and cloudy, and the nights
blustery and dreary--that Barclay sat in his office one night after a
hard day afield, his top-boots spattered with mud, his corduroy coat
spread out on a chair to dry, and his wet gray soft hat on his desk
beside him. Jane was with her parents in Minneola, and Barclay had
come to his office without eating, from the stable where he left his
team. The yellow lights in the street below were reflected on the
mists outside his window, and the dripping eaves and cornices above
him and about him seemed to mark the time of some eery music too fine
for his senses, and the footfalls in the street below, hurrying
footfalls of people shivering through the mists, seemed to be the drum
beats of the weird symphony that he could not hear.

Barclay drew a watch from, the pocket of his blue flannel shirt, and
looked at it and stopped writing and stood by the box-stove. He was
looking at the door when he heard a thud on the stairs. It was
followed by a rattling sound, and in a moment Adrian Brownwell and his
cane were in the room. After the rather gorgeous cadenza of
Brownwell's greeting had died away and Barclay had his man in a chair,
Barclay opened the stove door and let the glow of the flames fight the
shadows in the room.

"Well," said Barclay, turning toward his visitor brusquely, "why won't
you renew that accommodation paper for me again?"

The Papins and the Dulangpres shrugged their shoulders and waved
their hands through Brownwell rather nastily as he answered,
"Circumstances, Mr. Barclay, circumstances!"

"You're not getting along fast enough, eh?" retorted Barclay.

"Yes--and no," returned Brownwell.

"What do you mean?" asked Barclay, half divining the truth.

"Well--it is after all our own affair--but since you are a friend I
will say this: three times a week--sometimes four times a week I go
out to pay my respects. Until November I stayed until nine, at
Christmas we put on another hour; now it is ten-thirty. I am a man,
John Barclay--as you see. She--she is an angel. Very good. In that
way, yes. But," the Papins and Dulangpres came back to his face, and
he shook his head. "But otherwise--no. There we stand still. She will
not say it."

Barclay squinted at the man who sat so complacently in the glow of the
firelight, with his cane between his toes and his gloves lightly
fanning the air. "So I take it," said John, "that you are like the
Memorial Day parade, several hours passing a given