CHAPTER XXII

It is the prerogative of the dramatist to lower the curtain upon a scene and raise it upon a later one,—of the story-teller to close one chapter and begin another when time has passed. Real life is not so. There is no kind interval of time as the settings of the various experiences shift,—no heart-easing period of days between the chapters of life. Life is Time’s galley-slave, forever shackled to its relentless master. If its hardest blow be dealt at three o’clock, then four o’clock must be met and five and six,—th…