at he was going lo do it. Whenever common sense snorted, "Nonsense!
Folks don't run away from decent families and partners; just simply
don't do it, that's all!" then Babbitt answered pleadingly, "Well, it
wouldn't take any more nerve than for Paul to go to jail and--Lord,
how I'd' like to do it! Moccasins-six-gun-frontier town-gamblers--sleep
under the stars--be a regular man, with he-men like Joe Paradise--gosh!"

So he came to Maine, again stood on the wharf before the camp-hotel,
again spat heroically into the delicate and shivering water, while the
pines rustled, the mountains glowed, and a trout leaped and fell in a
sliding circle. He hurried to the guides' shack as to his real home,
his real friends, long missed. They would be glad to see him. They would
stand up and shout? "Why, here's Mr. Babbitt! He ain't one of these
ordinary sports! He's a real guy!"

In their boarded and rather littered cabin the guides sat about the
greasy table playing stud-poker with greasy cards: half a dozen wrinkled
men in old trousers and easy old felt hats. They glanced up and nodded.
Joe Paradise, the swart aging man with the big mustache, grunted, "How
do. Back again?"

Silence, except for the clatter of chips.

Babbitt stood beside them, very lonely. He hinted, after a period of
highly concentrated playing, "Guess I might take a hand, Joe."

"Sure. Sit in. How many chips you want? Let's see; you were here with
your wife, last year, wa'n't you?" said Joe Paradise.

That was all of Babbitt's welcome to the old home.

He played for half an hour before he spoke again. His head was reeking
with the smoke of pipes and cheap cigars, and he was weary of pairs and
four-flushes, resentful of the way in which they ignored him. He flung
at Joe:

"Working now?"

"Nope."

"Like to guide me for a few days?"

"Well, jus' soon. I ain't engaged till next week."

Only thus did Joe recognize the friendship Babbitt was offering him.
Babbitt paid up his losses and left the shack rather childishly. Joe
raised his head from the coils of smoke like a seal rising from surf,
grunted, "I'll come 'round t'morrow," and dived down to his three aces.

Neither in his voiceless cabin, fragrant with planks of new-cut pine,
nor along the lake, nor in the sunset clouds which presently eddied
behind the lavender-misted mountains, could Babbitt find the spirit of
Paul as a reassuring presence. He was so lonely that after supper
he stopped to talk with