y a man should conceal
a feature of such distinction under that disfiguring shock of beard.
Suddenly, as though he felt the young sculptor's keen glance, he opened
his eyes.

"Was he always a good deal of an oyster?" he asked abruptly. "He was
terribly shy as a boy."

"Yes, he was an oyster, since you put it so," rejoined Steavens.
"Although he could be very fond of people, he always gave one the
impression of being detached. He disliked violent emotion; he was
reflective, and rather distrustful of himself--except, of course, as
regarded his work. He was surefooted enough there. He distrusted men
pretty thoroughly and women even more, yet somehow without believing ill
of them. He was determined, indeed, to believe the best, but he seemed
afraid to investigate."

"A burnt dog dreads the fire," said the lawyer grimly, and closed his
eyes.

Steavens went on and on, reconstructing that whole miserable boyhood.
All this raw, biting ugliness had been the portion of the man whose
tastes were refined beyond the limits of the reasonable--whose mind was
an exhaustless gallery of beautiful impressions, and so sensitive that
the mere shadow of a poplar leaf flickering against a sunny wall would
be etched and held there forever. Surely, if ever a man had the magic
word in his fingertips, it was Merrick. Whatever he touched, he revealed
its holiest secret; liberated it from enchantment and restored it to its
pristine loveliness, like the Arabian prince who fought the enchantress
spell for spell. Upon whatever he had come in contact with, he had left
a beautiful record of the experience--a sort of ethereal signature; a
scent, a sound, a color that was his own.

Steavens understood now the real tragedy of his master's life; neither
love nor wine, as many had conjectured, but a blow which had fallen
earlier and cut deeper than these could have done--a shame not his, and
yet so unescapably his, to bide in his heart from his very boyhood. And
without--the frontier warfare; the yearning of a boy, cast ashore upon a
desert of newness and ugliness and sordidness, for all that is chastened
and old, and noble with traditions.

At eleven o'clock the tall, flat woman in black crepe entered, announced
that the watchers were arriving, and asked them "to step into the dining
room." As Steavens rose the lawyer said dryly: "You go on--it'll be a
good experience for you, doubtless; as for me, I'm not equal to that
crowd tonight; I've had twent