dd.

We were to be married in June. There was no reason why we should not
be married in June if we were content to begin our venture in a modest
five-room flat in Harlem, abandoning for a while the house on the bit
of green. Gladys was not only contented but was enthusiastic over the
prospect. In my pocket was her last night's letter asking if I had yet
rented the apartment. She had already planned it in her mind--here the
piano on which she would play soft accompaniments while I sang "The
Minute Guns at Sea"; there by the window her easel, and near it the
table where her brilliant husband was to sit at night writing novels
and plays and poems which would carry us not only to the green hill but
to the Parnassian heights. When in the quiet of my room I had first
read her letter, I had been lifted on the wave of her ardor, but now,
struggle though I might to look forward to June with contentment, down
in my heart I had to confess a strange uneasiness. It seemed to me
that we were rushing into matrimony. With my mind revolving such
problems over and over, was it a wonder that Mr. Hanks noticed my
distraction and pounded the desk and spoke cuttingly of the effect of
love on a man's mental balance! All that day I neglected my tasks for
the study of my own engrossing business, but when evening came and I
started home I was able to say to myself that I had reached a definite
and unchanging conclusion--I loved Gladys Todd; like all of us, she had
her peccadilloes, and yet I was not worthy of her, but I would try to
be; the girl with the blue wings bobbing so majestically in her hat was
not Penelope Blight.

Having reached this unchangeable decision, the very next morning, and
every morning after that, I walked up Fifth Avenue with but one thought
in my mind, and this was to see again a small black hat with blue
wings. I became argus-eyed. I peered boldly into passing carriages,
watched the foot traffic on both sides of the street, scanned the
windows of dwelling-houses, and even developed a habit of looking
behind me at fixed intervals that my vigilance might be still more
effective. One day I went boldly into the shop which I had seen the
stranger enter that day with the woman of the Pomeranian, and asked if
I could have Miss Blight's address. A saleswoman, a very blond and
very sinuous person who was standing by the door revolving a large hat
about on one hand while she caressed its plumes daintily, replied that