When I was sent abroad to school I lost sight of him; when I returned he was at college, apparently unchanged. When he came home for vacation, far from having been subdued by contact with strangers, it seemed that his unhappy sensitiveness had been only intensified by the ridicule of his fellows. He had even acquired a most ridiculous theory about the degrading effects of civilization, and wanted to go back to a state of barbarism. He said the wilderness was the only true home of man. My father, instead of bearing with what I believe was his infirmity, dryly offered him the means to try his experiment. He started for some place in Texas, saying we would never hear from him again. A month after he wrote for more money. My father replied rather impatiently, I suppose,--I never knew exactly what he wrote. That was some years ago. He had told the truth at last, for we never heard from him again.” It is to be feared that John Milton was following the animated lips and eyes of the fair speaker rather than her story. Perhaps that was the reason why he said, “May he not have been a disappointed man?” “I don't understand,” she said simply. “Perhaps,” said John Milton with a boyish blush, “you may have unconsciously raised hopes in his heart--and”-- “I should hardly attempt to interest a chronicler of adventure like you in such a very commonplace, every-day style of romance,” she said, with a little impatience, “even if my vanity compelled me to make such confidences to a stranger. No,--it was nothing quite as vulgar as that. And,” she added quickly, with a playfully amused smile as she saw the young fellow's evident distress, “I should have probably heard from him again. Those stories always end in that way.” “And you think?”--said John Milton. “I think,” said Mrs. Ashwood slowly, “that he actually did commit suicide--or effaced himself in some way, just as firmly as I believe he might have been saved by judicious treatment. Otherwise we should have heard from him. You'll say that's only a woman's reasoning--but I think our perceptions are often instinctive, and I knew his character.” Still following the play of her delicate features into a romance of his own weaving, the imaginative young reporter who had seen so much from the heights of Russian Hill said earnestly, “Then I have your permission to use this material at any future time?” “Yes,” said the lady smilingly. “And you will not mind if I should take some liberties with the text?” “I must of course leave something to your artistic taste. But you will let me see it?” There were voices outside now, breaking the silence of the veranda. They had been so preoccupied as not to notice the arrival of a horseman. Steps came along the passage; the landlord returned. Mrs. Ashwood turned quickly towards him. “Mr. Grant, of your party, ma'am, to fetch you.”