,
the Southern home of his mother's people, and the boy remembered it
always hanging there, opposite his bed, the first sight to meet his eyes
every morning since his babyhood. So he was certain there was no figure
in it, more than all one so remarkable as this strapping little chap in
his queer clothes; his dress of conspicuous plaid with large black
velvet squares sewed on it, who stood now in front of the old
manor-house. Could it be only a dream? Could it be that a little ghost,
wandering childlike in dim, heavenly fields, had joined the gay troop of
his boyish visions and shipped in with them through the ivory gate of
pleasant dreams? The boy put his fists to his eyes and rubbed them and
looked again. The little fellow was still there, standing with sturdy
legs wide apart as if owning the scene; he laughed as he held toward the
boy a key--a small key tied with a scarlet ribbon. There was no doubt in
the boy's mind that the key was for him, and out of the dim world of
sleep he stretched his young arm for it; to reach it he sat up in bed.
Then he was awake and knew himself alone in the peace of his own little
room, and laughed shamefacedly at the reality of the vision which had
followed him from dreamland into the very boundaries of consciousness,
which held him even now with gentle tenacity, which drew him back
through the day, from his studies, from his play, into the strong
current of its fascination.

The first time Philip Beckwith had this dream he was only twelve years
old, and, withheld by the deep reserve of childhood, he told not even
his mother about it, though he lived in its atmosphere all day and
remembered it vividly days longer. A year after it came again; and again
it was a June morning, and as his eyes opened the little boy came once
more out of the picture toward him, laughing and holding out the key on
its scarlet string. The dream was a pleasant one, and Philip welcomed it
eagerly from his sleep as a friend. There seemed something sweet and
familiar in the child's presence beyond the one memory of him, as again
the boy, with eyes half open to every-day life, saw him standing, small
but masterful, in the garden of that old house where the Fairfields had
lived for more than a century. Half consciously he tried to prolong the
vision, tried not to wake entirely for fear of losing it; but the
picture faded surely from the curtain of his mind as the tangible world
painted there its heavier outlines. It