s a sense of rest. I was going to forgive the world the
wrong it had done me; perhaps it would feel ashamed of itself and
reward me for my patience. So Hillars was "going to pieces." It is
strange how we men love another who has shared and spent with us our
late patrimonies. Hillars and I had been friends since our youth, and
we had lived together till a few years back. Then he went to
Washington, from there to Paris, thence to London. He was a better
newspaper man than I. I liked to dream too well, while he was always
for a little action. Liquor was getting the best of him. I wondered
why. It might be a woman. There is always one around somewhere when a
man's breath smells of whisky. A good deal of this woman's temperance
business is caused by remorse. I was drawing aimless pictures in the
frozen gravel, when I became aware that two skaters had stopped in
front of me. I glanced up and saw Phyllis and Ethel, their eyes like
stars and their cheeks like roses.

"I was wondering if it was you," said Ethel. "Phyllis, where is my
cavalier?"

"I believe he has forsaken us," said the voice of the woman I loved.

"Will you not accept part of the bench?" I asked, moving along.

The girls dropped easily beside me.

"I was just wishing I was a boy again and was in for a game of hockey,"
said I. "I am going to London on Saturday. Our foreign correspondent
has had to give up work on account of ill health."

"You haven't----" Phyllis stopped suddenly.

"Oh, no," said I intuitively. "I am growing rusty, and they think I
need a vacation." I was glad Ethel was there with her voluble chatter.

"Oh, a foreign correspondent!"' she cried.

"Yes."

"You will have a glorious time. Papa will probably return to B----
when the next administration comes in. It is sure to be Republican."
There are a few women who pose as Democrats; I never met one of them.
"You know papa was there twenty years ago. I suppose you will be
hob-nobbing with dukes and princes."

"It cannot be avoided," I said gravely. "I do not expect to remain
long in London. When my work is done perhaps I shall travel and
complete my foreign polish."

"Oh, yes!" said Phyllis. "I forgot to tell you, Ethel, that a fortune
has been left to Jack, and he need not work but for the love of it."

I laughed, but they thought it a self-conscious laugh. Somehow I was
not equal to the task of enlightening them.

"It is jolly to be rich," said Ethel, cli