them, my dear"). This had been disproved. Then it was spread
about that he belonged to a wealthy family of Masters from the upper
West Side ("very well in their way, no doubt, and the backbone of the
country, my dear, but one doesn't seem to get on with them, and I
shouldn't think they'd come to Aiken of all places"). But a gentleman
who knew the West Side Masters, root and branch, shook his head to this,
and went so far as to say, "Not much, he isn't"; and went further and
shuddered. Then it got about that Mister Masters was poor (and that made
people suspicious of him). Then it got about that he was rich (and that
made them even more so). Then that he wrote for a living (and that was
nearly as bad as to say that he cheated at cards--or at least it was the
kind of thing that _they_ didn't do). And then, finally, the real truth
about him, or something like it, got out; and the hatchet of suspicion
was buried, and there was peace in Aiken. In that Aiken of whose peace
the judge, referring to a pock-marked mulatto girl, had thundered that
it should not be disturbed for any woman--"no--not even were she Helen
of Troy."

This was the truth that got out about Mister Masters. He was a nephew of
the late Bishop Masters. His mother, on whom he was dependent, was very
rich; she had once been prominent in society. He was thirty, and was
good at games. He did not work at anything.

So he was something that Aiken could understand and appreciate: a young
man who was well-born, who didn't have to work--and who didn't _want_
to.

But old Mrs. Hotchkiss did not know of these things when, one bright day
in passing Willcox's (she was on one good foot, one rheumatic foot, and
a long black cane with a gold handle), she noticed the young man pale
and rather sad-looking in his fur coat and steamer-rug, his eyes on his
book, and stopped abruptly and spoke to him through the gap in the
hedge.

"I hope you'll forgive an old woman for scraping an acquaintance," she
piped in her brisk, cheerful voice, "but I want to know if you're
getting better, and I thought the best way to find out was to stop and
ask."

Mister Masters's steamer-rug fell from about his long legs and his face
became rosy, for he was very shy.

"Indeed I am," he said, "ever so much. And thank you for asking."

"I'm tired," said the old lady, "of seeing you always sitting by
yourself, dead tired of it. I shall come for you this afternoon at four
in my carriage, and take