He had spoken his parting words to Elizabeth with outward calmness, though his lips were blanched and his features drawn with pain; for he was a gentleman, and noblesse oblige, and why should he make her suffer when she had done him no wrong? "I am not the only man who has been denied his heart's desire," he had said to her in a dull, lifeless voice, and in this he was certainly right. All are not winners in the race; many fail to attain their goal, and retire baffled and disheartened from the contest; but few suffer as Malcolm Herrick did, and though he did not curse the day he was born, as Job did, the whole plan and purpose of his life seemed frustrated and the future a hopeless blank. And the fault was his own! Even in his most despairing moments he never ceased to tell himself that she had never encouraged him--never held out her woman's sceptre for him to touch; and even when she had been most sweet and winsome, she had not abridged the distance between them, nor, in her noble sincerity and friendship, attempted to draw him closer. No, it was he who had been a blind fool, and he must pay the penalty of his madness. The gates of his earthly paradise had closed behind him for ever. He could hear them clanging in the distance; and the golden bells of his city of dreams were chiming "Nevermore--oh, nevermore!" "His City of dreams--what a good name!" thought he; and through the long summer days he had dwelt there like a king. And now the gates had closed, and the golden pinnacles were no longer visible, and the breath of the roses and the fragrance of the spices of Araby the blessed would no longer steep his senses in sweetness. Nevermore--oh, nevermore would those blissful dreams be his! Malcolm never quite recollected what he did with himself that evening. The idea of going back to the Crow's Nest in his present state of mind was simply intolerable. How could he have joined in the simple meal and listened to Goliath's talk! No, it would be better to have a good long walk and look things in the face, and if he tired himself so much the better. But Malcolm never retained any clear recollection of that walk. He had a vague idea that he passed Earlsfield station, and presently he found himself on the open moor, where he had driven with Elizabeth the day when she had so naively confessed her ignorance to him. "I am rather a desultory sort of person," she had said to him, and he had offered to make out a list of books for her to read. He had done so, and she had thanked him very sweetly, and had sent for some of the books, but he had never seen her read them. Perhaps Carlyon--and at this thought he ground his teeth hard--perhaps Carlyon had discouraged her. Horticulture seemed his chief hobby, and he was always talking to her about a new fern-house they were making at the Wood House, and Malcolm's poor books were neglected.