Meeting him has
become a torture. I do my best to avoid him, and frequently succeed. But
often he will catch sight of me across the street and run over and grasp
me by the hand and inquire after my health in so hearty, so honest a
fashion that I cannot bear to look him in the face. And as he beams on
me and throws his arm over my shoulder, I can only blush and shift from
one foot to the other and stammer out some excuse for hurrying away.
Passers-by stop and admire the man's affection and concern for one who
is evidently some poor devil of a relation from the country. One Sunday
he waylaid me on Riverside Drive and introduced me to his wife as one of
his dearest friends. I mumbled something about its not having rained the
entire week, and his wife, who was a stately person in silks, looked at
me out of a cold eye. Then and there I knew she decided that I was a
person who had something to conceal and probably took advantage of her
husband.
No; the more I think of it, the more convinced am I that very few men
pass their time in contemplating death, which is the end of all things.
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