g then, puffing importantly, sending a wash almost
at my feet. I followed it with my eye till it became lost around the
bend. Over there was Austria and beyond, the Orient, a new world to me.

"If I could see them together!" I mused aloud.

The squirrel cocked his head to one side as if to ask: "Austria and
Turkey?"

"No," said I, looking around for another stick; "Phyllis and Gretchen.
If I could see them together, you know, I could tell positively then
which I love. As it is, I'm in doubt. Do you understand?"

The squirrel ran out to the end of the limb and sat down. It was an
act of deliberation.

"Well, why don't you answer?"

I was startled to my feet by the laughter which followed my question.
A few yards behind me stood Gretchen.

"Can't you find a better confidant?" she asked,

"Yes, but she will not be my confidant," said I. I wondered how much
she had heard of the one-sided dialogue. "Will you answer the question
I just put to that squirrel of yours?"

"And what was the question?" with innocence not feigned.

"Perhaps it was, Why should Gretchen not revoke the promise to which
she holds me?"

"You should know, Herr," said Gretchen, gently.

"But I do not. I only know that a man is human and that a beautiful
woman was made to be loved." Everything seemed solved now that
Gretchen stood at my side.

But she turned as if to go.

"Gretchen," I called, "do not go. Forgive me; if only you understood!'"

"Perhaps I do understand," she replied with a gentleness new to me.
"Do you remember why I asked you to stay?"

"Yes; I was to be your friend."

"This time it is for me to ask whether I go or stay."

"Stay, Gretchen!" But I was a hypocrite when I said it.

"I knew that you would say that," simply.

"Gretchen, sit down and I'll tell you the story of my life, as they say
on the stage." I knocked the dead ash from my pipe and stuffed the
bowl with fresh weed. I lit it and blew a cloud of smoke into the air.
"Do you see that, Gretchen?"

"Yes, Herr," sitting down, the space of a yard between us.

"It is pretty, very; but see how the wind carries it about! As it
leaves my throat it looks like a tangible substance. Reach for it and
it is gone. That cloud of smoke is my history."

"It disappears," said Gretchen.

"And so shall I at the appointed time. That cloud of smoke was a
fortune. I reached for it, and there was nothing but the air in my
hand. It was a woman's love. For