would
walk the length of Olive Street, look into face after face of
acquaintances, not a quiver of recognition in his eyes. But most probably
the next week he would win a brilliant case in the Supreme Court. And so
now, indifferent to the amusement of some about him, he stood staring
after Virginia and Clarence. Where had he seen Colfax's face before he
came West? Ah, he knew. Many, many years before he had stood with his
father in the mellow light of the long gallery at Hollingdean, Kent,
before a portrait of the Stuarts' time. The face was that of one of Lord
Northwell's ancestors, a sporting nobleman of the time of the second
Charles. It was a head which compelled one to pause before it. Strangely
enough,--it was the head likewise of Clarence Colfax.

The image of it Stephen had carried undimmed in the eye of his memory.
White-haired Northwell's story, also. It was not a story that Mr. Brice
had expected his small son to grasp. As a matter of fact Stephen had not
grasped it then--but years afterward. It was not a pleasant story,--and
yet there was much of credit in it to the young rake its subject,--of
dash and courage and princely generosity beside the profligacy and
incontinence.

The face had impressed him, with its story. He had often dreamed of it,
and of the lace collar over the dull-gold velvet that became it so well.
And here it was at last, in a city west of the Mississippi River. Here
were the same delicately chiselled features, with their pallor, and
satiety engraved there at one and twenty. Here was the same lazy scorn in
the eyes, and the look which sleeplessness gives to the lids: the hair,
straight and fine and black; the wilful indulgence--not of one life, but
of generations--about the mouth; the pointed chin. And yet it was a fact
to dare anything, and to do anything.

One thing more ere we have done with that which no man may explain. Had
he dreamed, too, of the girl? Of Virginia? Stephen might not tell, but
thrice had the Colonel spoken to him before he answered.

"You must meet some of these young ladies, sir."

It was little wonder that Puss Russell thought him dull on that first
occasion. Out of whom condescension is to flow is a matter of which
Heaven takes no cognizance. To use her own words, Puss thought him "stuck
up," when he should have been grateful. We know that Stephen was not
stuck up, and later Miss Russell learned that likewise. Very naturally
she took preoccupation for indiffer