ike him, I am sure,' said Mr. Sarrasin. 'You would find him
a kindred spirit.'

The Dictator graciously expressed his confidence that he should find a
kindred spirit in Mr. Sarrasin's brother. Then Mr. Sarrasin, apparently
much delighted with his interview, rose to his feet and declared that it
was time for him to depart. He shook hands very warmly with Miss
Ericson, but he held the Dictator's hands with a grasp that was devoted
in its enthusiasm. Then, expressing repeatedly the hope that he might
soon meet the Dictator again, and once more assuring him of the kinship
between the Dictator and Captain Oisin Stewart Sarrasin, the white
gentleman took himself off, a pale bulky figure looming heavily across
the grassy lawn and through the French window into the darkness of the
sitting-room.

When he was quite out of sight the Dictator, who had followed his
retreating figure with his eyes, turned to Miss Ericson with a look of
inquiry. Miss Ericson smiled.

'Who is Mr. Sarrasin?' the Dictator asked. 'He has come up since my
time.'

'Oh, yes; he first came to live here about six years ago. He is one of
the best souls in the world; simple, good-hearted, an eternal child.'

'What is he?' The Dictator asked.

'Well, he is nothing in particular now. He was in the City, his father
was the head of a very wealthy firm of tea merchants, Sarrasin, Jermyn,
& Co. When the father died a few years ago he left all his property to
Mr. Gilbert, and then Mr. Gilbert went out of business and came here.'

'He does not look as if he would make a very good business man,' said
the Dictator.

'No; but he was very patient and devoted to it for his father's sake.
Now, since he has been free to do as he likes, he has devoted himself to
folk-lore.'

'To folk-lore?'

'Yes, to the study of fairy tales, of comparative mythology. I am quite
learned in it now since I have had Mr. Sarrasin for a neighbour, and
know more about "Puss in Boots" and "Jack and the Beanstalk" than I ever
did when I was a girl.'

'Really,' said the Dictator, with a kind of sigh. 'Does he devote
himself to fairy tales?' It crossed his mind that a few moments before
he had been thinking of himself as a small child in that garden, with a
taste for fairy tales, and regretting that he had not stayed in that
garden. Now, with the dust of battle and the ashes of defeat upon him,
he came back to find a man much older than himself, who seemed still to
remain a child, and to b