But such moments are so few; and then there is
the torture of a glorious conception matched, with execution beneath the
standard of the Family Story Paper. For instance, I was happy for two
hours a night or two ago; I lay awake and saw visions. But then the
morning!" "What was your idea?" "It seemed to me a splendid one; I thought of Balzac and the 'Comédie
Humaine,' of Zola and the Rougon-Macquart family. It dawned upon me that
I would write the history of a street. Every house should form a volume. I fixed upon the street, I saw each house, and read, as clearly as in
letters, the physiology and psychology of each. The little by-way
stretched before me in its actual shape,--a street that I know and have
passed down a hundred times; with some twenty houses, prosperous and
mean, and lilac bushes in purple blossom; and yet it was at the same
time a symbol, a _via dolorosa_ of hopes cherished and disappointed, of
years of monotonous existence without content or discontent, of
tragedies and obscure sorrows; and on the door of one of those houses I
saw the red stain of blood, and behind a window two shadows, blackened
and faded, on the blind, as they swayed on tightened cords,--the shadows
of a man and a woman hanging in a vulgar, gas-lit parlor. These were my
fancies; but when pen touched paper, they shrivelled and vanished away,"

"Yes," said. Dyson, "there is a lot in that. I envy you the pains of
transmuting vision into reality, and still more I envy you the day when
you will look at your bookshelf and see twenty goodly books upon the
shelves,--the series complete and done forever. Let me entreat you to
have them bound in solid parchment, with gold lettering. It is the only
real cover for a valiant book. When I look in at the windows of some
choice shop, and see the bindings of Levant morocco, with pretty tools
and panellings, and your sweet contrasts of red and green, I say to
myself, 'These are not books, but bibelots.' A book bound so--a true
book, mind you--is like a Gothic statue draped in brocade of Lyons." "Alas!" said Russell, "we need not discuss the binding,--the books are
not begun." The talk went on as usual till eleven o'clock, when Dyson bade his
friend good-night. He knew the way downstairs, and walked down by
himself; but greatly to his surprise, as he crossed the first-floor
landing, the door opened slightly, and a hand was stretched out,
beckoning. Dyson was not the man to hesitate under such circumstances. In a moment
he saw himself involved in adventure; and, as he told himself, the
Dysons had never disobeyed a lady's summons. Softly, then, with due
regard for the lady's honor, he would have entered the room, when a low
but clear voice spoke to him,--

"Go downstairs and open the door, and shut it again rather loudly. Then
come up to me; and for heaven's sake, walk softly." Dyson obeyed her commands,--not without some hesitation, for he was
afraid of meeting the landlady or the maid on his return journey. But
walking like a cat, and making each step he trod on crack loudly, he
flattered himself that he had escaped observation; and as he gained the
top of the stairs, the door opened wide before him, and he found himself
in the lady's drawing-room, bowing awkwardly. "Pray be seated, sir. Perhaps this chair will be the best; it was the
favored chair of my landlady's deceased husband. I would ask you to
smoke, but the odor would betray me. I know my proceedings must seem to
you unconventional; but I saw you arrive this evening, and I do not
think you would refuse to help a woman who is so unfortunate as I am." Mr. Dyson looked shyly at the young lady before him. She was dressed in
deep mourning; but the piquant smiling face and charming hazel eyes ill
accorded with the heavy garments, and the mouldering surface of the
crape. "Madam," he said gallantly, "your instinct has served you well. We will
not trouble, if you please, about the question of social conventions;
the chivalrous gentleman knows nothing of such matters. I hope I may be
privileged to serve you." "You are very kind to me, but I knew it would be so. Alas, sir, I have
had experience of life, and I am rarely mistaken. Yet man is too often
so vile and so misjudging that I trembled even as I resolved to take
this step, which, for all I knew, might prove to be both desperate and
ruinous." "With me you have nothing to fear," said Dyson. "I was nurtured in the
faith of chivalry, and I have always endeavored to remember the proud
traditions of my race. Confide in me then, and count upon my secrecy,
and, if it prove possible, you may rely on my help." "Sir, I will not waste your time, which I am sure is valuable, by idle
parleyings. Learn, then, that I am a fugitive, and in hiding here. I
place myself in your power; you have but to describe my features, and I
fall into the hands of my relentless enemy." Mr. Dyson wondered for a passing instant how this could be; but he only
renewed his promise of silence, repeating that he would be the embodied
spirit of dark concealment. "Good," said the lady; "the Oriental fervor of your style is delightful. In the first place, I must disabuse your mind of the conviction that I
am a widow. These gloomy vestments have been forced on me by strange
circumstance; in plain language, I have deemed it expedient to go
disguised. You have a friend, I think, in the house,--Mr. Russell? He
seems of a coy and retiring nature." "Excuse me, madam," said Dyson, "he is not coy, but he is a realist; and
perhaps you are aware that no Carthusian monk can emulate the cloistral
seclusion in which a realistic novelist loves to shroud himself. It is
his way of observing human, nature." "Well, well," said the lady; "all this, though deeply interesting is not
germane to our affair. I must tell you my history." With these words the young lady proceeded to relate the




NOVEL OF THE WHITE POWDER. My name is Leicester; my father. Major General Wyn Leicester, a
distinguished officer of artillery, succumbed five years ago to a
complicated liver complaint acquired in the deadly climate of India. A
year later my only brother, Francis, came home after an exceptionally
brilliant career at the University, and settled down with the resolution
of a hermit to master what has been well called the great legend of the
law. He was a man who seemed to live in utter indifference to everything
that is called pleasure; and though he was handsomer than most men, and
could talk as merrily and wittily as if he were a mere vagabond, he
avoided society, and shut himself up in a large room at the top of the
house to make himself a lawyer. Ten hours a day of hard reading was at
first his allotted portion; from the first light in the east to the late
afternoon he remained shut up with his books, taking a hasty half-hour's
lunch with me as if he grudged the wasting of the moments, and going out
for a short walk when it began to grow dusk.