not of the varying results of some late scheme, nor of white shoulders
at the opera, nor the mood of the Ninth Ward, nor of the drift of
business, but of some farm-house's front yard in mid-summer with a boy
aiming a long shot-gun at a red-winged poacher in a cherry tree, or
that he saw, in sleep, the worn jambs beside the old-fashioned
fireplace where, winter mornings, he kicked on his frozen boots, and
the living-room where, later in the morning, he ate so largely of
buckwheat cakes. He was a figure, wicked some said, a schemer many
said, a rock of refuge for his friends said more. This was the man, no
uncommon type in the great cities of the great republic.

As for the woman, I write with greater hesitation. I can tell of her
in 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 or
fancy which mobile human features with them give. She was a woman of
the city, with all that gentle craft which is a woman's heritage. She
was good. She was unlike all others in the world to one man--no, to
two.

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




CHAPTER II.