. Only there is no proof of its ever happening."

"Now see here, Morton, so long as we are on this subject at last, I
want to ask you, do you believe mother is gone--absolutely blotted out
of existence?" She waited in tense silence, and as they passed a
street-lamp, and the light fell on his face, he seemed to have grown
suddenly pale. "Do you believe Darwin and Spencer and Victor Hugo have
gone to nothingness?"

"No, at the bottom of my heart I can't think that, and yet
theoretically I cannot conceive of the existence of any soul apart
from the body. Think of it! If mother lives, so do all the billions of
cannibals, negroes, Bushmen--you can't draw a line and say 'here
begins the immortal souls.'"

"That isn't the question. I do not believe that father and mother and
Hayward have vanished into a handful of dust, I cling to a belief in
their living selves, not because the bishop and the prayer-books say
so, but just because my own mind says so. I won't surrender them,
that's all."

"And yet a faith springing from such a desire is not well based. I
want to tell you about some people I met last summer. They will
interest you." Thereupon he pictured his first meeting with Viola. He
described the mother and Clarke. He told of his interview with Britt
and of Randall's revelations concerning Viola's life. "And now they
have convinced the girl that she should extend her sphere of influence
and bring her chicanery to bear on the metropolis."

"How do you know it is chicanery?"

"Britt said--"

"I don't care what Britt said. You found the mother sweet, and you
admit the girl is charming. I'll trust your instinct in such matters,
Mort; you've never been one to run after frumps and minxes. She had
good eyes?"

"Beautiful eyes, steady, blue-gray, wistful. She quite enchanted me at
first--"

"And you're sentimental over her still?"

"I didn't say that I was sentimental over her at any time."

"I don't care what you said. I can tell by your voice that she is a
lost, sweet dream. What do you want me to do?"

"Nothing."

"Yes, you do. You want me to see her and find out what she's doing
here. It is Kate to the rescue! I will go to-morrow."

"You are too precipitate! You might wait and get my mind."

"I have your mind already, and I believe in doing things vigorously.
Besides, you've roused my curiosity. After all these years of waiting
to see you get interested in something besides your 'bugs'!--I'm
delighted to kn