g wax before the fire of
feminine eyes. A man in love is a sorry spectacle!"

"Is he?"

"_Ach_, yes! Consider my cousin Richard Geddes, for instance."

At that I winced, remembering the doctor's eyes when he had spoken
of Alicia and of this man. I looked at Mr. Jelnik now, wonderingly.
If he knew that much, hadn't he any heart? He stopped short. A
wrinkle came between his black brows.

"I am not to speak lightly of my Cousin Richard, I perceive."

"No. Please, please, no!"

"I hadn't meant to. Richard," said Mr. Jelnik, gravely, "is a good
man."

"Oh, yes! Indeed, yes! And--and he has a deep affection for _you_,
Mr. Jelnik."

"We Hyndses are the deuce and all for affection. We take it in such
deadly earnest that we store up a fine lot of trouble for
ourselves." His face darkened.

I had been right, then, in supposing that there was somebody,
perhaps half the world away, for whom he cared. _And he didn't care
for Alicia._ I was sure of that.

"Don't go!" he begged, as I stirred. "Stay with me for a little
while: I need you. I am tired, I am bored, I am disgusted with
things as they are. There is nothing new under the sun, and all is
vanity and vexation of spirit. Also, I am fronting the forks of a
dilemma: Shall I shake the dust of Hyndsville from my foot, yield to
the _Wanderlust_ and go what our worthy friend Judge Gatchell calls
'tramping,' or shall I stay here yet awhile? I can't make up my
mind!"

"Do you want to go?"

"Yes and no. Hold: let's toss for it and let the fall of the coin
decide." He took from his pocket a thin silver foreign coin, and
showed it me.

"Heads, I go. Tails, I stay," he said, and tossed it into the air.
It fell beside me, out of his reach. With a swift hand I picked it
up.

"Well?" he asked, indifferently.

My hand shut down upon it. There was the sound of wind in my ears,
and my heart pounded, and my sight blurred. Then somebody--oh,
surely not I!--in a low, clear, modulated voice spoke:

"_You will have to stay, Mr. Jelnik_," said the voice, pleasantly.
"_It is tails._"

And all the while the inside Me, the real Me, was crying accusingly:
"Oh, _liar! liar! It is heads!_"

Did he smile? I do not know. He did not look at me for the minute,
but stared instead at the gray-blue, shadowed woods, the brown boles
of the pines, the bright trickle of water playing it was a real
brook.

"Tails it is. I stay," he said presently. And with a swift movement
he reached out an