connect them. Where the small rivers enter the larger ones, orwhere the larger enter the straits or lakes, men made the towns. Thesewere the water cross-roads, the intersections of nature's highways, andso it comes that to so many of these towns there is the great bluewater front intersected at its middle by a river. There is a bridge inthe town's main street, and the smell of water is ever in the air. Boys learn to swim like otters and skate like Hollanders, and theirsisters emulate them in the skating, though not so much in the swimmingas they should. There is a life full of great swing. The touchbetween the town and country is exceedingly close, and the countryfamily which comes to the community blends swiftly with the current. So with the family of Grant Harlson and so with him personally. A yearmade him collared and cravatted, short-cropped of hair, mighty inhigh-school frays, and with a new ambition stirring him, of a qualityto compare with that of one Lucifer of unbounded reputation anddoubtful biography. There was something beyond all shooting and ridingand wrestling fame and the breath of growing things. There was anotherworld with reachable prizes and much to feed upon. He must wearmedals, metaphorically, and eat his fill, in time. 

The high-school is really the first telescope through which a boy soborn and bred looks fairly out upon this planet. The astronomer whoinstructs him is often of just the sort for the labor, a being alsoclimbing, one not to be a high-school principal forever, but using thisoccupation merely as a stepping-stone upon his ascending journey. Ifhe be conscientious, he instils, together with his information that allGaul is divided and that a parasang is not something to eat, also thebelief that the game sought is worth the candle, and that hard study isnot wasted time. Such a teacher found young Harlson; such a teacherwas Professor--they always call the high-school principal "Professor"in small towns--Morgan, and he took an interest in the youth, not theinterest of the typical great educator, but rather that of an older andaspiring jockey aiding a younger one with his first mount, or of arailroad engineer who tells his fireman of a locomotive's moods andteaches him the tricks of management. They might help each other someday. Well equipped, too, was Morgan for the service. No shallowgraduate of some mere diploma-manufactory, but one who believed in theperfection of means for an end, --an advocate of thoroughness. 

So it came that for four years Grant Harlson studiedfeverishly, --selfishly might be almost the word, --such was the impulsethat moved him under Morgan's teaching, and so purely objective all hisreasoning. In his vacations he hunted, fished, and developed the morethews and sinews, and acquired new fancies as to whether an Irishsetter or a Gordon made the better dog with woodcock, and upon variousother healthful topics, but his main purpose never varied. In hisclasses there were fair girls, and in high-schools there is much callowgallantry; but at this period of his life he would have none of it. Hewas not timid, but he was absorbed. Morgan told him one day that hewas ready for college. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

NEW FORCES AT WORK. 

"You will be kind enough, sir, to write upon the blackboard twocouplets:

 "'What do you _think_ I'll shave you for nothing and _give you a drink_. '

"And

 "'_What_ do you think I'll shave you for _nothing_ and give you a drink. '

"You will observe that, while the wording is the same, the inflectionis different. Please punctuate them properly, and express the idea Iintend to convey. "

This from a professor, keen-eyed and unassuming in demeanor, to a big, long-limbed young fellow, facing, with misgivings despite himself, aportion of the test of whether or not he were qualified for admissionas a freshman into one of our great modern universities. He had notbeen under much apprehension until the moment for the beginning of thetrial. There was now to be met the first issue in the new field. Heplunged into his task. 

Then the professor:

"Well, yes, you have caught my idea. How write upon the board: 'Thisis the forest primeval, ' and a dozen lines or so following, from thisslip. Scan that for me; parse it; show me the relations of words andclauses, and all that sort of thing. "

A pause; some only half-confident explanation, and enlargement upon thesubject by the young man. 

The professor again:

"H-u-u-m--well--now you may write--no, you needn't--just tell me thedifference, in your opinion, between what are known as conjunctions andprepositions. Say what you please. We ask no odds of them. Beutterly free in your comment. "

More explanations by the young man. The professor: "We'll not pursuethat subject. You might tell us, incidentally, what a trochaic footis?--Yes. --And who wrote that 'Forest primeval' you justscanned?--Certainly--That will do, I think. Oh, by the way, who wasBecky Sharp?--The most desirable woman in 'Vanity Fair, ' eh? I may behalf inclined to agree with you, but I was asking who, not what. Goodafternoon. You have passed your examination in English literature. Itrust you may be equally successful in other departments. Goodafternoon, sir. "

And this was all from a professor whose name was known on more than onecontinent and who was counted one of the greatest of educators. Suchwas his test of what of English literature was required in a freshman. A lesser man than this great teacher would have taken an hour for thetask and learned less, for, after all, did not the examination coverthe whole ground? The droll range of the inquiry was such that thequestioner had gauged, far better than by some more ponderous anddetailed system, the quality of the young man's knowledge in one field. One of the strong teachers this, one not afraid of a departure, and oneof those who, within the last quarter of a century, have laid thefoundations of new American universities deep and wide, and given tothe youth facilities for a learning not creed-bound, nor school-bound, but both liberal and of all utility. 

It was well for the particular freshman whose examination is heredescribed that his first experience with a professor was with such aman. It gave confidence, and set him thinking. With others of theexaminers he did not, in each instance, fare so happily. Whatthousands of men of the world there are to-day who remember withsomething like a shudder still the inquisition of Prof. ----, whoseworks on Greek are text-books in many a college; or the ferocity ofProf. ----, to whom calculus was grander than Homer! But the woes offreshmen are passing things. 

What Grant Harlson did in college need not be told at any length. Hebut plucked the fruit within his reach, not over-wisely in someinstances, yet with some industry. He had, at least, the intelligenceto feel that it is better to know all of some things than a little ofall things, and so surpassed, in such branches as were his by gift andinclination, and but barely passed in those which went against themental grain. 

It may be the professor of English literature had something to do withthis. Between Grant and him there grew up a friendship somewhatunusual under all the circumstances. One day the professor wasovertaken by the student upon a by-way of the campus, and asked somequestions regarding certain changed hours of certain recitations, and, having answered, detained the questioner carelessly in generalconversation. The elder became interested--perhaps because it was arelief to him to talk with such a healthy animal--and, at thetermination of the interview, invited him to call. There grew uprapidly, binding these two, between whose ages a difference of twentyyears existed, a friendship which was never broken, and which doubtlessaffected to an extent the student's ways, for he at least acceptedsuggestions as to studies and specialties. This relationship resultednaturally in transplanting to the mind of the youth some of the fanciesand, possibly, the foibles of the man. One incident will illustrate. 

The student, during a summer vacation, had devoted himself largely tothe copying of Macaulay's essays, for, in his teens, one is muchimpressed by the rolling sentences of that great writer. Upon hisreturn Harlson told of his summer not entirely wasted, and expressedthe hope that he might have absorbed some trifle of the writer's style. 

The professor of English literature laughed. 

"Better have taken Carlyle's 'French Revolution' or any one of half adozen books which might be named. Let me tell a little story. Sometime ago a fellow professor of mine was shown by a Swedish servant girlin his employ a letter she had just written, with the request that hewould correct it. He found nothing to correct. It was a wonderfullyclear bit of epistolary literature. He was surprised, and questionedthe girl. He learned that, though well educated, she knew but littleEnglish, and had sought the dictionary, revising her own letter byselecting the shortest words to express the idea. Hence the letter'sstrength and clearness. Stick to the Saxon closely. Macaulay willwear off in time. " And this was better teaching than one sometimesgets in class. 

This is no tale of the inner life of an American university. It is buta brief summary of young Harlson's ways there. But some day, I hope, aThomas Hughes will come who will write the story, which can be made ashealthful as "Tom Brown, " though it will have a different flavor. Whata chance for character study! What opportunity for an Iliad of many agallant struggle! Valuable only in a lesser degree than what islearned from books is what is learned from men in college, that is, from young men, and herein lies the greater merit of the greater place. In the little college, however high the grade of study, there is a lackof one thing broadening, a lack of acquaintance with the youth of manyregions. The living together of a thousand hailing from Maine orCalifornia, or Oregon or Florida, or Canada or England, young men ofthe same general grade and having the same general object, is a greatthing for them all. It obliterates the prejudice of locality, andgives to each the key-note of the region of another. It builds up anacquaintance among those who will be regulating a land's affairs fromdifferent vantage-grounds in years to come, and has its most practicalutility in this. When men meet to nominate a President this fact comesout most strongly. The man from Texas makes a combination with the manfrom Michigan, and two delegations swing together, for have not thesetwo men well known each other since the day their classes met in a rushupon the campus twenty years ago?

No studious recluse was Harlson. His backwoods training would notallow of that. In every class encounter, in every fray with townsmen, it is to be feared in almost every hazing, after his own gruesomeexperience--for they hazed then vigorously--he was a factor, andbeefsteak had been bound upon his cheek on more than one occasion. Arollicking class was his, though not below the average in itsscholarship, and the sometimes reckless mood of it just suited him. "There were three men of Babylon, of Babylon, of Babylon. "

There is what some claim is an aristocracy in American colleges. It isasserted that the leading Greek fraternities are this, and that theexistence of Alpha Delta Phi, Psi Upsilon or Delta Kappa Epsilon, orothers of the secret groups, is not a good thing for the students as awhole. Yet in the existence of these societies is forged another ofthe links of life to come outside, and all the good things to be gainedin college are not the ratings won in classes. Harlson was one ofthose with badges and deep in college politics. He never had occasionto repent it. 

And so, with study, some rough encounter and much scheming and muchdreaming, time passed until the world outside loomed up again at closequarters. The present view was a new struggle. The great moneyquestion intervened. There had come a blight upon his father's dollarcrop, and when Grant Harlson left the university he was so nearlypenniless that the books he owned were sold to pay his railroad fare. 

CHAPTER IX. 

MRS. POTIPHAR. 

It must have been some person aged, say, twenty, who expressed to Noahthe opinion that there wasn't going to be much of a shower. At twentytomorrow is ever a clear day, and notes are easy things to meet, andfriends and women are faithful, and Welsh rarebit is digestible, andsleep is rest, and air is ever good to breathe. Grant Harlson was notparticularly troubled by the condition of his finances. That the moneyavailable had lasted till his schooling ended, was, at least, a goodthing, and, as for the future, was it not his business to attend tothat presently? Meanwhile he would dawdle for a week or two. 

So the young man stretched his big limbs and lounged in hammocks andadvised or domineered over his sisters, as the case might be, and readin a desultory way, and fished and shot, and ate with an appetite whichthreatened to bring famine to the family. Your lakeside small town isa fair place in July. He would loaf, he said, for a week or two. Theloafing was destined to have character, perhaps to change a character. 

There had come to Harlson in college, as to most young men, occasionalpackages from home, and in one of these he had found a pretty thing, aman's silk tie, worked wonderfully in green and gold, and evidently theproduct of great needlecraft. It was to his fancy, and he had thoughtto thank whichever of his sisters had wasted such time upon him, buthad forgotten it when next he wrote, and so the incident had passed. 

One day, wearing this same tie, he bethought him of his negligencelying supine on the grass, while his sister Bess was meanwhile readingin the immediate vicinity. He would be grateful, as a brother should. 

"I say, Bess, " he called, "I forgot to write about this tie and thankyou. Which of you did it?"

Bess looked up, interested. 

"I thought I wrote you when I sent the other things. None of us didit. It was Mrs. Rolfston. "

"Mrs. Rolfston?"

"Certainly. She was here one day, when we were making up a lot ofthings for you, and said that she'd make something herself to go withthe next lot. A week or two later she brought me that tie, and Iinclosed it. Pretty, isn't it?"

"Very pretty. "

The young man on the grass was thinking. 

He knew Mrs. Rolfston slightly; knew her as the wife of a well-to-doman who saw but little of her husband. 

Daughter of a poor man of none too good character in the little town, she had grown up shrewd, self-possessed, and with much animal beauty. At twenty she had married a man of fifty, a builder of steamboats, ared-faced, riotous brute, who had bought her as he would buy a horse, and to whom she went easily because she wanted the position moneygives. Within a week he had disgusted her to such an extent that shealmost repented of the bargain. Within a year, he had tired of her andwas openly unfaithful in every port upon the lakes, a vigorous, lawlessdebauchee. His ship-building was done in a distant port, and he rarelyvisited his wife. He rather feared her, mastiff as he was, for herewas the keener intelligence, and her moods, at times, were desperate ashis. So he furnished her abundant income and was content to let it goat that. It pleased her, also, to have it that way. 

Harlson thought of the woman, and wondered somewhat. Black-haired, black-eyed, white-skinned, deep of bust and with a graceful andpowerful swing of movement, she was a woman, physically considered, notof the common herd. She was a lioness, yet not quite the grand lionessof the desert. She lacked somewhat of dignity and grandeur ofcountenance, and had more of alertness and of craft. She was, thoughdark, more like the tawny beast of the Rocky Mountains, the Californialion, as that great cougar is called, supple, full of moods andpassion, and largely cat-like. She had filled his eye casually. Whyhad she sent him the tie, the silken thing in green and gold?

He thought and pulled his long limbs together and rose till he wassitting, and decided that it was but courteous, but his duty as agentleman, to wander over to her house and thank her for herremembrance of him. It was but an expression of good will toward thefamily generally, this little act of hers; he knew that, but it was apersonal matter, after all, and he should thank her. It was well to bethoughtful, to attend to the small amenities, and it took him more thanthe usual time to dress. His apparently careless summer garb requiredthe adjustment of an expert here and there. He was an hour in thedoing of it. When he emerged he was not, taken in a comprehensive way, bad-looking. He was clear-faced, strong-featured and of stalwart build. 

The ordinary man he would not have feared in any meeting; of the womanhe was about to meet he had some apprehension. He knew her quality, but--she had worked for him a tie! He went up the broad path to thedoorway, between flowers and trees and shrubbery. It was three o'clockin the afternoon, and he would find her alone, he thought, for chancesof calls are not so great in the smaller towns as in the cities; thereis an average to be maintained, and Mrs. Jones or Mrs. Smith does notreceive on days particularized. He was compelled to wait in the parlorbut a moment. She came in, and he saw her for the first time in twoyears. 

What a gift women have in producing physical effects upon the creaturemale, no matter what the woman's status. Mrs. Rolfston came in with alook of half inquiry on her face and with a presentation of herselfwhich was perfect in its way. She wore some soft and fluffy dress--aman cannot describe a garb in detail--with that lace-surroundedtriangular bareness upon the bosom just below the chin which is asirreproachable as it is telling. There was a relation between theswing of her drapery and, the movements of her body. She was rich offigure, and flexile. And she was glad to see Mr. Harlson, and said so. He was not really embarrassed. The time had passed when that could behis way. But he was puzzled as to what to say. Some comment he madeupon the quality of the season and upon Mrs. Rolfston's appearance ofgood health. Then he entered upon his subject with no link ofconnection with preceding sentences. "I but learned to-day, " he said, "that the tie I wear was made by you. All fellows have little fancies, I suppose. I have, anyhow. I liked this, though I did not know whomade it. My sister told me, and I have come to thank you. Why did youdo it for me?"

That was putting the case plainly enough, certainly, and promptlyenough, but it was not of a nature to trouble Mrs. Rolfston. This wasa clever woman, married ten years, and of experiences which varied. She even glanced over the visitor from head to heel before sheanswered, and her color deepened and her eyes brightened, though he didnot note it. 

"You have changed, " she commented. "I should hardly have known you butfor your lips and eyes. You are broader and taller, and a big man, areyou not? How long do you stay in town? Will you spend the summerhere?"

"I wish I could, " he answered. "It is pleasant here, but I must work, you know. I may idle for a little time. You haven't said anythingabout the tie. "

"Oh, the tie? Don't speak of that. I had the whim to make somethingfor somebody--I have an embroidering mania on me sometimes--and therewas a chance to dispose of it, you see. "

The young man's face fell a little as he looked upon the great, handsome woman and heard her seemingly careless words. He did not wantto go away, yet what excuse was there for staying? He rose, hat inhand. 

Here, now, was the woman in a quandary. She had not anticipated suchabruptness. 

"Don't go yet, " she said, impetuously. "I want to talk with you. Tellme all about the college, and yourself, and your plans. And---aboutthe tie--I wouldn't have made one for any one else. I remembered yourface. You know I was go often at your home, and I wondered how itwould suit you. You should take that interest as a compliment. And Iam lonesome here, and you are idling, you say, and why should we not begood friends for the summer? The men in town annoy me, and the girlshere are not bright enough for you. Let us be cronies, will you not?Take me fishing to-morrow. I want you to teach me how to catch bass inthe river. I heard some one say once you knew better than any one elsehow that is done. Is not this a good idea of mine? It will help bothof us kill time. "

She sat there on the sofa, half stretched out, yet not carelessly norungracefully, but in an assumed laziness of real felinishness, a womanjust ten years older than the man she was addressing, yet in all thelushness of magnificent womanhood, and emanating all magnetism. 

Harlson said he would call for her and that they would go fishing. Andthey went. 

The light is tawny upon the lily-pods in shady places on the river. And rods, such as are used for bass, are light upon the wrist, and, inthe lazy hours of mid-afternoon, when bass bite rarely, demand butslight attention. And two people idling in a boat get very close inthought together and come soon to know each other well. And a ruthlessyoung man of twenty and a tempestuous woman of thirty are as theconventional tow and tinder. 

And there were books she had never read in Mrs. Rolfston's library--forshe was not a woman of books--which interested Harlson, and it waseasier to read them there than take them home. And Mrs. Rolfstonwaited upon him--how gifted is a woman of thirty--and he felt bandsupon him, and liked it, and would not reason to himself concerning it. 

And one night, late, came a panting servant--Mrs. Rolfston had no men, only two women domestics, with her in her home--to say that hermistress had heard some one evidently attempting to open a window onthe piazza, and that they were all in fear of their lives, and that shehad fled out of the back way to ask Mr. Harlson the elder, or his son, to come over at once and look around. 

The father laughed, and said that, had there been a burglar, he musthave fled already, and the young man, laughing too, said that some onemust go anyhow, in all courtesy to defenseless women, and that if Mrs. Rolfston feared for her front porch, he would lie upon a blanket in thelawn beside it to set her mind at rest. He had not slept beneath thestars alone, he said, since the family had left the farm. And therewas much laughing, and Harlson took home the servant girl, and she, growing bold as they approached the house, ran up the path ahead ofhim. The lawn between the better house and street in the lake countrytown is often a little forest, so dense the trees and their foliage. And added to the fragrance of the leaves in later midsummer are themingled odors of petunias and pinks and rosemary and bergamot and musk, for all these flourish late. And the moon comes through the tree-topsin splashes, and there is a softness and a shade, and it is all like ascented garden in some old Arabian story, and the senses are affectedand, maybe, the reason. Harlson went up the path, half dreaming, yetalive in every vein. There was no burglar visible, but a wonderfulwoman, in fleecy dishabille, was sure she had heard a sound mostsinister, and endangered women must be guarded of the strong. 

And Grant Harlson returned not home that night; yet the moon, shiningthrough the trees, revealed no form upon a blanket in the garden. 

And the summer days drifted by; and the young man fresh from college, full of ambitions and dreams, found himself a creature he had neverknown, a something conscience-stricken, yet half-abandoned, and with aleaden weight upon his feet to keep them from carrying him away fromthe temptation. 

He would force himself to a solitary day at times, and go out into thecountry with dog and gun, and tramp for miles, and wonder at himself. He had all sorts of fancies. He thought of his wickedness and hiswasted time, and compared himself with the great men in the books whohad been in similar evil straits, --with Marc Antony, with King Arthurin Gwendolen's enchanted castle, and with Geraint the strong butslothful, --rather far-fetched this last comparison, --and of all therest. It was a grotesque variety, but amid it all he really suffered. And he would make good resolves and, for the moment, firm ones, andreturn to town when the dew was falling and the moonlight coming, andthe tale was but retold. And the woman was wise, as women are, andconscienceless, yet suffering a little, too. 

She had found more than a summer's toy, and she had grown to fear thegreat boy in his moods, and to want to keep him, and to doubt themeasure of her art. This must be a hard thing, too, for such splendidpirates to bear. They may not even scuttle all the craft they capture. 

And the root of all evil is sometimes the root of all good. The dollarpulls all ways. Harlson must earn his way. One day his father droppeda chance word regarding some one, miles in the country, who wanted afence built inclosing a tract out of the wood. It was isolated work, atask of a month or two for a strong man, a mere laborer. Young Harlsonbecame interested. 

"Why shouldn't I try it?" he asked. 

His father laughed. 

"It's work for a toughened man, my boy. You have softened with sixyears of only study. "

The boy laughed as well. 

"You needn't fear, " he said. "All strength is not attained upon afarm, and I want to swing an ax and maul again. "

And that day he set out afoot for the home of the man who needed afence. He told Mrs. Rolfston briefly. She paled a trifle, but made noobjection. He said he would make visits to the town. 

CHAPTER X. 

THE BUILDING OF THE FENCE. 

An ax, a maul, a yoke of oxen; these are the great requisites for himwho would build a rail fence through a forest. Grant Harlson made thebargain for the work, hired a yoke of oxen, as you may do in thecountry, and secured the right to eat plain food three times a day atthe cabin of a laborer. A bed he could not have, but the right tosleep in a barn back in the field, and there also to house his oxen forthe night, was given him. He slept upon the hay-mow. He went into theforest and began his work. The wood was dense, and what is known allthrough the region as a black ash swale, lowland which once reclaimedfrom nature makes, with its rich deposits, a wondrous meadow-land. He"lined" the fence's course and cleared the way rudely through theforest, a work of days, and then he made the maul. 

The mace of the mediaeval knight is the maul of to-day. No longer itcracks heads or helmets, but there is work for it. And it hasdeveloped into a mighty weapon. There are two sorts of maul in thelake country. As the stricken eagle is poetically described assupplying the feather for the arrow by which itself was hurt to death, the trees furnish forth the thing to rend them. Upon the side of thecurly maple, aristocrat of the sugar bush, grows sometimes a vast wart. This wart has neither rhyme nor reason. It has no grain defined. Itis twisted, convoluted, a solid, tough and heavy mass, and hard, almost, as iron. It is sawed away from the trunk with much travail, and is seasoned well, and from it is fashioned a great head, into whichis set a hickory handle, and the thing will crush a rock if need be. This is the maul proper. 

There is another maul, or mace, made from a cut of heavy iron-wood, afoot in length and half a foot in thickness, with the hickory handleset midway between iron bands, sprung on by the country blacksmith. This is sometimes called the beetle. 

The beetle is a monster hammer, the maul a monster mace. Each servesits purpose well, but the beetle never has the swing and mighty forceof the great heavy maple knot. Grant Harlson bought a seasoned knot ofan old woodman and shaped a maul. He had learned the craft in youth. 

The ash trees fell beneath the ax, the trunks were cut to rail lengths, and the oxen dragged logs through muck and mire and brush and brambleto the line of fence, and there the maul swung steadily in greatstrokes upon the iron and wooden wedges, the smell of timber newlysplit was in the air, and the heavy rails were lifted, and the fencebegan its growth. 

And it was lonesome in the depths of the wood, for the black ash swaleis not tenanted by many birds and squirrels as are the ridges, and onlythe striped woodpecker or a wandering jay fluttered about at times, ora coon might seek the pools for frogs. Harlson had circumstance forthought. Only the hard labor cleared his blood and brain, and helpedhim. 

Could fortune come to him who had such a load upon his conscience? Wasnot he a violator of all law, as he had learned it, --law of both Godand man? Had he an excuse at all, and what was the degree of it? Hecould not endure the time when it became too dark in the wood for work, and when he drove the jaded oxen out into the field and to the barn, and it was yet too early for seeking the hay-mow, which was of clover, and there seeking sleep. A clover mow is a wonderful sleep-compeller. There are the softness and fragrance, but, sometimes, even with that, he would be wakeful. To avoid himself, the young man would, at last, go in early evening to the older farmers' homes, --for it was his owncountry and he knew them all, --and there, with the sons and hired men, pitch quoits in the road before the house. 

Quoits is still a game of farmers' sons, and the horseshoe is superiorto the quoit of commerce and the town. The open side affords facilityfor aggressive feats of cleverness in displacing an opponent's cast, and the corks upon the shoes reduce some sliding chances, and the gamehas quality. And Harlson found rather a distraction in the contests. He found, maybe, distraction, too, in chatting with slim Jenny Bierce, who was a very little girl when he was in the country school, but whohad grown into almost a woman, and who was a trifle more refined, perhaps, than most of her associates. She had a sweetheart, a stalwartyoung farmer named Harrison Woodell, one of the schoolmates ofHarlson's early youth, but she liked to talk with Harlson. He wasdifferent from her own lover; no better, of course, but he had livedanother life, and could tell her many things. 

And Woodell, who expected to marry her, glowered a little. She did notcare for that. Grant Harlson had not noticed it. 

But neither quoits nor Jenny Bierce sufficed at all times forforgetfulness. Harlson was in the grasp of that enemy--or friend--whogives vast problems, and with them no solution. He could not rest. Heread his Bible, but that only puzzled him the more, because thereseemed to him, of necessity, degrees of wrong, and he could not find acommandment which was flexible. He chafed because there was no measurefor his sentence. 

A pebble at the rivulet's head will turn the tiny current either way, and so change the course of eventual creek and river. The pebble fellnear the source in Grant Harlson's case, for never before in his lifehad he studied much the moral problem. His had been the conventionaltraining, which is to-day the training which asks one to accept, unreasoning, the belief of yielding predecessors, and, until he feltthe prick of conscience, he had never cared to question theinheritance. Now he wanted proof. If he could not plead not guilty, might he not, at least, find weakness in the law? Then fell the pebble. 

It was only a country newspaper, and it was only the chance versesclipped from some unknown source which turned the tide that might havegrown yet have run forever between narrow banks. 

For the verses--who wrote them?--were those of that brief poem whichhas made more doubters than any single revelation of thehollow-heartedness of some famed godly one; than any effort of oratoryof some great agnostic; than any chapter of any book that was everwritten:

 I think till I'm weary of thinking, Said the sad-eyed Hindoo king, And I see but shadows around me, Illusion in every thing. 

 How knowest thou aught of God, Of His favor or His wrath? Can the little fish tell what the lion thinks, Or map out the eagle's path!

 Can the Finite the Infinite search! Did the blind discover the stars? Is the thought that I think a thought, Or a throb of a brain in its bars?

 For aught that my eyes can discern, Your God is what you think good-- Yourself flashed back from the glass When the light pours on it in flood. 

 You preach to me to be just, And this is His realm, you say; And the good are dying with hunger, And the bad gorge every day. 

 You say that He loveth mercy, And the famine is not yet gone; That He hateth the shedder of blood And He slayeth us every one. 

 You say that my soul shall live, That the spirit can never die: If He was content when I was not, Why not when I have passed by?

 You say I must have a meaning: So must dung, and its meaning is flowers; What if our souls are but nurture For lives that are greater than ours?

 When the fish swims out of the water, When the birds soar out of the blue, Man's thoughts may transcend man's knowledge, And your God be no reflex of you!

One night in after life I sat with Grant Harlson, in his rooms in agreat city, and he told me of this, his time of doubt and tribulation, and repeated to me the poem. 

"The questions it asks have not yet been answered, so far as I know, "said he, "and I do not think they can be by the alleged experts in suchthings. "

Then a sudden fancy seized him, and he broke out with a novelproposition:

"You have little to do to-morrow, nor have I much on my hands. Speaking of this to you has awakened an old interest in me and made mecurious. Help me to-morrow. We'll make up now a list of twentyleading clergymen. I know most of them personally, and some of themcan reason. We'll each take a cab and each visit ten, exhibiting theseverses, going over them stanza by stanza, explaining the doubts theyhave aroused, and asking for such solution as the clergymen have, andsuch solace as it may afford. That will be rather an interestingexperiment, will it not?"

I fell in with his whim, and the next day we made the rounds agreedupon. 

What a curious thing it was! How men of various creeds felt confidentand repeated the old platitudes, and would be anything but logical!How one or two were honest, and said they could not answer. 

And how absurd, we said at night, the keeping of men to tell us whatcan no more be learned in a theological school than in a blacksmithshop, and in neither place as well as in the woods or on the sea! Yetthere was no scoffing in it. We were neither irreligious. 

To this young man building the fence there came a resisting mood, andhe was puzzled still, but slept more pleasantly again upon hisclover-mow. He was groping, but less despondent, that was all. Itseemed all strange to him, for the old farm life had become largely amemory, and it was but yesterday that he was in college, one of athousand, full of all energy and lightsomeness, and here he was alonein the wood as in a monastery, and all else was somehow like a dream. Only the oxen and the logs and the ax and the maul and the growingfence were real by day. But, in the evening, there was Jenny Bierce, and she was very real, as well as charming. 

Ho wondered if she cared for him. She was apparently pleased when hefound her, and they had taken long walks alone in the twilight. Oncehe had kissed her, and she had not been angry. What sort of drift wasthis, and why was he so carried by it? How different it all was fromeven the life of a few weeks ago! Then there came before his eyes apicture of the great, splendid animal in town, and it remained withhim. It bothered him for many a day and night. 

If the Hindoo king were right, if all were so undefined, why not do asdid the birds and squirrels, and seek all sunny places? He could notwork at his fence Sunday. He had not done that yet, but he would walkthe miles Saturday night and spend his Sunday in the town. 

As he thought, so he did. He did not swing the maul late the nextSaturday that came, but took up his journey and reached home in earlyevening. 

He had been absent but three weeks, yet his family had much to ask, andhis father laughed at his hardened palms, and congratulated him. Hechanged his garb and took the way toward Mrs. Rolfston's. She had notlooked for him sooner, though she knew men well, for she had seen hisgrowing trouble and she knew his will. Her eyes blazed as might theeyes of some hungry thing to which food is brought. It was late whenhe reached his home again, and the next day he must read a book, hesaid, that he had found at Mrs. Rolfston's. At night he was stalkingacross the country again, to his couch on the dry clover; and hethought not even of the Hindoo king. Mrs. Rolfston's school oftheology was not of the sort which worries one with puzzling things, and he had been in a receptive mood. 

The next day he worked like a giant. In the early evening he foundJenny Bierce. She questioned him, but he had not much to answer. 

"Is there some one in the town ?" she asked. 

"There are several hundred people there. "

"You know what I mean. Is there any one in particular?"--thispoutingly. 

He said that of late the only one, to speak of, he had found anywherewas a girl in a calico dress. 

CHAPTER XI. 

SETTLING WITH WOODELL. 

So passed the days away. What added brawn came to the strong youngfellow's arms from the driving of the rails and lifting them to place!Brown, almost, as the changing beech-leaves his face, and the palms ofhis hands became like celluloid. He was unlike the farmers, though, for he lacked the farmers' stoop--he had not to dig nor mow, nor rakenor bind. He swung his ax or maul, and commanded the red oxen incountry speech, and deeper and deeper into the forest grew the fence. And, of evenings, he was with Jenny, and Sundays he was in the town. What days they were, with all their force, and health, and lawlessabandonment, though in the line of nature. He drank not, nor smoked, nor ate made dishes. He was like an unreasoning bobolink, or hawk, orfawn, or wolf. But there grew apace the problem of Jenny. 

One night, as the two were walking, each caught a glimpse of somethingdark, which moved swiftly through the bushes some distance from theroad. 

The girl started. 

"What is the matter?" Harlson said. 

"Did you not see it--that shadow in the bushes?"

"Yes. Some one was there. What of it? Some of the boys arecoon-hunting. "

"It wasn't that, " she whispered. "I know what it was. It was HarrisonWoodell, and he is watching. "

"Well, he might be in much better business. Are you fond of him?"

"I like him very much, " she answered, simply, "but sometimes I amafraid. "

He laughed. 

"He'll not hurt you. He dare not. "

"But he may hurt you. "

Another laugh. 

"Don't you think I can take care of myself?"

"Oh, yes"--hurriedly--"but one of you may get hurt, and I don't wantanything to happen to either of you. Oh, Grant! You must be careful!"

He was impressed, though he did not show it. There may have been someof that magnetic connection, of which the scientists have told us solittle, between minds tending toward each other, with sinister intentor otherwise, when all conditions are complete. Harlson felt in hisheart that the girl's apprehensions were not altogether groundless, but, as was said, he was in perfect health and had a pride, and he castaway the thought and but made love. And he prospered wickedly. It waslate when the girl reached her home again, and she went in tremblinglyand silently. So bent had been their footsteps that neither HarrisonWoodell nor other living thing could have been near them and unseen. 

Down the tree-fringed roadway and across the field to the barn wentHarlson, and wondered somewhat at himself. Into what had he developed, and how would it all end? He was elated, but uneasy. He was glad thefence was nearing completion, and that with the money due him life inthe big city would begin. He clambered upon the clover-mow, and tossedabout uneasily on the blanket upon which he had thrown himself stilldressed. It was some time before he slept, and then odd dreams came. 

He thought he had taken Jenny to the town, and that Mrs. Rolfstonseemed always near them, yet in hiding. They could not get away fromher. Then came a time when she had crept up behind them and over hishead had thrown a noose, and was drawing it tighter and tighter andstrangling him, and he could not, somehow, raise his hands to freehimself. He was suffocating! He struggled in his agony andawoke--awoke to find his dream no dream at all! to feel a hand on histhroat, a knee upon his chest, and to know that he was being choked todeath!

More than once in later life Grant Harlson felt himself very near theline which men who have crossed once may not repass, but never latercame to him the feeling of this moment. It was but a flash of thought, for the physical being's upheaval followed in an instant, but it was aflash of horror. Then began an awful struggle. 

Borne down deeply in the yielding clover, Harlson had little chance toexert his strength, which, with that grip upon his throat, could notlast long at most; but he writhed with all the force of desperation, and wrenched loose, at last, one arm, which had been pressed uselessagainst his side. With the free hand he clutched his adversary'scollar and strained at it, while he heaved with all his power to turnhimself below. The couch was not far from the edge of the great mow, but of that he was not thinking, nor of the fact that the hay had, inthe stowing away, been built out, so that the mow well overhung thebarn floor. Well for him that it was so! There was a sudden looseningand sliding as the struggle in the darkness became fiercer, and then, parting from the mass, a section of the mow, a ton at least in weight, shot downward, carrying upon it the two men, who, as it struck thefloor beneath, rolled from its surface through the great open doors, down the steep incline, up which wagons were driven on occasion, andleaped to their feet together, there in the clear moonlight. 

They stood glaring at each other. Grant Harlson gasping, but himselfagain, as he inhaled the blessed air. Each stood at bay and watchful. 

"Woodell!"

The man glared at him savagely. 

"What does it mean! What were you going to do?"

"I was going to kill you. "

"Then they would have hung you. "

"No, they wouldn't; they would never have found you. "

"Did you have a knife?"

"I didn't need one--if the cursed hay hadn't come away. "

"What are you going to do now?"

"I'm going to kill you. "

There was a look in the man's eyes which showed he was not jesting. Harlson thought very rapidly just then. He recognized the earnestnessof it all, but his sudden terror was now gone. Here were light and airand even terms with the other. The effect of the choking had passedaway. He felt himself a match for Woodell. 

With the revulsion of feeling came then suddenly upon him a rageagainst this would-be midnight slayer so great that he was calm in hisvery savagery. He laughed, as was his way. 

"You were very foolish. You should have brought a knife or club. Killme! Why, man, do you suppose if you were to try to get away now Iwould let you go? I want you, you murderer, I want you!" And hereached out his hands toward the other and opened and shut themclutchingly; and then with a snarl Woodell leaped forward and the twomen grappled like bull-dogs. 

Well for Harlson was it that through all the weeks he had been swingingthe maul and ax, and that his muscles were hard and his endurancegreat, for Woodell was counted one of the strong men of the region. Asit was, in point of sheer strength, the two were about evenly matched, but there was a difference in their resources. One wasgymnasium-trained, the other not. 

In country wrestling there are the side-hold, and square-hold, andback-hold, and rough-and-tumble, the last the catch-as-catch-can ofstage struggles. In early boyhood Harlson had learned the tricks ofthese, and in the college gymnasium he had supplemented this wisdom bypersistent training in every device of the professional gladiators. Hewas there considered something better than the common. And this, though a life depended on it, was but a wrestling-match. It was but astruggle to see which should get the other in his power, and blowscount but little in a death-grapple. 

They swayed and swung together, but so evenly braced and firm thatminutes passed, while, from a little distance, they would have seemedbut motionless. All who have watched two well-matched wrestlers willrecognize this situation. 

In each man's mind was a different immediate aim. Woodell wantedHarlson on the ground and underneath him; he wanted his hand upon histhroat, and to clutch that throat so savagely and so long that theman's face would blacken and his tongue protrude, and his limbs finallyrelax, and the work attempted on the hay-mow be done completely!Harlson had but one thought: to overmaster in some way his assailant. 

There was a sudden change, a mighty movement on the part of Woodell, and in an instant the struggle was over. 

Glorious are your possibilities, O pretty grip and heave, Ohalf-Nelson, beloved of wrestlers! What a leverage, what a perfectionof result is with you! What a friend you are in time of peril!Woodell, too bloodthirsty to feint or dally, released his hold andstooped and shot forward, his arms low down, to get the country hold, which rarely failed when once secured. And, even as he did so, in thatvery half-second of time, there was a half-turn of the other's body, anarm about his neck, a wrench forward to a hip, and, big man though hewas, nothing could save him!

His feet left the earth; he whirled on a pivot, high and clear, andcame to the ground with a force to match his weight, his body, like awhip-lash, cracking its whole length as he struck. 

Stunned by the awful shock, he did not move. His adversary stoodglaring at the still form for a moment, dazed himself by the suddenoutcome, then dashed into the barn, came out with a harnessthroat-latch and a pitchfork, strapped Woodell's hands together, pulledthem over his knees, and between the knees and wrists passed the longash fork-handle. The man, slowly recovering his senses, was "bucked"in a manner known to any schoolboy; as securely bound as if withhandcuffs and with shackles; as helpless as a babe!

CHAPTER XII. 

INCLINATION AGAINST CONSCIENCE. 

The shock had affected Woodell very much as what is known as a"knock-out" in sparring affects a man. Absolutely unconscious atfirst, he recovered intelligence slowly, though practically uninjured. Harlson stood beside the grotesquely trussed figure and watched thereturn to consciousness with curiosity. The cool night air assistedthe restoration. 

Woodell opened his eyes, seemed to be wondering where he was, and then, as realization came, made an attempt to rise. The effort wasridiculous, and he but flopped like a winged loon. The contortion ofhis face was frightful as there came upon him full understanding of hissituation. He struggled fiercely once again, then lay quiet, lookingup at Harlson with malignant eyes. 

Harlson's fit of rage had gone entirely. There had come upon him aswift compunction. "Why did you try to murder me?" he asked. 

"You know well enough, ---- you!" came from between the teeth of theman on the ground. 

"I do not. I can't understand it! Have I ever injured you?"

"Injured me? You dodging, lying thief! What are you quibbling for?You know just how you have injured me. Why don't you finish the thing?Get a club and knock out my brains! They won't hang you, for you cansay it was in self-defense, and my being here will prove it. Do it!Have a complete job of what you have done this summer!"

The man, writhed in his ignoble position, and tears gushed from hiseyes. Harlson reached forward and withdrew the pitchfork handle. Woodell scrambled to his feet ungracefully, for his hands were stillstrapped together before him. 

"Look here, Woodell, " said Harlson, "let us go to the road and walkdown toward your place. I'll not unstrap your hands just yet. I thinkI'll feel a trifle more comfortable having you as you are. I want totalk with you. I want you to be fair with me. Was it because of JennyBierce?"

"You know it was. "

"But why haven't I as good a right to make love to Jenny as you or anyother man?"

Woodell turned fiercely: "More quibbling. " Then in a tone of demand:"Tell me this: Are you going to marry her?"

Harlson hesitated. "I don't know. "

"You do know! You know you haven't any idea of such a thing. You arejust amusing yourself until you get your cursed fence built. "

"What is that to you?"

"To me! She was engaged to be married to me, and we were happytogether until you came; and you've come, broken up two lives and doneno one any good, not even yourself, you hungry wolf! She cares morefor me to-day than she does for you. She is better suited to me! Butwith your trick of words and your ways you tickled her fancy at first, and, finally, you charmed her somehow as they say snakes do birds. Andshe'll not be fit for anybody when you go away!" The big man sobbedlike a baby. 

Harlson made no immediate reply. Was not what Woodell was saying butthe truth? Did he really care for Jenny or she for him? What had itbeen but pastime? He could give her up. It would be a little hard, ofcourse. It is always so when a man has to surrender those closerelations with a woman which are so fascinating, and which come onlywhen there has been established that sympathy between them which, ifnot love, is involuntarily considered by each something that way. There was a struggle in his mind between the instinct to be honorableand straight-forward and fair, and to do what was right, and theimpulse, on the other hand, to refuse anything demanded by anassailant. But the would-be murderer was not a murderer, after all. He was only a temporary lunatic whom Harlson himself had driven mad. That was the just way to look at it. As for Jenny, she would notsuffer much. There had not been time enough. Not in a day does a manor woman have that effect produced upon the heart which lasts forever. So, were he to disappear from the affair, nothing very serious, nothingaffecting materially the whole of any life would follow. The odds wereagainst him, or rather against the worst side of him, in the reflection. 

He acted promptly. "I don't know about it, " he said; "I'm puzzled. Idon't care much. I don't know just where I stand, anyhow. I want tobe decent, but it seems to me I have some rights; I'm all tangled up. I don't think you imagine I am afraid--I wasn't when I was a little boyin school with you as a bigger one. You know that--and I'm not now. But that doesn't count. I've been studying over a lot of things, and Idon't know what to do. I think you may be right, and that I have beenall wrong. I give it up. But I do know that a fellow can't make anymistake if he tries to do what is right, and, in figuring out thething, takes the side that seems to be against him. He can fight, hecan do anything better after he feels that he has done that. Hold on. "

Woodell stopped, wonderingly. Harlson unbuckled the strap about theman's hands and threw it into the bushes at the roadside. 

The farmer straightened himself up, reached out his arms, clutched hispalms together, and looked at the other man. Harlson spoke bluntly. 

"Yes, I know you want to try it again. But, as I feel now, it couldonly end one way. I don't mind. I only wanted to loose you before Isay what I wanted to say, so that you wouldn't think I was making termson my own account. "

"Go on, " said Woodell, gruffly, still stretching his arms. 

"Well, it is just this. I don't think I've been doing the right thing. I am going to leave Jenny Bierce to you. She will not care much, andit will be all right in a little time. That is all. No, not quite!You tried to kill me. Maybe I would have been as big a fool, just sucha crazy, jealous man as you, if things had been the other way. I don'tknow. But I do know this, that your coming here to-night, except thatit has made me think, has nothing to do with what I have made up mymind to. Here we are in the road. I don't want to sleep uneasily inthe barn. You tried to kill me. I have tried to decide on what isright, and I will do it. Now, I want it settled with you. Here I am!Do you want to fight?"

Woodell's face had been something worth seeing while Harlson wasspeaking. He had followed the words of his late antagonist closely. He grasped in a general way the intent expressed. There was a radianceon his rough features. 

"Do you really mean that?"

"Of course I do. What should I say it for if I didn't?"

"Then it will be all right. "

"But do you want to fight?"

"No, I don't. I won't say you could lick me. It was partly luckbefore. I won't give up that way. But you might. That doesn'tmatter. I'm sorry I tried to kill you. I was crazy. You would havebeen, in my place. And you won't have anything to do with Jenny again?Oh, Harlson!"

And the two shook hands, and Harlson went back to his bed on theclover-mow. He thought he had done a great and philosophically nobledeed--remember, this was but a boy little over twenty--and he sleptlike a lamb. And next evening he went over to Woodell's home and saidhe wanted some supper, and after the meal laughed at Woodell, and saidhe was going off to another farm to pitch quoits until it got too dark, and the two young men walked down the road together and exchanged someconfidences, and when they parted each was on good terms with theother. This was strange, following an attempted murder, but suchthings happen in real life. And it may be that Woodell had the worstof the bargain in that conversation. 

He was better equipped for the winning of Jenny, but the troubled manwith whom he had been talking had reached out blindly for aid inanother direction. Not much satisfaction was the result. Woodell wasof the kind who, if religious at all, believe without much reasoning, but Harlson had repeated to him the reasoning of the Hindoo skeptic. Woodell had at least intelligence enough to follow the line of thought, and, in after time, when he was a family man and deacon, the lineswould recur to vex him sorely. 

And Jenny did not pine away and die because she saw little more ofHarlson. He met her and explained briefly that they had been doingwrong, and that he and Woodell had talked. She turned pale, then red, but said little. Of the struggle in the night Jenny never learned. She inferred, of course, that her lover had gone in a straightforwardway to Harlson, and that his demands had been acceded to. She wasgratified, perhaps, that she had become a person of much importance. She thought more of Woodell and less of Harlson, because of the issueof the debate, as she understood it, and, when the first pique andpassion were over, became resigned enough to the outlook. She had beenon the verge of sin, but she was not the only woman in the world tocarry a secret. Woodell's pleadings were met with yielding, and thewedding occurred within a month. Perhaps she made a better wifebecause her husband did not know the truth in detail, and she felt theburden of a debt, but that is doubtful. Though fair of feature, shewas not deep enough of mind to even brood. Of course, too, by thisstandard should be lessened the real degree of all erring. Harlson, wiser, was much the more guilty of the two and deserved somepunishment, but, as an equation, it could, at least, since he wasyoung, be said in his defense that as he was to Jenny so had Mrs. Rolfston been to him. The person who had changed things was that samefair animal of the town. 

And shallow-minded legislatures will enact preposterous social laws forthe regulation of the morals of boys, and imagine they have placedanother paving-stone in the road to the millennium, while the Mrs. Rolfstons are having a riotous time of it. 

CHAPTER XIII. 

FAREWELL TO THE FENCE. 

When the first frosts of autumn come the black ash swales are dry, andthere is more life in them than in midsummer. Hickory trees grow inthe swales, and the squirrels are very busy with the ripened nuts. Theruffed grouse, with broods well grown, find covert in the tops offallen trees, or strut along decaying logs. There are certain berrieswhich grow in the swales, and these have ripened and are sought by manybirds. The leaves are turning slowly to soft colors. There is none ofthe blaze and glory of the ridges where the hard maples and beechesare, but there is a general brownness and dryness and vigor of scene. It is good. The fence was nearly done, and the money for its buildingwas almost owned. The rails stretched away in a long line through thenarrow lane hewed through the wood, the tree-tops meeting overhead, anda new highway was built for the squirrels, who made famous use of thefence in their many journeys. The woodpeckers patronized it much, andtested every rail for food, but only in a merely incidental way, foreach woodpecker knew that every rail was green and tough, and sound andtenantless as yet. There was a general chirp and twitter and pleasantcall, for all the young life of the year was out of nest and hole andhollow, and now entering upon life in earnest. It was a season forbuoyant work. 

The great maul, firm and heavy still, showed an indentation round itsmiddle, where tens of thousands of impacts against the iron wedges hadworn their way, and even the heads of the wedges themselves wererounded outward and downward with an iron fringe where particles of themetal had been forced from place. The huge hook at the end of the logchain was twisted all awry, though no less firm its grip. The fence, the implements and all about showed mighty work, something of mind, butmore of muscle. 

Most perfect of all tonics is physical, out-door labor, particularly inthe forest, and it is as well for mind as body. It eliminates what maybe morbid, and is healthful for a conscience. Why it is that, undermost natural conditions which may exist, the conscience is not sonervously acute, is something for the theologians to decide, --they willdecide anything, --but the fact remains. The out-door conscience isstrong, but seldom retrospective. 

Grant Harlson swung his maul and delighted in what was about him, andbreathed the crisp October air, scented with the spice bushes he cut toclear the way, and pondered less and less upon the puzzles of theHindoo king. His mood was all robust, and when he visited the town hewas a wonder to Mrs. Rolfston, who was infatuated with the savagery ofhis wooing and madly discontent with the certainty that she must losehim. She made wild propositions, which he laughed at. She wouldremove to the city; she would do many things. He said only that thepresent was good, and that she was fair to look upon. And from her hewould go to his other sweetheart, the great maul, and be faithful forsix days of the seven. He did not work as late of afternoons now. Hewas enjoying life again in the old healthful, boyish way. 

He had a friend from town with him, too--a setter, with Titian hair andbig eyes, which slept on the clover beside him, and an afternoon or twoa week he would take dog and gun and go where the ruffed grouse were orwhere a flock of wild turkeys had their haunts among the beech trees. He would announce, with much presumption and assurance, at somefarm-house door, that he would be over for dinner to-morrow, and thatit would be a game dinner, and that he would leave the game with themon his way back that same evening. There would be chaffings andexpressions of doubt as to reliance upon such promise and "First catchyour rabbit" comment, but they were not earnest words, for his abilityas a mighty hunter was well known. 

Craft and patience are required when the wild turkey is to be secured, for it is wise in its generation, and will carry lead, but it is worththe trouble, for no pampered gobbler of the farm-yard has meat of itsrich flavor. Beech-nuts and berries make diet for a bird for kings toeat. And when Harlson brought a couple of noble young turkeys to theboard the banquet was a great one, and the boys pitched quoits thatnight no better for it. A good thing is the wild turkey, but even abetter thing, when his numbers and quality are considered, is theruffed grouse, the partridge of the North, the pheasant of the South. How, in the lake region, he dawdles among the low-land thornberrybushes in autumn, how he knows of many things to eat beside thethorn-apples, and how plump he gets, and how cunning! How watchful heis, how knowing of covert, and with what a burst he lifts himself fromhis hiding-place and whirls away between the tree-trunks! How quickthe eye and hand to catch him when he rises from the underbrush and isout of sight in the wood before the untrained sportsman stops him withwhat is little more than a snapshot, so instantaneously must all bedone! Yet what a dignified thing is he, and how easy to find by onewho knows his ways and what hold habit has upon his gray-brown majesty. Should the sudden shot fail, there is the fatal weakness of the bird offlying, as the bee flies, straight as an arrow goes, and of alightinghigh, say about two hundred yards away, and trusting to the trick whichfools all other enemies to fool the man. Following the straight lineof his flight, scanning the tree-tops, will you note at last, upon somegreat limb and close to the tree's trunk, an upright thing, slender, still-hued, silent and motionless. It is so like the wood it wellmight miss the tyro. It is not unsportsmanlike, it is in fair chase toshoot, and then there comes to the ground, with a great thump, the cockof the northern woods, and you have one of the prizes man gets byslaying. But this is only in the wood. In the open it is quiteanother thing. What a toothsome bird, too, is your ruffed grouse, howplump and yet gamey to the taste! You must know how to cook him, though. He must be broiled, split open neatly and well larded withgood butter, for not so juicy even as the quail is the ruffed grouse, and he must have aid. But, broiled and buttered and seasoned, well, what a bird he is!

There were woodcock, too, in the lowlands, and Harlson found with themsuch buoyant life as we men find in sudden death of those small, succulent creatures. To stop a woodcock on the wing as it pitches overthe willows is no simple thing, and he who does it handily is, in onerespect, greater than he who ruleth a kingdom. And, at the table--butwhy talk of the woodcock? There are other game birds for the eating, good in their various degrees, but the woodcock is not classed withthem. In him is the flavoring drawn by his long bill from the veryheart of the earth, the very aroma of nature, and all richness. Theyate peacocks' brains in Caesar's time. Later, they found there wassomething greater in the ortolan, and in some of the similar smallerthings which fly. But as the ages passed, and palates becamecultivated by heredity, and what made all flavors became known, thewoodcock rose and was given the rank of his great heritage--the mostperfect bird for him who knows of eating; the bird which is to otherswhat the long-treasured product of some Rhine hillside or Italianvineyard is to the vintage of the day, what old Roquefort or Stilton isto curd, what the sweet, dense, musky perfume of the hyacinth is to theshallow scent of rhododendron. Even the Titian-haired setterrecognized the imperial nature of the woodcock, and was all emotionabout the willow-clumps. 

Of course, from one point of view it is absurd, to thus depart from asimple story upon the killing or the cooking or the flavor of a bird. But I am telling of Grant Harlson and the woman he later found, and itseems to me that even such matters as these, the sport he had, and thefacts and fancies he acquired, are part of the story, and havesomething to do with defining and making clear the forming knowingness, and character, and habits and inclinations of the man. Between him whoknows old Tokay and woodcock, and the other man, there is everydistinction. Harlson had learned his woodcock, but the Tokay was yetto come. 

And the fence neared its end. The young man almost regretted it, eageras he had become to test his strength in the great city. Physically, it was grand for him. What thews he gained; what bands of musclecriss-crosses between and below his shoulders! What arms he had andwhat full cushions formed upon his chest! That was the maul. How heate and drank and slept!

The days shortened, and the hoar frosts in the early morning made thefence look a thing in silver-work strung through the woods. Where theoxen had stepped in some soft place were now, at the beginning of theday, thin flakes of ice. Even in the depth of the clover-mow thechange of temperature was manifest, and Harlson slept with a blanketclose about him. The autumn had come briskly. And the last ash wasfelled, the oxen for the last time scrambled through the wood with theheavy logs, and for the last time ax and maul and wedge did sturdyservice. One day Grant Harlson lifted the last rail into place; thenclimbed upon the fence, looked critically along it, and knew his workin the country was well done. He was absorbed in the material aspectof it just then. It was a good fence. Fifteen years later he strolledone afternoon, cigar in mouth, across the wheat-field where the woodhad been, and inspected the fence he had built alone that summer, awayback. The rails had grown gray from the effect of time and storms, anda rider was missing here and there, but the structure was a sound onegenerally, and still equal to all needs. It was a great fence, wellbuilt. He looked at the wasting evidence of the great ax strokes uponthe rail ends, and said, as did Brakespeare, when he visited the castleof Huguemont and noted where his sword had chipped the stairway stonein former fight; "It was a gallant fray. "

There was the getting of pay--the selling of a Morgan yearling coltsufficed the owner of the land for that--and the end of one part of onehuman being's life was reached. He went to town again and lived therea week or two. A life not held in bonds, but somehow under allcontrol. It was curious; he could not understand it; but, even in thewood, he had out-grown Mrs. Rolfston. He was with her much. There wasno let nor hindrance to their united reckless being, but all wasdifferent from the beginning. He was not selfish with her; he grewmore courteous and thoughtful, yet the woman knew she could not keephim. There were stormy episodes and tender ones, threats and tears, and plottings and pleadings, and all to the same unavailing end. Yourwoman of thirty of this sort is a Hecla ever in eruption, but becomingsometimes, like Hecla, in the ages, ice-surrounded. She has hertrials, this woman, but her trials never kill her. The rending of theearth, earthy, is never fatal. She recovers. With her, good digestionever waits on appetite, though an occasional appetite be faulty. 

And one day Grant Harlson left the town, his face turned cityward. Thecountry boy--this later young man of the summer--was no more. To fillhis place among the mass of bipeds who conduct the affairs of the worldso badly and so blunderingly, was but one added to the throng ofstrugglers in one of men's great permanent encampments. 

CHAPTER XIV. 

A RUGGED LOST SHEEP. 

The journal of Marie Bashkirtseff is a great revelation of the hopesand imaginings and sufferings of a girl just entering that period oflife when woman's world begins. Many upon two continents have beenaffected by the depths and sadness of it, yet it is but a primer, themere record of a kindergarten experience, in comparison with what wouldbe the picture showing as plainly a heart of some man of the city. Didyou ever read the diary, unearthed after his death, and printed in partbut recently, of Ellsworth, the young Zouave colonel, who was slain inAlexandria, and avenged on the moment, at the very beginning of thegreat civil war? That is a diary worth the reading. There is told thestory of not alone vain hopes and ungratified ambitions, but of anempty stomach and dizzy head to supplement the mental agony and makeits ruthlessness complete. There were, too, the high courage which wassorely tested--and an empty stomach is a dreadful shackle--and thebulldog pertinacity which ever does things. That was a diary of reallife, with little room for dreams, and much blood upon the pen. 

It befell Grant Harlson to learn how helpless in the great city is theman as yet unlearned in all its heartlessness and devious ways and lackof regard for strangers, and the story of Ellsworth was very nearly his. 

It was well enough at first. He had some money, and had occupation ata pittance, intended only by the law firm with whom he was a student toserve for his car or cab-hire when on service outside the office. Hisprivilege of studying with the firm was counted remuneration for hisservices, and he was, so far as this went, but in the position of otheryoung men of his age and value under such circumstances, but, unlikeothers, he had relied upon the law of chance to aid him. 

One hundred dollars does not last long when one is healthy and has amighty appetite, and, that gone, two dollars and fifty cents a week, and hard work for it, is very little to live on, and Harlson found itso. Not for all the comforts of the world would he have written homefor aid in the town. It seemed there was nothing for him to do. Ithad become mid-winter, and the winter was a cold one. Gaunt menfollowed the coal wagons or visited the places where charity isbunglingly dispensed by the sort of people who drift into smugofficials at such agencies as naturally as some birds fly toworm-besprinkled furrows for their gleanings. 

Harlson saw much of this, and knew his fate was not the worst among somany, and it aided him in his philosophy, but he had a mighty appetite. He was a great creature, of much bone and brawn, and being hungry wassomething he could not endure. He thought--how far back it seemed--ofthe farmers' dinners, and the turkey and ruffed grouse and woodcock. Woodcock! Why, his whole two dollars and fifty cents would not feedhim for a single time upon that glorious bird! He looked through thefine restaurant windows, and it amused him. His own meals were takenin restaurants of a poorer class. With thirty-five cents and afraction to live upon for a day, one does not care for game. 

Harlson's dress became of the shabby genteel order. The binding uponcoat and vest had begun to show that little wound which is not wide nordeep, but is past the healing, and the shininess at knees and elbowsreflected the light that never was on land or sea, or, at least, oughtnot to be. He felt a degradation with it all, though it was with himthe result of folly, not of fault, and he made a struggle for reform inhis finances. He abandoned the cheap room in which he lived, and sleptupon the office floor at night, the place in decent weather beingmoderately warm. 

The individual from China and the individual from more than one otherland, who comes to live with us, can exist on thirty-five cents a dayand think his provender the fat of the land. But he is not a greatmeat-eater. The fiber of him is not our own. His style of tissue wasnot fixed in northern bay and fjord and English and Norman forests, andhis ancestors transmitted to him a self-denying stomach. He can livein the city upon thirty-five cents a day, and clasp his hands acrosshis abdomen and say, with the thankful, "I have dined. " Not so the manof Harlson's type, and of his size. The sum of two dollars and fiftycents, the young man found, would not feed and clothe him for a week. He was a boy still, in the freshness of his appetite, yet his demandsin quantity were manly, to a certainty. Six feet of maul-swinginghumanity had eaten much, even in midsummer. That same six feetrequired more now, when the temperature was low and the system neededcarbon. Perhaps he got all that was good for him; it is well to traindown a little occasionally; but Harlson wandered about sometimes with afeeling of sympathy for the wolf of the forest, the hawk of the air, and the pickerel of the waters, all hungry ever and all refusing tolive by bread alone. 

As time passed this condition of things wore upon the man. Hisfancies, if not morbid, became a trifle ugly. He worked feverishly, but he chafed at his own ignorance of city ways, such that he could notincrease his income. He sought manual labor which could be done atnight, but failed even in this, for at that time he lacked utterly theway about him which fits the city, and persuades the man of businesswhen there is little labor to be done. It was almost a time of panic. He would wander about the streets at night like a lost spirit. Sometimes he would meet old college friends. He had classmates in thecity, some of them well-to-do and well established, and they were gladto meet him, the man who had done a little to give the class itsrecord, and he was invited to swell dinners and to parties. He wouldbut feign excuses, and to none of them told bluntly, as he should havedone, just what his situation was, and how a trifling aid would makehis future different. He was very proud, this arrogant product of theold Briton blending and the new world's new northwest, and he lackedthe sense which comes with experience in the bearings of a life allnovel, and so he remained silent, and, incidentally, hungry. 

It was at this period of his career that Harlson was in closestsympathy with the sad-eyed Hindoo king. He was not doing anything outof the way; he was working hard, with clean ambitions, yet he washungry. He could not understand it. No doubt an empty stomachinclines a man to much logic and the splitting of straws. There comeswith an empty stomach less of grossness and more of abstract reason, and an exaltation which may be all impractical, but which is recklesslyacute. 

"I want to do things, I want to help others--I don't know why, but Ido--I have ambitions, but I try to make them good. I am doing the bestI can with the brains I have. I get up in the morning from the officefloor and do my utmost all day, and try to do better when I get out, but nothing helps me! Where is the God who, it is said, at worst, helps those who help themselves. 

 "'You say that we have a meaning; So has dung, and its meaning is flowers. '

"The Hindoo king must be right. I am, we all are but like horses, ortrees, or mushrooms; and it is only some sort of accident which makeseach thing with life successful or unsuccessful, happy or unhappy, asthe case may be. "

So, at this time, Grant Harlson reasoned, blindly, yet in his heartthere was something which protested against his own deductions and kepthim in the path which was straightforward, and from staking all thefuture on the morrow. So drifted away the days, and this strong-limbedyoung fellow became hungrier and hungrier, and more shiny at knees andelbows, and more lapsided of foot-gear, and more thoroughly puzzled at, and disgusted with, the city world. 

Sometimes the young man would resolve that in the morning he wouldabandon all his plans, and seek the country again, and there, where hecould hold his own and more, live and die apart from all thefeverishness and chances of another way of living. And he would awakeand sniff in the morning air, and say to himself that he was a cur lastnight, and that he would stay and hold his own, and, in the end, winsomehow. The bulldog strain asserted itself, and he was his own again. At night, after a fruitless day, he might become again depressed, butthe morning restrung the bow. Sometimes--these were his weakerdays--he would abandon all effort, and seek the free public library, and there plunge into books and find, for the passing time, forgetfulness. These were his only draughts of absolute nepenthe, forat night he dreamed of the yesterday or of the morrow, and it marredhis rest. The library gave him, for the time, another world, though ithad harsh suggestions. He would stop his reading to wonder howChatterton felt when starving, or if Hood had as miserable a time of itas alleged, or if Goldsmith was jolly when, penniless, he argued hisway through Europe, or if even Shakespeare went without a meal. Butthe library, on the whole, was a solace and a tonic. It rested him, since it made him, for a time, forget. 

It was but characteristic of Harlson that, in the midst of all thistest of endurance of a certain sort, he should do what deprived him ofall chance of greater ease and greater vantage-ground with timeexpended out of the line he had established. One of his old collegefriends, guessing, perhaps, his real condition, came to him with anoffer of what was more than a fair income, if he would teach one of thecity's high-schools. The hungry fellow only laughed, and said that wasnot on his programme. He still went hungry and grew more shabby inappearance, and then came to him what was, perhaps, a sear upon hislife--perhaps what broadened, educated, and made him wiser. 

CHAPTER XV. 

THE STRANGE WORLD. 

One night Harlson, with a great appetite, as usual, --for he had noteaten since his scant breakfast, --went out to get his supper. It wasnot dinner, for he never, at that time, dined. He had in his pockettwenty cents. The next day he would get his usual weekly stipend. Hewould spend fifteen cents, he thought, upon his supper, then return tothe office to sleep, and would have five cents remaining for themorning meal. That would do to buy buns with, and he would endure whatstomach clamor might come until evening, when he would be a capitalist, and riot in all he could eat, even though he doubled a cheap order. 

So he reasoned, as he went down the garish street, and looked right andleft for some new restaurant, for he chanced to want a change. One'slove for cheap restaurants is not perpetual. A mild illuminated signover a small building attracted his attention. It had the aspect ofwhat would be cheap, but clean. 

Harlson entered the place and found what he had looked for. There wasthe small front room with scattered tables, the partition at the back, reaching but half way to the ceiling, with the usual curtained door, and there was no one in the room. He took a seat beside one of thetables and there waited. He had not long to wait. The curtains partedand a woman entered. The woman who came into the room was possiblythirty-five years of age. She was strong of frame, though not uncouth, and had keen, laughing gray eyes, heavy eyebrows and chestnut hair. She was a half jaunty, buxom amazon, with a brazen, comrade look abouther, and was evidently the proprietress of the place. She came towhere Harlson was seated and asked him what he wished to eat. Thepatron of this restaurant was studying the bill of fare intently. Hewanted to get what was, as Sam Weller says, "werry fillin, " at theprice, and yet he had certain fancies. He looked up at the woman andsaid, bluntly:

"I have only fifteen cents to spend. What would you advise for themoney?"

For the first time the eyes of the two met. Harlson was interested inthe fraction of a second. In the fraction of a second he knew that itwas not a restaurant pure and simple that he had entered, for he hadlearned much already in the city. The woman who looked at him was notmerely the proprietress of a place where food was sold. 

The woman did not answer at once. She was looking at the customer. She pulled out the chair opposite him and sat down. 

"Have you lived here long?" she said. 

Harlson had been so isolated, that to have an inquiry made in relationto his personal affairs seemed droll. It seemed something likehumanity again, as well. 

He studied more closely the woman opposite. She did not convey anyidea of a creature of innate dishonesty or treacherous character. Shehad the appearance of being a shrewd, merry, healthy sinner. He forgotthat she owed him an answer as he met her question:

"No, I have not lived here long, but I am as hungry as if I had livedhere for half a century. What shall I order?"

She looked at him curiously. His language was not of the kind she hadbeen accustomed to. She measured him from head to heel, while he notedher examination and was amused, and showed it in his face. Sheblushed, or rather flushed, and measured him again. Then she told himwhat he should order most wisely for the sum he had named. He wassurprised at the quantity and quality of it. 

The woman, meanwhile, had left him without further comment. As he wasending his meal, she came in again and took the seat in front of him. 

"You are hungry, " she said. 

"I was, decidedly. I'm not now. "

She looked him over. 

"You have spent only fifteen cents. What is the matter?"

He was surprised. He looked into her eyes and was perplexed. Whyshould this woman ask him this question? But he could see nothing inthose eyes save a gray inquisition. 

"I had only that much to spend to-night, that's all. Do you seeanything absurd about it?"

The woman was puzzled in turn. She looked into the man's face in afearless way enough, but did not know what to say. Then again camethat odd way of looking over him. Finally she broke out:

"You haven't any more money, and yet you put on airs. I like it. "

"I am much obliged, " said he. 

"That isn't fair. You know what I mean. And you know already--you'renot a fool--what this place is. It is mine. The little restaurant infront is but a part. Women come here--and men. Two women live here. Did you think that?"

Harlson said he had inferred, since he came in, that the restaurant wasnot a restaurant alone. 

"It's a funny world, " he said. 

She was bothered. "I don't know what you mean about the world, and Idon't care. But I would like to know what your business is, and howyou are doing?"

"I am not doing well, and get hungry sometimes. Had it not been forthat I should not have come here to-night. But what is it to you?"

"Can't you see? Why am I talking to you?"

"I don't know. "

She looked at him steadily again. 

"What do you want?" was his inquiry. 

"Where do you live?"

"I have no bed. I am in a lawyer's office. I can't afford aboarding-house just now, and I sleep on the office floor. "

"How do you like that?" she asked. 

"I don't like it. "

"Then why do you stay there?"

"Where else would I sleep? I have only so much a week. "

"Would you like to stay here to-night?"

"Maybe. This is better than the office floor; at least I imagine itis. "

The curtains parted and there was a heavy step upon the floor. A mancame in. He stopped and looked at the couple grimly. He was a big manwhose cheeks had jowls and whose eyes were red. He had the air of abully. He seemed perfectly at ease and conscious of his status, andthe woman started, then looked up half anxiously and half defiantly. The man spoke first:

"What are you doing here?"

"I am talking with this gentleman at the table. "

"You mustn't talk with these fellows. Get out of here!" he said, turning to Harlson. 

Harlson was not really in a pleasant frame of mind; he had been toohungry. It was not the occasion on which a flabby bully should havethus addressed him. He did not answer the man, but turned to the woman. 

"Is that your husband?" he asked. 

"No. "

"What is he, then?"

It was the intruder who answered, violently:

"She belongs to me, and you'd better get out of here. "

"I don't belong to him! He has lived here, but I want to get away fromhim! Now, " turning recklessly to the man, "you may do what you please!"

The man paid little note to what the woman said. His attention wasbestowed upon Harlson. 

"Look here, young fellow! Get out of this, and get out quick! You'rein the way!"

Now, upon this young man Harlson, during this conversation, had come acertain increased ill humor. He was in no violent mood, as yet, but hewas not, as has been said, one for a big flabby brute to thus annoy. He was quiet enough, though. 

"I've come into a restaurant to get my supper. "

The man's red face became redder still. "If you don't get out, I'llthrow you out!"

Harlson stood up. "I'll not go!" he said, and then the man rushed uponhim. 

It was only a clean, quick blow, but there was no check nor parry tomar its full effectiveness. The man plunged forward too confidently, the blow caught him fairly in the face, on the fullness of the cheek, just under the eye, and those bronzed knuckles cut in to the bone. Itwas a wicked blow, and its force was great enough to hurl the wholebody back. The man whirled away under it, and he went toppling down, with his arms thrown up wildly. As he fell, he pitched still furtherback, in his effort to save himself, and his head struck thewainscoting as he reached the floor. Blood gushed from his cut cheek. It was a moment or two before he clambered slowly to his feet. 

"Shall I hit you just once more?" was Harlson's query. 

The man did not answer. The woman stood looking on curiously, butsaying nothing. Harlson waited for a time, then told his assailant togo away; and the man picked up his hat and stumbled out upon the street. 

The woman sat down again. It was some time before she spoke. 

"You are strong, and will fight, " she said. 

"I had nothing else to do. "

"Do you want to stay here?"

"It is better than the office floor. "

"Will you stay here?"

He hesitated. It was a turning-point in his life, and he knew it. There was something rather startling to him in it. 

Then came the swift reflection: He wanted to know all of life. Thiswas the under-life, the under-current, of which reformers prate so muchand know so little. Why not be greater than they? Why not have been apart of it, and in time to come speak knowingly? He was but a part ofthis world, as accident had made it. He hoped if the world wagged wellto be a protector for certain weak ones. It was a world whereinimmediate brute force told. Well, he could supply that easily enough. And what would he not learn? He would learn the city, the ignorance ofwhich had resulted in his being hungry--he, a young man college-bred, and with some knowledge of Quintilian's crabbedness, or the equationsof X and Y in this or that or the Witch of Agnesi. And were not thesepeople part of the world, and was not this life something of which heought to know the very heart?

Still, there were relations of things to be considered. There werepeople at home, and it would not do. 

Then, just as he turned to refuge the woman who sat looking at him, thecurtains parted again and a face appeared. It was the face of a woman, not of the world about him. It was some accident, some sinister, unexampled happening, which had brought the face to the surroundings. It gave to the wavering man a new idea of this world of shame and sin, and it may have been the deciding ounce. 

CHAPTER XVI. 

THE REALLY UGLY DUCKLING. 

He turned, to the woman across the table: "All right; I will stay. "

I am but telling the story of a man of whose life from this time fortwo years I know but little. He was always reticent about these years, yet always said he had no occasion to regret them. With the life'soutlines, though, with what it really was, aside from details, Ibecame, in a degree, familiar. 

What does the average person in one class know of the life in another?There are "classes, " certainly, with great bars between them here, though this is a republic, and all men and women are supposed to befree and equal and alike in most things. There are lower and widergrades of existence, such that the story of them may never be told savein patch-work or by inference, yet which have as full a history, andwhere there are loves and hates and hopes and despairs as deep as areever felt in the mass where the creed-teachers and Mrs. Grundy and thelegislatures are greater factors. 

And of this more reckless, hopeless people Harlson learned much. Withthem he was; of them he could never fully be. The extent to which aman is permanently defiled by pitch-touching cannot, of course, beknown. It depends upon the pitch and upon the man. It was not a quietlife the young man led! On the contrary, it was a very feverish one, for he labored hard in the office by day--he never for an instantabandoned his ambitions and his plans--and at night he drifted into theland where were warmth and light and lawlessness. He had his dutythere, such as it might be, for he was both a gambler and a protector, and, young as he was, callow as he was, within a year he had become onein demand, no trifler at the table, and an object of rivalry amongthose whose regard means fee of body and of soul. He, himself, at thattime, did not appreciate the remarkable nature of his changing. Sorapidly he aged in knowledge of all undercurrents that he passed intofull maturity without a comprehension of the change. It is said thatsome Indians teach their children to swim, not by repeated gentlelessons, but by throwing them into a deep stream recklessly, savingthem only at the last moment. So had some power hurled Grant Harlsoninto the black waters, and he had not drowned, and had taken rank amongstrong swimmers. 

It is, as I have said, difficult to write intelligently of this portionof this man's life. I want to do him justice, for I have always caredfor him; yet, from the conventional point of view, at least, nothingcan excuse his lapse at this one time. He should have continuedstarving, I suppose, as have so many others, and have either died orwon, as they did, instead of tasting all that is denied, and gainingmuch knowledge of the world, of much use in the future, all at theexpense, perhaps, of that purity attaching to certain ignorances, asmuch in the man as the woman, since between the sexes all things arerelative. 

There were enough odd things in this most odd career. There werefriendships and feuds with those who were of the lower multitudemorally, but who were politicians and had their followings. There wereromances of the order which makes the story of Dumas such a successupon the stage, and risks and escapes enough to satisfy the hungriestof romance-readers. It was all grotesque in its grim reality, and theyoung man did not know it. He was an unconscious desperado, and theodd thing about it all was the ease with which he led the double life. 

In the morning, clear-headed and competent--for he did not drink at allof liquors--he appeared and was resolute at his work. He was becomingmore and more considered. That he, somehow, knew the town so well, wasin his favor. More than one case of importance was decided in anotherway from which it might have been, because of his knowledge of theoutcasts and their connections, and how they had been used or trifledwith on this occasion or on that one. He was zealous and studiedfuriously, and in the mere letter of the law became most confident. His examination was a trifling thing, and, once admitted to the bar, hedid not remit his efforts. He was valuable to the firm. He was theirwatch-dog, and he suggested many things. 

One day the senior partner called Harlson in, and a long conference washeld. The younger man was offered a partnership on condition that hewould make a specialty of certain branches of the firm's variedpractice; but the offer had its disadvantages. It was not in the linepolitical at all, but in one with vexatious business demands andrequisites; yet it was accepted in a moment. And within the next weekall the wicked, nervous night-life was abandoned, all the friendshipsformed there put upon probation, all the soiled sentiment made a thingto be ended surely and forgotten, if possible. 

There were some wrenches to it all. Camille learns to love sometimes, and Oakhurst, the gambler, does not want to part with one who has stooda friend in an emergency. But Camille knows that, for her, few flowersare even annual, and Oakhurst is practical and a fatalist. 

From that day, all his life, Grant Harlson kept away from close touchwith this ever-existing group who live from day to day because theyhave been branded and do not care. Good friends he ever had amongthem, but they never claimed him, though, on many occasions, the menserved him. They recognized the fact that he had never been more thanan adopted wanderer among them, and rather prided themselves upon him. In later times he would occasionally exchange a word or two on that oldlife with some one who had grown outwardly respectable, with someone-time thug, later saloon-keeper and alderman and what may follow, and would be reminded of what happened on the night when the mirrorswere all broken, and the Washington woman shot the man she was seeking, or when "we did the Coulson gang;" but it had long grown to seem unrealand dreamlike. He grew away from the memory, and there was no glamourto him in what might attract some other men to evil-doing, because tohim there could be no novelty. He was a past-master in the ceremonialsof fallen, reckless human nature, and the ritual bored him. Hedeserved no credit further than that. True, he was but young when helearned the rites, but that he was not still a member of the order wasonly because his ambition was dominant and his tastes had changed. That his will was strong, that he had tastes to develop, was because ofthe blood which filled his veins, and of nothing else. He had gonewith a current absolutely, though swimming and always keeping his headabove water until he swam ashore. Yet, as told in the beginning ofthis chapter, he always said to me that he did not regret thisexperience of abandonment. And he became a man seeking place and money. 

He liked to visit his old home, and was faithful to his old crony, hisaging mother, still; and, for a time, after any of these sojourns amongthe birds and squirrels and in the forest, he would be distrait andpreoccupied with something; but all this would wear off, and then wouldcome the press for place and pelf again. He was not entirelyunsuccessful, and finally he married, as a prospering young manshould--married a woman with money and presence for a hostess, and withtraits to make her potent. He lived with her for a season, and foundanother, without his dreams and sympathies and understandings, but witha will and a way. 

I do not care to tell the story of it, --indeed, I do not know it, --butthe man learned the old-fashioned lesson, which seems to hold goodstill, that for a really comfortable wedded life a little love, as apreliminary, is a good thing always--usually a requisite. The womanlacked neither perception nor good sense. It was she who proposed, since they were ill-mated, they should live apart, and he consented, with only such show of courtesy as might conceal his height ofgladness. There were money features to the arrangement made, and itwas all dignified and thoughtful. The world knew nothing of theagreement, though that generation of vipers, the relations of Mrs. Grundy, wondered why Mr. Harlson's wife and he so lived apart, and ifeither of them were opium-eaters, or dangerous in insane moods. Therelations of Mrs. Grundy have the reputation of the universe on theirhands, and, the task being one so great, they must be pardoned if theyerr occasionally. 

From the day he was alone, Grant Harlson appeared himself again, and Ispeak knowingly, for I was with him then. His old self seemed thenrestored. The buoyancy of boyhood was his as it had never been to mesince we were young together. It matters not what a chance, --this is aland where all men drift about, --but I was in the city near him now, and the old relationship was resumed. We rioted in the past of thecountry, and we visited it together. As time went on, Harlson seemedto forget that he was, or ever had been, a married man, and eventuallythe woman found other things in life than awaiting old age withoutsocial potency, and suggested, from a distance, that the separation becompleted. Perhaps there was another man. I know that Harlson did nothesitate. He responded carelessly, and then reverted to thingspractical. 

The reflection came that the mismated in this present age mustordinarily bear the burden to the end. Collusion, which in such caseis but a term for a mutual business agreement, is not allowable. Thesocial problem is a puzzle the solution of which is left to those whoseideas were given to them stereotyped. The separation was delayed, butwas, vaguely, a thing possible. And Harlson laughed and threw out hisarms, and made friends of many women. 

They were the variety of his life, which else was a hard-working one. He was not a saint nor a deliberate sinner. He but drifted again. 

CHAPTER XVII. 

"EH, BUT SHE'S WINSOME. "

"Eh, but she's winsome!"

Grant Harlson entered my room one evening with this irrelevantexclamation. 

I have remained unmarried, and have learned how to live, as a man may, after a fashion, who has no aid from that sex which alone knows how tomake a home. 

Harlson, at this time, had apartments very near me, and we invaded eachother's rooms at will, and were a mutual comfort to each other, and ahelp--at least I know that he was all this to me. I have never yetseen a man so strong and self-reliant or secretive--save some few whowere misers or recluses, and not of the real world--who, if there wereno woman for him, would not tell things to some one man. We two kneweach other, and counted on each other, and while I could not do as muchfor him as he for me, I could try as hard. He knew that. 

"Eh, but she's winsome!"

He went to the mantel, took a cigar, and lit it, and turned to meindignantly:

"You smoke-producing dolt, why are you silent? Didn't you hear myearnest comment? Where is the trace of good behavior you once owned?"

"Who's winsome?"

"She, I tell you! She--the girl I met to-night. And you sit there andinhale the fumes of a weed, and are no more stirred by my announcementthan the belching chimney of an exposition by the fair display aroundit!"

"You big, driveling idiot, how can I know what you are talking about?You come in with an obscure outburst of enthusiasm over something, --awoman, I infer, --and because the particular tone, and direction, andmood of your insanity is not recognized within a moment, you descend topersonalities. If your distemper has left you reason enough for thecomprehension of words, sit down and tell me about it. Who's winsome?What's winsome? And have you been to a banquet?"

"There is a degree of reason in what you say--that is, from the pointof a clod. I'll tell you. I've met a woman. "

"I dare say. There are a number in town, I understand. "

"Spoken in the vein of your dullness. A person not sodden withnicotine and dreams would have recognized the fact that I had met aWoman, one deserving a large W whenever her name is spelled, a woman ofthe sort to make one think that all poems are not trickery, and allromances not romance. "

"What's her name?"

"Do you suppose I'll tell you, you scheming wife-hunter! If I do, you'll get an introduction somehow, and then you'll win her, for I'mafraid she has good sense. "

And Harlson laughed and looked down in the brotherly way he had. 

"But this is nonsense. Why don't you tell me something about her? Isshe fat and fifty and rich, or bread-and-buttery and white-skinned andpromising, or twenty and just generally fair to look upon, ortwenty-five and piquant and knowing, or some big, red-haired lioness, or some yellow-haired, blue-eyed innocent, with good digestion andpremature maternal ways, or----"

"Rot! She's a woman, I tell you!"

"All right. Answer questions now categorically. "

"Go ahead. "

"How old is she?"

"Twenty-seven or eight. "

"Married?"

"No. "

"Ever been married?"

"Certainly not. "

"How do you know?"

Harlson looked surprised, and then he became indignant again. 

"Alf, " said he, "you have good traits, but you have paralysis of acertain section of your brain. You don't remember things. Don't youthink I could tell whether or not a woman were married?"

I did not answer him off-hand. I could not very well. He knew thathis reply had set me thinking of many a curious test and many a curiousexperience. Harlson had an odd fad over which we had many a debate. 

It occurred usually upon the street cars. He would make a study of thewomen in the car when we were together--it seemed to amuse him--andtell me whether they were married or not. He would not look at theirhands--that would be a point of honor between us--but only at theireyes, and then he would say whether any particular woman were marriedor single, and we would leave it to the rings to decide. 

Sometimes he would lose, but then he would only say: "Well, if shedidn't wear a wedding ring she should have done so, " and would pay forthe cigars we smoked. 

He had some sort of fancy about their eyes which I could never quiteunderstand. He said that a woman who had been very close to a man, whohad been part of him in any way, had nevermore the same look, and thatthe difference was perceptible to one who knew the thing. I tested himmore than once, and I found that he had never actually failed. Sometimes the woman with the look had proved unmarried, but there werefacts that made the difference. 

One night Harlson and I were wandering about the city, mere driftwood, after a dinner, and our mood carried us into the haunts of thosewithout the pale, not that we cared for any new emotion or excitement, but that we wanted to look at something outside the commonplace. To methere might be, of course, some novelty in the things that mightconfront us, though to Harlson they were, at their utmost, but areminiscence. We went where a man alone was not in safe companionship, but there were enough who knew my companion well, and all was curiousto me, without even the spice of care for self. 

It chanced that at one period of the wandering, very late at night, or, rather, early morning, Harlson became hungry, and insisted uponentrance to a restaurant where were gathered the very refuse of thereckless and non-law-abiding, and I went with him, perforce, and saw amotley gathering. There were all sorts of people there, from thief topander, all save those who might retain a claim to faintrespectability. Harlson demanded comparative cleanliness at our table, and the food was fairly decent. We ate, then smoked, and looked aboutus. 

I have seen many people, and many strange faces, but never such aperson nor such a face as of an old woman who sat at that early hour ofthe morning at a table near us. The figure was a warped and witheredcaricature, the face that of a hag, a creature vixenish and viperish, and mean and crafty. It was the face of a procuress of the lowest andmost desperate type, of a deformed she-wolf of the slums, of the worstthere is in all abandoned human nature, and Harlson was as interestedas I was disgusted and repelled. He noted the woman closely. 

"By Jove! look there!" he said. 

"What is it?"

"Look at her hand. "

I looked. I saw a hand which was a claw, a strong, shriveled thingwith long, dirty nails and a vulturous suggestion. It was not apleasant sight. On the third finger of the left hand, though, was aslight gleam amid the carnivorous dullness. There was a slender bandof gold there, a ring worn down to narrowness and thinness. I turnedto Harlson, but he spoke first:

"Do you see that old wedding ring?"

"Yes. "

"It's queer. It's good, too. There's a streak of what was good leftin everything, it seems to me. I'm going to talk to her. "

"Don't do it. She'll throw the plate in your face. "

"No, she won't. " And he rose and went over to the table of the beldameand sat down beside her. She looked up at him glaringly. He did notsmile, nor, apparently, make any apology or excuse, but began talkingto her, looking at the ring, and saying I know not what. And I watchedthat miserable old woman's face and wondered. There was more than oneemotion shown--fierce resentment at first, then the half fear of thehound or the hound-bitch yielding to the master, and then the yieldingof the heart, not touched, perhaps, for a quarter of a century. Harlson talked. The woman did not speak for minutes, then made someshort reply, and then, a little later, there were tears in her old foxyeyes. 

He rose, glared at the one or two hard-faced waiters who had venturednear him, and took upon a card something she said. Then he came backto me as the old woman left the place. 

"Queer-looking, wasn't she?" he said. 

"Decidedly, " said I. "What were you talking about?"

"Oh, nothing but the ring. It's wonderful how they always wear thering when they have the right to. "

"But what was the use of it all? What came of your talk?"

"Nothing to speak of. It was only a fad of mine. I have a right to anoccasional whim, haven't I? I'll be hanged if I'll see a wedding ringworn that way buried in unbought ground. The old hag was a marvel ofall that is unwomanly and sinful. But that ring shall be properlyburied, and the hand that wears it, because it _does_ wear it. So I'mgoing to take the woman out of this and put her where she will not haveto be a monster in order to live. "

And he did what he said he would do. He found a place in some oldwomen's home for that aged demon, and one day he made me go with him tosee her. Maybe it was the different dress and the differentsurroundings, but, it seemed to me, her eyes were not as they were inthe low restaurant. The hand that wore the thin gold ring was clean inits pitiful shrunkenness. The creature looked neither hunted norhunting. She was but an old woman going to the grave so near her, andgoing, I could not but imagine, to find the one who had given her thatgold circlet some half century ago. I rather fancied Harlson's fad. As for him, when I told him so, he only said:

"Oh, of course. Peter told the third assistant bookkeeper to creditHarlson with such or such an amount. " And he added; "If those peopledon't take good care of that old woman there'll be a newsuperintendent. " But they took good care of her. 

This is lugging in an incident at great length as an illustration, butI know of no other way to explain how Harlson so expressed himself whenI asked him how he knew whether the woman of whom he had been talkingwas married or not. He felt confident enough. 

"Well, what is she like? Can't you describe her? Has she seared youreyes with her loveliness?"

"She hasn't seared my eyes. She has only opened them. Listen to me, you thing of mud! She is just a little brown streak. "

"That's an odd description of a woman. "

"It's the correct one, though. She's just a little brown streak of athing. "

"Well, I've heard of a man in love with a dream, and in love with ashadow, but never before did I hear of one infatuated with a streak. Where did you meet this creature? Have you known her long?"

"Only for a month or so, and but slightly. We have not met half adozen times. It was only tonight, you see, that I began to know herwell. We talked together, and I got a glimpse of her real self--of herslender little body, of her earthly tenement, of course, I had an ideabefore. She is a lissom thing, with eyes like wells, and with a way toher which conveys the idea of wisdom without wickedness, and whichmakes a man wish he were not what he is, and were more fitted toassociate with her. "

"That's one good effect, anyhow. I don't know of any man who moreneeded to meet such a woman. How long do you expect this influence tolast?"

"Longer than one of your good resolutions, my son; as long as she willhave anything to do with me. "

"Does this brown streak of a saint live in the city? Is her shrineeasy of access? What are you going to do about it?"

"She's not a saint; she's a piquant, cultivated woman; but she isdifferent, somehow, from any other I've ever met. "

"You've met a good many, my boy. "

His face fell a little. 

"Yes, " he said, "and I almost wish it were different; but the past isnot all there is of being. There's a heap of comfort in that. "

"Cupid has thumped you with his bird-bolt, certainly. Why, man, youdon't mean to say that you're in earnest--that you are really stricken;that this promises to be something unlike all other heart or headtroubles with you?"

He laughed. 

"I am inclined to believe that the gravest diagnosis is the correctone. "

"But how about the present Mrs. Harlson?"

No friend less close than I could have asked such a question. I almostrepented it myself, when I noted the look which came upon the man'sface after its utterance. 

I suppose such a look might come to one in prison, who, in the midst ofsome pleasant fancy, has forgotten his surroundings, and is awakened toreason and suddenly to a perception again of the grim walls about him, and of his helplessness and, maybe, hopelessness. Harlson left themantel against which he bad been leaning, and walked about the room fora moment or two before speaking. 

"It's true, " he said, "I am certainly a married man. The law allowsit, and the court awards it, as things are in this society, bound bythe tapes of Justice Shallow and the rest. I entered into a contractwhich was a mistake on the part of two people. They discovered theirerror, and rectified it as far as they could. Had they been two men ortwo women who had gone into ordinary business together, andsubsequently discovered they were not fitted for a partnership, the lawwould have assisted cheerfully in their absolute separation. But withthis, the gravest of all contracts, the one most affecting humanwelfare, no such kindness of the statutes may exist. Some of thechurches say the contract is a sacrament, though the shepherd kings, whose story is our Bible, had no such thought, nor was it taught by thelowly Nazarene; but the law supports the legend, within certain limits. What are we going to do about it?"

I told him that I didn't know, and there were several thousandpeople--good people--in the city facing the same conundrum. 

I called attention to the fact that the conventional band was a strongone at this time, and could not be burst without a penalty, even by theshrewdest. The dwarfs were so many that, united, they were strongerthan any Gulliver. And I added that, in my opinion, as a mere layman, he was very well off; that he had been at least relieved of the great, continued trouble which follows a mismating, and that it would be timeenough for him to chafe at the light chain still restraining him, whenhe was sure he wanted to replace it by another. 

"It's not your fashion, " I said, "to fret over the morrow, and it is mypersonal and profound conviction that you have no more real idea ofmarrying again than you have of volunteering in the service of theAkhoond of Swat--if there be an Akhoond of Swat at present. You'reonly wandering mentally to-night, my boy, dreaming, because this wispof a young woman of whom you have been telling has turned your brainfor the time. You'll be wiser in the morning. "

All this I said with much lofty arrogance, and a great assumption ofknowing all, and of being a competent adviser of a friend in trouble, but, at heart, I knew that, in Harlson's place, I should not have shownany particular degree of self-control. I have never felt the thing, but it must be grinding to occupy a position like that of this man Iwas addressing. The serving out of a society sentence must be a testof grit. 

We dropped the discussion of the problem, and Harlson referred to itagain but incidentally. 

"The fact is, " said he, "I had almost forgotten that I was not as freeas other men. I have not regulated my course by my real condition. I've drifted, and there have been happenings, as you know well. There's Mrs. Gorse. I've never concealed anything. Those who know meat all well know my relationships, but I imagine that I have beendeceiving myself. I am not a free agent--though I will be. It's notright as it is. "

"And when am I to see this woman who has interested you, and restoredthe old colors to the rainbow? You will allow me to admire her, Isuppose, if only from a distance?"

"Oh, yes! Come with me to the Laffins' to-morrow night. She'll bethere, I learned, and I said I was going to be there too. Come withme. Of course, you understand that if she smiles on you at all, or ifyou appear to have produced a favorable impression upon her, I shallassassinate you on our way home. "

I told him that I thought my general appearance and style ofconversation would preserve me from the danger, and that I would takethe risk and accompany him. 

The next night I met Jean Cornish. We were destined to become verywell acquainted. 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

THE WOMAN. 

 Only a little brown woman she. Man of the world and profligate he, Hard and conscienceless, cynical, yet, Somehow, when he and the woman met, He learned what other there is in life Than passion-feeding and careless strife. There came resolve and a sense of shame, For she made as his motto but "Faith and fame. "

 The world is foolish: we cover truth; We're barred by the gates that we built in youth. Two were they surely, and two might stay, But she turned him into the better way; His thoughts were purified even when He chafed and raged at the might-have-been; He learned that living is not a whim, For the soul in her entered into him. 

 He fights, as others, to win or fall, And the spell of the Woman is over all. Bravely they battle in their degree, For--"The woman I love shall be proud of me!" And the man and woman, the one in heart, May be buried together or hurled apart, But the strong will battle in his degree, For--"The woman I love shall be proud of me!"

There were men and women, and music and flowers, and some of the peoplehad intelligence, and I drifted about at the Laffins' party, and ratherenjoyed myself. Of course I wanted to see the woman a fancy for whomhad gripped Harlson so hardly. I had forgotten about her until, with apleasant and clever person upon my arm, I had found something to eatand had come upstairs again, and released her to another. I wanderedinto an adjacent room, and there ran upon Harlson among a group. I waspresented to Miss Cornish. 

I do not know how to describe a woman. This one, whom I have knownbetter than any other woman in the world, is most difficult of all forme to picture. She stood there, not uninterested altogether, for, nodoubt, Harlson had been telling her already of his closest friend, hislieutenant in many things, and I had an opportunity to study her withall closeness as we exchanged the commonplaces. I understood, when Isaw her, how it was that he had referred to her so absurdly as a littlebrown streak of a thing. Little she was, assuredly, and brown, and soslender, that his simile was not bad, but the brownness and theslenderness were by no means all there was noticeable of her. She wasnot imposing, this woman, but she was not commonplace. Supple offigure she was, and there were the big eyes this stricken friend ofmine had told me of, and rather pronounced eyebrows, and her lips werefull and red, and there was that fullness of the chin, or, rather, thevague dream or hint or vision of a daintily double chin at fifty, whichmeans so much, but the forehead was what a woman's should be, and theglance of the eyes was clean and pure, though, in a clever woman's way, observant and comprehensive. It was a cultivated and fascinating womanwhom I met. 

We talked together, and Grant Harlson looked on gratified, and sheseemed to like me. She made me feel, in her own way, that she liked mebecause she knew of me, and as we were talking I felt that she waspaying, unconsciously, the greatest compliment she could to the manbeside us. I knew it was because of the other, and of something thathe had said of me, that she was so readily on terms of comradeship. And I knew, in the same connection, and from the same reasoning, thatshe had already begun to care as much for him as he for her--the manwho, the night before, had so comported himself with me. Of course, itappears absurd that I could reach such a conclusion upon so littlebasis, but to tell when people are interested in each other is notdifficult sometimes, even for so dull a man as I. 

"You have known Mr. Harlson many years, I believe, " she said, and addedsmilingly: "What kind of a man is he?"

"A very bad man, " I replied, gravely. 

She turned to him in a charming, judicial way:

"If your friends so describe you, Mr. Harlson, what must your enemiessay? And what have you to say in your own defense? What you yourselfhave owned to me in the past is recognition of the soundness of theauthority. "

"I haven't a word to say. Of course, I had not expected thisunfriendly villain to be what he has proved himself, but what he saysis, no doubt, true. I'm going to reform, though. In fact, I'vealready begun. "

"When was the revolution inaugurated?"

He looked at her so earnestly that there came a faint flush to hercheek. "Since my eyes were opened, and I saw the light, " he answered. 

She diverted the conversation by turning to me, and saying that, whilethe information I had given her was no doubt valuable, and that sheshould regulate her course accordingly, and advise all her friends todo the same, yet she felt it her duty to reprimand me for telling thetruth so bluntly. She knew that I had done it for the best, but ifthere were really any hope for this wicked man, if he had reallydecided upon a new life, we ought to encourage him. Did I think him inearnest?

I told her that it hurt me to say it, but that I had no greatconfidence in Mr. Harlson's protestations. He was of the earth, earthy. A friend, it was true, should bear a friend's infirmities, buthe should not ask other people to bear them, nor should he testify toanything but the truth. Mr. Harlson might or might not be in earnestin what he had declared, but, even if in earnest, there was the matterof persistency. I doubted seriously his ability to overcome the habitsof a lifetime. 

She was becoming really interested in the chaffing. 

"What is the nature of Mr. Harlson's great iniquity?"

"There, Miss Cornish, I am justified in drawing the line in my reply. I have conscientiously explained that he was, in a general way, avillain of the deepest dye, but to make specifications would beunfriendly, and I know you wouldn't have me that. "

Harlson said that he was very much obliged for my toleration, or wouldbe until he got me alone, and Miss Cornish showed a proper spirit, andso I left them. But I had no evidence that she believed what I hadsaid. 

As we walked home together in the early morning, Harlson told me moreof the young lady. She was living with an aunt, he said, and was, otherwise, alone in the world. She had but a little income, barelyenough to live on, but she had courage unlimited, and tact, and was notinsignificant as a social factor. She had the sturdiness of herancestry, in which the name of Jean ran. 

"I like it, " Harlson said; "it fits her--'Jean Cornish'--little brown'Jean Cornish'--little leopardess, little, wise, good woman. "

I told him that he was mixing his similes, and that in a broad, comprehensive way he had become a fool. 

"I tell you I'm in love with her already, " he blurted out, "andsomehow, some day, I will have her, and wear her and care for her!"

"But, my dear boy, don't be insane. There is the problem we werediscussing last night. Have you a solution of it? And first catchyour hare. Have you caught your pretty hare yet? I'll admit it'spossible. Women are fools over such fellows as you when they should beadhesive to good, plodding members of society, like the friend who isnow advising you, but Miss Cornish is not a fool, you see, and I don'tthink you deserve her. "

"For that matter, neither do I, " he answered; "but I will deserve heryet. I must do more of many things, and cease to do many things. Ibelieve I comprehend better now than I ever did the words in theservice, 'We have done those things and left undone, ' and all that. But you'll see a difference. I'll make her proud of me. That's theright way to become clean, isn't it, old man?"

I said I thought it a wholesome and commendable resolution, on generalprinciples, and, of course, the idol would gradually disintegrate. Allidols were of clay. But it didn't matter about the idol, so long asthe effect was produced. He might count on me any time for goodadvice. He only glared at me, and called me hard names, and we droppedin at the club and finished our cigars, and separated. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

PURGATORY. 

And Grant Harlson made love to Jean Cornish and won her heart. 

But all the time, unconsciously, he was a man of false pretensions, onedishonorable and unworthy of her. His friends knew of his marriage andits sequel. He had never concealed nor thought of concealing hiscondition, and it never occurred to him that Jean Cornish was not awareof it. He had supposed her, if she cared for him as he hoped, to besomewhat troubled, but to understand that he would do no mean thing, and that all would be well in time. Then came the sorrow of it, forJean Cornish learned, quite accidentally, that Grant Harlson was a manwith a living wife. 

She would not believe it at first, and, when convinced, was dazed andcould not understand. No such shock had ever before come into herlife. This man, of whom she had made a hero, a trickster and a liar!It seemed as if the world were gone! There was a meeting and anexplanation, and she learned how wrong she had been, in one way. 

He put the case earnestly and desperately. He would not yield her. Heknew she loved him, and he knew she was too good and wise to sufferforever herself or let him suffer because, in society, there wereblunders. There was a way out--a clean, right way--and they must takeit. He could get a divorce on grounds of mere desertion, and threepeople, at least, would be better off. It was pitiful, the scene, oneafternoon. He had called to see her, and was pleading with her. Itwas in the drawing-room, and there were stained windows they bothremembered in later years. He had talked of his bondage and of hishopes. She was not quite herself; she was suffering too much. I knowwhat happened. Grant told me once of the wrench of him then, and ofall the scene. There had been a fierce appeal from him. He had becomealmost enraged. 

"And so, " he said, "you would have a man's marriage like the blackbiretta of Spain that is drawn over the prisoner's head before theygarrote him?"

She did not move nor speak, but stood straight and silent, her handshanging at her sides with the palms loosely open, the very abandonmentof pathetic helplessness. 

Such a little woman, to withstand a storm of passion!

As he wondered at her curiously blended strength and weakness, asun-shaft blazed through the crimson glass of the upper window. Thereddened light, falling on her up-springing almost coppery locks, seemed to the man's excited fancy a crown, of thorns, crimsoned withblood, and there was, oddly enough, a cross in the window. 

The thought of another vicarious sacrifice awed him. Must this be one, too?

"Mistakes, dear, are not crimes. Can you not understand? I have beenmistaken, have suffered, have atoned for my error. Is that enough?"

"But, " she said, and her voice seemed to have suddenly grown old andthin, "you have no right to talk of mistakes. She is your wife. "

"The biretta, that ends all, again! No, not so. It is as insane andinhuman to force two people to remain in wedlock after it has becomeodious to them, as it would be to force them into that marriage atfirst. Oh, my tender-hearted little one, can you not see that thebondage is more humiliating, more craven than is the idea of theveriest chattel mortgage? Yet you refuse to let the injured one gofree, as you would not refuse the poorest prodigal whose one chance forhome and happiness was passing from his sight. "

"I cannot answer you when you discuss learnedly on such questions, " shesaid, with a weary dignity, "for I have never thought about them. Whyshould I? It has always seemed to me that a man with more than onewife was a--a--Mormon. It is all so dreadful. Surely, if a marriageis anything, it is a vow before God. "

"It is you that make the mistake now, " he said, "for the mere form ofmarriage is nothing but the outward evidence of a union that hasalready taken place. The first is the vow before God--not the latter. I understand why you think all this; clergymen have so long been calledupon to officiate at marriage rites that, with the fatherly assumptionnotable in the order all the world over, they have grown to regardthemselves as the especial and heaven-appointed guardians of theinstitution. It is all so grotesque when one remembers how ready theyare to 'solemnize'--save the mark!--marriage, no matter what theconditions. Have the candidates to be known as right and fittingpersons? Is there even the simplest formula of preparatoryexamination? None! Two wholly unsuited people may rush intomarriage--and misery--any day by simply presenting themselves before asleek-faced person who mumbles drowsily over their clasped hands, andcalls it a vow before God!--as he hurries back to his dinner!"

Still she was silent. 

An errand boy trudging by whistled a few bars of the wedding march, doubtless heard that day at some open church door. 

"Dear, there is a higher, holier law of the great Power, who made uswhat we are, than this one of slavish obedience to a tradition. Whymust our feet go in the burning ruts?"

"It is not the well-worn ruts that burn, but the by-paths, " sheanswered, "and oh! _how_ they burn!"

"Let me lift you in my arms and carry you over them, then, that yourfeet may not touch. Do not be unjust to yourself. Cannot you see howright, how good it is? It is not as if I came to you from anotherwoman----"

The girl faced around on him almost fiercely. 

"No, you could not be so bad as that! To have felt the morning kiss ofanother woman, to have watched her good-night smile, and then to havecome to me--that would have been too base, too degrading--I should havehated you because I despised you. I should have loathed youinstead----"

"Of loving me! Be honest and true, little Jean--you do care. "

"Yes, I have cared. "

"And do still?"

"Yes. "

Her tone was as cold and as clear as the sound of an icicle strikingthe frozen earth in the fall. It angered him, and his voice shookroughly. 

"A man who binds up his life in the love of a woman is a fool! Becauseshe is all the world to him, all he works to receive praise from, allhe fears in the blaming, he thinks her capable of as much love ashimself. And even as he watches, he sees her pass from fervor intoapathy. Her affection is but the dry husks of what he hoped to find. You never cared!"

"Grant, " she said, earnestly, "you have told me to be honest. I willbe. I think"--with a little laugh--"that if I had been a man I shouldnot have been a coward. I shall not be now. You wrong me and yourselfwhen you say that I never cared. It is because my caring has been somuch a part of myself that I have never been able to stand aloof andlook and comment upon it. It was just me. When I lived, it lived;when I die----"

"My love!"

"When--no. I do not believe it can die even then! I think it is apart of my soul, and will outstand all time. "

She hesitated as if devising words to express herself with even moresweet abandon. There was a certain loving recklessness in what sheuttered now:

"Not care? I wish you, too, would understand! Perhaps it is becausewe care in such different ways. I don't know, but to me it has beenall! There is no joy, no pleasure, however petty, through all the day, but it brings with it the swift desire to share it with you. Everymorning I waken with your half-uttered name on my lips, as though, whenI slipped hack through the portals of consciousness into the world ofreality, I came only to find you, as a timid child awakes and callsfeebly for its mother. Once, not long ago, in a street accident, suchas you know of in our busy city, I seemed very close to death, and inan instant my spirit seemed to have overleaped the peril and theterrible scene, and was with you. Afterward, one who sat near me saidthat, while some screamed or prayed, I said only 'Grant, ' and he asked, lightly, now that danger was over: 'Is the great general your patronsaint?' And I--I did not know that I had said it, since the name cannever be as near to my lips as it is to my heart. "

Harlson did not reply. He could not then. His head was bent. 

"And when you were ill--ah! then it was the hardest of all! I dreamedof the little things I could do for you--how your dear head could reston my shoulders, and it might help to ease the pain; how I could saveyou from annoyances; how I could--love you!"

"Then come, love of me; I need you--we need each other. "

"No, I think a woman who loves a man could scarcely bear that he hadever been bound to another still living, or even dead. "

"But----"

"No. It is not right. "

It is not always that even he who is right and strong in theconsciousness of it, and resolute toward the end he is seeking mayexpress himself as he would in protest against the object yielding towhat is in the social world, though it be wrong. Grant Harlson lookeddown upon the slender figure and into the earnest face and was helplessfor the time. Yet he was fixed of mind. 

He was very tender with her, but this was not a man to give up easilywhat was his. He pleaded with her further, but in vain. She would notyield. 

And so the weeks passed, with the problem yet unsolved. They werestill much together, for she could not turn him away, and he would notstay away. There was more pleading on his part, and more angersometimes. It seemed to him absurd that lives should be blightedbecause of a legend. 

And she was unhappy, and, it may be, gradually attaining to broaderviews and moral bravery. Jean Cornish was courageous, but there wasthe legend. 

And suddenly all was changed, the problem finding a solution notexpected. Grant Harlson's wife was, as has been said, a woman ofreason and of force, and she had her own life, with its objects. Shechafed under the bond which still connected her with Harlson, and shebroke it cleanly. It was she, not he, who sought divorce, and thesimple logical ground of incompatibility of temperament was all thatwas required, in the State where she resided. There was no defense. Grant Harlson became free, and Jean Cornish, since his freedom came inthis way, promised, at last, to become his wife. 

CHAPTER XX. 

TWO FOOLS. 

They loved. They were to marry, but there were the conventionalitiesto be observed, and they could not be wed at once. That was understoodby Grant Harlson, though he chafed at it a little. 

There were certain months to be passed before the two would be as onecompletely, and those months were very sweet months to the twain. Theywere much together, this man and woman who were plighted to each other, for why should they not be, since they were to become man and wife, andsince neither was so happy under other circumstances? They were notwhat a profound, unsentimental person would consider models ofcommon-sense, but they were not depending upon the opinions ofprofound, unsentimental persons for anything in particular; so this didnot affect them. 

They exhibited no great interest in society, though each commanded aplace there, but they would go to church or theater together, and theywere much addicted to luncheons. She would come down town at noon tomeet him, and then--what banquets! Sometimes they would visit therestaurants where there were fine things, and he would seek to make ofher a gourmet. He taught her the beauties of the bobolink in his laterattractive form, the form he assumes when, after having beentransformed into a reed bird, he comes back on ice to the region where, in the midsummer, he disported himself, and stirs the heart of the goodliver, as in June he did the heart of the poet. He taught her thedifference between Roquefort cheese, that green garden of toothsomefungi, that crumbly, piquant apotheosis of the best that comes fromcurd, and all other cheeses, and taught, too, the virtues of each inits own way. She learned the adjuncts of black coffee and hardcrackers. She even learned to criticise a claret, and once, withHarlson, she tested a _pousse cafe_, but only once. He didn't approveof it, he said, for ladies. And, besides, a _pousse cafe_ was not ofmerit in itself. It was but a thing spectacular. 

And in the matter of made dishes from the man about town she acquiredmuch wisdom. 

The man in his great happiness was buoyant and fantastic, and well itwas that the woman, too, possessed the sense of humor which makes theworld worth occupancy, and that the two could understand together. Hewas but a foolish boy in this, his delicious period of probation. 

And she was but a loving woman who had given her heart to him, whounderstood him, and who, in a woman's way, was of his mood. It was anidyl of the clever. 

At the more modest restaurants were the lunches of these two the mostdelightful. He would, somehow, find queer little places where all wasclean and the cooking good, but far away from the haunts of men, thatis, far away from the haunts of the men and women they knew, and therethe two would have great feasts. At one unpretending place he had oneday found pork and beans, --not the molasses-colored abominationordinarily sold in town, but the white beans, baked in a deep pan, withthe slashed piece of pork browned in the middle of the dish, --and thisplace became a great resort for them. They would sit at a small table, and have the beans brought on, and mustard of the sharpest andshrewdest, and dishes such as formed a halo about the beans, which werethe central figure, and then would they eat, being healthy, and lookinto each other's face, and riot in present happiness, having certainbrains and being in love. The very rudeness of it pleased him mightily. 

One evening they had dined together. She had been shopping or doingwhat it is that women do down town of afternoons, and he had met her atthe close of business, and they had eaten together as usual, and whenthey emerged into the open air it was but to learn that the mercury haddropped some few degrees, and that the jacket she wore was light forthe occasion. She became cold before her home was reached, and he wastroubled. 

"I wish it were months later, " he said. 

"Why?"

"Because then I could care for you, and see to it that you did notsuffer from the chill. I don't know though, even with the admirablesupervision I'd have over you then, whether you would take proper careof yourself, my Brownie. What would you do?"

"I don't know quite, " she answered. "I think I should want to getpretty near the grate. I'd pull one of the tiger-skins or bear-skinson the rug, very close to the fire, and I'd curl down on the fur andturn about a little, and get very warm. "

He assumed a lofty air, and announced that he was under the impressionthat, when chilled, she would do nothing of the sort! He had his ownideas regarding the treatment of chills of small, brown women. Whatwould really occur, what the solid, tangible fact of the occasion wouldbe, required no effort to describe. He should merely draw a greateasy-chair before the grate. Then some one would be picked up andturned about before the fire until thoroughly warmed and with fullcirculation of the blood again. She should be simply, butscientifically, toasted:

 "I'd hold you thus before the brand, To catch caloric blisses, And you should be my muffin and I'd butter you with kisses. "

She responded that the gift of doggerel was not one to be desired, and, furthermore, that she was not a muffin, nor anything in the culinaryway. 

All of which, of course, served but as provocation to furtherflippancy, and, for days later, the lady was referred to as his ownsweetest soda biscuit, his bun, his precious fruit-cake, and so on, until a bakery's terms were so exhausted. All this was, no doubt, silliness. 

The woman, in her way, was not less inexcusable than the man. She wasas much in love as he, and the strictly personal equation was as strongwithin her. She would watch him when they were at lunch together, andif her gaze was not so bold and feeding as was his, it was at heart asearnest. 

She wanted to do something, because of the passionately loving moodwithin her. She wanted to "hurt" him just a little, and one dayoccurred an odd thing. 

They were chatting across a little table in a restaurant almost vacantsave for them, and he had made some grotesque sweetheart comment whichhad pleased her fancy, lovingly alert, and she suddenly straightened inher seat and looked at him with eyes which were becoming dewy, but saidnever a word. 

She looked all about the room in one swift, comprehensive glance, andthen, leaning over, with her small right hand she smote him hardly uponthe cheek. There was no occasion for such demonstration. It was butthe outpouring, the sweet, barbaric fancy of the woman, in line withthe man's grotesquerie, and not one whit less affectionate. And he, thus smitten, made no remonstrance nor defense, further than to referincidentally to his slender sweet assailant as "a burly ruffian. "

That evening, at her home, he suddenly, just before leaving, picked upthe woman, as if she were a baby, and threatened to carry her away withhim. She did not appear alarmed, at least to the extent of hysteria, though she struggled feebly, and said that somebody was a big, brutalgorilla, and that she did not propose to be snatched from the bosom ofher tribe to be conveyed to some tree-top refuge, and there become amonster's bride. 

He would assert at times, and the idea was one he clung to with greatpersistency, that the person with him was not even of the race, but hadbeen substituted in the cradle for a white child stolen by an Indianwoman with some great wrong to avenge. He would call her his ChippewaChangeling, and at lunch would be most solicitous as to whether or notthe Wild Rose would have a little more of the chicken salad. Would theFlying Pawn try the celery? Some of the jelly, he felt confident, would please the palate of the Brown Dove. Might the white hunter helpher to a little more of this or that? Only once she rebelled. She waslaughing at something he had said, and he referred to her benignantlyas his Minnegiggle, which was, admittedly, an outrage. 

A great fancy of these two it was to imagine themselves a couple apartfrom the crowd, and unversed in city ways, and just from the country. Not from the farm would they come, but from some town of moderate size, for they prided themselves on not being altogether ignorant. Far fromit. Was there not a city hall in Blossomville, and a high-school, andwere there not social functions there? But, of course, it was a littledifferent in a great city, and it would be well not to mingle toorecklessly with the multitude. 

They would even visit the circus when one of those "aggregations" madethe summer hideous, and he would buy her peanuts and observe all theconventional rules laid down for rural deportment on such occasions. The whimsicality, the childishness of it all, gave it a charm. Theyappreciated anything together. Harlson said, one day:

"I believe that an old proverb should be changed. 'He laughs best wholaughs last, ' is incorrect. It should be: 'He laughs best who laughswith some one else. ' And that is what will make us strong in life, mylove. Some trying times may come, but we shall be brave. We'll justlook at each other, and laugh, because we shall understand. We know. We, somehow, comprehend together. Don't you see? Of course you do, because, if you didn't understand, what I am saying would be nonsense. "

She understood well enough. She understood his very heart-beats. Ithad grown that way. 

"I am getting very much like you, I think, " she said, "and I want youto understand, sir, that I do not regret it. I'm afraid I'm losttotally. I'm not alarmed that it is as if your blood were in my veins. What can a poor girl do?"

"You might as well abandon yourself, " he answered. "What is it they doin a part of Africa, when something to last forever is intended? Ithink they drink a little of another's blood. Could you do that?"

She laughed. "I could drink yours. "

He bared his arm in an instant, and sank the point of a pen-knife intoa small vein. The red current came out upon the smooth skin prettily. She looked at Harlson's act in astonishment, and turned a little pale;then, all at once, with a great resolve in her eyes, she bent swiftlyforward and applied the red of her lips to that upon the arm. Sheraised her head proudly, and he looked at her delightedly. 

"How did it taste?"

"Salty"--with a pucker of her lips and a desperate effort to keep fromfainting. 

"Yes, there is much saline matter in blood. Even such admirable bloodas that you have just tasted is, no doubt, a little salty. Are yousorry you did it?"

"No, " she said, bravely, but she was pallid still. 

"Allow me to remind you that science has learned many things, and thatyou will have, literally, some of my blood in your veins. Not much, itis true, but there will be a little. "

She replied that she was glad of it. 

And henceforth, when her moods most pleased his lordship, he wouldcomment on the good effect of the experiment, and when they differed hewould regret that she had not taken more of him. 

They were two fools. 

CHAPTER XXI. 

"MY LITTLE RHINOCEROS-BIRD. "

It was not all sweet nonsense, though, with this man and woman. Somepractical things of life became theirs soon, because of the love whichwas theirs. 

A curious thing, and to me a pleasant thing, occurred one night. I waswith Grant Harlson in his room, and he was lying on a sofa smoking, while I lounged in an easy-chair. Harlson was pretty well fagged out, for it was the end of a hard day for him, as, for that matter, it hadbeen for me. There was a ward to be carried against a ring, andHarlson was in the midst of the fray for half a hundred reasons, and Iwas aiding him. He headed the more reputable faction, but in theopposition were many shrewd men and men of standing. 

It was no simple task we had before us, and we had been working hard, and we were not quite satisfied with the condition of things. Therelations of two men of prominence we wanted to know particularly. Hadthere, or had there not, been a coalition between them? If there had, it would change Harlson's policy, naturally, but work so far had beenconducted on the supposition that an ancient political feud between thetwo was not yet ended, and that upon the support of one against theother he could count with reasonable certainty. We were discussingthis very matter when there came a ring at the door, and a cab-driverentered. 

"There is a lady in my cab, " said he, "who wants to see Mr. Harlson. "

Harlson was puzzled. 

"I don't know what it means, " he said. "Come down with me and we'llsolve the mystery, " and we went to where the cab was drawn close to thesidewalk. 

The door was opened with some energy, and a woman's head appeared--ahead with brown hair. 

"Grant!"

"Jean! What is the matter? What brings you here at such a time? Mypoor child. "

She laughed. "There is nothing the matter, you big baby. Only I heardsomething I thought you would care to know, and which I thought youshould know at once, so I came to tell you. "

"Yes, tell me. "

"It was this way, you see. " All this impetuously. "I was at Mrs. Carlson's party, and among the guests were Mr. Gordon and Mr. Mason, with their wives. I didn't listen intentionally, of course, but Mr. Mason and Mr. Gordon came close to where I was sitting and I heard yourname mentioned, and I suppose that made my hearing suddenly acute, andI heard in two sentences enough to know that those two gentlemen areworking together against you in something political. So, sir, knowingyour foolish interest in such things, and actuated by my foolishinterest in you, I told aunt I'd like to go home early, and a cab wascalled and I was put into it, and I told the driver to come here, and--you know the rest, you staring personage. "

Women can read men's faces, and Jean Cornish must have been repaid forwhat she had done by the mere look of the man before her. He saidnothing for a moment, and then uttered only these words softly:

"My little rhinoceros-bird. "

"Will you kindly explain the meaning of that extraordinary phrase?"

He did not answer just then, but got into the cab with her and directedthe driver to her home. 

She had removed her wraps in the drawing-room when she turned to himand demanded further information as to the term applied to her. Hemade comment on some people's general ignorance of natural history, took a big arm-chair, placed the young lady in a low seat close besidehim, and, assuming a ponderous, pedagogical air, began:

"The rhinoceros, my child, as you may possibly be aware, is a hugebeast of uncouth appearance, with a horn on its nose, and inhabitingthe wild regions of certain wild countries, notably Africa. It is adangerous animal, and has enemies galore and friends but few. Thehunter counts it a noble prize, and steals upon it in its fastnesses, and even a rhinoceros may not withstand the explosive bullet of modernscience. Somewhat sluggish and dull, at times, is the rhinoceros, andit is in his careless, listless moods that he is liable to fall avictim. Well for him is it on such occasions that he has a friend, aguardian, a tiny lover. Well for him that the rhinoceros-bird exists!The rhinoceros-bird is a little thing which never deserts the mightybeast. It perches upon his head or back, and flutters about him, andmakes of him its world. To the rhinoceros-bird the rhinoceros is allthere is of earth. And well is the brute repaid for liking the birdabout him. Though the monster may have stupid periods, the bird hasnone, and, hovering about bushes, fluttering over openings, ever alert, watchful and solicitous, naught may escape its eye, and, danger oncediscovered, swift is the warning to the slumbering giant, and then woeto the intruder on his domain! And such, dear pupil, is therhinoceros-bird. And you are my rhinoceros-bird. "

She understood, of course. The look in her eyes told that, but herwords belied her. 

She said that, in a general way, the simile had application, therhinoceros being a huge beast of uncouth appearance. 

And, so far as this conversation was concerned, he perished miserably. 

But that was only the beginning of a practical exhibition of thewoman's earnestness and acuteness, and her great love. It was butevidence that she was to be, what she became in time, hisrhinoceros-bird in all things, his right hand, prompter in suchrelations as a woman's wit and woman's way best serve. She was of him. But with two who blended, so there must be many added intervals ofdelicious nonsense before the reality of marriage came. 

They made odd names for things. They ate lobster together one day, andhe, in some mood, kept misquoting and distorting passages from thePersian poet, and thenceforth broiled lobster was known to the two as"a Rubaiyat. " And there were a score or two of other bizarre titlesthey had made for things or for localities, with the instinct of soembalming a perfect recollection. And each had certain tricks ofspeech, of course, as have all human beings, and these two, so livingin each other, caught all these, and mocked and gibed and imitated, until there was little difference in their pronunciations. To some oneoverhearing them they might have been deemed as of unsound mind, thoughthey were only talking in love's volapuk. 

They resembled each other, these two beings, as nearly in bodilyfancies as in other ways. Each, for instance, was a great water lover, each addicted to the bath and perfumes, he perhaps because of his longgymnasium training, and she from the instinct of all purity whichappertains to all women worth the owning. 

One afternoon they had fled from the city and were walking on thebeach, beside the lake, with no one near them. For a mile in eitherdirection, they could look up and down and see that no intruder was insight. He sent flat stones skipping and galloping over the waves withsome whirling trick of underthrow, and tried to teach her the device ofit, and they sat upon the sand and ate the luncheon he had securedpreparatory to this great excursion, a luncheon devised with greatskill by a great caterer, and packed in a paper box which would go in acoat-pocket, and they talked of many things and delighted in beingtogether, and alone. And he, floundering in the sand, must needs getmuch of it inside his shoe. And then this reckless person, havingremoved the shoe to rid himself of the sand, must needs step in atreacherous spot and wet his stocking dismally. And the sensible thingto do was to remove the stocking and dry it in the sun. 

There should be, so far as its relation to society is concerned, nodifference between the human hand and the human foot, but, somehow, theaverage man is not, as a rule, ready to exhibit his bare feetcarelessly to the one woman, and to the average woman a similarrevelation would seem a thing indelicate; but these two were not of thecommon sort. Harlson pulled off his stocking as carefully as he wouldhave done a glove, and spread it on the sand where it might dry, and, laughing at his disaster, he dabbled with his foot in the sand. 

She looked at him curiously. She looked at the foot, too, being awoman, and this being the man above all others to her, and then shelaughed out joyously and frankly. 

"I don't believe any one but you would have done that, Grant. And whata foot you have!"

He replied, with much pomposity, that it was the far-famed Arabianfoot, the instep of which arched so beautifully that water could flowbeneath it without wetting the skin. Just at present, though, hethought a little water might run over it to advantage, instead ofunder, the sand being a trifle mucky. And why would no one else havedone such a thing? And he was glad she liked his foot; in fact, he wasglad she liked anything about him, and rather wondered that she did, and the world had become to him a good place to live in. 

All of which was but the sentimentalism which appertains to a man and awoman in love with each other, but the drift of thought continued inthe direction suggested by his action and her comment. They looked atthe lake, with its shifting coloring of green and blue and purple, andhe told her how, some day, he would teach her to swim like a SandwichIsland beauty, and she said she would like to learn. She liked thewater. 

"I'm very glad of that, " he commented; "I like it myself. I am a greatbather. I admire the English for the 'tubbing' which is made such asubject of jest against them by other people. There must be water intowhich I may tumble when I rise in the morning, or water in abundance insome way, else I should be a trifle uncomfortable all day long. Idon't mean just a mild lavatory business, you know, but a plunge or acataract, or something of that sort. It is barely possible, my dear, that you are going to marry a man whose remote ancestors were theproduct of evolution from otters, instead of monkeys. Think of that!"

And she confessed, half-blushingly, her own regard for water, and thatshe had been laughed at by other women for what they deemed a fancycarried to an extreme. And she said she was very glad that a great bigSomebody was dainty in his ways. While in many respects she could notapprove of him, it was a comfort, at least, to be enabled to think ofhim as ever clean and wholesome, and as having one weakness of whichshe could condone. 

He looked at her majesty, as she sat enthroned upon a little mound, butto her small oration made no reply. He was worshiping her bodily. Andfrom this conversation came a sequel, a day or two later, which was butthe worshiping put into things material. Of his love and the bath hewould have fancies, and he wanted what touched her to be from him. Shewas surprised by a cumbrous package which, opened, revealed greatthings for a woman's dalliance with water--the soft Turkish towel, vastenough to envelop her, the perfumed soaps, and even the bath-mittens. And she was a little frightened, maybe, at the personality of it all, but she recognized the nature of his fancy, and but loved him the morebecause he had it. It was an odd gift, it is true, but they were oddpeople. They were very close together. 

An eventful day in other respects, that is, from a lover's point ofview, was this one of the outing by the lake. The stocking dried, andin its proper place upon the foot, and inside the shoe again, and thelunch dispatched, there was more idle rambling by the lakeside, and, ofcourse, more lovers' talk. At one place there was a little wood whichextended to the water's edge, and there she perched herself in a seatformed by the bent limb of an upturned tree, and he produced from hiscoat-pocket a paper of macaroons for her dessert, and she sat theremunching them like a monkey, while he sprawled, again upon the sand. She made a pretty picture, this small, brown woman, thus exalted; tohim a wonderful one. Suddenly she ceased her munching and spoke to himimperiously:

"Come here, sir. "

He rose and went to her, standing before her, obedient and waiting. She reached up and took his face between her hands, and pulled his facegently downward until the faces of the two were close together. Shelooked into his eyes. 

"I merely called you up, sir, " she said, "to impart a certain piece ofinformation. I am in love with you. "

CHAPTER XXII. 

TWO FOOLS STILL. 

When a woman, who is all there is in the world to a man, falls into thedeliciously generous mood of abandonment, and is revealing what is inher heart, the man, I understand from various excellent authorities, gets about as near heaven as he may ever do in the flesh. And Harlsonformed no exception to the rule. The small personage on the limb ofthe fallen tree owned him as absolutely and completely as everCleopatra owned a slave, or Elizabeth a servitor. 

"I don't know what to say, " he murmured. "There aren't anywords--but--you understand. "

She pulled his face still closer and kissed him on the lips, thoughblushing as she did so, for this young woman had fancies regarding lipsand regarding kisses which should be entertained by a greater number ofthe women of the land. Then she told him to lie upon the sand again;that she wanted to look at him. And he obeyed, machine-like. 

She was in a fantastic mood assuredly. She watched him, her cheekresting upon one little hand for a long time, a thoughtful look uponher face. Then she broke out impetuously:

"How smooth and clean your face is! Do you--do you go to--you knowwhat I mean. Do you go to a barber every day?"

He answered that he shaved himself. 

"Is it very hard?" she asked. 

"Well, that depends. "

She studied once more for a long time, then spoke again, on thisoccasion blushing furiously:

"Grant, dear, I want to _do_ things for you always. I want to takecare of you. It seems to me that, some time, I might learn, you know. It seems to me that some time I might almost"--with a littlegasp--"shave you. "

He wanted to gather her up in his arms and smother and caress her, after that climax of tender admission, but she waved her hand as shesaw him rising. He fell back then upon his ignoble habit of talkingvast science to her. 

"My dear, that dream may, I hope, be realized. I'd rather have my faceslashed by you than be shaved by the most careful, conscientious andsilent barber in all Christendom, but shaving is a matter of muchgravity. It is not the removal of the beard which tests the intellect;it is the sharpening of the razors. "

"How is that, sir?"

"All razors are feminine, and things of moods. The razor you sharpento-day may not be sharp, though manipulated upon hone or strap with allpersistence and all skill. The razor you sharpen to-morrow may be farmore tractable. Furthermore, the razor which is comparatively dullto-day may be sharp to-morrow, without further treatment. "

She said that, in her opinion, that was nonsense, and that he wastrying to impose upon a friendless girl, because the topic was one ofwhich men would, ordinarily, have a monopoly, and regarding which theywould assume all wisdom, and, perhaps, make jests. 

"I am in earnest, " he said. "Razors have moods, and are known to sulk. But science has solved the conundrum of their antics. It has beendiscovered that whetting changes the location of the molecules ofmetal, that there is frequently left what is not a perfect edge afterthe supposed sharpening, but that, given time, the molecules willreadjust themselves, and the edge return. My dear, you are now, or atleast should be, a woman rarely learned in one great mystery. Is thereno reward for merit?"

She scorned reply to such a screed, but slid down from her perch withthe remark that she had "et hearty. " A man who had eaten near them ina restaurant had used the expression, and they had both promptlyadopted it. 

He rose, went to her side, and leaned over, and inhaled the perfume ofher hair. 

She looked up mischievously. "You are a big black animal!"

As already remarked, these two were very foolish. 

That same evening, when Grant Harlson reached his office, he found anote awaiting him. It was a pretty, perfumed thing, and he knew thehandwriting upon it well. He had not seen the writer for three months. He had almost forgotten her existence, yet she had been one with whomhis life had been, upon a time, closely associated. He opened theenvelope and read the note:

MY DEAR GRANT: Yon know I am philosophical--for a woman--and that Ihave never been exacting. I have formed habits, though, and havecertain foolish ways. One of these ways was to be much with GrantHarlson, not very long ago. I lost him, somehow, but still have acuriosity to see his face again, to note if it has changed. I havesomething to say to him, too. Please call upon me to-night. ADA. 

The effect of the note upon the man was not altogether pleasant. Hefelt a certain guiltiness at his own indifference. This clever womanof the social world he knew was not to be trifled with by one unarmoredor irresolute. He had hoped she would forget him, that his ownindifference would breed the same feeling upon her part, and now heknew he was mistaken, as men have been mistaken before. There was aninterview to be faced, and one promising interesting features. Hestarted on the mission with a grimace. 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

JUST A PANG. 

Mrs. Gorse was at home, the servant said, and Harlson found herawaiting him in a room which was worth a visit, so luxurious were itsappointments and so delicate its colorings and its perfumes. A womanof admirable taste was Mrs. Gorse, and one who knew how to producedramatic effect. But dramatic effects as between her and Grant Harlsonwere things of the past. People sometimes know each other so well thatthe introduction of anything but reality is absurd. Mrs. Gorseattempted nothing as Harlson entered. She was not posed. She wasstanding, and met him at the door smilingly. 

"How do you do, Grant?"

"I'm well, " he said, "and how are you? Certainly you are looking well. "

"I am not ill. I think I am not plumper nor more thin than usual. Iimagine my weight is normal. "

He laughed. 

"And how much is that?"

The woman flushed a little. 

"It is hardly worth the telling, since you do not remember. There wasa time, you know, when you had some whim about it, and when I had toreport to you. You professed to be solicitous about my health orpersonal appearance, or whatever it was that led you to the demand. And you have forgotten. "

He was uneasy. "That is true, Ada. I did have that fad, didn't I?Well, I forget the figures, but I see that you are still yourself, andas you should be. "

She shrugged her shoulders. "Take the big chair. It's the one youlike best. You see I don't forget certain trifles" (this with a slighttrembling inflection). "And tell me about yourself. I haven't seenyou for three months and over. Haven't you been out of town. Couldn'tyou have written me a note. "

"I've not been out of town. I might have written you a note, but Ididn't suppose it mattered. "

"Yet there is a legend to the effect that men and women sometimes getto be such friends, and have such relations, that a sudden unexplainedabsence of three months matters a great deal. "

"That is so. But--what is the use, Ada? It doesn't matter with us, does it? Are we not each capable of taking care of ourselves? Were weever of the conventionally sentimental?"

She sighed. "I suppose not. But it grew that way a little, didn't it, Grant? Has it all been nothing to you?"

"I won't say that, " he answered. "It has been a great deal to me, butisn't it wiser to make all in the past tense now? What have we togain?"

She tried to smile. "Nothing, I suppose. " Then breaking out fiercely:"You are a strange man! You are like the creature Margrave, inBulwer's hard 'Strange Story, ' with mind and body, but with no soul norsympathy. "

The man in his turn became almost angry. He spoke more grimly:

"You are not just! Have I broken any pledge or violated any promise, even an implied one? Have we not known each other on even terms? Itwas but a pact for mutual enjoyment until either should be weary. Wehave no illusions. You a Lilith of the red earth, not of Adam; you awoman sweet and passionate and kind, but soulless, too, and fickle; andI a trained man, made as soulless by experience, we met and agreed, without words, to break a lance in a flirtation. And that both lanceswere splintered doesn't matter now. We had joy in the encounter, didn't we, and more after each surrendered captive? But it has beenonly mimic warfare. It has not been the real thing. "

"Evidently not--to you! Unfortunately one forgets sometimes, and thenone is endangered. "

He was troubled. He rose and came to her side, and put his hand uponher head, the usually proudly carried head of a handsome woman, nowbowed in the effort to hide a face which told too much. "It is allunfortunate. It is unfortunate that we met, if you care as youprofess. I had counted us as equal; that you were, with me, caring forthe day and never for the morrow, so far as we two were concerned. "

She raised her face. "Do you love me?" she said. 

He hesitated. "I am fond of you. "

"Do you love me?"

"In the sense that I suppose you mean, no. "

She did not look at him for a moment; then she rose swiftly to her feetand looked squarely in his face. 

"Is there some one else?"

He did not answer. 

"Is there some one else?"

"Yes. "

"Then it _is_ unfortunate, as you say--and for her. "

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that I will not endure to be dropped by you as a child drops atoy of which it is weary. I mean that I will not surrender you to somenew creature who has intervened! What does it matter that there hasbeen no pledge between us? You have made me love you! You know it!The very being to each other what you and I have been is a pledge forthe future. Oh, Grant!"

The woman's eyes were full of tears, and her voice was a moan. The manwas suffering both shame and agony. He knew that, careless as he hadbeen, the relations had grown to imply a permanency. The woman was atleast justified in her claims that words are not always necessary to acontract. What could he do? Then came the thought of Jean. One hairof her brown head was more to him than this woman, or any other womanhe had ever known. He was decided. 

"I am a brute, Ada, " he said, "or, at least, I have to be brutal. Wedo care for each other in a certain way, and we have found togethermany of the good things in living, but we are not lovers in the greatersense. We never could be. It means much. It means a knittingtogether of lives, a oneness, a confluence of soul and heart andpassions, and a disposition to sacrifice, if need be. We have not beenthat way, and are not. We have been more like two chess-players. Wehave had a mutual pleasure in the game, but we have been none the lessantagonists. The playing is over, that is all. It doesn't matter whohas won the game. We will call it drawn, or you may have it. But itis ended!"

She stood with one hand upon her breast. There came a shadow of painto her face, and a hard look followed. 

"It is nonsense talking about the game. The playing ended a year ago, and you were the winner. Now you are careless about the prize! Well"(bitterly), "it may not be worth much--to you. "

"It is worth a great deal. It has been worth a great deal to me. ButI must relinquish it. "

"Why did you make me care for you?" she demanded, fiercely, again. 

"I did not do more than you did. As I said before, we played the gametogether. It is but the usual way of a flirting man and woman. Weshould have each been more on guard. "

The woman was silent for a little time, and it was evident that she wasmaking an effort at self-control. She succeeded. She had half-turnedher back to Harlson, and when she again faced him, she had assumed herdignity. 

"You are right, after all, " she said. "I did not consider your owncharacter well enough. You tire of things. You will tire of the womanyou love now. And you will come back to me, just because I have beenless sentimental, and, so, less monotonous than some others. Whetheror not I shall receive you time will determine. Is that the way youwant me to look at it?"

He bowed. "That is perhaps as good a way as any. It doesn't matter. Will you shake hands, Ada?"

She reached out her hand listlessly, and he took it. A minute laterand he was on the street. And so the last link of one sort with thepast was broken. It was long--though he had no concealments fromher--before he told Jean of this interview. And then he did not tellthe woman's name, nor did she care to know. 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

AS TO THOSE OTHERS. 

Time passes, even with an impatient lover, and so there came an end atlast to Grant Harlson's season of probation. There was nothingdramatic about the wedding. 

To him the ceremony was merely the gaining of the human title-deed tothe fortune which was his on earth, and to Jean Cornish it was but thegiving of herself fully to the man--that which she wished to do withherself. There were few of us present, but we were the two's closestfriends. They were a striking pair as they stood together and plightedtheir faith calmly: he big and strong, almost to the point ofburliness, and she slight, sweet and lissom. There was no nervousnessapparent in either, perhaps because there was such earnestness. Andthen he carried her away from us. 

They had not been long away, this newly wedded couple, when theyreturned to the home he had prepared. As he remarked half grimly tome, in comment on lost years, they had met so late in the nestingseason that time should not be wasted. Of that home more will be toldin other pages, but it is only of the two people I am talking now. 

I noted a difference in their way when I first dined with them, which Idid, of course, as soon as they had returned. I had thought them veryclose together before in thought and being, but I saw that there wasmore. The sweet, sacred intimacy which marriage afforded had given thegreater fullness to what had seemed to me already perfect. But I wasone with much to learn of many things. And yet these two were to comecloser still--closer through a better mutual understanding and newmutual hopes. It was long afterward when I understood. 

It was after dinner one day, and in the sitting-room, which was alibrary as well. They were going out that evening, but it was earlystill, and he was leaning back in a big chair smoking the post-prandialcigar, and she coiled upon a lower seat very near him, so near that hecould put his hand upon her head, and they were talking lightly of manythings. She looked up more earnestly at last. 

"Will you ever tire of it, Grant?"

He laughed happily. 

"Tire of what, Brownie?"

"Of this, of me, and of it all; will you never weary of the quietnessof it and want some change? You must care very much, indeed, if youwill not. "

He spoke slowly. 

"It seems to me that though we were to live each a thousand years, Iwould never tire of this as it is. But, of course, it will not be justthis way. We could not keep it so if we would, and would not if wecould. "

"Why should it change?"

He drew her close to him and placed his hand upon her face and kissedher on the forehead. 

"I shall be more in the fray again. I must be. You would not haveyour husband a sluggard among men, and that will sometimes take me fromyou, though never for long, because I'm afraid I shall be selfish andhave you with me when there are long journeys. And it will change, too, you know--because you see, dear, there may be the--the others. You hope so, with me, do you not?"

Her face remained hidden for a little time. When she raised it, therewas a blush upon her cheeks, but her eyes had not the glance he hadanticipated. 

"No!" she said. 

He did not reply, because he could not comprehend. He looked at her, astonished, and she broke forth recklessly:

"I love you so, Grant! I love you so! I want you, just you, and noone else. Are we not happy as we are? Are you not satisfied with me, just me? You are like all men! You are selfish! You--oh, love! Youlove me so--I know that--but you think of me--it seems so, anyhow--asbut part of a scheme of life, of the life which will make you happy. My love, my husband! why need it be that way? Why am I not enough?Why may we not be one, just one, and be that way? I want nothing more. Why should you? Are we not all our own world? I will be everything toyou. Oh, Grant!" And she ceased, sobbingly. 

The man said nothing. He could not understand at first; then came uponhim, gradually, a comprehension of how different had been their dreamsin some ways. It was inexplicable. He thought of the mother instinctwhich gives even to the little girl a doll. He had supposed that hisown fancies were but weak reflections of what was in the innermostheart of the woman he loved so. He blurted out, almost roughly:

"'Portia is Brutus' harlot, not his wife. '" Then added, bitterly, "Itis the man who is saying it this time, you see. "

A second later, shame-faced and repentant, he had caught the slenderfigure in his arms and was holding it close to him. 

"I'm a brute, dear, " he said, "and there is no excuse for me. Iunderstand, I think. We dreamed differently. That was all. Had youloved me less, dear heart, you would have been more like other women. But it doesn't matter. It shall be as you say, as you may wish orfancy. We thought unlike, yet you were as much the pivot of my thoughtas I of yours. It was of you, for you, and because of you, I had myvisions. That is all. And we will not talk more of it. "

She nestled closer to him, and he stroked the brown mass of her hairand remained silent. Some moments passed that way. Then she rousedherself and sat up squarely, and looked him bravely in the face. 

"I have been thinking, " she said, "and I can think very well when I amso close to you, with my head where it is now. I have been thinking, and it has occurred to me that I was not a wise, good woman, and I wantyou to forgive me. "

His answer involved no words at all, but it was meet for every purpose. She pushed him away from her, and spoke gravely:

"Will you do something for me, Grant?"

"Yes. "

"Will you do it now?"

"Yes--if it be good for you. "

"I want you to do this. I want you to imagine me some one else, someone you regard, but for whom you do not care particularly. And then Iwant you to tell me what you think, what you would think best aboutthe--'the others'"--blushing more fairly than any rose that ever grewon stem. "Will you do that?"

His face was very earnest. "I will try, " he said, "but it will bedifficult to imagine you someone else. How can I do that when I canlook into your eyes, my little wife? I'll try, though. "

"Then talk to me, now. "

He was troubled. He did not know how to express himself in the spiritasked of him, and he did not look at her in the beginning. 

"Sweetheart, you are a part of me, and you are the greatest of whatthere is of my life. It is about you that all my thoughts converge. Ido not suppose there will be any happier, any dearer time ever thanthis we are passing together, with none to molest us, or divert us fromeach other. You know me well now. I am what I am, and never was a manof stronger personal moods or one who so hungered for the one woman. And you are the one woman, the one physical object in the world, Iworship. There is no need that I tell you anything. And you havelearned, too, how I care for you in all greater, and, it may be, purerways. We are happy together. But, love of me, we are a man and wife, an American man and wife, of the social grade--for there are socialgrades, despite all our democracy--where, it seems to me, a family hascome to be esteemed almost a disgrace, as something vulgar andannoying. And it seems to me this is something unnatural, and allwrong. Whatever nature indicates is best. To do what nature indicatesis to secure the greatest happiness. Trials may come, new sorrows andincumbrances be risked, but nature brings her recompense. I want youthe mother of our child, of our children, as it may be. I know whatyour thought has been, I understand it now, but how can childrenseparate us? When a man and woman look together upon a child, anotherhuman being, a part of each of them, a being who would never haveexisted had they not found each other, a being with the traits of eachcombined, it seems to me as if their souls should blend somehow asnever before. They are one then, to a certainty. They have become aunit in the great scheme of existence. And so, darling, I have thoughtand thought much. I have dreamed of you as the little mother, the onewho would not be of the silly modern type, the one who, with me, wouldnot be ashamed any more than were our sturdy ancestors of a sturdyfamily, should we be blessed so. The one who would be glad with me inthe womanhood and manhood of it. And, as I said, it could never partus. It would but make me more totally your own, more watchful, if thatwere possible, more tender, if that could be, more worshipful of you inthe greater life of us two together, us two more completely. And thatis all. It shall be as you say, and I will not complain, for I knowyour impulse in what you said and all its lovingness. "

She had listened to each word intently, and her face had flushed andpaled alternately. When he had done she snuggled more closely to him, and still said nothing. When she did speak, this is what she said, andshe said it earnestly:

"I was wrong, my husband; I was a selfish, infatuated woman, who lovedwith one foolish idea which marred its fullness. You have taught mesomething, dear. You could not give me the thought I had again, evenwere you to try yourself, for I see it now. And----"

She put her arms about his neck and buried her fair face upon thepillow which afforded her such convenient shelter. As for the man, there was something like a lump in his throat, but he spoke with aneffort at playfulness, though his voice wavered a little:

"It is right, my love. And we will visit this nature of ours together. It is the season now, and next week we go camping. I want to show oldfriends of mine, the spirits of the forest, how fair a wife I've won. "

And, a few days later, there was a pretty little scene down town. "Sportsmen's Goods, " the sign above the doorway said, and in thewindows were numerous wooden ducks and dainty rods of split bamboo, andglittering German silver reels and gaudy flies, and a thousand thingsto delight the heart of a fisherman or hunter. Enter, abroad-shouldered gentleman and a haughty wisp of a woman, the latter atrifle embarrassed, despite her stateliness. 

"How are you, Jack?"

This to the proprietor of the place, as he comes forward. 

"How are you, Harlson?"

"This is Mrs. Harlson. " The ceremony takes place. "Now, Jack, here'sa grave matter of business. Have you a private room? And I want youto send in a lot of light wading-boots--the smallest sizes. And I wantsome other things. " And the list is given. 

And the lady and gentleman disappear into a small room assigned them, and a lot of wading-boots are taken in, and time elapses. And, eventually, lady and gentleman emerge again, the man's eyes full oflaughter, and the woman's eyes full of laughter and confusion, and apackage is made up. 

"Send it to my house, Jack, " says the man, and the couple leave theplace. 

CHAPTER XXV. 

MATURE AGAIN. 

Michigan is divided into two peninsulas, the apexes of which meet. 

The State is shaped like an hour-glass, with the upper portion twistedto the left. About all the two peninsulas lie blue waters, the inlandseas, lakes Michigan, Superior and Huron. Upon the upper peninsula aregreat mineral ranges, copper and iron, a stunted but sturdy forestgrowth, and hundreds of little lakelets. The lower peninsula, at itsapex, is yet largely unclaimed from nature, but, toward the south, broadens out into the great area of grain and apple blossoms, and big, natty towns, once the country of oak openings, the haunt of Pontiac andof Tecumseh, braided and crossed by one of Cooper's romances. 

It is with the crest of the lower peninsula that this descriptiondeals. There exist not the rigors of the northern peninsula; there thetimber has not tempted woodland plunderers, nor have dried brook-bedsfollowed shorn forests, nor the farmer invaded the region of lightsoil. There is the dense but stunted growth of the hard maple and pineand beech and fir, and there are windfalls and slashes which sometimesbridge the creeks. There are still black ash swales and dry beechridges, but they are not as massive as further south. There are stillthe haunting deer and the black bear and the ruffed grouse, the"partridge" in the idiom of the country, the "pheasant" of the Southand Southwest. There are scores of tiny lakes, deep and pure andtenanted, and babbling streams, and there are the knighted speckledtrout, the viking black bass and that rakish aristocrat, the grayling. 

One way to cross from Michigan to Huron is in a canoe, threading one'sway from woodland lake to woodland lake, through brush-hiddenbrooklets, without a portage. In this region the liverwort bloomsfragrantly beside the snow-bank in early spring, and here the arbutusexists as in New England. The adder-tongues and violets and anemonesare here in rare profusion in their time, and the wandering gray wolf, last of his kind, almost, treads softly over knolls carpeted withwintergreen and decorated with scarlet berries. It is a country ofblue water and pure air, of forest depths and long alleys arching abovestrong streams. 

This is the southern peninsula of Michigan in its northern part, andhere came, as the first suspicion of a tinge of yellow came to theleaves of certain trees, as the hard maple trees first flashed out infaint red, two people. 

There were three of them who came at first, for there was the man withthe wagon, engaged in the outlying settlement, who brought them fifteenmiles into the depths of the woodland. They came lumbering through anarchway over an old trail, the homesteader sitting jauntily, howbeituncertainly, upon the front seat--for the roadway tilted in spots--andbehind him a couple from the town, a man and a woman, the man laughingand supporting his companion as the wagon swayed, and the womanwondering and plucky, and laughing, too, at the oddness of it all. Theforest amazed her a little, and awed her a little, but from awe of itsoon came, as they plunged along, much friendliness. She wasreceptive, this game woman, and knew Nature when she met her. 

In the rear of the wagon crouched or stood upright, or laid down, asthe mood came upon his chestnut-colored grandness, a great Irishsetter, loved of the man because of many a day together in stubble orover fallow, loved of the woman because he, the setter, had alreadylearned to love and regard the woman as an arbitrator, as queen ofsomething he knew not what. 

And so the wagon rumbled on and pitched and tilted, and finally, inmid-afternoon, reached a place where the road seemed to end. There wasa little open glade, but a few yards across, and there was dense forestall around, and, just beyond the glade, the tree-tops seemed to all belowered, because there was a descent and a lake half a mile long, asclear as crystal and as blue as the sky. A little way beyond the gladecould be heard the gurgling and ruffling of a creek, which, through adeep hollow, came athwart the forest and plunged into the lake mostwillingly. This was the place where these two people, this man andwoman, were to end their present journey, for the man had been therebefore and knew what there to seek and what to find. 

And there was a creaky turn of the wagon, a disembarkment, and anunloading of various things. There was all the kit for a hunter of thenorthern woods, and there were things in addition which indicated thatthe hunter was not alone this time. There was a tent which had morethan ordinarily selected fixtures to it, and there were two realsteamer-chairs with backs, and there were four or five of what in thecountry they call "comforts, " or "comforters, " great quilts, thicklypadded, generally covered with a design in white of stars or flowers onbeaming red, and there were rods and guns and numerous utensils forplain cooking. 

The wagon with its horses and its driver turned about and tumbled alongthe roadway on its return, and there were left alone in the forest, miles from civilization, miles from any human being save the driverfast leaving them, the man and woman and the setter dog. 

They did not appear depressed or alarmed by the circumstance. 

The load from the wagon had been left in a heap. The man pulled fromit a camp-chair with a back, and opened it, and set it up on the grassvery near the edge of the glade, and announced that the throne wasready for the Empress, not of Great Britain and India, nor of any otherpart of the earth, but of the World; it was ready, and would she takeher seat?

He explained that, as, at present, there were some things she didn'tknow anything about, she might as well sit in state. So the Empress, who was not very big, sat in state. 

The dog had pursued a rabbit, and was making a fool of himself. Theman selected from among the baggage left an ax, heavy and keen, andattacked a young spruce tree near. It soon fell with a crash, and theEmpress leaped up, but to sit down again and look interestedly at whatwas going on. 

The man, the tree fallen, sheared off its wealth of fragrant tips, andlaid the mass of it by the side of the great tree. Then from out thewagon's leavings he dragged a tent, a simple thing, and, setting up twocrotched sticks with a cross-pole, soon had it in its place. Hecarried the mass of spruce-tips by armfuls to the tent and dumped themwithin it until there was a great heap of soft, perfumed greennessthere. Then, over all, he spread a quilt or two, and announced, withmuch form, to her majesty, that her couch was prepared for her, andthat she could sit in the front of the tent if she wished. 

And he cut and put in place two more forked stakes, with a cross-bar, and hung a kettle and built a fire beneath, and brought water and gotout a frying-pan and bread and prepared for supper. All articles notdemanded for immediate use were stowed away just back of the tent. "And, " he remarked, "there you are. "

The Empress rose from her camp-chair and investigated. 

"Are we to sleep in the tent, Grant?"

"Yes. "

"What will we do if it rains?"

"Stay in the tent. "

"But we'll get wet, won't we?"

"No; we'll be upon the spruce-tops; the water will run under us. "

"Aren't there animals in the wood?"

"Yes. "

"What will you do if they come about?"

"I think I'll kiss you. "

The Empress of the World did not seem to fully enter into the spirit ofhis carelessness. 

She had her imaginings, after all. She knew that she was all right, somehow, yet she did not quite comprehend. But she knew her royalty. 

She rose and went to the entrance of the tent, and stepped in daintily, and sat down in another chair which had been placed there for herreception, and then inhaled all the sweetness of the spruce-tips, andpitched herself down upon the quilts, and curled herself up there for amoment or two, and then rose and came out again into the open, whereher husband stood watching her. 

"Do you like the woods, dear?" he said. 

"Don't you see?"

He said nothing, but led her majesty to a seat for a time, while he gotready for the evening meal--of food from the town for this firsttime--and then, in a courtier's way, of course, suggested, that she aidhim. 

They cooked and ate the strips of bacon with the soft stale bread hehad brought, and drank the tea, and the shadows of the trees lengthenedacross the glade, and the chestnut-hued setter came back to camp andwas gravely reprimanded by his master, and it soon became night, andtime passed, and the fire flashed against the greenery strangely, andthe man took the woman by the hand and led her to the entrance to thetent, and said:

"We must rise early. "

She entered the tent, and not long later he entered, also, or thoughtto do so. He lifted the flap, which he had let down, and looked inside. 

She lay there upon the cushioned spruce-tips, and, as he raised thewhite curtain, the moonlight streamed in upon her. 

She looked up at him, and smiled. 

The loving face of her was all he saw--the face of the one woman. 

He spoke to her. He tried to tell her what she was to him, and failed. She answered gently and in few words. They understood. 

He entered the tent and sat upon the couch beside her as she was lyingthere, and took her small hand in his, but said no more. From the woodabout them--for it was into the night now--came many sounds, known ofold, and wonderfully sweet to him, but all new and strange to her. 

"Ah-rr-oomp, ah-rr-oomp, ba-rr-oomp, " came from the edge of the waterthe deep cry of the bullfrog; from the further end of the lake came thestrange gobble, gurgle and gulp of the shitepoke, the small green heronwhich is the flitting ghost of shaded creeks and haunting thing ofmarshy courses everywhere. Night-hawks, far above, cried with apleasant monotony, then swooped downward with a zip and boom. It wasnot so late in the season that the call of the whippoorwill might notbe heard, and there were odd notes of tree-toads and katydids from thebranches. There came suddenly the noise of a squall and scuffle fromthe marshy edge of the lake, where 'coons were wrangling, and the weirdcry of the loon re-echoed up and down. The air was full of theperfumes of the wood. The setter just outside the tent became uneasy, and dashed into a thicket near, and there was a snort and the measured, swift thud of feet flying in the distance. A deer had been attractedby the fire-light. An owl hooted from a dead tree near by. There wasthe hum of many insects of the night, and the soft sighing of the windthrough boughs. It was simply night in the northern woods. 

The man rose and went outside, and stood with one hand upon thetent-pole at the front. He seemed to himself to be in a dream. Helooked up at the moon and stars, and then at the glittering greenerydeepening further out into blackness about him. He looked down towardthe grass at his feet, and there appeared near him a flash of gold. 

What Harlson saw was but a dandelion. That most home-like andsteadfast flower blooms in early springtime and later in the season, with no regard to the chronology of the year. It was one of thevagrant late gladdeners of the earth that his eye chanced to light upon. 

It held him, somehow. It was wide open--so wide that there was a whitespot in its yellow center--and close above it drooped, a beech-tree'sbranch, so close that one long green leaf hung just above the petals. And upon this green leaf the dew was gathering. 

The man looked at the flower. 

"Is all the world golden?" he said to himself. And he straightened andmoved and went from the tent to where the open was. He stood in theglade in the moonlight, and wondered at it all. 

Here he was--he could not comprehend it--here, all alone, save for her, in the forest, miles away from any other human being! He had whollyloved but two things all his life--her and nature--and the three ofthem--she, nature and he--were here together! It was wonderful!

And there in that preposterous covering of canvas, half hid in theforest's edge, was Jean Cor--no, Jean Harlson, belonging to him--allhis--away from all the world, just part of him, in this solitude!

He wondered why he had deserved it. He wondered how he had won it. Helooked up at the pure sky, with the moon defined so clearly, and allthe stars, and was grateful, and reached out his hands and asked theBeing of it to tell him, if it might be, how to do something as anoffset. 

The night passed, and the sun rose clearly over the forest. Thechestnut setter roused himself from behind the tent, and came in frontof it, and barked joyously at a yellow-hammer which had chosen a greatbasswood tree with deadened spaces for an early morning experimenttoward a breakfast. 

There issued from the white tent a man, who looked upward toward allthe greenness and all the glory, and was glad. 

He looked downward at the sward, and there was the little flower. Andthe dew had run its course, and had gathered in a jewel at the leaf'stip, and there, fallen in the midst of the disk of yellow, was theproduct from the skies. There, in the flower's heart, was the perfectgem--a diamond in a setting of fine gold!

CHAPTER XXVI. 

ADVENTURES MANIFOLD. 

"I've et hearty, " said the woman, saucily, as the breakfast, for whichthe birds furnished the music, was done. And then he initiated herinto the brief art of washing tin things in the gravel at the water'sedge. Then he informed her that target practice was about to begin, and brought out four guns from their cases. 

Two of the pieces were rifles, and of each kind one was a light anddainty piece. He said they would practice with the rifles; that whenshe became an expert rifle-shot the rest would all be easy, and thenupon the boll of a tree at one side of the opening he pinned a redscrap of paper, and shot at it. 

With the report half the scrap was torn away, and then he taught herhow to hold the piece and how to aim. 

She expressed, at last, a desire to shoot, and he gave her the littlerifle loaded. She aimed swiftly and desperately, and pressed thetrigger, and the echoes had not died away when she let fall the gunupon the grass. 

"I'm hurt, " she said. 

He sprang to her side, pale-faced, as she raised her hand to hershoulder, but he brightened a moment later. He opened the dress at herneck, and turned it down on one side, and there, on the round, whiteshoulder, was a slight ruddy bruise. He kissed it, and laughed. 

"It'll be all right in no time. Now, do as I tell you. "

He put a cartridge in the piece again. 

"Try it once more, " he said; "aim more deliberately and hold the stockof the gun very tightly against your shoulder as you fire. "

"But it will hurt me. "

"No, it won't. Do as I tell you. "

She would have obeyed him had he told her to leap into the lake, andthe lake was deep. 

She set her lips firmly, held the gun hard against her shoulder, aimedcarefully and fired. 

The red spot flew from the gray trunk of the oak. She looked up amazed. 

"Why, it didn't hurt me a bit!"

"Of course not. There is a law of impact, and you are learning it. The strongest man in the world could not hurt you pushing you againstnothing. He could kill you with a blow. With the first shot your gungave you a blow. In the second it could only push you. Listen to thewisdom of your consort!"

She made a mouth at him, and he told her she'd had her "baptism offire, " and soon they sallied into the forest, hunting. 

She was very pretty and piquant in her kilted dress and shooting jacketand high boots. It was a formidable army of two. 

There were myriads of bees in the openings, and the fall flowers wereyielding up the honey to be stored, in the hearts of great trees, andat noon-time they sat down in one of the openings for luncheon. 

He had shot only a couple of ruffed grouse, for it was a ramble ratherthan a real hunt, this first mid-wood excursion of the pair, and shehad shot at various things, a grouse or two and squirrels, and missedwith regularity, and was piqued over it, but he had noted herincreasing courage and confidence and resolution with each successiveshot, and knew that he had with him, for the future, a "littlesportsman, " as he called her. 

They built a fire, just for the fun of it, and a grouse was plucked andbroiled with much ado, and never was greater feast. And, the mealover, he produced a cigar and--which was not really good form for thewoods--lay on the grass and smoked it, looking at her and talkingnonsense. 

She sat upon a log and delighted in the fragrance and the light, andthe droning sounds and bird-cries, and the new world of it to her. Allat once, her gaze became fixed upon some object a little distance away. She reached out her hand to him appealingly. 

"What is that?"

He rose and looked where she pointed. 

Years of decay had made of the trunk of a fallen tree but a long ridgeof crumbling, brown chips, and, upon this ridge, where the sun streameddown hotly, lay something coiled in a black mass, and there was a flat, hideous head resting upon it all with beady eyes which seemed, to leer. 

Harlson looked at it carelessly. 

"Big one, isn't it?" he said. 

"What is it?" she gasped. 

"What is it, you small ignoramus! It's a blacksnake and a monster. Itis one of the dreads of the small life of the wood, and it was one ofthe dreads of my youth, and its days are numbered. "

He reached for his gun, then checked himself. 

"Shoot it. "

She picked up the little rifle and raised it to her shoulder, as calmlyas any Leather-Stocking in the land. 

The report came like a whip-crack, and up from the dead log leaped agreat writhing mass, which coiled and twisted and thrashed about, andfinally lay still. 

Harlson walked up and examined what he called the "remains. " Half theserpent's ugly head had been torn away by the bullet. 

"It was a great shot! 'And the woman shall bruise the serpent'shead!'" he quoted. "Egad, you've done it with a vengeance, myhuntress! And you are a markswoman among many, and thy price is aboverubies! Hooray!"

She informed him, with much dignity, that she never missed suchmonsters as were blacksnakes, and that her undoubted skill with therifle was due to the quality of the tutor she had owned, and, at thesame time, would he mind moving to some other place to finish hiscigar, for the sight of the dead monster was not a pleasant thing?

And so was accomplished the woman's first feat with the gun; but onthat same day, before they had returned to camp, she had slain, at afair distance, a grouse which, when flushed, had sailed away with loftycontempt for but a score of yards, and, alighting upon a limb closebeside the body of a tree, had stood awaiting, jauntily and ignorantly, his doom. 

She was a proud woman when the bird came plunging to the ground, and ofthat particular fowl he remarked, subsequently, when they were eatingit, that its flavor was a little superior to anything in the way ofgame he had ever tasted, and he was more than half in earnest. 

And the nights were poems and the days were full of life, and the browncheeks of the woman became browner still, and she was referred to morefrequently than even in the ante-wedded days as merely of the tribe ofChippewas. 

In one respect, too, she excelled in deserving that same title, foryour Chippewa, of either sex, takes to the water like a duck, asbecomes a tribe of the lake regions. He took her to the lake andtaught her not to fear it, and they frolicked in its waves together, and she learned to swim as well as he, and to dive as smoothly as aloon or otter, and was a water nymph such as the creatures of the woodhad never seen. He was very vain of her art acquired so swiftly, though in conversation he gave vast credit to her teacher. And in thecatching of the black bass there came eventually to the nine-ouncesplit bamboo in her little hands as many trophies as to his heavierlancewood. One day, after she had become at home in the water, and hadbetter luck than he, and was lofty in her demeanor, he upset the boatin deep water, and her majesty was compelled to swim about it with himand assist at one end while he was at the other, in righting it. Somean of spirit was he. 

All other things, though, were but the veriest trifle compared with theadventure which came at last. He had made her wise in woodcraft, andshe could tell at the lake's margin or along the creek's bed the tracksof the 'coon, like the prints of a baby's foot, the mink's twin pads, or the sharp imprint of the hoofs of the deer. One day another trackwas noted near the camp, a track resembling that of a small man, shoeless, and Harlson informed her that a bear had been about. 

She asked if the black bear of Michigan were dangerous, and he said theblack bear of Michigan ate only very bad people, or very small ones. 

One afternoon they were some distance from the camp. They had beenshooting with fair success, and, returning, had seated themselves inidle mood upon one end of a great fallen trunk, upon which they hadjust crossed the gully, at the bottom of which a little creek tumbledtoward the lake. The gleam of a maple's leaves near by, alreadyturning scarlet, had caught her eye; she had expressed a wish for someof the gaudy beauties, and he had climbed the tree and was plucking theleaves for her, when, suddenly, the woods resounded with the fiercebarking of the dog in the direction from which they had just come. Hecalled to her to be ready to shoot, that a deer might have beenstarted, when there was a crashing through the bushes and the quarryburst into sight. 

Lumbering into the open, turning only to growl at the dog which wasyelping wildly in its rear, but keeping wisely out of its reach, was ablack bear. The beast did not see the woman opposite him, but rushedat the log and was half way across it when she screamed. Then itpaused. Behind was the dog, before the woman; it advanced slowly, growling. 

Harlson, in the tree, saw it all, and, as a fireman drops with a rushdown the pole in the engine-house, he came down the maple's boll andbounded toward the log. The bear hesitated. 

"Shoot! you little fool, shoot!" shouted the man, as he ran. 

Her courage returned in a moment, at least did partial presence ofmind. She raised the gun desperately, and the report rang out. Thebear clutched wildly at the log, then rolled off, and fell to the rockybottom, twenty feet below. Harlson seized his own gun and looked down. The beast was motionless, and from a little hole in its head the bloodwas trickling. 

And the woman--well, the woman was sitting on the grass, very pale offace and silent. 

The man seized her, and half smothered her with kisses, and shoutedaloud to the forest and all its creatures that great was Diana of theEphesians!

CHAPTER XXVII. 

THE HOUSE WONDERFUL. 

And the bear's skin was tanned with the glossy black fur still upon it, the head with the white-fanged jaws still attached and made naturalwith all the skill of an artist in such things, and it lay, a great, soft, black rug, upon a couch in the House Wonderful, or, at least, thehouse to which Harlson gave that name. It seemed to him the HouseWonderful, indeed. 

Therein was held all there was in the world for him, and he wassatisfied with it all, and content, save that he felt, at seasons, howlittle man is worthy of the happiness which may come to him sometimes, even in this world. Yet it was not all poetry in the House Wonderful;there were many practical happenings, and many droll ones. 

The House Wonderful, it is needless to say, was in the city. Thebear-skin was but one of many such soft trophies of the chase whichwere spread upon the floors or upon soft lounges and divans. Over thisparticular skin there was much said, at times, when there were guests. 

Jean would explain to some curious person, that she herself had shotthe original wearer of the skin, and that her husband was up a tree atthe time, and there would be odd looks, and he would explain nothing, and then she, woman-like, must needs spoil the mystery by telling allabout it, as if any one would not comprehend some jest in the matter!It was a home of rugs and books, and very restful. I liked to gothere, where they both spoiled me, and where the softness and theperfume of it all made me useless and dissatisfied after I had comeaway. There is no reason in the average man. But in the Eden was onegreat serpent--not a real serpent, but a glittering one, like the toysnakes sold at Christmas time. 

There is some weakness in our American training of girls. Visibly andcertainly the woman who marries a man engages herself to conduct hishousehold--to relieve him of all troubles there--because he is thebread-winner. But very few girls seem trained with such idea, thoughall girls look forward to a marriage and such mutually helpful compactbetween two human beings. It is, of course, the fault of a socialgrowth, the fault of mothers, the fault of many conditions. And Jeandid not know how to cook! She was a woman of keen intelligence, of allsweetness and all faithfulness, yet she found herself almost helplesswhen she became the chatelaine of the castle where Grant was to come todinner. 

It is needless to tell of all that happened. The woman was adroit inthe engagement of domestics, and there were dinners certainly, and, possibly, good ones, but the knowingness of it all was wanting. Hefelt it, and wondered a little, but did not fret. He knew the woman. One evening they were together, after dinner again, just as they hadbeen when he told her he would take her to the woods, and she laycoiled up upon a divan, while he sat beside her. It was theirafter-dinner way. She spoke up abruptly and very bravely:

"Grant, I'm a humbug. "

"Certainly, dear; what of it?"

"I mean--and it's something serious--I really am, you know, and I wantto tell you. "

"Go ahead, midget. "

She did not seem altogether reassured, but plunged in gallantly:

"You thought I would be a good wife to you. You thought I kneweverything a woman should know who agreed to live together with the manshe loved, and make the most of life. But, Grant, I was and am reallya humbug! I don't know how to manage a house; I have to leave it tothe servants, and I can see enough, at least, to know that it isn'twhat it should be. There are a thousand little fancies of yours Idon't know how to gratify, and I want to do it so, Grant! What shall Ido?"

He responded by saying that he was very fond of his little DoraCopperfield and that he would buy her a poodle dog. He added, though, that she mustn't die--he needed her!

There was a laugh in his eyes, and he was but the tyrant man enjoyingthe discomfort of the one being to him; but when she curled a littlecloser and looked up in earnestness, he relented. 

"That is nothing, dear, " he said, "save that I'm afraid you have alittle work ahead. Yes, it is right that you should know what you donot. You must learn. It is nothing for a clever woman, such as theone I have gained. I look to you, love, for the home and all thesweetness of it, and I wouldn't do that if I did not think that in theend there would be all pride and comfort for you. Down East they callthis or that woman 'house-proud. ' I want you to be 'house-proud. ' Nowife who is that but is doing very much for all about her, and I won'tsay any more, except that you must let me help you. "

And thenceforth ensued strange things. There were experiments, andthere was even a cooking-school episode, Harlson, at this period, professing great weariness, and sometimes, after meals, simulatingpains which required much attention, though drugs were vigorouslyrefused. All he wanted was strictly personal care. It is to be fearedthat he was not honest as to details, though honest as a whole. And hewould go marketing with the brown woman, who had become so practical, and they became critical together, and the gourmands, wise old menabout town, whom he brought, occasionally, to dine with him, began towonder how it was that they found such perfection at a private table. And, as for the woman, well, she passed so far beyond her clumsy Mentorthat he became but as the babe which doesn't know, and had nothing tosay in her august presence. He might talk about a cheese or a wine orsome such trifle, but how small a portion of living are cheese and wine!

The first year of wedded life is experimental, though it be with thepair best mated since the world began. There is an unconsciousdropping of all surface traits and all disguises, and a showing ofheart and brain to the one other. Never lived the woman soself-contained and tactful that, at the end of a year, her husband, ifhe were a man of ordinary intelligence, did not know her for what shewas worth; never the man so thoughtful and discreet that he was notestimated at his value by the one so near him. This I have been toldby men and women who should know. I lack the trial which should givewisdom to myself, but I am inclined to accept the dictum of theseothers. It must be so, from force of circumstances. 

It was pleasant to me to watch this man and woman. It seemed to methat the hard lines in Grant Harlson's face became, week by week andmonth by month, less harshly and clearly defined, while upon the faceof his wife grew that new look of a content and ownership which marksthe woman who sleeps in some man's arms, the one who owns her--the samelook which Grant, with his broader experience and keener insight, usedto recognize when he puzzled me so in telling whimsically, in thestreet cars, who were wedded, without looking at their rings. It mayhave been a fancy, but it seemed to me the two grew very much to lookalike. It was in no feature, in nothing I can describe, but insomething beyond words, in a certain way which cannot be defined. Itmay have been but the unconscious imitation by each of some trick ofthe other's speech, or manner, but it appeared a deeper thing. Icannot explain it. 

They were not much apart, those two. Sometimes Harlson would be calledaway by some business or political emergency, and then would occur whatimpressed me as a silly thing, deeply as I cared, for each. He wouldget railroad tickets for two, and they would go riotously across thecountry, playing at keeping house in a state-room, and enjoyingthemselves beyond all reason. I explained often to each of them thatit wasn't fair to the other; that he could attend to business better insome distant city without having to report to her at a hotel, and thatit would be more comfortable for her in her own fair home; and the twoidiots would but laugh at me. 

The library was their fad together, for Jean was as much of abibliomaniac, almost, as was her husband, and I confess I enjoyedmyself amid the rich collection, made without precedent or reason, but, somehow, wonderfully attractive. They were whimsical, the pair, withbooks as with regard to other things, but the few who might invadetheir library were inclined to linger there. I always found a mingledodor there of cigar-smoke and of some perfume which Jean preferred, andI learned to like the combination. Maybe that was a pervertedtaste, --cigar-smoke and delicate perfumes are not consorted in the codeof odor-lovers, --but, as I say, I learned to like it. 

I have but little more to tell of this first wedded year of my dearfriends. One incident I may relate. It occurred less than a year fromthe date of the outing in the woods. There were relations each of thetwo should meet, and he was very busy with many things, and it was, finally, after much thought, decided that Jean should go her way and hehis for two long weeks; so they bade good-by to each other and left thecity, in different directions, the same day. 

It was just four days later when I got a note asking me to call at thehouse. It was from Jean, and she was a little shame-faced when she metme. Certain business complications had arisen in Grant's absence towhich I might attend, and it was for this that she had summoned me; butshe had an explanation to make. She did it, blushing. 

"I went to my people, Alf, " she said, "but it palled in a couple ofdays. That is all. I'd rather be here alone, where he has been, andawait him here, than be anywhere else. It's foolish, of course, butyou, who know us both so well, may possibly understand. " And sheblushed more than ever. 

The next day there stalked into my office a man who asked me to lunch. It was Grant Harlson. There was a quizzical look on his face, and arather happy one. 

"I won't tell you anything, old man, " he said. "I was only a few hoursbehind the girl. That's all. I suppose we might as well keep up thefool record we have begun. It suits me, anyhow. "

And a single man, knowing nothing about such things, could give noopinion. I was abusive and sarcastic, but he insisted on buying agreat luncheon. 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 

THE APE. 

Given a man and a woman, married, loving each other, and what a recentclever writer calls "the inevitable consequences" ordinarily come andcause the inevitable anxiety, more, doubtless, to the man than to thewoman. There comes a time when she he loves must bear him their firstchild. In primitive existence this trouble to the man must have beenmuch less, must have been little more than the sympathy of an hour, because, in nature, unaffected, there is seldom much of suffering andalmost never death prematurely. But we have changed all this. We haveviolated gentle Nature's laws in our ways of living, and inasmuch as wehave done this, we have lost, to such extent, her soft protecting hand. We breathe too little of the pure air; we are lax in physical effort, and, even though the individual man or woman be wise, he or she mustbear the burden of the errors of an ancestry or the evils of thepresent. So, to the woman gentle-bred there comes a risk in theundergoing of that which she has most hoped for since she loved a man, and since she would be all there is of perfect womanhood. There isperil, and she knows it, but is braver than man at this time. There isperil, and he knows it, and he is helpless and clinging as a child. What can he do? Nothing, save to bring in a hard hour the presence ofone who may not bear a portion of the real trial. Yet this issomething. It has saved dear women's lives. There is something--we donot quite understand about it yet--which is a band of more than steelbetween two close together, and which holds back the one sometimes fromeven the grip of that force seldom denied, which is named Death, theone who fills the graveyards. 

And, one evening, there was a man in deep trouble, and in the morninghe sat beside a bed in which was his small wife and beside her a tinyred thing, "rather underdone, " he said, in the buoyant reaction whichcame upon him, for that was Harlson's way when he had emerged fromtrouble; and the small red thing was the son of the two of them. Andwho can tell what the man said to the woman. There are precious, sacred overflows of love, sweet outbursts of what makes life worth theliving, never yet in words for all, never yet written in black uponsome white surface. There is a sanctuary. 

It was a healthy baby, and the mother was soon herself, and the mostfoolish of small women over it. I rather liked the young animalmyself, for they let me see it when its days were few, and it clutchedat my fingers in a way that won me. It was a curious young animal tome. It took to the water wonderfully, and all three of us togethersometimes, when I would call, would summon the nurse and see the youngvillain bathe. This was when he was but a few months old. He was sucha royal fellow, so brave and buoyant, that I fell in love with him. How could a lonely man help being foolish?

An odd name had the child. It all came from the hours, when, alldanger passed, a proud and happy man sat upon a bedside and looked downinto the face of a proud and happy woman, and, at times, studied thequality of the odd mite beside her, half hidden in the waves of pillowand of sheet. He would look at the thing's wonderful hands, and itswonderful pink feet, and have remarks to make. One hour he came in andexamined the creature and repeated great words from some authority:

"How many people have ever taken notice of a baby's foot, except toadmire its pinkiness and its prettiness?" said he. "And yet, to theanatomist, it is a revelation. Take, for example, the feet of a childof ten months, that has never walked nor stood alone. It has a powerof grasping to some extent, and is used instinctively like a hand. Thegreat toe has a certain independent working, like a thumb, and thewrinkles of the sole resemble those of the palm. These markingsdisappear when the pedal extremity has come to be employed for purposesof support. 

"The hands and feet of a human being are strikingly like those of thechimpanzee in conformation, while the gorilla's resemblance to man inthese respects is even more remarkable. The higher apes have beenclassified as 'quadrumana, ' or 'four-handed, ' because their hind feetare hand-shaped; but this designation is improperly applied, becausethe ape's posterior extremities are not really hands at all. Theymerely look like hands at the first glance, whereas, in fact, they arebut feet adapted for climbing. The big toes cannot be 'opposed' toother toes, as thumbs are to the fingers, but simply act pincer-wise, for the purpose of grasping. Now, oddly enough, the 'infant's' feethave this same power of grasping, pincer-fashion, and the action isperformed in precisely the same way. Advocates of evolutionarytheories take this to signify that the human foot was originallyutilized for climbing trees also, before the species was so highlydeveloped as it is now. Also, they assert that the fact that the artof walking erect is learned by the child with such difficulty provesthat the race has only acquired it recently. 

"There, darling, " he said, "you see how it is. We have but come intopossession of a little ape! What shall we do?"

She was not troubled. In his eyes she saw that which is worth more tothe young mother than all else the world can give, but she entered intothe spirit of his mood. She replied, gently, that she didn't know whatto do, but had he the bad taste to kiss an Ape? And he admitted thathe had, and kissed the object gently, as if afraid of breaking it, andkissed the gentle mother a hundred to one. 

I liked the Ape--for so they came to allude to that sturdy babe. Hemay be my heir some day--though he was named, as Jean insisted, for hisfather--and I had many a frolic with him in his babyhood, when I wasallowed to enter the sanctuary of that home. He was a little viking, alittle raider, this child, conceived in the forest. There seemed tohave come to him the daring and the vigor of outdoor things, and theforce of nature. A great man-child was this. 

I was not alone in the rejoicing over the infant, though really he was, it seems to me, as dear to me, the isolated man, as to his parents. They rioted in their vast possession, and were very foolish people. But why should I keep repeating that these two were very foolish peopletogether?

They were like other fathers and mothers, in some respects, but onedifference I noted. They seemed almost to adore the child, but he wasnever first with either of them. He but bound the two more closelytogether, and the looks of the man were sometimes almost worshipful ashe looked upon the mother of his child. And she--she understood, andthey were glad together. Their kingdom had been but enlarged. 

It is not to be supposed that this whimsical couple--for they werereally whimsical, these friends of mine, as must have appeared often inmy account could rear a child without grotesqueries. The woman, I amafraid, was, before she became a mother, addicted to monkey tricks, even to the extent of bounding leopard-like upon the man fromunexpected places, and the Ape was, in his early days, bred in a waybarbaric. They had great times with the Ape. 

One day Grant Harlson had his business for the day concluded early. Hecould reach home as a little after five o'clock, where dinner came atsix. One of the fiercest of summer rains was falling. He startedbuoyantly. He wanted his wife and boy. 

He reached the house and entered. No wife was there to greet him; nodrunken-footed babe, for the Ape had learned to walk now, albeitunsteadily; not even a servant girl to make some explanation. Hestalked through the house wonderingly, back to the kitchen, whichlooked out upon a green back-yard where they had erected a tent, andhad there had dinners and inhaled the odor of the grass. He found inthe kitchen the two girls, who were all delight, and exhibited butslight awe at his presence. He recognized that all was well, andlooked out through the descending sheets of water. 

There, beside the quaint tent set upon the green-sward, were twopeople. One was a graceful woman, one a sturdy, shouting child. Neither was garbed save in the simplest way. She wore a wrap of somesort, a careless thing, the boy a night-gown, and they were movingabout in the warm rain and bathing in nature's way, and particularlyhappy. 

The man was righteously indignant at all desertion of him. He shoutedmanfully, and at last attracted the attention of the pair. He toldthem to come in to him. As well have talked to the wild winds. Helooked from the porch upon the riant, dissipated two, and commanded andcajoled and made tremendous threats, but to no purpose. He reproachedhis wife with unwifely disobedience, and with the crime of turning herown offspring against his father, and the two but mocked him! Then hedisappeared, and appeared five minutes later in a frayed old swimmingsuit, and there was terror in the camp of the foe! He made a chargethrough sheets of rain, and a fair woman was, in most unmanly way, laidin a puddle, and her son set aloft in pride upon his prostrate andlaughing mother. And high jinks ensued. So did these two conductthemselves!

But an hour later, when guests came to the dinner, the Ape had gone tohis nursery without a whimper, and no more grave and courteous man ormore stately and gracious dame sat down at table that evening in allthe city of a million people. 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

THE FIRST DISTRICT. 

The trouble with us in the First Congressional District was that wecould not carry the Ninth Ward. But for this weak point we would havefelt assured at any time. With the Ninth Ward eliminated we couldcontrol the district barely. With the Ninth Ward for us it would be awalk-over. But the ward belonged to Gunderson. 

Gunderson employed three thousand men. He was not a party man, but hewas a partisan; that is, he would get interested sometimes in acampaign, and when he did, each workman in his big manufactory mustvote as indicated or go. And Gunderson did not like Harlson. The waysof the big employer were not what Harlson admired, and he had nevertried much to conciliate him. So it came that in more than onelegislative and local contest we had lost the Ninth Ward. And nowHarlson was a candidate for Congress. 

We were puzzled. "I'm afraid Jean will have to lock me out again, "laughed Harlson, as we were discussing the problem one night after acommittee meeting, and herein he referred to a funny episode, datingback to the time when the Ape was but a yearling. Jean, dignified, chatelaine, sweet wife and fond mother, was as interested in politicsas in anything else that commanded her husband's attention at any time, and had learned from our conversations all about the Ninth Ward. Wewere confident one spring, and as Grant left home on the morning ofelection day he was informed that unless he came as a victor he mustnot expect admission to the home containing his wife and baby boy. Hesaid he would return in triumph or upon his shield, but he did neither. At five o'clock in the afternoon we knew that we were whipped, whippedbeautifully and thoroughly, and all because of that same black demon ofa Ninth Ward, and the fact was so apparent that we became suddenlyphilosophical, and Grant turned to me and said:

"Come to dinner with me, Alf, and let's go now. What's the use ofstaying to the funeral? We'll eat a good dinner and smoke, and gooddigestion will wait on appetite, and we'll plan and say we'll do betternext time. "

So we left the hurly-burly and took the train, and were at Harlson'shome a little before the dinner hour. Grant tried his latch-key, butit would not serve. He rang the bell, but there came no answer. Thenthere came a tapping and clatter from inside a window, and both of usleft the porch to get down upon the sward and visit the window andinvestigate. 

Inside the window, and smiling, was a small, brown woman, holding inher arms a crowing youngster, who was making a great ado and reachingout his hands toward his father. She raised the window just a little, and put a question, gravely:

"What is it that you wish, gentlemen?"

Grant intimated, humbly, that we wanted to get in and be given somedinner. 

"Are you the gentlemen who were going to carry the Ninth Ward?"

"Yes. "

"Did you carry it?"

"No. "

The laughing face fell a little, but the stately air was recovered in amoment. "Well, " she said, with dignity, "I'm very sorry. We do notwish to seem inhospitable, neither the baby nor I, but really we do notfeel justified in harboring people incapable of carrying the NinthWard. "

We explained and pleaded and apologized and promised, but for a longtime to no avail. At last, after the dinner-bell had sounded, andafter we had pledged ourselves to carry that ward yet or perish, wewere admitted, only then, though, as was explained, for the child'ssake. He was accustomed to climb upon his father after dinner. 

So carrying the Ninth Ward became a synonym for any difficult feat withus, and if Grant accomplished this or that, or I made a good turn, orJean gave her cook or dressmaker an inspiration, the Ninth Ward wasreferred to as having been carried. And here was that ward before usagain in a greater emergency, and in its own proper person. 

Gunderson had a wife. He would have owned two wives had the one in hispossession been surveyed and subdivided properly, for she was bigenough, abundantly, for two. She was the best illustration I ever sawof what difficulties burden the ignorant rich who have socialambitions. She was good-hearted, coarse, shy and hopeful. A woman maybe coarse and yet timid, as I have noted many a time, and Mrs. Gunderson was of this type. She hungered for social status, but knewnot how to attain it. To her burly husband's credit, he wished, aboveall things, to gratify his wife's ambition, but he was as ignorant asshe regarding ways and means. He had learned that there was a limiteven to the power of money. 

Jean had met Mrs. Gunderson in a social way, but of course there couldbe no affinity between the two, and the heavy-weight matron, anxiousfor recognition, had hardly attracted a second thought from the smallaristocrat. I do not know, by the way, that I have told of the socialstatus of these friends of mine. I don't think either Grant or Jeanever gave the matter much attention. Grant was democratic in everyprinciple, and yet, unknowingly, it seems to me, exclusive arbitrarily. He had those about him whom he liked, and they were necessarilysomewhat of his kind. And Jean was, a little more thoughtfully, perhaps, of the same sort. Unconsciously they were the center of a setfor admission to which rich men would have given money. But, as Isaid, this key is one of the few things money cannot buy. 

The political fight was on, and fierce. We did good work in thatcampaign. The struggle was so keen, the supervision of everything sosearching, that daring fraud became a thing impossible. It was simplya test of persuasion, of popularity and of relative skill in thosedevices which are but the moves upon the chessboard in a game wherechances are nearly even. We were but moderately hopeful. Harlson wasimmeasurably the better candidate. He was, at least, earnest andhonest, and would represent the district well. I asked once why hewanted to go to Congress. 

"I'll have to think, " he said, "to answer you in full. Firstly, Ibelieve I want to go because I have some fool ideas about certainlegislation which I think I can accomplish. I believe they'll like mebetter in this district, and, perhaps, in a broader way, after I havebeen there. Then I want Jean to enjoy with me all the mummery andabsurdity of the most mixed social conditions on the face of thecivilized globe, and, besides that, I've been invited to take blackbass with her out of a certain stream in the Shenandoah Valley, and tokill a deer or two, with headquarters at an old house up in WestVirginia. "

He said this lightly, yet I knew it was not far from the full truth. He had ideas of changes and reforms, and was prepared to fight forthem. As for Jean and the fishing and the shooting, that was a matterof course. He must get out to nature, and he must have her with himcertainly. As for me, personally--well, we had fought the worldtogether for many a year, and I never knew him to fail me, and I couldnot very well fail him. I worried about this battle, though we hadgained steadily. There was an element in the district, led by shrewdpoliticians, of the graduated saloon-keeper type, which did not lacklarge numbers. Outside one ward, though we had practically beatenthem, Grant had invoked everything. He had stood up squarely on everyplatform, and as well in every drinking-shop and den, and almostbagnio, and explained to whom he found the nature of the contest, andtold them what he wanted to do, and what all the hearings were, andtold them then to conduct themselves as they pleased--he had but puthis case as it was. 

And there are men among the thugs, and humanity is not altogether bad, even in the slums, and help had come to us from unexpected places. More than one man, brutal-looking, but with lines in his countenanceshowing that he had once been something better, came around and workedwell, and all to his future advantage, for Harlson's memory of suchthings was as the memory of that cardinal--what was his name?--whonever forgot a face or incident or figure. We were what thepoliticians call "on top, " a week before election, save in that sameNinth Ward. I had seen old Gunderson myself. He was not what we callaffable. I had to wander through many offices, and finally to send inmy card. I found this burly man in his private room, looking overpapers on his desk. He did not look up as I came in. I took a seat, unasked, and waited. It was five minutes before he turned his head. Then he muttered a "good-morning, " for we had met before. 

I tried to be companionable and easy. I returned his salutation, somewhat too effusively, it may be, and asked him about his business, and then wanted to know, in a general way, how be stood on theCongressional issue. He hardened in a moment. 

"I don't know why I should support Harlson, " he said. 

"Isn't he honest?" I asked. 

"Oh, yes, I suppose so, " he grunted; "but he's not my kind. "

"Is the other man?" I asked. 

Even the burly animal before me flushed. The other man was but atricky politician of the creeping sort, a caterer to all prejudices, and a flatterer and favorer. This everybody knew. But he had become apart of the machine, was shrewd, and, with the machine behind him, wasa power. 

"I've nothing to say about that; but Harlson's not my kind. He's likeone of those stag-hounds. He has nothing to do with the other dogs. "

"He's fought some of the other dogs, " I suggested. 

The man grunted, again: "He's not my kind. " And I left the place. Ihad little hope of the Ninth Ward. 

CHAPTER XXX. 

THE NINTH WARD. 

Unaccustomed to story-telling, it is possible that I have neglectedchronology in this account. I referred just now to the time wecouldn't get into Harlson's house because we hadn't carried the NinthWard and to the Ape crowing at the window in his mother's arms. Timepassed after that, and, we all grew older, though, somehow, Jean didnot seem to change, nor, for that matter, did Grant, though he wasyears her elder. But the Ape changed amazingly. He grew into astalwart youth of fourteen, and became, about that time, addicted to abad habit for which I reproved him in vain. He had discovered that hecould pick up his little mother and carry her about in his arms, and hedid so frequently. And his two younger brothers looked on enviously, and his pretty sister, the youngest of the group, with gravestapprehension. But Jean seemed rather to like it, though it was mostundignified, and Grant, though he ruled his children well, seemedrather to approve of their treatment of her majesty. They were a happylot together. The Ape was a good deal interested in the election, butwas not allowed to talk outside the house. And Jean wore a seriouslook. She lived for one man. 

I attended a party soon after my visit to Gunderson, and a very prettyaffair it was. A very pretty incident I saw there, too. 

What I saw was the advent of a big, blowsy woman, who was blazing withdiamonds, whose face was good-natured, but who seemed ill at ease. Shewas like a Muscovy duck among game fowl. She was well received by themass and overlooked by the few, and, being a woman, though of no acutecomprehension, she understood vaguely her condition. She was unhappy, and there was a flush, upon her face. 

I saw a small woman, neat in a gown of the Directory, it seemed to me, though of course not so pronounced, brought by apparent accident incontact with the big, blazing creature. The smaller woman wasself-contained and of the blue-blooded in look and unconsciousness fromhead to heel. The two engaged in conversation, the one affable andinterested, the other flushed and happy. 

I do not know that I ever enjoyed a party more, yet I did nothing onthat occasion, save to watch at a distance the two people I havementioned. They drifted along together, and there was soon a groupabout them. Was not Mrs. Grant Harlson a social power, and was not afriend of hers fit friend and confidant for any one? I do notunderstand the ways of women. I do not comprehend their manner ofdoing things, but I know a thing when it is done. And when that partyended I knew that fat Mrs. Gunderson had risen to a higher plane thanshe had dared to covet for the time, and that she knew who hadaccomplished it. Grant was not present at the party, and of theincident I told him nothing then. I wanted him to note its possiblesequence first. 

The day of election came, and a great day it was. Outside the NinthWard we had passed beyond our hopes. That ward, though, --at least fromthe first reports, and we paid slight attention to the laterones, --remained, through Gunderson, sullen, incomprehensible, uncommitted. And at night, the voting over, newspapers began to showthe bulletins as the ballots were counted and the returns came in. Wewere at campaign headquarters and got the figures early. 

The scattering returns were satisfactory. Through most of the districtthey showed a gain for us over past encounters. The drift was all ourway, but it was not big enough to offset all contingencies. There wasnothing from the Ninth Ward yet. The counting was slow there. 

It was eleven o'clock before the vote of any precinct from the NinthWard came in. It stood as follows:

Harlson, 71. 

Sharkey, 53. 

Harlson picked up the filled-out blank, glanced at it, and threw itdown again. 

"It's some mistake, " he said; "that precinct is one of the stiffest theother way. Wait until we get more of them. "

We waited, but not for long. The returns came fluttering in likepigeons now. The second read:

Harlson, 33. 

Sharkey, 30. 

There dawned a light upon me; but I said no word. I was interested inwatching Harlson's face. He was a trifle pale, despite his usualself-control, and was noting the figures carefully. Added precinctsrepeated the same story. Harlson would take up a return, glance at it, compare it with another, and then examine a dozen of them together, foronce in his life he was taken unawares, and was at sea. He left thetable at length, lit a cigar, and came over to where I stood, leaningagainst the wall. 

"What does it mean, Alf? If those figures don't lie, the Ninth Wardhas swung as vigorously for us as it ever did against us. With an evenvote in the ward the chances were about even. Now, unless I'mdreaming, we own the district. "

"We do. "

"But how is it? What does it all mean?"

"I suppose it means that Gunderson is with you. "

"But how can that be?"

"Were you at Mrs. Gorson's party?"

"No. "

"Jean was there, though. "

"Yes. "

"So was Mrs. Gunderson. "

The man's face was a study worth the scrutiny. For a moment or two heuttered no word. The whole measurement of it was dawning on him. "Thelittle rhinoceros-bird!" he said, softly. 

The room was thronged, and there was a roar of cheers. The issue wasdecided beyond all question. The newspaper offices were flashing outthe fact from illuminated windows. There were shouting crowds upon thestreets. Hosts of people were grasping Harlson's hand. He had littleto say save to thank them in a perfunctory manner. He was in a hurryto get home. 

When I dined with Harlson the next day I hoped to learn some details, but I was disappointed. Jean was herself a trifle radiant, perhaps, for she remarked to me, apropos of nothing, and in the most casual way, that men were dull, and Harlson had little to say. Judging from hisgeneral demeanor, though, and the expression on his face, I would havegiven something to know what he said to his wife when he reached homethe night before. Something no bachelor, I imagine, could comprehend. 

And before the year ended Harlson had the Ninth Ward so that itcouldn't bolt him under any ordinary circumstances. 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

THEIR FOOLISH WAYS. 

It is, as I have said so often, but the simple story of two friends ofmine I am trying to tell, but I wish I had more gift in that direction. I wish I could paint, just as an artist with brush and colorsreproduces something, the home life in the house where much of my timewas spent. I can but give a mechanical idea of what it was, but to meit was very pleasant. 

A very shrewd politician Jean became, after the famous contest in whichthe Ninth Ward aided us to victory, and we were accustomed to consulther on the social bearings of many a struggle. In case she became tooarbitrary on any occasion Grant had fallen into the way of calling theApe, and asking him to remove her, whereupon the youth would carry offhis small mother in his arms and insist that, as he put it, from achildhood expression, with a long "a, " she "'have herself. " There wasever this quality of the whimsical about life in this home. And I aminclined to believe that the world is better for such a flavor. 

The children, were well grown now, the family was rounded out, andGrant's mustache, gray when he was forty, was now grayer still, thoughJean's brown hair showed yet no glint of silver. I asked one day afterdinner, when we two were idling and smoking in the library, and Jeanwas hovering about, if she hadn't a gray hair yet, and Grant said no, without hesitation, though the lady herself seemed less assured. Thenhappened a curious thing, at least to me. I asked Grant how he knew sowell, if even his wife, who, being a woman and fair to look upon, wouldbe naturally apprehensive of any change in aspect, could not tell if agray hair had come, and he but laughed at me. "Come here, Jean, " hesaid. 

She came and stood, beside him, close to me. 

"Alf, " said he, "I have a vast opinion of you, but there are somethings I imagine you do not comprehend. You should have blended yourlife with that of some such creature as this, and you would havedeveloped a new faculty. Now I close my eyes. Ask me anything abouther--I don't mean about her dress, but about her head or hands, all youcan see of the real woman. "

I accepted the challenge, and there was great sport, and a little-greatresult. I made the inquest a most searching and minute affair. Iasked him to tell me if there were any mark upon the neck, near oneear, and he described the precise locality and outline of a tiny brownfleck, no larger than a pin's head. He told of any little dimple, ofany sweep of the downward growth of the brown hair, of any triflingscar from childhood. And of her chin and neck he told the verymarkings, in a way that was something wonderful. His eyes were closed, and his face was turned away from us, but this made no difference. Hedescribed to me even the character of the wonderful network in thepalms of her little hands. Then he opened his eyes and turned to me, chaffingly:

"You see how ignorant is a man of your sort. Having no world worthspeaking of, he knows nothing of geography. "

I do not believe that even Jean herself knew, before, of how even thephysical being of her had been impressed upon the heart and brain ofthis man. She listened curiously and wonderingly when, he was talkingwith his eyes closed, and when he opened them and began his nonsensewith me she stood looking at him silently, then suddenly left the room. It was a way of Jean's to flee to her own room for a little season whensomething touched her, and I imagine this was one of the occasions. She had known for long years how two souls could become knitted andinterwoven into one, but I do not believe that before this incident shehad ever comprehended how her physical self, as well, had become anever present picture upon the mind's retina of her lover and herhusband. 

I am worried, and bothered. I am a man past middle age. I shall nevermarry now, and shall but drift into a time of doing some little, Ihope, toward making things easier for some other men and some women, and then--into a crematory. I have a fancy that my body, this machineof flesh and muscle in which I live, should not be boxed and buried inseeping earth to become a foul thing. That was an idea I learned fromthis firm friend of mine. I want it burned, and all of it, save thelittle urn full of white ashes which some one may care for, to go outand mingle with the pure air, and there to be one of earth's goodthings, and to be breathed in again and make part of the life of themaple leaf, or the young girl going to school in the morning, or theold-fashioned pinks in the front yard of the old-fashioned people, orthe red roses in the florist's hot-houses. I have that fancy. 

I am worried because I, clumsy, dull-thinking man, cannot tell what Iwish to tell of a life I saw. I am worried because I cannot makeothers understand it as it was. It seems to me it would do some goodin the world. It seems to me that many a man and woman, if they couldknow about Grant and Jean, who really lived, --for this is but a tale offact, --would be now more loving and better men and women because of it. But I do not know how to tell of what I saw and what I knew. 

Grant was over sixty years old at this time of which I write, and I amcoming very near the end, and Jean was past forty, and the two were notmuch different from what they were when I first saw them together. Isuppose it was partly because I had been with them so much that I didnot note the changes nature wrought in this pair of her children, butcertainly they were far younger than their years. They had foundtogether the only fountain of eternal youth which exists or ever willexist upon this planet which threw off a barren moon and bred monstersand, later, mastodons and apes, and finally made a specialty of men andwomen. They laughed at time, and hoped for a future of souls afterthis trial. I saw it with my eyes, I heard it with my ears, when theyspoke together. They were blended, and it made life worth the living. What I learned conveyed to me new things. It taught me that all thereis in novels is not romance nor untrue. It taught me that a male andfemale of this species of ours may meet, and from the two may come anentity which is something very near divine. Why is it, I wonder, thatthe right man and the right woman out of the hundreds of millions meetso seldom at the fitting time, and that life is either so barren or sojagged and hurtful because of the non-meeting of those who should bemated? What a world this might be! Of course, though, there is somehigher thought, and it is all right in some way. 

They were what you would call religious, Grant and Jean. They likedthe same church--it doesn't matter which it was--and attendedregularly, and worshiped without much regard for its more narrowlegends. They did not trouble themselves with the idea of theeverlasting punishment of babes, nor the fate of the untutored heathen. They had, somehow, a simple idea that the human being who tried to doright according to his or her views was all right as to the future. They were not much in sympathy with what is called heretic-hunting. They had each read the story of the gentle Nazarene, and had failed tolearn that there was more than one church--a church without eitherspectacular effects or creed bickerings. A church of the group who, atone time, clung to Him and His teachings, and so had shaped theircourse. To them a narrow, grim old Presbyterian--were he but honestand earnest according to his inherited brain and intelligence--might, some time, a year or ten million years from now, be walking arm and armalong the sidewalks of some glorious street of some New Jerusalem withthe Jesuit of to-day, honest and earnest according to his brain and hisintelligence. This is not reasoning. Was it a bad creed?

They were not afraid of old age as it came nearer, hour by hour and dayby day, these friends of mine. They had pondered of it much, ofcourse, for they were thoughtful people, and they had talked of itdoubtless many times, for there was little of which they thought thatthe two did not reveal to each other in plain words; but they were nottroubled over the outlook. They seemed to realize that the flower isno greater than what follows, that fruit is the sequel of allfragrance, and that to those who reason rightly there is no differencein the income of what is good in all the seasons of human being. Iremember well an incident of one evening. 

We had been playing billiards, Grant and I. He had a table in hishouse and had taught Jean how to play until she had become a terror, though the Ape had nearly caught up with her in skill, and there was, at this time, a great pretended struggle between them, and we had comeup into the library after a hard after-dinner game. Jean came in, andwe talked of various things, and looked at some old books, and, somehow--I forget the connection--began talking of old age. It was inthe midst of our debate that Grant, after his insane way, suddenlyleaped up and, standing beside me as I sat, proceeded to make me anoration. He talked of the friction of things and of the future of thissoul or mind of ours, concerning the luck of which we know so little. And, while I may or may not have agreed with his general theories, Idid not disagree with the one that the autumn is as much a part of whatthere is as is the spring, and that all trends toward a common end, which must be for the best in some way we do not comprehend, because wesee, at least, enough to know that nature, wiser than we, makes nomistakes. "The fruitage 'goes'!" Grant exclaimed larkingly, and then, forgetting me for the moment, he caught up Jean, and, carrying hergravely about, repeated to her these lines:

 "Grow old, along with me; The best is yet to be, The last of life, for which the first was made!"

And they were at least exponents of the belief they had, and it was tome an education and a comfort. I learned, what I could not profit by, that a man and woman together are more than twice one man or twice onewoman, when the man and woman are the right two. It was like anastronomer studying the sun. And what warmth and light there was tolook upon!

I have tried in these rambling words to tell how these two people facedthe autumn and found it spring, since they were still together. Iwonder why I made the attempt? It is but a simple relation of certainthings which happened, yet I do not, somehow, get the pulse of it. Itmust be because I have known the people all too well. My heart is somuch in what I try to say that I am not clear. 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

THE LAW OF NATURE. 

Of what was the result of finally owning the Ninth Ward and thedistrict I have only to say that it, of course, added to the reputationof one man--and of one woman as well, it may be added, for Jean in hernecessary social functions grew in her way with Grant; but otherwise itmade little difference. There was the family hegira to the capital, and much enjoyment of the limited attractions of the semi-Ethiopian andshabby but semi-magnificent city in a miasmatic valley, and it was, nodoubt, some education for the children. To Grant it was a fray, ofcourse, and to Jean it was enjoyment of his successes, and probablymore sorrow than he felt at his failures. The successes were the morenumerous. Jean herself never failed. She was an envied woman in thesocial world. She was a strong man's wife, and possessed of all tactand gentle wisdom in aiding him, but she was not a rival of the mereself-advertisers among the queens of a shifting society. She could notafford it, even had her inclination bent that way. She had absorbingriches. They were a man and her children. 

When I brightened up, because my friends were coming back to me, wasthe great season of the year to me, as to them. When the familyreturned from the capital and reoccupied the home there was rejoicing. And what rioters we were! But once more, each time, it was said byGrant, and by me as well, the battle must be fought, and so camere-elections and the flittings. And, after all, it was good. It wasnot the rusting in the sheath. 

And it came that there was another gallant fight on. The cityCongressional district is not like the country one, where a man oncefirmly in the saddle may stay there for a quarter of a century. Thecity constituencies have the fault in make-up that their Congressmenare not selected as those who will do best for the districts, butbecause they have hands on the lever of some machine. Of course, thereare always exceptions, as in Grant's case, but the rule prevails. Andnow there had been flung down the gauntlet of a clever adversary, andthe battle was a warm one. 

We both enjoyed this contest, for, though the struggle was likely to besharp, we knew the issue was ours, from the beginning, and the wholething, as Grant said, was like a hunting trip. But how it ended!

He had been out much at night, for it was a large district and therewere many meetings, and had been as tireless as was usual with him. His thought was never given much to the care of himself, and in thiscampaign he appeared more than ordinarily reckless. Jean, watchfulever, reproached him and made him change his ways a little. Perhaps itwas not all his fault that one day he felt ill. It was on the eve ofthe election. 

We carried the day as we had hoped, and easily, and there was a demandfor Harlson that night which could not be refused with grace. He wascompelled to speak, and in the open air of a chill November evening. He told me he felt ill. When, late at night, we reached his home andhe found Jean awaiting him, he turned to me and said:

"It's all right, Alf. I'll be myself again by morning. I'm where allthat is good for me is, and should be well in no time. She will butpass her hands above my head, and--there you are!"

And we parted, as carelessly as usual, and as I went home I wasspeculating on what the revised returns would show the majority to be, not as to the outcome of Grant Harlson's indisposition. 

Jean sent for me the next morning. I found a look upon her face whichtroubled me. 

"Grant is not well, " she said. "He came home late and spoke of an oddfeeling. We cared for him, but this morning he was listless and didnot want to dress and come to breakfast. He is in bed still. Pleasego up and see him, and then come down to the library and tell me whatyou think the matter is. "

I went upstairs and found Grant lying in his bed and breathing heavily. I shook him by the shoulder. 

"What's the matter, old man?"

He turned over with an effort, though laughing. "I don't know, " heanswered. "I only know I haven't been well since last night, and thatthere is a queer feeling about my throat and chest. I ought to be up, of course, but I'm listless and careless, somehow. By the way, whatwere the totals?"

I gave him the figures, and he smiled, and then with an "Excuse me, oldman, " turned his face to the wall. A moment later, as I sat watchinghim, alarmed, he roused himself and turned toward me again. "Won't yousend Jean to me?" he asked. 

I saw Jean, and she went upstairs, and when she came down her face waswhite. The Ape, rugged young man as he was, had tears in his eyes, andhis brothers and sisters were crying quietly. I left the house, and anhour later a physician, one of the most famous on the continent, was byGrant Harlson's bedside. He was a personal friend of both of us. Whenhe came down his face was grave. 

"What is it, Doctor?"

"It's pneumonia, and a bad case. "

"What can we do?"

"Nothing, but to care for him and aid him with all hopefulness andstrength. He has vitality beyond one man in a thousand. He may throwoff all the incubus of it. But it has come suddenly and is growing. "Then he got mad in all his friendship, and blurted out: "Why didn't thegreat blundering brute send for me when first he felt something hecouldn't meet nor understand?" And there were almost tears in his eyes. 

The doctors have much to say about pneumonia. Doubtless they know ofwhat they talk, but pneumonia comes nevertheless, and defeats thestrong man and the doctors. The strong man it strangles. The doctorsit laughs at. 

All that medical science could command was brought to the bedside ofGrant Harlson. The doctor, his friend, called in the wisest ofassociates in consultation, and as for care--there was Jean! He wascared for as the angels might care for a wandering soul. But the bigman in the bed tossed and muttered, and looked at Jean appealingly, andgrew worse. The strength seemed going from him at last--from him, thebulwark of us all. 

All that science could do was done. All that care could do was done, but our giant weakened. The doctors talk of the croupous form ofpneumonia, and of some other form--I do not know the difference--but Ido know that this man had a great pain in his chest, and that his headached, and that he had alternate arctic chills and flames of fever. His pulse was rapid, and he gasped as he breathed. Sometimes he wouldbecome delirious, then weaker in the sane intervals. He would send usfrom the room then, and call for Jean alone, and, when sheemerged--well--God help me!--I never want to see that awful look ofsuspense and agony upon a human face again. It will stay with me untilI follow the roadway leading to my friends. 

The doctor gave the sick man opiates or stimulants, as the case mightat any moment seem to need, and they had some slight effect; but therecame a shallower breathing, and the quilts tossed under the heaving ofthe broad chest, fitfully. It reminded me in some strange way of theimitation sea scenes at the theater, where a great cloth of some sortis rocked and lifted to represent the waves. Only one lung wascongested in the beginning, but, later, the thing extended to each, andthe air-cells began filling, and the man suffered more and more. Hefought against it fiercely. 

"Grant, " said the doctor, after the administration of some strongstimulant, "help us all you can. Cough! Force the air through thosehuge lungs of yours, and see if you can't tear away that tissue whichis forming to throttle you!"

And Grant would summon all his strength, by no means yet exhausted, andexert his will, and cough, despite the fearful pain of it; but thehuman form held not the machinery to dislodge that growing web whichwas filling the lung-chambers and cutting off, hour by hour, the oxygenwhich makes pure blood and makes the being. 

And the man who laughed at things grew weaker and weaker, and, thoughhe laughed still and was his old self and made us happy for a briefinterval, when he had not the fever and was clear-headed, and said thatit was nothing and that he would throw it off, we knew that there wasdeadly peril. And one evening, when Grant was again delirious, thedoctor came to me and said there was very little hope. 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 

WHITEST ASHES. 

What is the mood of fate? Must strong men die illogically? What doesit all mean, anyhow? About this I am but blind and reasonless. I wishI knew! The world is more than hollow to me, yet I have a hope, I'llsay that. There was some one very like Jean, one whom I loved and wholoved me, thirty years ago. Will she and I meet some day, I wonder?And what will she be to me then? I suppose I have the philosophy andendurance of the average man; but this is, with any doubt, a blackworld at times, and one in which there is no good. The breaking ofheart-strings mars all music. I am alone and dull and wondering, andin a blind revolt. Why should all things change so, and what is thisdeath which comes? There must be some future world. If there be not, what a failure is all the brutal material scheme. 

One day Grant was clear of head, but weaker, and talked with me long ofhis affairs. 

"I'm afraid I can't fight it out after all, " he said, "though youmustn't let Jean and the children know that yet. "

We talked more of what I should do if the worst came, and then he sentfor the children. He addressed himself to the Ape first, the braveboy's eyes full of tears and his whole body trembling as he listened:

"My boy, you are hardly a man yet, but I know your manliness. If Icannot stay with you, you will become the practical head of the family. Make them all proud of you. And care for your mother always as youwould for your own life or whatever is greatest. " Then he called theothers to him:

"You heard what I just said. I spoke to the Ape only because he isoldest. Remember that I have said this thing to all of you. I needn'tsay it, I know--my blessed boys and girls--you understand. But livefor your little mother always. "

I cannot describe what those young people said or did. It was mostpitiful. It was brave and sweet, too. But they would not let theirfather die. He must not! They could not face the fact. 

Jean came then, and we three were left alone for a time. She satbeside the bed, for he wanted his hand in hers when possible, and hespoke slowly:

"Jean, I don't know. There must be another world, as we have trusted. The great Power that fitted us to each other so will surely bring ustogether again. Let us look at it that way. We'll imagine that I'monly going to the country, and that you are to join me. That is all. I know it. God knows. He will adjust it somehow. "

Jean did not answer. She but clasped his hand and looked into hisface. I feared she would die of a bursting heart. From that time tillthe end she never left his bedside. 

Murderous Death has certain kindnesses in his killings. Just beforethe end is peace. The struggles of this strong man became somethingfearful as the lungs congested, and the most powerful of anti-pyreticsceased to have effect, and then came the peace which follows nature'svirtual surrender, the armistice of the moment. What trick ofreversion to first impressions comes, and what causes it, none have yetexplained, but long before the time of Falstaff men, dying, had babbledo' green fields. Grant Harlson, now, was surely dying. The physicianshad warned us all, and we were all about his bedside. As for me, thankGod, the tears could come as they did to the children. But there werenone upon the cheeks of Jean. Her sweet face was as if of stone;whiter than that of the man in the bed. 

The convulsions had ceased, but his mind was wandering and his speechwas rambling. It was easy to tell of what he was thinking. He was alittle boy in the woodland home with his mother again, and was tellingher delightedly of what he had seen and found, and of the yellowmandrake apples he had stored in a hollow log. She should help him eatthem. And then the scene would shift, and he was older, and we weretogether in the fields. He called to me excitedly to take the dog tothe other side of the brush-heap, for the woodchuck was slippingthrough that way! There was the old merry ring in his voice, and Iknew where he was and how there came to him, in fancy, the sweetperfumes of the fields, and how his eyes, which were opened wide butsaw us not, were blessed with all the greenness and the glory of thesummer of long ago. Then his manner changed, and the word "Jean" camesoftly to his lips, and again I knew they were camping out together, and he was teaching to his wife the pleasant mysteries of the forest, and all woodcraft. There was love in his tones and in his features. The breast of the woman holding his hand heaved, and the pallor on herface grew more. 

There was another struggle for breath, then a desperate one, and withits end came consciousness. Grant smiled and spoke faintly:

"It must he pretty near the end. I am very tired. Jean, darling, getcloser to me. Kiss me. "

She leaned over and kissed him passionately. He smiled again, thenfeebly took one of her little hands in each of his and lifted them tohis face and kissed them; then held them down upon his eyes. There wasa single heave of his great chest, and he was dead. 

And the woman who fell to the floor was, apparently, as lifeless as thesilent figure on the bed. 

She was not dead. We carried her to her own room--hers and his, withthe dressing-rooms attached--and she woke at last to a consciousness ofher world bereft of one human being who had been to her nearly allthere was. She was not as we had imagined she would be when sherecovered. She was not hysterical, nor did she weep. She wassingularly quiet. But that set, thoughtful look had never left herface. She seemed some other person. I talked to her of what was to bedone. What a task that was, for I could scarcely utter words myself. She suddenly brightened when I spoke of the crematory and what Grant'swishes were. 

"It must be as he wished, " she said--"as he wished, in each smalldetail. " Then she said no more, and all the rest was left to me. 

She was quiet and grave at the funeral of her husband and my friend. She shed no tears; she uttered not a word. She listened quietly whileI told her how I had arranged to carry out all his wishes abouthimself, or, rather, about his tenement. She did not accompany me. There came with me on that journey only the Ape, who was red of eye andvainly trying to conceal it all. How the youth was suffering!

I came to the home one day with an urn of bronze. There were onlyashes in it, clean and white. Jean looked at them and asked me to goaway. The urn was put, at her request, in her own apartments. It wassealed and stood upon a mantel of the room in which she slept. I donot believe she thought much of the ashes as representing the man whohad gone away from her. She may have thought of them as precious, justas she did of a pair of gloves she had mended for him just before hisillness, and which she kept always with her, but I believe that of theashes, as of the gloves, she thought only of what her love had used inlife and left behind. That was the total of it. It was the heart, thesoul, the knowing of her that was gone. 

How the Ape, how all the children cared for the small mother now!Never was woman more watched, and guarded and waited upon. Sherecognized it all, too, but said very little. Her soft hands wouldstroke the forehead of her first-born, or of her eldest daughter, or ofany of the offspring of the two, the product of their love, and shewould tell them that she was glad they were so good, but, gentle andthoughtful as she was, there was something lacking. She seemed inanother world. 

I talked to Jean. I tried to be a philosopher, to tell her of thechildren and of the broadness of life, and that she must drift into itagain. She was kind and courteous as of old with me, but it wassomehow not the same. And she grew weaker day by day, and would liefor hours, the children told me, in the room where Grant and she hadbeen together all those years. 

How can I tell of it! Jean, who had become my sister, who was part ofGrant Harlson, drifted away before my eyes! It was harder, almost, forus than the fierce fight with death of the one who had been themainstay of us all. Somehow, we knew she was going to leave us, andthe grief of the children was something terrible. She listened to themand was kind to them, wildly affectionate at times, but she lapsed everinto the same strange apathy. We had the best physicians again. Italked with one of them. "What shall we do?" I asked. 

He was a great man, a successful one, a man above the rut, and heanswered simply:

"I cannot advise. The mind governs the body beyond us sometimes, --veryoften, I imagine. She does not want to live. That is all I can say. Drugs are not in the treatment of the case. "

She grew thinner and thinner and more listless, and finally, one day, the Ape came to my office and said his mother had not left her room fora day or two. I went with him to the home which had been almost as myown. 

I was admitted to Jean's room as a matter of course. I was one of thehousehold. She was lying upon a great sofa, one Grant had liked. Iasked her to tell me what to do. 

She was calm and quiet as she answered. "There is nothing, " she said. Then suddenly she seemed to be the Jean I had known one time. Sheraised herself up: "Alf, you were very close to us. Cannot you see?"She began another sentence, then stopped suddenly, and only smiled atme and said I was the nest friend ever two people had in all thisworld. She still spoke of two people. As if Grant were with us still!

How can one tell of the fading of a lily. No one ever told of it all. One day they sent for me, and when I came the sweetest woman lay uponher couch! She had talked with her children much that day, and toldthem many things--of plannings for their futures. She had, for thefirst time, told them of all their father had designed, or hoped, orguessed for each of them. And they had been very happy, and thoughtshe would recover. And she had slept peacefully, and had not awakened. 

I looked upon her face, and the smile upon it was something wonderful. It was one of the things which makes me believe there is some greatstory to it. There was none with her but her youngest daughter whenshe left us, and the child could not tell when worlds were touching. But upon that face was the expression which tells of what is allbeyond. I do believe that, even before she quitted her earthly frame, dear Jean knew that she had found Grant again. 

Why have I told this story of two people, which is no story at all, butonly what I know of what has happened to those closest to me? There isno more of it. It ends with the deaths of them, and yet I do not knowthat it is sad. They lived and loved and died. They had morehappiness than comes to one-half humanity. Their life was of the goldof what is the inner life of the better ones of this great new nationof a new continent. They lived and loved, and their children live, andwill be good men and women. 

 * * * * * *

I cannot understand the problem. No learning clears it. I only knowthat there were Grant and I, that there were bees and perfumes, andwild, boyish delights, and the older life, and the feverish life of acity, and the rare, great love I looked upon.