Presently Bennington Cole announced that he must be going on, as he had an appointment with an out-of-town insurance agent who was leaving Boston that evening, and soon afterward Miss Maitland took her departure, escorted by Pelgram. Then Wilkinson went, having executed as much havoc as he could among the comestibles, and Isabel was left with her father. Mr. Hurd lit a cigar and looked thoughtfully at his daughter. "Splendid appetite that young feller has," he observed, nodding toward the large tray which stood almost nude of food. The girl moved a little uneasily in her chair. "Now, father," she protested, "you shouldn't be so hard on Charlie. He's really in a very embarrassing position. He's never had a chance to show what he could do if he found something he liked and was suited for. He's as clever and amusing as he can be, but he just naturally isn't practical and no one has ever been able to make him so, and you yourself are so absolutely practical in everything that you can't excuse the lack of it in any one else. But he's really all right." Mr. Hurd looked sharply up, and the lines around his eyes came a little closer together. "You don't mean that you're interested in him--seriously, do you?" he said. "Oh, no," replied his daughter. "Not at all--that way." The traction magnate smiled indulgently, with manifest relief. "I don't want to criticize your analysis of character, Isabel," he said, "but I think you're dead wrong on one point. In my opinion Mr. Charles Wilkinson is one of the most practical young men of my acquaintance." Meanwhile Miss Maitland and her companion had crossed the Common, and when they came to Boylston Street the shop windows were all alit and the street lamps began to shine. It was the close of a cool September day, and a sharp wind whipped the skirt of Pelgram's frock coat around his legs and flecked the blood into the girl's cheeks as she stepped briskly westward, swinging along easily while her rather stout and soft escort, patting the walk with his cane, kept up with some little difficulty. As often as he dared, the artist glanced at her, and with hope kindled by gratitude, he thought her never so attractive. And no matter what might be said of the eccentricity of his artistic taste in pursuit of the ideal, his selection of the real was indisputably sound; Miss Maitland was well worth the admiration of any man. As they came to Portland Street, waiting at the crossing for a motor-car to pass, Pelgram quite suddenly said, "I wish I could paint you here and just as you are looking now." The girl flushed a little. The compliment was conventional enough, but there was a tone in his voice that she had never heard before and that carried its meaning clearly. "Thank you. Is it because the atmosphere and background would be so ugly--wind and iron and dead leaves and raw brick walls and hideous advertising signs--and I should seem attractive by comparison?"