pon his knee. He looked thinner, more angular. His
ears were cocked like two stiff v-shaped funnels. Now he looked like
an older dog. It was more reasonable to suppose, Donaldson realized,
that Barstow had two dogs of this same breed than that a dead dog had
come to life.

"Sandy!" he called sharply.

The dog wagged his stub-tail with vigor.

"Spike!" he called again.

The tail wagged on with undiminished enthusiasm.

Donaldson passed his hand over his forehead.

This was as useless as to try to solve the enigma of the Sphinx. The
dog's lips were sealed as tightly as the stone lips; the barrier
between his brain and Donaldson's brain was as high as that between the
man-chiseled image and the man who chiseled. He was only wasting his
time on such a task, time that he should use in the framing of his
letter.

He sat down again upon the sofa, took the dog upon his knee, and tried
to think. Before him the bottles danced--purple, brown, and blood-red.
He closed his eyes. He would begin his letter like this:

"To the most wonderful woman in all the world."

He would do this because it was true. There was no other woman like
her. No other woman would have so helped an old man in his battle with
himself; no other woman would have stayed on there alone in that house
and would have helped the son in his battle with himself; no other
woman would have followed him as she had wished to do and help him
fight his battle with himself. But she was the most wonderful woman in
the world because of the white courage she had shown in standing before
him and telling of her love. The eyes of her--the glory in her
hair--the marvel in her cheeks--the smile of her!

He opened his eyes. The devil in the bottle directly in front of him
was more impish than it had been at all. Donaldson rose. The pup
rolled to the floor. Donaldson crossed the room, picked out the
bottle, drew back his arm, and hurled it against the wall, where it
broke into a thousand pieces. It left a gory-looking blotch where it
struck. He went back to the sofa. The dog crept to his side again.
Before him a devil danced in a purple bottle. He closed his eyes.

He would begin his letter, then, like that. He would go on to tell her
that he was unable to compute his life save in terms of her, that it
had its beginning in her, grew to its fulness through her, and now had
reached its zenith in her. At the brook when he had clasped her in his
arms, h