difficult, that is, to any one not aware of the unusual criterion by which he measured his fellow men. He was himself conscious that he had ceased to "take any stock" in his employer, since the day on which he had discovered that that excellent man of business did not know the Ninth Symphony from Hail Columbia.
Against Fate, on the other hand, Peckham had several grudges. He was inconveniently poor, he was ill, and he was in exile. With so many hard feelings to cherish against his two immediate superiors—namely, Hillerton and Fate—it is no wonder that Peckham had the reputation of being of a morose disposition.
He was perhaps the most solitary man in Springtown. Not only did he live in lodgings, and pick up his meals at cheap restaurants; he had wilfully denied himself the compensations which club life offers. Living, too, in a singularly hospitable community, he never put himself in the way of receiving invitations, and he consequently was allowed to do without them. He did not keep a horse; he thought a lodging-house no place for dogs, and he entertained serious thoughts of shooting his landlady's cat. He had always refrained from burdening himself with correspondents, and
