he felt as he gazed at the multitudes of human beings swarming
through the streets, that all were, like himself, the victims of some
insane folly which had precipitated them into some peculiar form of
misery or crime.

And so, as he peered into their faces, he would catch himself wondering
what wrong this man had done, what sin that woman had committed, and
what sorrow each was suffering. That all must be in some secret way
guilty and miserable, he could not doubt, for it seemed to him
impossible that in this world of darkness and disorder, any one should
have been able to escape being deceived and victimized. "No man," he
thought, "can pick his way over all these hot plowshares without
stepping on some of them. None can run this horrible gauntlet without
being somewhere struck and wounded. What has befallen me, has in some
form or other befallen them all. They are trying, just as I am, to
conceal their sorrows and their crimes from each other. There is nothing
else to do. There is no such thing as happiness. There is nothing but
deception. Some of the keener ones see through my mask as I see through
theirs. And yet some of them smile and look as gay as if they were
really happy. Perhaps I can throw off this weight that is crushing me,
as they have thrown off theirs--if I try a little harder." Such were the
reflections which revolved ceaselessly within his brain.

But his efforts were in vain. In this life he had but a single
consolation, and that was in a friendship which from its nature did not
and could not become an intimacy.

Among the many acquaintances he had made in that realm of life to which
his vices and his crimes had consigned him, a single person had awakened
in his bosom emotions of interest and regard. There was in that circle
of silent, terrible, remorseless parasites of society, a young man whose
classical face, exquisite manners and varied accomplishments
set him apart from all the others. He moved among them like a
ghost,--mysterious, uncommunicative and unapproachable.

He had inspired in his companions a sort of unacknowledged respect, from
the superiority of his professional code of ethics, for he never preyed
upon the innocent, the weak, or the helpless, and gambled only with the
rich or the crafty. He victimized the victimizers, and signalized his
triumph with a mocking smile in which there was no trace of bitterness,
but only a gentle and humorous irony.

From the time of their first meet