ave stood there with a smiling,
expectant face had I not in that very hour seen Penelope. I had held
to that cherished custom of mine to begin my day with a walk up-town,
for always there was a bare chance that I might have a glimpse of her.
There was poor consolation in her passing bow; but I could not let her
go altogether out of my existence, and even her distant greeting served
to keep me in the number of her acquaintances. This day I wanted to
take a formal farewell, as if in doffing my hat I renounced all my
claims, abandoned all my idle dreams, and set myself to the right path.
Of course, I met her, and for a time I had cause to regret that I had
not taken the direct way to the pier, for Penelope that morning, as she
drove by me rapidly down the avenue, was the embodiment of loveliness,
a loveliness beyond the reach of him whom fortune held to the sidewalk.
Her horses seemed to step with pride at being a part of such a perfect
turnout, and the men on the box to have turned to statues by the
congealing of their self-importance. Seeing her, erect, a slender,
quiet figure in filmy black, with a white-gloved hand on her parasol,
you forgave the horses for lifting their feet so mincingly and the men
for staring before them with such hauteur. She whirled by me in all
that costly simplicity. I doffed my hat. She saw me and, strangely
enough, smiled at me more kindly than in many days. I watched until
even the men's tall hats were lost in the maze at Twenty-third Street,
and as I watched I said my silent farewell to Penelope Blight.

On the pier, in the cheering, expectant throng that watched the steamer
turning into her dock, I leaned on my cane and fixed my eyes with
resolution on the ship which was bringing me a life of happiness. But
I was silent as I pondered over the radiant smile with which I had been
greeted as the carriage swept by. A week ago Penelope had given her
head just a tilt of recognition; this morning she had seemed genuinely
glad to see me, as though it were a pleasure to know that I lived in
the same world. This afternoon, I said forgetfully, I would call upon
her again--I had not called for so long. Then I heard my name. I came
back to the pier and the cheering crowd, and, looking up, saw Gladys
Todd.

Beside me there was a young man who brandished his cane to the peril of
his neighbors' heads while he shouted again and again to his inamorata.
My duty was to evince just such joy, but wh