And the man and the maiden passed on down Asylum Avenue.
The Mystic appeared actually to know where he wanted to go. After conducting her to the outskirts he led her upward to the summit of a bluff overlooking the City, the Asylum and the Vanderhook drug store.
Then he became strangely silent. Indeed, he had spoken but once in their long walk, and then only when his companion halted suddenly, dropping a few paces behind him.
“What is it, dear Miss Sheets, art weary?”—he had murmured softly, and he anxiously contemplated her listless expression.
“It’s nothing,” the lady replied, and then she smiled bravely.
But it was something, very unpleasant and very painful. Miss Sheets was breaking in a new pair of boots—an immense feat, as any Chicago girl knows.
It made her very tired.
Finally they reached and paused upon the summit. It was the hour when the sun is apparently sinking. Kankakee lay bathed in that rosy afterglow.
“Is not this inspiring—uplifting? Is not this Realization? Let us VIBRATE.”
His large, round, blue eyes were fixed steadfastly upon nothing. He wore an expression of ineffable self-satisfaction.