Alma Mater with an Apollo-like physique.  At the same time he had developed fine literary tastes, and was well informed, even if he had not gone very deeply into the classics and the sciences that were remote from the business career which he had chosen.  After a brief interval of foreign travel he had entered his brother’s office, and was schooling his buoyant, pleasure-loving temperament to the routine of trade.  When business hours were over, however, Graydon gave himself up to the gratification of his social tastes.  His vitality and flow of spirits were so immense that wherever he went he always caused a breezy ripple of excitement.  Even veteran society girls found something exhilarating in the mirthful flash of his blue eyes, and to be whirled through a waltz on his strong arm was a pleasure not declined by reigning belles.  Many looks that to other men might have been the arrows of Cupid were directed toward him, but they glanced harmlessly from his polished armor.  Society was to him what business was to his brother,—­an arena in which he easily manifested his power.  At the same time he was a manly fellow, and had no taste for corner flirtations or the excitement of drawing perilously near to a committal with those who would have responded to marked attentions.  The atmosphere he loved was that of general and social gayety.  The girls that he singled out for his especial regard were noted for their vivacity and intelligence, as well as their beauty.  Meanwhile he had won a reputation for his good-natured attentions to “wall-flowers.”  Such kindly efforts were rarely made at the promptings of conscience.  The truth was, he enjoyed life so fully himself that he disliked to see any one having a dismal time.  It gave him genuine pleasure to come to a plain-featured, neglected damsel, and set all her blood tingling by a brief whirl in a dance or a breezy chat that did her good, body and soul, so devoid of satire or patronage was the attention.  His superb health and tireless strength, his perfect familiarity with the usages of society, and his graceful decision of action made everything he did appear as easy and natural as the beat of a bird’s wing upon the air, and in his large circle it was felt that no entertainment was complete without his presence.

Graydon was still attending college when Madge Alden first became associated with him in her home-life.  She was then but thirteen, and was small and slight for her age.  The first evening when she came down to dinner, shrinking in the shadow of her sister, lingered ever in her memory.  Even now it gave her pain to recall her embarrassment when she was compelled to take her seat in the full blaze of the light and meet the eyes of the one to whom she felt that she must appear so very plain and unattractive.  Clad in the deepest mourning, pallid from grief and watching at her mother’s bedside, coming from a life of seclusion and sorrow, sensitive in the extreme, she had barely reached that age when awkwardness is in