th, it becomes prone to the old illusions. Again
women entered his life--never believe otherwise--drawn, perhaps, by a
certain wistfulness and loneliness in Eugene, who though quieted by
tragedy for a little while was once more moving in the world. He saw
their approach with more skepticism, and yet not unmoved--women who came
through the drawing rooms to which he was invited, wives and daughters
who sought to interest him in themselves and would scarcely take no for
an answer; women of the stage--women artists, poetasters, "varietists,"
critics, dreamers. From the many approaches, letters and meetings, some
few relationships resulted, ending as others had ended. Was he not
changed, then? Not much--no. Only hardened intellectually and
emotionally--tempered for life and work. There were scenes, too, violent
ones, tears, separations, renouncements, cold meetings--with little
Angela always to one side in Myrtle's care as a stay and consolation.

In Eugene one saw an artist who, pagan to the core, enjoyed reading the
Bible for its artistry of expression, and Schopenhauer, Nietzsche,
Spinoza and James for the mystery of things which they suggested. In his
child he found a charming personality and a study as well--one whom he
could brood over with affectionate interest at times, seeing already
something of himself and something of Angela, and wondering at the
outcome. What would she be like? Would art have any interest for her?
She was so daring, gay, self-willed, he thought.

"You've a Tartar on your hands," Myrtle once said to him, and he smiled
as he replied:

"Just the same I'll see if I can't keep up with her."

One of his occasional thoughts was that if he and Angela, junior, came
to understand each other thoroughly, and she did not marry too soon, he
could build a charming home around her. Perhaps her husband might not
object to living with them.

The last scene of all may be taken from his studio in Montclair, where
with Myrtle and her husband as resident housekeepers and Angela as his
diversion he was living and working. He was sitting in front of his
fireplace one night reading, when a thought in some history recalled to
his mind a paragraph somewhere in Spencer's astonishing chapters on "the
unknowable" in his "Facts and Comments," and he arose to see if he could
find it. Rummaging around in his books he extracted the volume and
reread it, with a kind of smack of intellectual agreement, for it suited
his mood