the unknown,
lived Mary.

With McCleary he took a car that galloped like a broncho, and started
for the very heart of the mystery. As the crowds thickened, as the cars
they met grew more heavily laden, McCleary said:

"My God! Where are they all goin'? How do they all make a livin'?"

"That beats me," said Harold. "Seems as if they eat up all the grub in
the world."

The older man sighed. "Well, I reckon they know what they're doin', but
I'd hate to take my chances among 'em."

If any man had told Harold before he started that he would grow
irresolute and weak in the presence of the city he would have bitterly
resented it, but now the mass and weight of things hitherto unimagined
appalled and bewildered him.

A profound melancholy settled over his heart as the smoke and gray light
of the metropolis closed in over his head. For half a day he did little
more than wander up and down Clark Street. His ears, acute as a hound's,
took hold of every sound and attempted to identify it, just as his eyes
seized and tried to understand the forms and faces of the swarming
pavements. He felt his weakness as never before and it made him sullen
and irritable. He acknowledged also the folly of thrusting himself into
such a world, and had it not been for a certain tenacity of purpose
which was beyond his will, he would have returned with his companions at
the end of their riotous week.

Up till the day of their going he had made no effort to find Mary but
had merely loitered in the streets in the daytime, and at night had
visited the cheap theaters, not knowing the good from the bad. The city
grew each day more vast and more hateful to him. The mere thought of
being forced to earn a living in such a mad tumult made him shudder. The
day that McCleary started West Harold went to see him off, and after
they had shaken hands for the last time, Harold went to the ticket
window and handed in his return coupon to the agent, saying, "I'd like
to have you put that aside for me; I don't want to run any chances of
losing it."

The agent smiled knowingly. "All right, what name?"

"Excell, 'XL,' that's my brand."

"All right, she's right here any time you want her--inside of the thirty
days--time runs out on the fifteenth."

"I savvy," said Harold as he turned away.

He disposed his money about his person in four or five small wads, and
so fortified, faced the city. To lose his little fund would be like
having his pack mule give out