their discussion of him to appeal directly to him. He was rubbing his
eyes, to relieve himself for the moment from the intolerable affliction
of those swarming eidolons, which, whenever he thought of this thing or
that, thickened about him. They now no longer displaced one another, but
those which came first remained fadedly beside or behind the fresher
appearances, like the earlier rainbow which loses depth and color when a
later arch defines itself.

"Yes," he said, glad of the subterfuge. "They annoy me a good deal of
late."

"You want to get fitted for a good pair of glasses. I kept letting it
go, when I first began to get old-sighted."

Another lady came to Alford's rescue. "I guess Mr. Alford has no need to
get fitted for old sight yet a while. You got little spidery
things--specks and dots--in your eyes?"

"Yes--multitudes," he said, hopelessly.

"Well, I'll tell you what: you want to build up. That was the way with
me, and the oculist said it was from getting all run down. I built up,
and the first thing I knew my sight was as clear as a bell. You want to
build up."

"You want to go to the mountains," a third interposed. "That's where
Mrs. Yarrow's gone, and I guess it'll do her more good than sticking it
out here would ever have done."

Alford would have been glad enough to go to the mountains, but with