s, may I not, now that you are away from me, give you a glimpse
of that side of my soul which a girl is taught to hide? This was the
'swan's nest among the reeds' which Little Ellie meant to show to that
lover who, maybe, never came. Ah, Mrs. Browning was a woman, and knew!
(Mind, dear, it's Mrs. Browning I speak of!)

"Sometimes, when the Knight has come, and the wife wishes to show the
glories of her soul, 'the wild swan has deserted, and a rat has gnawed
the reed.' Let the wild and flowery little pool of womanhood which is
yours--yours, dearest--grow somewhat less strange to you than it would
have been--last evening--so that when you see me again you will see it
as a part of me, and, without a word or look from me, know me, even
more than you now do,

"Yours,

"Elizabeth."

Florian read it again and again. Sometimes he blushed--not with shame,
but with the embarrassment of a girl--at the fervid eloquence. And
then he would feel a twinge of envy for this Eugene Brassfield who
could be to such a girl "a perfect lover."

"From one soon to be a bride," said he to himself, "to the man she
loves: it's the sweetest letter ever written. I wonder how long ago
she wrote it! Here's the date: 7th January, 1901. Odd, that she
should mistake the year! But it was the 7th, no doubt. By the way, I
don't know the day of the week or month, or what month it is! Here,
boy! Is that the morning paper?"

He seized the paper feverishly, held it crushed in his hand until the
boy left him, and then spread it out, looking for the date. It was
January the 8th, 1901! The letter had been written the preceding
evening. Whatever had happened to this man Brassfield, had occurred
within the past sixteen hours. And, great God! where had Florian
Amidon been since June, 1896? All was dark; and, in sympathy with it,
blackness came over his eyes, and he rode into New York in a dead faint.

III

ANY PORT IN A STORM

_Cosimo_: Join us, Ludovico! Our plans are ripe,
Our enterprise as fairly lamped with promise
As yon steep headland, based, 'tis true, with cliff,
But crowned with waving palms, and holding high
Its beaconing light, as holds its jewel up,
Your lady's tolling finger! Come, the stage
Is set, your cue is spoke.

_Ludovico_: And all the lines
Are stranger to my lips, and alien quite
To car and eye and mind. I tell thee, Cosimo,
This play of thine is one in which no man
Should s