r the coffee stains. Then with a murmur of
apology I tore the end and drew out the blank. I don't think the doctor
detected the disgust of perusal.

"Have just arrived from Florida. If in town call and see me. Aunt
Sarah."

Aunt Sarah was one of those disquieting persons who loathe telephones
and note-paper. Her city messages came by wire with the insistence of
commands.

The end was that the doctor decided I must get my mind active, and after
vainly trying to bully me back into literary effort he took a new tack.

"Are you too surly and apathetic to combine a small service to friends
with the augmenting of your own fortunes?" he demanded, and before I
could reply he fell into the discussion of a matter which just now lay
at the front of his interests. There was a Kentuckian in town, with
glowing projects for fortune reaping along the ridges of the
Cumberlands. He was not a mere promoter, but a man of large means and
ability, who was also much the gentleman. His present scheme of things
required the enlistment of additional capital, and he had come to men
who had interested the doctor as well as themselves. The Kentuckian had
suggested, however, that before committing themselves in the matter they
send one of their own number with him to look over the options. None of
the others, as it happened, could go. Here, declared the doctor, was my
opportunity to try the novelty of useful occupation.

The man, whose name was Weighborne, was to lunch with him. Would I meet
him and talk it over, and if I was favorably impressed accompany him to
the Kentucky mountains?

We were sitting by a Fifth Avenue window as he outlined the matter with
persuasiveness. The sky was drear with the ash gray of autumn. 'Busses,
motors and taxis were trailing along in the same old hopeless monotony.
At the thought of remaining here I sickened. Until a letter or message
could arrive from Keller I could do little, and this trip would take
only ten days or two weeks. I now inferred that Keller had awaited the
next steamer. If that were so there would still be the six days at sea.
At all events Kentucky is on the telegraph lines. His word could follow
me there without loss of time. Then he had said, "the loveliest girl in
Dixie." South of Mason and Dixon's line I might be closer to my
discoveries when the name arrived. But above all that, I must fill in
the time of waiting with some sort of action. There in the hills I
should at least be away from