town, furtively haunting old book-shops and dusty editorial rooms, a
man of ingratiating simplicity of manner, who always spoke in a low,
hesitating voice, with a note of refinement in it. He was a devout
worshiper of Elia, and wrote pleasant discursive essays smacking
somewhat of his master's flavor--suggesting rather than imitating
it--which he signed "Tom Folio." I forget how he glided into my
acquaintanceship; doubtless in some way too shy and elusive for
remembrance. I never knew him intimately, perhaps no one did, but the
intercourse between us was most cordial, and our chance meetings and
bookish chats extended over a space of a dozen years.

Tom Folio--I cling to the winning pseudonym--was sparely built and under
medium height, or maybe a slight droop of the shoulders made it seem so,
with a fragile look about him and an aspect of youth that was not his.
Encountering him casually on a street corner, you would, at the first
glance, have taken him for a youngish man, but the second glance left
you doubtful. It was a figure that struck a note of singularity and
would have attracted your attention even in a crowd.

During the first four or five years of our acquaintance, meeting him
only out of doors or in shops, I had never happened to see him with his
hat off. One day he recklessly removed it, and in the twinkling of an
eye he became an elderly bald-headed man. The Tom Folio I once knew
had virtually vanished. An instant earlier he was a familiar shape; an
instant later, an almost unrecognizable individual. A narrow fringe of
light-colored hair, extending from ear to ear under the rear brim of
his hat, had perpetrated an unintentional deception by leading one to
suppose a head profusely covered with curly locks. "Tom Folio," I said,
"put on your hat and come back!" But after that day he never seemed young
to me.