city to be the finest city in
the world, so did he believe his family to be--in spite of his son
Bibbs--the finest family in the world. As a matter of fact, he knew
nothing worth knowing about either.

Bibbs Sheridan was a musing sort of boy, poor in health, and considered
the failure--the "odd one"--of the family. Born during that most
dangerous and anxious of the early years, when the mother fretted and
the father took his chance, he was an ill-nourished baby, and
grew meagerly, only lengthwise, through a feeble childhood. At his
christening he was committed for life to "Bibbs" mainly through lack of
imagination on his mother's part, for though it was her maiden name, she
had no strong affection for it; but it was "her turn" to name the baby,
and, as she explained later, she "couldn't think of anything else she
liked AT ALL!" She offered this explanation one day when the sickly boy
was nine and after a long fit of brooding had demanded some reason for
his name's being Bibbs. He requested then with unwonted vehemence to
be allowed to exchange names with his older brother, Roscoe Conkling
Sheridan, or with the oldest, James Sheridan, Junior, and upon being
refused went down into the cellar and remained there the rest of
that day. And the cook, descending toward dusk, reported that he had
vanished; but a search revealed that he was in the coal-pile, completely
covered and still burrowing. Removed by force and carried upstairs,
he maintained a cryptic demeanor, refusing to utter a syllable of
explanation, even under the lash. This obvious thing was wholly a
mystery to both parents; the mother was nonplussed, failed to trace and
connect; and the father regarded his son as a stubborn and mysterious
fool, an impression not effaced as the years went by.

At twenty-two, Bibbs was physically no more than the outer scaffolding
of a man, waiting for the building to begin inside--a long-shanked,
long-faced, rickety youth, sallow and hollow and haggard, dark-haired
and dark-eyed, with a peculiar expression of countenance; indeed, at
first sight of Bibbs Sheridan a stranger might well be solicitous, for
he seemed upon the point of tears. But to a slightly longer gaze, not
grief, but mirth, was revealed as his emotion; while a more searching
scrutiny was proportionately more puzzling--he seemed about to burst out
crying or to burst out laughing, one or the other, inevitably, but it
was impossible to decide which. And Bibbs never, o