One Day

and richer blue; the flowers reached a higher state of fragrant and rainbow-hued perfection; the sun shining through the green of the trees was tempered

his youth when the wandering spirit had filled his soul, when the love of adventure had lent wings to his feet, and the glory of romance had lured h

an unusual distinction-even in that land of distinguished men. His companion was a boy of twenty, straight and tall and proud, carrying himself with the regal grace of a Greek god. He was a strong, handsome, healthy, well-built, and well-instructed boy, a boy at whom any one who looked once would be sure to look the second time, even thou

f the man-not an accent, nor yet an inflection, but still a quality that lent a subtle suggestion of foreign shores. It was an expressive voice, neither languorous n

r import. Paul Verdayne-the man -realized this to the full. His companion-the Boy-was dimly but just as acute

s something of a secret, but I know no more! We are closer comrades, it seems to me-you and I-than any others in all the world. We always understand each other, somehow, almost without word

ertainly expected? He paced up and down under the tall trees of the park and for a time did not answer. Then he paused and laid his

could never, never do that! You

as if to speak, but th

to me as you. Men don't usually talk about these things to one another, you know, Boy; but, though I am a bachelor, you see, I feel toward you as

h the shade of a giant oak. The Boy looked at him wit

l! But that time has not yet come, and for the present it is best that

on's feet. "I have never learned the word! Could you be patient, Uncle Paul, when youth was all o

y as his strong fingers str

n faculty of your being that all of us that love you may have the happiness of seeing you perform wisely and well the mission upon which you have been sent to this kingdom of yours to accomplish. Boy! every true man is a king in

ht young sapling, who was only the "Boy" to Paul Verdayne, was to the world at large

now and then and be the real live boy he was at heart. He did enjoy to the full h

ed scornfully. "Bah!-what is tha

leting part somewhere, given its place in the scheme of the universe by intricate design-always by

might have been born a prince

that is yours! My Boy, yours is a mission, a responsibility, from the Creator of Life Himself. Everybody can follow-but

wistfully upward into th

Now you, yourself the most reserved and secretive of individuals when it pleases you to be so, have just been surprised into something of the same expression. Do you wonder that I long to unravel the mystery that you are all so determined to keep from me? I can learn nothing at home-absolutely

e king, Boy!-nev

must ha

t I can tell you-a

acing back and forth under the trees, as was

other-you

I knew you

me abo

again! Every life has this garden to pass through-some, alas! again and yet again! And Paul Verd

on's quick ear did not fail to catch. "But you must be patient if you wish to hear what little there is, after all, that I

ber," the Boy

dayne did not forget! And somehow the older man felt confident that the Boy knew, and was stra

are very like her, Paul-not in appearance, a mistake of Fate to be everlastingly deplored, but in spirit you are her living counterp

ds of the man who had known his mother, hanging upon the stor

absorb during their allotted three score and ten. And her knowledge was not of the world alone, but of the heart. She was full of ideals of advancement, of growth, of doing and being something worthy the greatest endeavor, exe

always

Only for thre

should have learned so much about her in that short space of

at I have done or ever expect to accomplish-I owe to your mother. She was the one inspiration of my life. Until

of years still shrouded those mysterious three weeks, and the time had not yet come when that silence could be br

you meet

Luce

surd, of course-I suppose I could not possibly remember her-and yet there is such a haunting, vague sense of close-clinging arms, of an intensely white and tender face bending over me-sometimes in the radiance of day and again i

me from them to voice the passionate c

would not part with it for the world. Uncle, do you know, I can never look upon the pictured face of a M

owing harder and har

r! Her deepest desires centred about her son. You were the embodiment of the greatest, sweetest joys-if not the only real joys-of her strangely unhappy life, and her whole thought, her one hope, was fo

, Uncle Paul? Am I

ruth and power and grandeur of overmastering love. You believe in the past, in all the dreams and legends of the Long Ago still relived in the Now, in the capabilities of the human mind, the kingship of the soul. Your voice is hers, every tone and cad

thoughts, Uncle Paul. Yo

oul into being. You have always been alive to the joy of the world and the beauty of living. Your soul was born with your body and

h his own thoughts. The older Paul was lost in memories of the past, for his life lay all behind him-

out personal affairs, had at last reconciled themselves to never finding out. Everyone suspected that the Boy was a scion of rank-and some went so far as to say of royalty, but beyond the fact that every May he came with his faithful, foreign-looking attendant to Verdayne Place and spent the summer months with the Verdayne family,

ir young guest, and made much of his annual visits. As for Paul himself, he never

n of brain as well as brawn. People were glad to listen when he talked. He inspired them with the idea-so nearly extinct in this day and age of the world-that life after all was very much worth the living. He stirred languid pulses with a dormant enthusiasm. He roused torpid brains to thought. He had ideas

of disappointment to certain younger feminine hearts as well, who in the days of his youth, and even in the ripeness of later years, had regarded Paul Verdayne with eyes that found him good to look upon. But the young politician had never been a woman's man. He was chivalrous, of course, as all well-bred Englishmen are, but he kept himself

der, he had learned to hunt and took long rides with his then youthful host across the wide stretch of English country that made up the Verdayne estates and those of the neighboring gentry. Often they cruised about in distant waters, for the young fellow from his earliest years shared with the elder an absorbing love of nature in all her varied and glorious forms; and in February, always in February, Verdayne found time to steal away from England for a brie

still less. There was too strong a bond of camaraderie between them to be dist

as now twenty

lenska broke the

e in his life-something to make strong men shrink and shudder at the thought-something-criminal! Oh, I dare n

whisper and there was a n

ine! Why isn't his name heralded over the length and breadth of the kingdom in paeans of praise? Why isn't the whole wo

ontrol, forcing the hideous idea from him and at las

nd the wisdom of the ancient seers, that I may make up by my efficiency for all my father's

Verdayne, looking up at him, realized as he had never before that the

to justify the high hopes cherished for him so long.

y and more fortunate mortals! I know I shouldn' be complaining like this-certainly not to you, Uncle Paul, who have been all most fathers are to most boys! But there are times, you know, when you persist in keeping me at arm's length as you keep everyone else! When you put up that sign, 'Thus far and no further!' I feel myself almost a stranger! Won't you let me co

ed heart, chilling, paralyzing its every beat. What did he mean? The Boy was just then looking thoughtfully at the setting s

t all right, surely! You will let me, won't you? In all the world there is no one so close to me as you, and such dreams as I may happily bring to fulfillment will be, more than you kn

ung shoulders, and gazing far off to the distant west, felt himself shaken by

new radiance upon the faces of the two men who sat in the silent shadows of the park, feeling themselves drawn more closely together

lay, but neither was much interested in the performance. Something had kindled in the heart of th

ch I am beginning to doubt-so I should be disenchanted if I were to see her, I suppose. But I'd like to know!" Yet, after all, he could not comprehend how such a voice could accompany an unattractive face. The spirit that anima

age, his blood mounted to his face, dyeing it crimson. In the sudden silence th

n away from the curb, but it was unmistakably the voice. Had the Boy been alo

onlit revels of Far Away! It was the note of a siren's song, calling, calling the hearts and souls of

lips, but Verdane had noticed n

the way to Berkeley Square and lured him on