ust and the pompous
inconsequence of my official superior. Suddenly I was startled out of my
brooding.

"You are unhappy," I heard a voice murmur ever so softly. It seemed like
the sighing of a night wind through the tree tops.

I looked up. Before me stood a young man with deep blue eyes, blond
hair, exquisite daintiness of feature and unnaturally pale complexion.
He was dressed in soft gray tweeds. In the crook of his left elbow he
carried roses. Their fragrance permeated the cafe and, for once, the
odor of stale tobacco was not dominant.

"You are unhappy," he repeated mildly as if it were the most natural
thing in the world for him to say.

"I am," I answered frankly. "The world is a stupid place to live in."

"You must not say that," he reproached quietly. "It is we who are
stupid. The world is beautiful. Won't you accept a rose?" Like a prince
in a fairy story he bowed grandly and offered me an American Beauty
still moist with the mock dews of the florist.

"But why do you honor me thus?" I asked, taking the flower and inhaling
its fragrance.

He looked a bit put out as if I were asking the obvious thing. "You were
sad, of course, and a thing of beauty----"

"Is a joy forever," I concluded.

He flushed with pleasure.

"I am so glad you have read my Endymion," he exclaimed delightedly.
"Suppose we walk out together and preach the gospel of beauty to those
who like yourself forget the eternal in the trivial. I have some
powerful sermons here." He caressed his roses as a mother would stroke
the head of a child.

Along the avenue we were followed by hordes of little girls with starved
eyes. My good samaritan picked the poorest and the most wistful for his
largesse of roses. And to each one as he handed the flower he repeated
the famous line from the work of the great romantic poet.

"'A thing of beauty is a joy forever.'"

Soon there were only two left. These my friend was inclined to withhold
from the clamoring tots who assailed us.

"After all they are young," he said. "Their sad moments vanish like the
mists. But the sorrows of the years of discretion are not thrown off so
easily. They persist like scars long after the original bruise has
healed."

We entered a hallway to escape our little friends. From a door ajar on
the first story a man's voice floated down to us. It was high pitched
and strident, as if a relentless lawyer were arraigning a criminal.

"My friends," we heard, "how long are yo