e to-night stands at the bar to answer if chivalry or darkness
inhabits his bosom. To judge us sits womankind in the form of one of
its fairest flowers. In her hand she holds the prize, intrinsically
insignificant, but worthy of our noblest efforts to win as a guerdon
of approval from so worthy a representative of feminine judgment and
taste.

"In taking up the imaginary history of Redruth and the fair being
to whom he gave his heart, I must, in the beginning, raise my voice
against the unworthy insinuation that the selfishness or perfidy or
love of luxury of any woman drove him to renounce the world. I have
not found woman to be so unspiritual or venal. We must seek elsewhere,
among man's baser nature and lower motives for the cause.

"There was, in all probability, a lover's quarrel as they stood at
the gate on that memorable day. Tormented by jealousy, young Redruth
vanished from his native haunts. But had he just cause to do so? There
is no evidence for or against. But there is something higher than
evidence; there is the grand, eternal belief in woman's goodness, in
her steadfastness against temptation, in her loyalty even in the face
of proffered riches.

"I picture to myself the rash lover, wandering, self-tortured, about
the world. I picture his gradual descent, and, finally, his complete
despair when he realises that he has lost the most precious gift life
had to offer him. Then his withdrawal from the world of sorrow and the
subsequent derangement of his faculties becomes intelligible.

"But what do I see on the other hand? A lonely woman fading away as
the years roll by; still faithful, still waiting, still watching for a
form and listening for a step that will come no more. She is old now.
Her hair is white and smoothly banded. Each day she sits at the door
and gazes longingly down the dusty road. In spirit she is waiting
there at the gate, just as he left her--his forever, but not here
below. Yes; my belief in woman paints that picture in my mind. Parted
forever on earth, but waiting! She in anticipation of a meeting in
Elysium; he in the Slough of Despond."

"I thought he was in the bughouse," said the passenger who was nobody
in particular.

Judge Menefee stirred, a little impatiently. The men sat, drooping, in
grotesque attitudes. The wind had abated its violence; coming now in
fitful, virulent puffs. The fire had burned to a mass of red coals
which shed but a dim light within the room. The lady p