black eyes; the twenty-first was a Russian who
could scarcely speak any English. He said he had changed his name from
Karaforvochristophervitch to something more suited to American
pronunciation. He seemed to think that Jones gave him a better chance. I
sincerely hope it did. He told me that all the rest of the Jones family
was in Siberia, but that he was going to bomb them out! The
twenty-second was a negro. The twenty-third--! He was a tall, youngish
man, narrow-shouldered, rather commonplace-looking, with beautiful blue
eyes, and a timid, winning, deprecatory manner. I told him I was
suffering from insomnia. After raking over my grandfathers again and
bringing the family history down by stages to the very moment I was
shown into his office he said he should have to ask me to undergo a
thorough physical--! But I was tired of being slapped and punched and
breathed on and prodded, and was bold enough to refuse point-blank. I'd
rather have the insomnia! We worked up quite a fuss about it, for there
was something tenacious in the fellow, for all his mild, kind, gentle
ways; and I had all I could do to get off by pleading press of
business. But I wasn't to escape scot-free. Medical science had to get
even somehow. He compromised by stinging my eye out with belladonna.
Have _you_ ever had belladonna squirted in _your_ eye? Well, don't.

He was sitting at the table, writing out some cabalistic wiggles that
stood for bromide of potassium, when I remarked casually that it was
strange how well I could always sleep in Colorado.

He laid down the pen with a sigh.

"A wonderful state--Colorado," I observed.

"To me it's the land of memories," he said. "Sad, beautiful, irrevocable
memories--try tea for breakfast--do you read Browning? Then you will
remember that line: 'Oh, if I--' And I insist on your giving up that
cocktail before dinner."

"Some very dear friends of mine were once in Colorado," I said.
"Morristown people--the Van Coorts."

"The Van Coorts!"

Doctor Jones sprang from his chair, his thin, handsome face flushing
with excitement.

"Do you mean to say that you know Eleanor Van Coort?" he gasped.

"All my life."

He dropped back into the chair again and mumbled something about cigars.
I was only to have blank a day. In his perturbation I believe he limited
me to a daily box. He was trying--and trying very badly--to conceal the
emotions I had conjured up.

"They were talking about you only yesterday," I we