d in the city of Ur right straight along."

"You have no idea what a scholarly man Dr. Ledsmar is," Theron suddenly
found himself inspired to volunteer. "He has the most marvellous
collection of books--a whole library devoted to this very subject--and
he has put them all quite freely at my disposal. Extremely kind of him,
isn't it?"

"Ledsmar? Ledsmar?" queried Alice. "I don't seem to remember the name.
He isn't the little man with the birthmark, who sits in the pew behind
the Lovejoys, is he? I think some one said he was a doctor."

"Yes, a horse doctor!" said Theron, with a sniff. "No; you haven't seen
this Dr. Ledsmar at all. I--I don't know that he attends any church
regularly. I scraped his acquaintance quite by accident. He is really a
character. He lives in the big house, just beyond the race-course, you
know--the one with the tower at the back--"

"No, I don't know. How should I? I've hardly poked my nose outside of
the yard since I have been here."

"Well, you shall go," said the husband, consolingly. "You HAVE been
cooped up here too much, poor girl. I must take you out more, really.
I don't know that I could take you to the doctor's place--without an
invitation, I mean. He is very queer about some things. He lives there
all alone, for instance, with only a Chinaman for a servant. He told
me I was almost the only man he had asked under his roof for years. He
isn't a practising physician at all, you know. He is a scientist; he
makes experiments with lizards--and things."

"Theron," the wife said, pausing lamp in hand on her way to the bedroom,
"do you be careful, now! For all you know this doctor may be a loose
man, or pretty near an infidel. You've got to be mighty particular in
such matters, you know, or you'll have the trustees down on you like a
'thousand of bricks.'"

"I will thank the trustees to mind their own business," said Theron,
stiffly, and the subject dropped.

The bedroom window upstairs was open, and upon the fresh night air
was borne in the shrill, jangling sound of a piano, being played off
somewhere in the distance, but so vehemently that the noise imposed
itself upon the silence far and wide. Theron listened to this as he
undressed. It proceeded from the direction of the main street, and he
knew, as by instinct, that it was the Madden girl who was playing. The
incongruity of the hour escaped his notice. He mused instead upon the
wild and tropical tangle of moods, emotions, passions,