I shouldn't have realized it before. I had
somehow taken it for granted that he was a self-conscious hermit, who
lived in a squalid seclusion because he liked being wondered at. But he
did not seem to be anything of the kind. I don't know whether he's a
good cook, for he didn't ask me to eat anything; but I don't think he's
a bad housekeeper."

"With his bed unmade at eight o'clock in the evening!"

"He may have got up late," said Ewbert. "The house seemed very orderly,
otherwise; and what is really the use of making up a bed till you need
it!"

Mrs. Ewbert passed the point, and asked, "What did you talk about when
you got started?"

"I found he was a reader, or had been. There was a case of good books in
the parlor, and I began by talking with him about them."

"Well, what did he say about them?"

"That he wasn't interested in them. He had been once, but he was not
now."

"I can understand that," said Mrs. Ewbert philosophically. "Books _are_
crowded out after your life fills up with other interests."

"Yes."

"Yes, what?" Mrs. Ewbert followed him up.

"So far as I could make out, Mr. Hilbrook's life hadn't filled up with
other interests. He did not care for the events of the day, as far as I
tried him on them, and he did not care for the past. I tempted him with
autobiography; but he seemed quite indifferent to his own history,
though he was not reticent about it. I proposed the history of his
cousin in the boyish days which he said they had spent together; but he
seemed no more interested in his cousin than in himself. Then I tried
his dog and his pathetic sufferings, and I said something about the pity
of the poor old fellow's last days being so miserable. That seemed to
strike a gleam of interest from him, and he asked me if I thought
animals might live again. And I found--I don't know just how to put it
so as to give you the right sense of his psychological attitude."

"No matter! Put it any way, and I will take care of the right sense. Go
on!" said Mrs. Ewbert.

"I found that his question led up to the question whether men lived
again, and to a confession that he didn't or couldn't believe they did."

"Well, upon my word!" Mrs. Ewbert exclaimed. "I don't see what business
he has coming to church, then. Doesn't he understand that the idea of
immortality is the very essence of Rixonitism! I think it was personally
insulting to _you_, Clarence. What did you say?"

"I didn't take a very high hand w