another party."




VI.

IN A BOHEMIAN QUICKSAND.


Howard could have got her new address; and for many weeks habit, at first
steadily, afterward intermittently, teased him to look her up. He was
amazed at her hold upon him. At times the longing for her was so intense
that he almost suspected himself of being in love with her.

"I escaped from that none too soon," he congratulated himself. "It wasn't
nearly so one-sided as I thought."

He had never been gregarious. Thus far he had not had a single intimate
friend, man or woman. He knew many people and knew them well. They liked
him and some of them sought his friendship. These were often puzzled
because it was easy to get acquainted with him, impossible to know him
intimately.

The explanation of this combination of openness and reserve, friendliness
and unapproachableness, was that his boyhood and youth had been spent
wholly among books. That life had trained him not to look to others for
amusement, sympathy or counsel, but to depend upon himself. As his
temperament was open and good-natured and sympathetic, he was as free from
enemies and enmities as he was from friends and friendships.