That morning Sommers returned to the city. Mrs. Preston had asked him to notify Dr. Leonard and Miss M'Gann, the only friends she had in Chicago, that the funeral would take place late in the afternoon. In the elevator of the Athenian Building, Sommers met Dr. Lindsay with Dr. Rupert, the oldest member of the office staff. The two men bowed and edged their backs toward Sommers. He was already being forgotten. When the elevator cage discharged its load on the top floor, Rupert, who was popularly held to be a genial man, lingered behind his colleague, and tried to say something to the young doctor. "Private practice?" he asked sympathetically, "or will you try hospital work again?" "I haven't thought anything about it," Sommers replied truthfully. Rupert, a man of useful, mediocre ability, eyed the younger man with curiosity, thinking that doubtless he had private means; that it was a pity he and Lindsay had fallen out, for he was a good fellow and clever. "Well--glad to see you. Drop in occasionally--if you stay in Chicago." The last phrase stung Sommers. It seemed to take for granted that there could be nothing professionally to keep him in Chicago after the fiasco of his introduction. He would have to learn how much a man's future depended upon the opinion of men whose opinion he despised. Dr. Leonard came out of his den, where he was filling a tooth. His spectacles were pushed up over his shaggy brows, and little particles of gold and of ground bone clung untidily to the folds of his crumpled linen jacket. His patients did not belong to the class that is exacting about small things. "So the feller has taken himself off for good," he observed, after listening to the doctor's brief statement. "That's first-rate, couldn't be better for Alves." Sommers started at the familiar use of the first name. "She's never had a show. Preston wasn't much except as a looker. The first time she came in here I could see how things stood. But you couldn't budge her from him--jest like a woman--she loved him." Sommers must have shown some irritation, for Dr. Leonard, watching him closely, repeated: "Yes! she loved _him_, would have him back, though I argued with her against it. Well, I'm glad it's settled up now so clever. Of course I'll be out to the funeral. Alves ain't got any folks near connected, and Preston--well, it's no use harboring hard thoughts about dead folks. They'll have to settle with some one else, won't they?" From the Athenian Building Sommers went to an ambitious boarding-house that called itself a hotel, where Miss M'Gann boarded. A dirty negro boy opened the door, and with his duster indicated the reception room. Miss M'Gann came down, wearing a costume of early morning relaxation. She listened to the news with the usual feminine feeling for decorum, compounded of curiosity, conventional respect for the dead, and speculation for the future.