emain on the
ferry-boat and land again on the towering island so heavily freighted
with human sorrows, so brilliant with human joys, and only a realization
that his presence might trouble and distract Helen kept him to his
journey's westward course.

As he looked back at the monstrous hive of men the wonder of Helen's
personality came to him. That she alone, and unaided (save by her own
inborn genius and her beauty), should have succeeded in becoming
distinguished, even regnant, among so many eager and striving souls,
overwhelmed him with love and admiration.

He wondered how he could have assumed even for an instant the tone of a
lover, the gesture of a master. "I, a poor, restless, penniless vagabond
on the face of the earth--I presumed to complain of her!" he exclaimed,
and shuddered with guilty disgust at thought of that night behind the
scenes.

In this mood he rode out into the West, which was bleak with winter
winds and piled high with snow. He paused but a day with his father,
whom he found busy prolonging the lives of the old people with whom the
town was filled. It was always a shock to the son, this contrast between
the outward peace and well-seeming of his native town and the inner
mortality and swift decay. Even in a day's visit he felt the grim
destroyer's presence, palpable as the shadow of a cloud.

He hastened on to Darien, that curious mixture of Spanish-Mexican
indolence and bustling American enterprise, a town wherein his brother
Walt had established himself some years before.

Walter Douglass was shocked by the change in his brother. "I can't
understand how fourteen months in New York can reduce a lusty youth to
the color of a cabbage and the consistency of a gelatine pudding. I
reckon you'd better key yourself down to my pace for a while. Look at
me!"

The playwright smiled. "I haven't indulged myself too much. You can't
hit a very high pace on twelve dollars a week."

"Oh, I don't know. There are cheap brands of whiskey; and you can
breathe the bad air of a theatre every night if you climb high enough. I
know you've been too strenuous at some point. Now, what's the meaning of
it all?"

"I've been working very hard."

"Shouldn't do it. Look at me. I never work and never worry. I play. I
weigh two hundred pounds, eat well, sleep like a doorknob, make about
three thousand dollars a year, and educate my children. I don't want to
seem conceited, but my way of life appeals to me as philosoph