lution always went to the Amidons for ancient
toggery for their eighteenth-century costumes--and checks for their
deficits. The family even had a printed genealogy. Moreover, Florian
had been at the head of his class in the high school, had gone through
the family _alma mater_ in New England, and been finished in Germany.
Hazelhurst, therefore, looked on him as a possession, and thought it
knew him.

We, however, may confide to the world that Hazelhurst knew only his
outer husk, and that Mr. Amidon was inwardly proud of his psychological
hinterland whereof his townsmen knew nothing. To Hazelhurst his
celibacy was the banker's caution, waiting for something of value in
the matrimonial market: to him it was a bashful and palpitant--almost
maidenly--expectancy of the approach of some radiant companion of his
soul, like those which spoke to him from the pages of his favorite
poets.

This was silly in a mere business man! If found out it would have
justified a run on the bank.

To Hazelhurst he was a fixed and integral part of their society: to
himself he was a galley-slave chained to the sweep of percentages,
interest-tables, cash-balances, and lines of credit, to whom there came
daily the vision of a native Arcadia of art, letters and travel. It
was good business to allow Hazelhurst to harbor its illusions; it was
excellent pastime and good spiritual nourishment for Amidon to harbor
his; and one can see how it may have been with some quixotic sense of
seeking adventure that he boarded the train.

What followed was so extraordinary that everything he said or did was
remembered, and the record is tolerably complete. He talked with
Simeon Woolaver, one of his tenants, about the delinquent rent, and
gave Simeon a note to Baggs relative to taking some steers in
settlement. This was before 5:17, at which time Mr. Woolaver got off
at Duxbury.

"He was entirely normal," said Simeon during the course of his
examination--"more normal than I ever seen him; an' figgered the shrink
on them steers most correct from his standp'int, on a business card
with a indelible pencil. He done me out of about eight dollars an' a
half. He was exceedin'ly normal--up to 5:17!"

Mr. Amidon also encountered Mrs. Hunter and Miss Hunter in the
parlor-car, immediately after leaving Duxbury. Miss Hunter was on her
way to the Maine summer resorts with the Senator Fowlers, to whom Mrs.
Hunter was taking her. Mrs. Hunter noticed nothing pecu