, she crept cautiously from her
hiding-place and stole through the ungroomed grass to the fence opposite
the hotel. Here she stretched herself flat in the weeds and took from
underneath the tangled masses of her hair, where it was tied with a
string, a rolled-up, crumpled slip of greasy paper. With this in
her fingers, she lay peering under the fence, her fierce eyes fixed
unwinkingly on Harkless and the youth sitting near him.

The street ran flat and gray in the slowly gathering dusk, straight
to the western horizon where the sunset embers were strewn in long,
dark-red streaks; the maple trees were clean-cut silhouettes against the
pale rose and pearl tints of the sky above, and a tenderness seemed to
tremble in the air. Harkless often vowed to himself he would watch no
more sunsets in Plattville; he realized that their loveliness lent a
too unhappy tone to the imaginings and introspections upon which he was
thrown by the loneliness of the environment, and he considered that he
had too much time in which to think about himself. For five years
his introspections had monotonously hurled one word at him: "Failure;
Failure! Failure!" He thought the sunsets were making him morbid. Could
he have shared them, that would have been different.

His long, melancholy face grew longer and more melancholy in the
twilight, while William Todd patiently whittled near by. Plattville
had often discussed the editor's habit of silence, and Mr. Martin had
suggested that possibly the reason Mr. Harkless was such a quiet man was
that there was nobody for him to talk to. His hearers did not agree, for
the population of Carlow County was a thing of pride, being greater
than that of several bordering counties. They did agree, however, that
Harkless's quiet was not unkind, whatever its cause, and that when it
was broken it was usually broken to conspicuous effect. Perhaps it was
because he wrote so much that he hated to talk.

A bent figure came slowly down the street, and William hailed it
cheerfully: "Evening, Mr. Fisbee."

"A good evening, Mr. Todd," answered the old man, pausing. "Ah, Mr.
Harkless, I was looking for you." He had not seemed to be looking for
anything beyond the boundaries of his own dreams, but he approached
Harkless, tugging nervously at some papers in his pocket. "I have
completed my notes for our Saturday edition. It was quite easy; there is
much doing."

"Thank you, Mr. Fisbee," said Harkless, as he took the manuscri