"The poet in a golden clime was born,
With golden stars above;
Dowered with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn,
The love of love.
"He saw through life and death, through good and ill,
saw through his own soul."
As Ralph gazed at the handsome face of the unhappy lover, he felt that here was the material for a novelist's pen to frame a most bewitching love-story, and he hoped that some day Hawthorne would confide in him.
Suddenly the young man looked up at him, saying, abruptly:
"Ralph, I want you to take me to the best detective in Chicago to-morrow morning."
"Very well," replied Ralph, going to a table and mixing a sedative that had been used under Doctor Rowe's orders. He presented it to the patient, saying:
"Drink this, or you won't be able to stir to-morrow morning."
Hawthorne complied readily, for he was, indeed, weary of the tumult of his mind and heart.
He closed his eyes wearily, and Ralph dimmed the light and returned to his study, and the last verse of the pretty poem he was composing.
When he had written the last line he heard Hawthorne breathing gently in a saving sleep, and he, too, retired to his bed.