"You have a fine dog here, sir," he said encouragingly.
Without replying, the other turned away and in another moment returned with a chair; whereupon the dog, with slightly waving, feathery tail, transferred his attention to his master.
Caressing the seal-brown head with a gentle hand, and apparently speaking to the soft eyes that looked up at him so understandingly, the man said, "If the human race was fit to associate with such dogs, the world would be a more comfortable place to live in." The deep voice that rumbled up from some unguessed depths of that sunken chest was remarkable in its suggestion of a virile power that the general appearance of the man seemed to deny.

Facing his companion suddenly, he asked with a direct bluntness, "Are you not Aaron King--son of the Aaron King of New England political fame ?" Under the searching gaze of those green-gray eyes, the young man flushed.
"Yes; my father was active in New England politics," he answered simply.
"Did you know him ?" "Very well"-- returned the other--"very well." He repeated the two words with a suggestive emphasis; his eyes--with that curious, baffling, questioning look--still fixed upon his companion's face.
The red in Aaron King's cheeks deepened.
Looking away, the strange man added, with a softer note in his rough voice, "I thought I knew you, when I saw you at the depot.

Your mother and I were boy and girl together.

There is a little of her face in yours.

If you have as much of her character, you are to be congratulated--and--so are the rest of us." The last words were spoken, apparently, to the dog; who, still looking up at him, seemed to express with slow-waving tail, an understanding of thoughts that were only partly put into words.
There was an impersonality in the man's personalities that made it impossible for the subject of his observations to take offense.
Aaron King--when it was evident that the man had no thought of introducing himself--said, with the fine courtesy that seemed always to find expression in his voice and manner, "May I ask your name, sir ?" The other, without turning his eyes from the dog, answered, "Conrad Lagrange." The young man smiled.