himself with making a
humble record of facts.

"And now that each of you have made a discovery in the row of houses,
let me try my luck." Overtop rubbed the window, looked out, and
carefully surveyed the row from end to end, and back again. "Ah, I have
it!" he said. "A real mystery, too. Look at that four-story house near
the western end of the block, the one a trifle shabbier than its
neighbors. Do you see, in the open window, a man with a pale,
intellectual face, gray hair, and arms bare to the elbows, filing away
at something held in a vise before him? Now he stops to examine a
paper--a plan, probably--which he holds in his hand. Now he wipes the
perspiration from his forehead. Can't you see him?"

"Distinctly," was the joint reply.

"What do you suppose he is doing?" asked Overtop.

"No idea," said Wilkeson. "Perhaps mending a teakettle."

"Or repairing an umbrella," suggested Maltboy.

Overtop smiled, and said:

"A person with the slightest powers of observation, would see that that
man has genius in his face; that his thin arm is not used to hard
mechanical labor; that his brain is so heated with great ideas, that he
tries to cool it by opening the window. The tinkering of an umbrella or
teakettle would not make a man sweat in midwinter. You won't deny the
force of that suggestion."

As he spoke, a young girl advanced from the back part of the room, and
stood by the pale workman's side. She wore a bonnet, and a shawl
tightly wrapped around her. Though the features of her face could not be
distinguished in the distance, it was not hard to detect a pleasant
expression in her eyes, a smile on her lips, and a high color on her
cheeks, as if she had just come in from the street. She held up a little
basket for the workman's inspection.

He paused in his labor, took the girl's head between his hands, and
kissed her fondly on the brow. Then he opened the little basket, and
drew from it a loaf of bread and a piece of cheese, which he began
eating hurriedly. He also seemed, by signs, to press the girl to eat;
but she shook her head, smiled more than before, and looked up
affectionately into his face. Having bolted a few mouthfuls, the workman
placed the remains of the repast on the bench or table before him,
kissed the young girl, and resumed his work. She watched every motion of
his hand with eager eyes. Once she moved as if to close the window, but
he shook his head, and again wiped the sweat from his brow.