n, and I am not
ashamed. Yet that I should so fail to read your mind I am ashamed.
Perhaps it was my egotism, which made me over-bold, thinking that
any woman could love me. But if what I offered was nothing to you,
if even for a moment you hated me, it is enough. Now for all this
talk of friendship--I am not your friend and never will be; and
if, after what has passed, you are my friend, I ask but one
thing--let me forget. For I will never come back, I will never
write, I will never submit. Surely, with all that life offers you,
you can spare me the humiliation of being angry with you.

I am now engaged in work which, out of consideration for Judge
Ware, I cannot leave; otherwise I would not ask you not to write
to me.

Trusting that you will remember me kindly to your mother, I
remain, sincerely,

Rufus Hardy.

He signed his name at the bottom, folded the sheet carefully, and
thrust the sealed envelope into an inner pocket. Then for the first
time, he drew out the third letter and spread its pages before him--a
long letter, full of news, yet asking no questions. The tense lines
about his lips relaxed as he read, he smiled whimsically as he heard
of the queer doings of his old-time friends; how these two had run
away and got married in order to escape a church wedding, how Tupper
Browne had painted a likeness of Mather in Hades--after the "Dante" of
Dore--and had been detected in the act; and then this little note,
cued in casually near the end:

Kitty Bonnair has given up art for the present on account of her
eyes, and has gone in for physical culture and riding lessons in
the park. She dropped in at the last meeting of The Circle, and I
told her how curiously father had encountered you at Bender. We
all miss you very much at The Circle--in fact, it is not doing so
well of late. Kitty has not attended a meeting in months, and I
often wonder where we may look for another Poet, Philosopher, and
Friend--unless you will come back! Father did not tell me where
you had been or what you intended to do, but I hope you have not
given up the Muse. To encourage you I will send down a book, now
and then, and you may send me a poem. Is it a bargain? Then
good-bye.

With best wishes,
LUCY WARE.

P. S.--I met your father on the stre