He could not bear it in the cold, dark room; the streets would be full of people who might divert him. He soon found himself in a crowded thoroughfare. It was six o’clock, and the city was full of hurrying men, women, and children returning homeward after the long day’s work. The girl from the millinery establishment under his room, whose sweet, childish face he had painted from memory the very day before, was just leaving the shop as he stepped into the street. She was very poorly dressed, with a hat which would have disgraced anybody but a milliner’s apprentice. Her dress fitted neatly, however, and she gave her close-cut jacket a tug to make it smooth about the shoulders before she reached the corner. A tall, pale, dyspeptic-looking youth joined her just outside the druggist’s. Graham recognized him as the clerk in a dry-goods shop near by. Their greeting he could not but overhear. "I am late, George--" "Twenty minutes; I almost gave you up," in a surly tone. "I am so sorry; don’t be angry." The man hesitated a moment; then her pleading voice got the better of his ill-temper, and, taking her by the arm after the fashion of his kind, he led her across the street, and in a moment they were lost to Graham’s sight. He next stopped at the cobbler’s around the corner to call for a pair of boots which had needed repairing. The narrow stall was brightly lighted, and he saw through the window a little child holding up its face to be kissed. The cobbler’s girl had just brought her father his supper. As Graham entered, the man pushed the little figure gently into the street. "Tell mother I ’ll not be late," he said; and wiping his blackened hands upon his dirty ticking apron, he greeted the artist civilly, and proceeded to find his boots for him. "They need re-soling, Mr. Graham, but I did not like to do the job without orders. The patches are all right." Graham paid the man for his work, and went out. He had thought to find distraction in the street, but what he saw there only made him more desolate. He was alone, while all other men had some loving soul to greet them after their day’s toil. The pair of lovers, the cobbler and his child, made him feel his loneliness more acutely, and emphasized painfully the news which the letter had brought to him,--Millicent was gone!