IMMENSEE




THE OLD MAN



0ne afternoon in the late autumn a well-dressed old man was walking
slowly down the street. He appeared to be returning home from a walk,
for his buckle-shoes, which followed a fashion long since out of date,
were covered with dust.

Under his arm he carried a long, gold-headed cane; his dark eyes, in
which the whole of his long-lost youth seemed to have centred, and
which contrasted strangely with his snow-white hair, gazed calmly on
the sights around him or peered into the town below as it lay before
him, bathed in the haze of sunset. He appeared to be almost a
stranger, for of the passers-by only a few greeted him, although many
a one involuntarily was compelled to gaze into those grave eyes.

At last he halted before a high, gabled house, cast one more glance
out toward the town, and then passed into the hall. At the sound of
the door-bell some one in the room within drew aside the green curtain
from a small window that looked out on to the hall, and the face of an
old woman was seen behind it. The man made a sign to her with his
cane.