were
comments on his appearance, they must have been admiring comments. The
man's skin was white and he was lithe and tense and muscular. Breeding
showed in him as it shows in the muscles and conformation of a
race-horse. When he was dried he threw down the makeshift towel and
combed his shock of brown hair with his fingers. Now that the bristle of
beard was off his face he looked younger.

From the pile of clothing he selected his outfit, garment by garment.
The jovial humor of the judge had provided complete equipment for a man.
In the breast pockets of the frock-coat there were a clean collar, a
necktie, and a freshly laundered handkerchief.

By the time he had finished his dressing the pool was still and glassy
once more. He flirted out the handkerchief, holding it by one corner,
and swept the soft fabric around and around the crown of the black hat.

He carefully set the hat on his head and leaned over the pool and took
an interested peep at himself.

"You are a fool in this matter," he informed the reflection. "And I
wonder why you are determined to persist in the folly. The man
Chick's tin suit cannot bring as much trouble to him as this garb of
respectability may bring to you. For no man can step up to that poor
Quaker and touch his shoulder and say--"

He broke off. He began to search through his discarded garments and to
stow his few possessions into the pockets of his new attire.

"All folly!" ran his thoughts. "I am consumed with it all of a sudden.
I have ranted to a tramp. Now I rant at myself. I am sloughing the rags
that have protected me. All folly!"

His searching fingers, groping to the deepest corner of a pocket,
found the crumbling fragments of a dried rose. He narrowed his eyes and
surveyed it as it lay in his palm, and then made as if to toss it into
the pool. But he checked the gesture. He set his chin in his hands and
communed aloud with himself after the fashion of those who hold aloof
from mankind:

"Folly, little sister! I may as well be truthful! Two dark eyes which
gave me the first honest, unafraid, and frank gaze I've had from a maid
in two years, two red lips which said 'Please' and 'Thank you'! A flash
of a glance behind her which called me, even if she did not mean it as
a call--and so, on I fare in a lunatic's dream. Own up! I have dreamed
that some day I will see her again. And down in the depths of me stirs
that impulse of the male which makes the peacock spread his feathe