Something of which he had need could be procured only
in very small quantities; but repetition of his demand in different
places supplied him sufficiently. When he reached his room, he emptied
the contents of sundry little bottles into one larger, and put this in
his pocket. Then he wrote rather a long letter, addressed to his brother
at Liverpool.

It had been a beautiful day, and there wanted still a couple of hours
before the warm, golden sunlight would disappear. Harold stood and
looked round his room. As always, it presented a neat, orderly aspect,
but his eye caught sight of a volume which stood upside down, and this
fault--particularly hateful to a bookish man--he rectified. He put
his blotting-pad square on the table, closed the lid of the inkstand,
arranged his pens. Then he took his hat and stick, locked the door
behind him, and went downstairs. At the foot he spoke to his landlady,
and told her that he should not return that night. As soon as possible
after leaving the house he posted his letter.

His direction was westward; walking at a steady, purposeful pace, with
cheery countenance and eyes that gave sign of pleasure as often as they
turned to the sun-smitten clouds, he struck across Kensington Gardens,
and then on towards Fulham, where he crossed the Thames to Putney. The
sun was just setting; he paused a few moments on the bridge, watching
the river with a quiet smile, and enjoying the splendour of the sky.
Up Putney Hill he walked slowly; when he reached the top it was growing
dark, but an unwonted effect in the atmosphere caused him to turn and
look to the east. An exclamation escaped his lips, for there before him
was the new-risen moon, a perfect globe, vast and red. He gazed at it
for a long time.

When the daylight had entirely passed, he went forward on to the heath,
and rambled, as if idly, to a secluded part, where trees and bushes made
a deep shadow under the full moon. It was still quite warm, and scarcely
a breath of air moved among the reddening leaves.

Sure at length that he was remote from all observation, he pressed into
a little copse, and there reclined on the grass, leaning against the
stem of a tree. The moon was now hidden from him, but by looking upward
he could see its light upon a long, faint cloud, and the blue of the
placid sky. His mood was one of ineffable peace. Only thoughts of
beautiful things came into his mind; he had reverted to an earlier
period of life, when as