Over his breakfast he planned his embassy to Miss Bretherton.

The best time to find her alone, he imagined, would be about mid-day, and in the interval he would put his books and papers to rights.

They lay scattered about--books, proofs, and manuscript.

As his orderly hands went to work upon them, he was conscious that he had never been so remote from all that they represented.

But his nature was faithful and tenacious, and under the outward sense of detachment there was an inward promise of return.