I looked around the saloon at the dozen or more men who lounged about in varying degrees of alcoholic stupefaction, and had just noted a group of men half concealed at a table at the farther end of the L of the room, when a rapid step descended the stairs, and Parks appeared. "Hampden!" he cried, shaking my hand. "What can I do for you? It is a surprise to see you here." "If I need an apology for intruding, here is a good one." And I held out Mercy’s letter. Parks seized it with a start of emotion as he recognized the handwriting, looked about with apparent thought of the profanation of reading Mercy’s words in that place, and then giving me a nod to follow him, strode to a secluded table and opened the letter. His face lost something of its aggressive resolution as he read and re-read the pages. "Hampden," he said in a softened voice, "did you ever realize that the sympathies of women are individual and concrete? The welfare of the masses is but a shadow to them, except as they see it through some one they know and care for. Here my petty personal welfare is put before the interests of the whole people!" And he laid a monitory finger on the letter. "I am asked to give up an enterprise of the greatest moment lest I shall get my head cracked or be thrown into prison." "Would you have her think otherwise?" He looked at the letter without answering. Then he thrust it into his pocket, gave his head a shake, and his face was once more dominated by the aggressive spirit of the agitator. "I don’t deny it is pleasant to be considered worth a moment of anxiety; but it is weakening to the resolution. It is something that must have no part in my life." "Good heavens, Parks! You don’t mean to say that you would give up the chance to get a girl like Mercy Fillmore, just for the sake of making speeches about--" It was on the tip of my tongue to say "the riffraff," but in deference to the prejudices of my listener, I ended weakly with "--people who don’t care a snap of their fingers for you?" Parks was silent for some seconds, and he studied the table with a far-away look in his eyes. "Do you think I have a chance?" he asked. "Great Scott, man, how much encouragement do you want? Why, if a young lady I could name--and won’t--showed half as much interest in my personal safety as this girl is showing in yours, I’d be down on my knees at once." He looked in my eyes, with something of frank boyishness, for the first time, showing under the enthusiast and dreamer.