“Hollins stared at the speaker in utter amazement.  Shelldrake gave a long whistle, and finally gasped out,—­

“‘Well, what next?’

“None of us were prepared for such a sudden and complete wreck of our Arcadian scheme.  The foundations had been sapped before, it is true; but we had not perceived it; and now, in two short days, the whole edifice tumbled about our ears.  Though it was inevitable, we felt a shock of sorrow, and a silence fell upon us.  Only that scamp of a Perkins Brown, chuckling and rubbing his boot, really rejoiced.  I could have kicked him.

“We all went to bed, feeling that the charm of our Arcadian life was over.  I was so full of the new happiness of love that I was scarcely conscious of regret.  I seemed to have leaped at once into responsible manhood, and a glad rush of courage filled me at the knowledge that my own heart was a better oracle than those—­now so shamefully overthrown—­ on whom I had so long implicitly relied.  In the first revulsion of feeling, I was perhaps unjust to my associates.  I see now, more clearly, the causes of those vagaries, which originated in a genuine aspiration, and failed from an ignorance of the true nature of Man, quite as much as from the egotism of the individuals.  Other attempts at reorganizing Society were made about the same time by men of culture and experience, but in the A.C. we had neither.  Our leaders had caught a few half-truths, which, in their minds, were speedily warped into errors.  I can laugh over the absurdities I helped to perpetrate, but I must confess that the experiences of those few weeks went far towards making a man of me.”

“Did the A.C. break up at once?” asked Mr. Johnson.

“Not precisely; though Eunice and I left the house within two days, as we had agreed.  We were not married immediately, however.  Three long years—­years of hope and mutual encouragement—­passed away before that happy consummation.  Before our departure, Hollins had fallen into his old manner, convinced, apparently, that Candor must be postponed to a better age of the world.  But the quarrel rankled in Shelldrake’s mind, and especially in that of his wife.  I could see by her looks and little fidgety ways that his further stay would be very uncomfortable.  Abel Mallory, finding himself gaining in weight and improving in color, had no thought of returning.  The day previous, as I afterwards learned, he had discovered Perkins Brown’s secret kitchen in the woods.

“‘Golly!’ said that youth, in describing the circumstance to me, ’I had to ketch two porgies that day.’

“Miss Ringtop, who must have suspected the new relation between Eunice and myself, was for the most part rigidly silent.  If she quoted, it was from the darkest and dreariest utterances of her favorite Gamaliel.