This evening there was a note of more seriousness in the air than he had ever before witnessed on this gay thoroughfare. The rush of automobiles and taxicabs and carriages with beautifully gowned women and fine-looking men as occupants was as great as ever; the perfectly groomed New York woman on the sidewalk, with figure and carriage such as outclasses the women of every other large city in the world, was there in numbers quite as great as formerly; the Western woman, who had come on to take New York by storm, or who imagined the acme of human existence was in New York cafe life, with all of its vulgar display and raucous manners, was abundantly in evidence. But over the entire concourse there appeared to drift an atmosphere of the spiritual, which lifted them from the plane of the Fifth Avenue crowd of a year and a half before, and impressed him in the same manner that he had been impressed in the far East by adepts when they gave public demonstrations of their powers, or conversed with their Chelae without the medium of written or spoken language. When he left America the woman suffrage movement in New York was a subject of more or less ridicule; a few wealthy women had begun to identify themselves with it, but they were called "faddists" and their efforts were not taken seriously. It was apparent now that the suffrage cause had been given the impetus of the world-wide movement that was reaching the women of all countries, and had changed from a gospel of tracts to a militant crusade for their share of the duties and responsibilities of life and the power properly to discharge them. Never had he seen so many of the real leaders of New York society engaged in any work, charitable or otherwise, as had taken part in this parade, marching on foot the full two miles, and often side by side with the working-women of the city. He had once seen a painting of the Maid of Orleans in a foreign gallery that carried so much of spiritual earnestness that he felt that he could appreciate how easy it was for the French army instinctively to follow her lead, and how much easier it was for the poor dupes of ignorance and superstition to believe that this overmastering spiritual nature was the product of witchcraft. Absorbing though these thoughts were, they did not exclude another train which had to do with the mysterious banner bearer, and as he entered his hotel he clenched his right hand suddenly and muttered to himself, "I must dismiss her from my thoughts." CHAPTER III THE MYSTERIOUS YOUNG WOMAN Dr. Earl took a late dinner at his sister's house, after having spent an hour with his fiancee on the way. There were just the four of them at table, his sister and her husband, his brother and himself. His sister was the oldest member of his family, which comprised but the three of them, his father and mother having died some years before.