For my third venture I hit upon a device that took strong hold upon my imagination. The idea of laying a trap for the reader tickled me; and when once I had written the first chapter and outlined the last, I yielded myself to the story and bade it run its own course. I was never more honestly astonished in my life than to find my half-dozen characters taking matters into their own hands, and leaving me the merest spectator and reporter. I had made notes for the story, but in looking them over to-day, I find that I made practically no use of them. I never expect to experience again the delight of the winter I spent over that tale. The sight of white paper had no terrors for me. The hero, constantly cornered, had always in his pocket the key to his successive dilemmas; the heroine, misunderstood and misjudged, was struck at proper intervals by the spot-light that revealed her charm and reëstablished faith in her honorable motives. No other girl in my little gallery of heroines exerts upon me the spell of that young lady, who, on the day I began the story, as I waited for the ink to thaw in my workshop, passed under my window, by one of those kindly orderings of Providence that keep alive the superstition of inspiration in the hearts of all fiction-writers. She never came my way again--but she need not! She was the bright particular star of my stage--its _dea ex machina_. She is of the sisterhood of radiant goddesses who are visible from any window, even though its prospect be only a commonplace city street. Always, and everywhere, the essential woman for any tale is passing by with grave mien, if the tale be sober; with upturned chin and a saucy twinkle in the eye, if such be the seeker’s need! I think I must have begun every morning’s work with a grin on my face, for it was all fun, and I entered with zest into all the changes and chances of the story. I was embarrassed, not by any paucity of incident, but by my own fecundity and dexterity. The audacity of my project used sometimes to give me pause; it was almost too bold a thing to carry through; but my curiosity as to just how the ultimate goal would be reached kept my interest keyed high. At times, feeling that I was going too fast, I used to halt and write a purple patch or two for my own satisfaction,--a harmless diversion to which I am prone, and which no one could be cruel enough to deny me. There are pages in that book over which I dallied for a week, and in looking at them now I find that I still think them--as Mr. James would say--“rather nice.” And once, while thus amusing myself, a phrase slipped from the pen which I saw at once had been, from all time, ordained to be the title of my book.