it. When he came to think of it, Mr. Lancaster came nearer possessing
what others strove for than any one else he knew. Yet, Youth looks on
Youth as peculiarly its own, and Keith found it hard to look on Alice
Yorke's marriage as anything but a sale.

"They talk about the sin of selling negroes," he said; "that is as very
a sale as ever took place at a slave-auction."

For a time he plunged into the gayest life that Gumbolt offered. He even
began to visit Terpsichore. But this was not for long. Mr. Plume's
congratulations were too distasteful to him for him to stomach them; and
Terpy began to show her partiality too plainly for him to take advantage
of it. Besides, after all, though Alice Yorke had failed him, it was
treason to the ideal he had so long carried in his heart. This still
remained to him.

He went back to his work, resolved to tear from his heart all memory of
Alice Yorke. She was married and forever beyond his dreams. If he had
worked before with enthusiasm, he now worked with fury. Mr. Lancaster,
as wealthy as he was, as completely equipped with all that success could
give, lacked one thing that Keith possessed: he lacked the promise of
the Future. Keith would show these Yorkes who he was.



CHAPTER XVI

KEITH VISITS NEW YORK, AND MRS. LANCASTER SEES A GHOST

For the next year or two the tide set in very strong toward the