an economically free
forever. You never have to do anything for money, with fifty dollars a
month. Receipts were, of course, moneys taken in for services rendered.
If Vivian's sick insisted on paying him a little something for his
trouble, he thought it moral not to restrain them. However, the sick's
attitude was commonly the reverse of the above....

Ignoring "Receipts," as a highly uncertain quantity, the scheme of
income and outgo commonly left a net monthly balance of about ten
dollars for works of a philanthropic nature. From a strictly scientific
point of view, the budget contained an unsoundness, in that it allowed
nothing for depreciation of plant, so to say: the necessity for fresh
supplies of a personal nature really was not duly faced in it. However,
the doctor had so far eliminated all expenditures in that quarter, save
only for a little half-soling matter week before last. He was confident
that it would all work out very satisfactorily when occasion arose.

The trial balance to-night developed a shortage of $1.22. Before the
budgeteer could precisely place it, his attention became diverted by
something else, to return no more that evening. Having drawn a stray
sheet of paper toward him to scribble on it "Milk for Miggs," he was
caught and engrossed by other inscriptions on the sheet, noted down in
the early forenoon. They ran:

Heth Works (Pickle) Art in _Factory Worker_
See Mr. Dayne--Settlement--Begin canvass not
before Feb. 1. H. Cooney
Todd Inst.--Night School?
Socks?--Or darning
Playground. (Council Com. meets Fri. 5 P.M.)
Jack D.
Mrs. G. Loan 20c.

Through the next to the last item, Vivian absently drew a pencil mark,
the weekly cheering letter to Weymouth, Texas, having been written just
after the memorandum. However, the young man's eye remained fixed on the
item erased. He lit his pipe, took his head in both hands and continued
to stare....

Dalhousie had called at the Dabney House on the night of his departure
for the new country. His reappearance in the flesh proved at least that
that fierce instability of character, which betrays men in moments of
disaster to the irreparable rashness, was not in him. So much was a
comfort, for the witch fear had ridden Vivian in the silent weeks
following the Beach.

But the reparting was a heart-rack none the less. Dalhousie was no
lifelong friend like O'Neill, or even like Chas Cooney. But Vivian,
having