He seemed to be laughing now as he talked. "Oh, Lois, Lois, I was asking God for more then. I wanted the letters you'd write me and the place I'd have at your table. I wanted an awful lot, Lois, dear." "You've got me, Kieth," she sobbed "you know it, say you know it. Oh, I'm acting like a baby but I didn't think you'd be this way, and I--oh, Kieth--Kieth---" He took her hand and patted it softly. "Here's the bus. You'll come again won't you?" She put her hands on his cheeks, add drawing his head down, pressed her tear-wet face against his. "Oh, Kieth, brother, some day I'll tell you something." He helped her in, saw her take down her handkerchief and smile bravely at him, as the driver kicked his whip and the bus rolled off. Then a thick cloud of dust rose around it and she was gone. For a few minutes he stood there on the road his hand on the gate-post, his lips half parted in a smile. "Lois," he said aloud in a sort of wonder, "Lois, Lois." Later, some probationers passing noticed him kneeling before the pietà, and coming back after a time found him still there. And he was there until twilight came down and the courteous trees grew garrulous overhead and the crickets took up their burden of song in the dusky grass. VII The first clerk in the telegraph booth in the Baltimore Station whistled through his buck teeth at the second clerk: "S'matter?" "See that girl--no, the pretty one with the big black dots on her veil. Too late--she's gone. You missed somep'n." "What about her?" "Nothing. 'Cept she's damn good-looking. Came in here yesterday and sent a wire to some guy to meet her somewhere. Then a minute ago she came in with a telegram all written out and was standin' there goin' to give it to me when she changed her mind or somep'n and all of a sudden tore it up." "Hm." The first clerk came around tile counter and picking up the two pieces of paper from the floor put them together idly. The second clerk read them over his shoulder and subconsciously counted the words as he read. There were just thirteen. "This is in the way of a permanent goodbye. I should suggest Italy. "Lois." "Tore it up, eh?" said the second clerk. Dalyrimple Goes Wrong In the millennium an educational genius will write a book to be given to every young man on the date of his disillusion. This work will have the flavor of Montaigne's essays and Samuel Butler's note-books--and a little of Tolstoi and Marcus Aurelius. It will be neither cheerful nor pleasant but will contain numerous passages of striking humor. Since first-class minds never believe anything very strongly until they've experienced it, its value will be purely relative . . . all people over thirty will refer to it as "depressing." This prelude belongs to the story of a young man who lived, as you and I do, before the book. II