k pageant. His dream of life, his new-felt
ambitions--all were dead, dead, like his father before him, where the
black plume nodded.

They passed up through the little town and the shop-keepers came out
to look. Some were in their shirt sleeves; the butcher had his white
apron tucked up around his belt. They gathered together in twos and
groups, nodding toward the procession, their lips moving as in
pantomime. One man walked out to the crossing, counting aloud as the
teams went by. "One, two, three, four, five, six--" he intoned. To him
it was all a thing to amuse, like a circus parade,--interesting in
proportion to its length.

Landers looked almost curiously at the stolid shopmen. It required no
flush of inspiration to tell him that but a few years of this life
were necessary to make him as impassive as they. He who had sworn to
make the world move would be contentedly sitting on an empty goods
box, diligently numbering a passing procession!

The biting humor of the thought appealed to him. He smiled grimly to
himself.

VI

Once more on an early evening, a man turned out from a weather-stained
prairie farm-house, through the frosted grass, arriving presently at
the dusty public road. As before, he walked slowly along between the
tall cottonwoods; but not, as on a memorable former occasion, because
it would be for the last time. He was tired, tired with that absolute
abandon of youth that sees no hope in the future, and has no
philosophy to support it. Only thirty odd days since he went that way
before! That many years would not add more to his life in the future.

Unconsciously he searched along the way for the landmarks he had
watched with so much interest the past summer. He found the nest
where the quail had reared their brood, empty now, and covered thick
with the scattered dust of passing teams. Forgetful that he was weary
he climbed well up the bole of a shaggy old friend, to peep in at the
opening of a deserted woodpecker's home. He came to the big tree at
whose roots, on that other night he remembered so well, he had thrown
himself hopelessly. With a stolid sort of curiosity he looked down at
the spot. Yes, there was the place. A few fallen leaves were scattered
upon the earth where his body had pressed tightly against the
tree-trunk, and there were the hollows where his clenched hands had
found hold. A dull rebellion crept over him as he looked. It had been
needless to torture him so!

He came i