father, who had come to see him.

"Sorry--I brought down a piece o' venison," said Allen.

"Well, there's two kinds o' meat," said the boy; "what ye can have,
that's good, an' what ye can't have, that ain't worth havin'."

He got a job in the mill for every Saturday at 75 cents a day, and
soon thereafter was able to have a necktie and a pair of fine
boots, and a barber, now and then, to control the length of his
hair.

Trove burnt the candles freely and was able but never brilliant in
his work that year, owing, as all who knew him agreed, to great
modesty and small confidence. He was a kindly, big-hearted fellow,
and had wit and a knowledge of animals and of woodcraft that made
him excellent company. That schoolboy diary has been of great
service to all with a wish to understand him. On a faded leaf in
the old book one may read as follows:--

"I have received letters in the handwriting of girls, unsigned.
They think they are in love with me and say foolish things. I know
what they're up to. They're the kind my mother spoke of--the kind
that set their traps for a fool, and when he's caught they use him
for a thing to laugh at. They're not going to catch me.

"Expenses for seven days have been $1.14. Clint McCormick spent 60
cents to take his girl to a show and I had to help him through the
week. I told him he ought to love Caesar less and Rome more."

Then follows the odd entry without which it is doubtful if the
history of Sidney Trove could ever have been written. At least
only a guess would have been possible, where now is certainty. And
here is the entry:--

"Since leaving home the men of the dark have been very troublesome.
They wake me about every other night and sometimes I wonder what
they mean."

Now an odd thing had developed in the mystery of the boy. Even
before he could distinguish between reality and its shadow that we
see in dreams, he used often to start up with a loud cry of fear in
the night. When a small boy he used to explain it briefly by
saying, "the men in the dark." Later he used to say, "the men
outdoors in the dark." At ten years of age he went off on a three
days' journey with the Allens. They put up in a tavern that had
many rooms and stairways and large windows. It was a while after
his return of an evening, before candle-light, when a gray curtain
of dusk had dimmed the windows, that he first told the story, soon
oft repeated and familiar, of "the men in