y two in the morning when he reached home. He stole on
tiptoe into his room, but Bhani, whose sleep was light and restless
when he was not there, heard him directly. She stretched out her arms
to him with a low exclamation of joy, pressed him to her bosom while he
kissed her on the brow, and was for jumping up and attending to his
wants. He would not suffer it, and declared that he wanted nothing. So
she remained where she was, only following him with her eyes while he
unpacked his bag and put everything in order. He then went into his
study adjoining and locked the door behind him. Bhani heard him walking
up and down for awhile, and then caught the sound of a creaking as of a
drawer being opened. She knew what that meant and heaved a deep sigh.
He was taking out the great leather book with metal-bound corners; his
diary, which had become his sole confidant now that Wilhelm was dead.
Guided by the delicate tact of the Oriental, the poor simple creature
divined easily enough that her sahib had cares which she could not
understand and sorrows which she might not share, and yet how happy she
would be if he would but deign to enlighten her ignorance, to explain
it all to her and disclose his heart to her fully. But, proud and
reserved, he scorned to acknowledge his troubles to any but himself,
and it was only in his diary that he unburdened himself of all that
weighed upon his heart and mind.

And now he sat at his study table and wrote in the big book.

"My poor Eynhardt! Only a year since he departed, and already it is as
if he had never been. What remains of him? A book that bears a
stranger's name upon the title-page; a little dog that is perhaps
happier now than when it belonged to him; a child like a dozen others,
who will presumably grow up to be a man like a dozen other men; and a
memory in my heart which will cease with the day, not far hence, when
this heart shall cease to beat. Now if Haber were to die to-day, a
flourishing tract of land and a hundred people whose existence he has
improved would testify aloud that his term on earth had not been in
vain.

"And for all that, Eynhardt was a rare and noble character, and Haber
the personification of all that is commonplace and work-a-day.
Eynhardt's gaze was on the stars, Haber's eyes fixed on the ground at
his feet. Wilhelm plucked that supremest fruit of the Tree of
Knowledge, the consciousness of our ignorance; Paul has the conceit to
think himself a discoverer