delicacies, palm-tree salad; seen and heard by
fits and starts, now peering round the corner of the door, now railing
within against invisible assistants, a certain comely young native lady
in a sacque, who seemed too modest to be a member of the family, and too
imperious to be less; and then if such an one were whisked again through
space to Upper Tooting, or wherever else he honored the domestic gods,
"I have had a dream," I think he would say, as he sat up, rubbing his
eyes, in the familiar chimney-corner chair, "I have had a dream of a
place, and I declare I believe it must be heaven." But to Dodd and his
entertainer, all this amenity of the tropic night and all these dainties
of the island table, were grown things of custom; and they fell to meat
like men who were hungry, and drifted into idle talk like men who were a
trifle bored.

The scene in the club was referred to.

"I never heard you talk so much nonsense, Loudon," said the host.

"Well, it seemed to me there was sulphur in the air, so I talked for
talking," returned the other. "But it was none of it nonsense."

"Do you mean to say it was true?" cried Havens,--"that about the opium
and the wreck, and the blackmailing and the man who became your friend?"

"Every last word of it," said Loudon.

"You seem to have been seeing life," returned the other.

"Yes, it's a queer yarn," said his friend; "if you think you would like,
I'll tell it you."

Here follows the yarn of Loudon Dodd, not as he told it to his friend,
but as he subsequently wrote it.

THE YARN.

CHAPTER I. A SOUND COMMERCIAL EDUCATION.

The beginning of this yarn is my poor father's character. There
never was a better man, nor a handsomer, nor (in my view) a more
unhappy--unhappy in his business, in his pleasures, in his place of
residence, and (I am sorry to say it) in his son. He had begun life as a
land-surveyor, soon became interested in real estate, branched off into
many other speculations, and had the name of one of the smartest men in
the State of Muskegon. "Dodd has a big head," people used to say; but I
was never so sure of his capacity. His luck, at least, was beyond doubt
for long; his assiduity, always. He fought in that daily battle of
money-grubbing, with a kind of sad-eyed loyalty like a martyr's; rose
early, ate fast, came home dispirited and over-weary, even from success;
grudged himself all pleasure, if his nature was capable of taking any,
which I some