ugh another man's kingdom are never very safe for the wandering
feet of imagination. It is an old refrain, "If I were king," the song
of a usurper, if only in thought.

If he were king of Deena Ponsonby's life, Stephen thought, would he
write letters that another chap might read? Would he dwell upon the
shape of an albatross, when there must be memories--beautiful, glowing
memories--between them to recall? Pen and ink was a wretched medium
for love, but the heart of the world has throbbed to its inspiration
before now. Why, if a woman like Mrs. Ponsonby shared his hearth, he
would let Tierra del Fuego, with its flora and its fauna, sink into
the sea and be damned to it, before he'd put the hall door between
himself and her. His own front door had suggested the idea, and he
shut it with a bang.

He picked up the letters he found waiting on the hall table, and went
directly to his library, passing through a room that would have been a
drawing-room had a lady presided there, but to the master served only
as a defense against intrusion into the privacy of his sanctum.

The postman had left a pile of bills and advertisements, but there was
one letter in Ben Minthrop's familiar writing, and Stephen turned up
his light and settled himself to read it. Ben wrote:

DEAR FRENCH: When I asked you to spend Christmas with us in
Boston I had no idea that, like the Prophet Habbacuc, I, with my
dinner pail, was to be lifted by the hair of my head, and
transported to Babylon--in other words, New York. But so it is!
If you know your Apocrypha, this figurative language will seem
apt, but in case you should like my end of it explained I will
leave the mystifications of Bel and the Dragon and come down to
plain speech.

My father has conceived the idea that I am one of the dawning
lights in the financial world, and he has decided to open a
branch office of our business in New York and to put me at its
head. I must confess that the whole thing is very pleasant and
flattering, and it has stirred all the decent ambitions I
have--that I have any I owe to you, old fellow--and I am rather
keen to be off.

We have taken a house not far from the park in East Sixty-fifth
Street, where a welcome will always be yours, and where Polly
and I hope you will eat your Christmas dinner.

Perhaps you may reflect that it is a serious thing to befriend
straying men and dogs;