d the lights shone late from their windows every night in the year.
Sometimes that would mean only that the two friends were talking, for
they never reached a silent intimacy, but, even after several years of
companionship, were rarely seen together when not in interested, often
eager, conversation, so that people wondered what in the world they
still found to say to each other. But many a night the late-shining
lamp meant that Tom sat alone, with a brief or a book, or wooed the long
hours with his magical guitar. For he never went to bed until the other
came home.

And if daylight came without Crailey, Vanrevel would go out, yawning
mightily, to look for him; and when there was no finding him, Tom would
come back, sleepless, to the day's work. Crailey was called "peculiar"
and he explained, with a kind of jovial helplessness, that he was always
prepared for the unexpected in himself, nor did such a view detract from
his picturesqueness to his own perusal of himself; though it was not
only to himself that he was interesting. To the vision of the lookers-on
in Rouen, quiet souls who hovered along the walls at merry-makings and
cheerfully counted themselves spectators at the play, Crailey Gray held
the centre of the stage and was the chief comedian of the place. Wit,
poet, and scapegrace, the small society sometimes seemed the mere
background set for his performances, spectacles which he, also, enjoyed,
and from the best seat in the house; for he was not content as the
actor, but must be the Prince in the box as well.

His friendship for Tom Vanrevel was, in a measure, that of the vine for
the oak. He was full of levities at Tom's expense, which the other
bore with a grin of sympathetic comprehension, or, at long intervals,
returned upon Crailey with devastating effect. Vanrevel was the one
steadying thing in his life, and, at the same time, the only one of the
young men upon whom he did not have an almost mesmeric influence. In
good truth, Crailey was the ringleader in all the devilries of the town.
Many a youth swore to avoid the roisterer's company for all time, and,
within two hours of the vow, found himself, flagon in hand, engaged in
a bout that would last the night, with Mr. Gray out-bumpering the
hardiest, at the head of the table. And, the next morning, the fevered,
scarlet-eyed perjurer might creep shaking to his wretched tasks, only
to behold the cause of his folly and headache tripping merrily along the
stree