ized and sweated to keep? What silly weakness to spend
the respite in anything but getting as much of what you wanted as you
could, before it was all gone in the big final smash-up, and the yellow
or black man were on top.

* * * * *

With a bitter relish he felt sunk deep in one of his rank reactions
against life and human beings. Now at least he was on bed-rock. There
was a certain hard, quiet restfulness in scorning it all so
whole-heartedly as either stupid or base.

* * * * *

At this a woman's face hung suddenly there in the blackness. Her long
eyes seemed to look directly into his, a full revealing look such as
they had never given him in reality. His hard quiet was broken by an
agitation he could not control. No, no, there was something there that
was not mud. He had thought he would live and die without meeting it.
And there it was, giving to paltry life a meaning, after all, a
troubling and immortal meaning.

A frosty breath blew down upon him from the mountains. A long shudder
ran through him.

The sensation moved him to a sweeping change of mood, to a furious
resentment as at an indignity. God! What was he doing? Who was this
moping in the dark like a boy?

* * * * *

The great night stood huge and breathless above him as before, but now
he saw only the lamp-lit house, tiny as an insect, but vibrant with
eager and joyous life. With a strong, resolute step he went rapidly back
to the door, opened it wide, stepped in, and walked across the floor to
Marise Crittenden. "You're going to dance the next dance with _me_, you
know," he told her.

CHAPTER X

AT THE MILL

I

_An Afternoon in the Life of Mr. Neale Crittenden, aet. 38_

May 27.

The stenographer, a pale, thin boy, with a scarred face, and very white
hands, limped over to the manager's desk with a pile of letters to be
signed. "There, Captain Crittenden," he said, pride in his accent.

Neale was surprised and pleased. "All done, Arthur?" He looked over the
work hastily. "Good work, good work." He leaned back, looking up at the
other. "How about it, anyhow, Arthur? Is it going to work out all
right?"

The stenographer looked at him hard and swallowed visibly. "I never
dreamed I'd be fit to do anything I like half so well. I thought when I
was in the hospital that I was done for, for sure. Captain Crittenden,
if you only knew what my m