He pushed on to Providence, stifling these antic misgivings as he might, and without allowing himself time to falter from his intent, he set out to find Mrs. Vervain’s house. He knew the street and the number, for she had often given him the address in her invitations against the time when he should return to America. As he drew near the house a tender trepidation filled him and silenced all other senses in him; his heart beat thickly; the universe included only the fact that he was to look upon the face he loved, and this fact had neither past nor future. But a terrible foreboding as of death seized him when he stood before the house, and glanced up at its close-shuttered front, and round upon the dusty grass-plots and neglected flower-beds of the door-yard. With a cold hand he rang and rang again, and no answer came. At last a man lounged up to the fence from the next house-door. “Guess you won’t make anybody hear,” he said, casually. “Doesn’t Mrs. Vervain live in this house?” asked Ferris, finding a husky voice in his throat that sounded to him like some other’s voice lost there. “She used to, but she isn’t at home. Family’s in Europe.” They had not come back yet. “Thanks,” said Ferris mechanically, and he went away. He laughed to himself at this keen irony of fortune; he was prepared for the confirmation of his doubts; he was ready for relief from them, Heaven knew; but this blank that the turn of the wheel had brought, this Nothing! The Vervains were as lost to him as if Europe were in another planet. How should he find them there? Besides, he was poor; he had no money to get back with, if he had wanted to return. He took the first train to New York, and hunted up a young fellow of his acquaintance, who in the days of peace had been one of the governor’s aides. He was still holding this place, and was an ardent recruiter. He hailed with rapture the expression of Ferris’s wish to go into the war. “Look here!” he said after a moment’s thought, “didn’t you have some rank as a consul?” “Yes,” replied Ferris with a dreary smile, “I have been equivalent to a commander in the navy and a colonel in the army--I don’t mean both, but either.” “Good!” cried his friend. “We must strike high. The colonelcies are rather inaccessible, just at present, and so are the lieutenant-colonelcies, but a majorship, now”.... “Oh no; don’t!” pleaded Ferris. “Make me a corporal--or a cook. I shall not be so mischievous to our own side, then, and when the other fellows shoot me, I shall not be so much of a loss.” “Oh, they won’t _shoot_ you,” expostulated his friend, high-heartedly. He got Ferris a commission as second lieutenant, and lent him money to buy a uniform.