woke to find myself greatly troubled by
Susan's parting words of the night before, and lay in bed for perhaps
twenty minutes turning them over fretfully in my mind. Then I could
stand it no longer and rose, bathed, dressed and ate my breakfast in
self-exasperating haste, yet with no very clear idea of why I was
hurrying or what was to follow. I had an appointment with my lawyer for
eleven; I was to lunch with Heywood Sampson at one; after lunch--my
immediate business in town being completed--I had purposed to return to
New Haven.

Susan would be expecting me for my daily morning call at half-past nine.
That call was a fixed custom between us when I was stopping in New York.
It seldom lasted over twenty minutes and was really just an opportunity
to say good-morning and arrange conveniently for any further plans for
the day or evening. But it was now only a few minutes past eight. No
matter, Susan was both a nighthawk and a lark, retiring always too late
and rising too early--though it must be said she seemed to need little
sleep; and I felt that I must see her at once and try somehow to
encourage her about her work and bring her back to a more reasonable and
normal point of view. "Overstrain," I kept mumbling to myself,
idiotically enough, as I charged rather than walked down Fifth Avenue
from my hotel: "Overstrain--overstrain...."

However, the brisk physical exertion of my walk gradually quieted my
nerves, and as I turned west on Tenth Street I was beginning to feel a
little ashamed of my unreasonable anxiety, was even beginning to poke a
little fun at myself and preparing to amuse Susan if I could by a
whimsical account of my morning brainstorm. I had now persuaded myself
that I should find her quietly at work, as I so usually did, and quite
prepared to talk things over more calmly. I meant this time to make a
supreme effort, and really hoped to persuade her to do two sensible
things: First, to accept Heywood Sampson's offer; second, to give up all
other work for the present, and get a complete rest and change of scene
until her services were needed for the review. That would not be for six
or eight weeks at the very least.

And I at last had a plan for her. You may or may not remember that
Ashton Parker was a famous man thirty years ago; they called him "Hyena
Parker" in Wall Street, and no doubt he deserved it; yet he faded gently
out with consumption like any spring poet, having turned theosophist
toward the en