He was very weary--heart-sick and foot-sore--as he climbed the dark steps of the three-story house. He felt pent in the vast pulsations of life about him--a feeling of impossibility, of a task greater than he could bear. He simply had to see the young woman who was responsible for sending him here. He had a vivid mental image of her tragic loveliness, of how she had stepped back and forth before him and suddenly put her hands to her face and wept, of how she had divined his suffering, and impulsively seized his hand, and whispered, "I have faith in you." He expected a sort of self-illumined Joan of Arc with eyes that saw visions, with spirit flaming. And even in the dark top-floor hallway he was awed, and almost afraid. Then in the blackness, his eyes on the thread of light beneath the rear door, he advanced, reached up his hand, and knocked. There came, somehow surprising him, a definite, clear-edged voice: "Come in!" He opened the door, which swung just free of the narrow cot. Just beyond, Sally Heffer was writing at a little table, and the globed gas burned above her, lighting the thin gold of her sparse hair. She turned her face to him quite casually, the same pallid, rounded face, the same broad forehead and gray eyes, of remarkable clarity--eyes that were as clear windows allowing one to peer in. And she was dressed in a white shirtwaist and the same brown skirt, and over a hook, behind her, hung the same brown coat. Yet Joe was shocked. This was not the Sally Heffer of his dreams--but rather a refreshing, forceful, dynamic young woman, brimming over with the joy of life. And even in that flash of strangeness he sensed the fact that at the time he had met her she was merely the voice of a vast insurgent spirit, merely the instrument of a great event. This was the everyday Sally, a quite livable, lovable human being, healthy, free in her actions, pulsing with the life about her. The very words she used were of a different order. And as she casually glanced around she began to stare, her eyes lit with wonder, and she arose, exclaiming: "Mr.--_Blaine_!" At the sound of her voice the tension snapped within him; he felt common and homely again; he felt comfortable and warm; and he smiled wearily. "Yes," he said, "I'm here." She came close to him, more and more incredulous, and the air became electric. "But what brings you here?" "I live here--West Tenth." "_Live_ here? Why?" Her eyes seemed to search through his. "You made me," he murmured. She smiled strangely. "_That night_?" "Yes." Impulsively her hand went out, and he clasped it ... her hand seemed almost frozen. Tears of humility sprang to her eyes. "I was high and mighty that night,... but I couldn't help it.... But you ... do you realize what a wonderful thing you've done?" He laughed awkwardly. "Yes, here's what I've done"--he handed her a copy of _The Nine-Tenths_--"and it's very wonderful."