the care of the
moulds, and his personal tenderness for the bronze creatures was so keen
that he did not appreciate the significant fact that he was treated with
scant respect. He stepped in at the Field palace on the way up-town, and
a man in an official cap at the door asked him for his card of
admission.

"Card of admission? Why, I'm one of the decorators here.... I reckon
you're new, my boy. I only quit working a fortnight ago."

He was nervous and pale; his clothes were shabby.

"Sorry," returned the man, "my orders are strict from Mr. Cedersholm
himself. _Nobody_ comes in without his card."

The sculptor ground his heel on the cruel stones.

He had been shut away by his concentrated work in Cedersholm's studio
from outside interests. He had no friends in New York but the children.
No friend but his aunt, who had borrowed of him nearly all he possessed,
no sympathizers but the little old ladies, no consolations but his
visions. In the May evenings, now warm, he sat on a bench in Central
Park, listlessly watching the wind in the young trees and the voices of
happy children on their way to the lake with their boats. He began to
have a proper conception of his own single-handed struggle. He began to
know what it is, without protection or home or any capital, to grapple
with life first-hand.

"Why, _art is the longest way in the world_," he thought. "It's the
rudest and steepest, and to climb it successfully needs colossal
_genius_, as well as the other things, and it needs money."

He went slowly back to his lodging and his hall room. Along the wall his
array of boots, all in bad condition--his unequal boots and his
deformity struck him and his failure. A mist rose before his eyes. Over
by the mirror he had pinned the sketch he liked the best.

* * * * *

On Sunday afternoon, in his desire to see the children, he forgot his
distaste of meeting the master of the house, and rang the bell at an
hour when Carew was likely to be at home. He had, too, for the first
time, a wish to see the man who had made a success of his own life.
Whatever his home and family were--_Carew_ was a success. Fairfax often
noted his uncle's name mentioned at directors' meetings and functions
where his presence indicated that the banker was an authority on
finance. Ever since Mrs. Carew had borrowed money of him, Fairfax had
been inclined to think better of his uncle. As the door opened before
him now h