get rested up."
"Rested up!" He stretched forth his arm and then doubled it back, and they both laughed. "That's a joke—my getting rested up. Why I feel like a fighting cock!"
"And crazy to get to work?"
"Getting that way. Oh, I tell you, Ernestine, there's nothing like it."
Again she did not mind; she understood. She looked at his glowing face, all alight with enthusiasm for the work to which he was going back. She was never tired of thinking how Karl's face was just what Karl's face should be—reflective of a clear-cut, far-seeing, deeply comprehending mind. It seemed all written there—all those things of mind and character, and something too of those other things—the things which were for her alone. Ernestine held that one could tell by looking at Karl that he was doing some great thing.
"But see here, Dr. Hubers, a nice way you have of shirking your domestic duties! Who is going to help me settle this famous house Georgia tells about?"
"I'll do it at night," he protested eagerly. "I'll work every night until the house is spick and span."
Ernestine sighed. "I have a sad feeling that our house never will be spick and span. But we'll have some fun,"—eagerly—"fixing it up."
"Of course we'll have fun fixing it up! Georgia's sure to be on hand, and
I'll make old Parkman get busy too—do him good."
"I don't care about knowing a lot of men—"
"Well I should hope not"
"You didn't let me finish. I was going to say that Dr. Parkman is one man
I do want to know."
"You'll like Parkman; and he'll like you. By Jove, he's got to! You mustn't mind if he snaps your head off occasionally. His life's made him savage, but even his life—he's had an awful one, Ernestine—couldn't make him vicious. He's the gruffest, snarliest, biggest man I ever knew—meaner than the devil, and the best friend on top of earth. And Lord, how he works! I don't know any other three men could swing the same load. And I tell you, Ernestine, he's great. There's not a better surgeon in all Europe. Parkman's a tremendous help to me. Oh, it's going to be great to get back!"
"We have some really nice things for our house," mused Ernestine. "I'm glad we decided to take that rug for the library. Of course it seemed pretty high, but a library without a nice rug wouldn't do at all—not for us."
"No—that's right—library without a rug—now I wonder if I am to have my old eight o'clock lecture hour? I want that hour! I want to get all the school business out of the way in the morning. I must have plenty of uninterrupted time for myself. I tell you what it is, Ernestine, I'm going to get it! What I saw over there of the other fellows makes me all the more sure of myself. And coming back now after being made all over new—you see there's such a thing as inspiration in my work, just as there is in yours. Of course it's work—work—work, work your way through this and that, but there's something or other that leads you on—and I know I'm going to do something now!"
"I know it too, Karl," she responded, and the steadfastness shone strong through the tenderness now. "We all know it."
"I've got to," he murmured—"got to." And then his whole mind seized upon it; some suggestion had come to him, some of that inspiration of which he had spoken. He sat there looking straight ahead, brows drawn, eyes sometimes half closing, occasionally nodding his head as he saw a point more clearly. He looked in such moments as though indeed made for conquest—indomitable. One could almost feel his mind at work, could fancy the skillful cutting away of error, the inevitable working ahead to truth.
At last he turned to her. "There's no reason for not beginning to-morrow," he said, with the eagerness of a boy who would try a new gun or fishing rod. "There are a whole lot of things I want to get right at now."
CHAPTER VI
"GLORIA VICTIS"
"We'll just put our Russian friend back here in the corner, where the shelf suppresses him," said Georgia, who seemed to have accepted the self-appointed position of head cataloguer. "Some of the students might happen to call."
"This," said Dr. Parkman, who was dusting Gibbon's Rome, "is the sort of thing that is called the backbone of a library."
"Consequently," replied Georgia glibly, "we will put it up here on the top shelf. Nobody wants a library's backbone. It's to be had, not read. Now the trimmings, like our friend Mr. Shaw here, must be given places of accessibility."
The host was picking his way around among the contents of a box which he had just emptied upon the floor. The hostess was yielding to the temptation of an interesting bit which had caught her eye in dusting "An Attic Philosopher in Paris."
"Now here," said Dr. Hubers, picking up a thick, green book, "is Walt Whitman and that means trouble. No one is going to know whether he is prose or poetry."
"When art weds science," observed Georgia, "the resulting library is difficult to manage. Mr. Haeckel and Mr. Maeterlinck may not like being bumped up here together."
"Then put Haeckel somewhere else," said Ernestine, looking up from her book.
"No, fire Maeterlinck," commanded Karl.
"See," said Georgia—"it's begun. Strife and dissension have set in."
"I'm neither a literary man nor a librarian," ventured Dr. Parkman, "but it seems a slight oversight to complete the list of poets and leave Shakespeare lying out there on the floor."
"Got my Goethe in?" asked Karl, after Shakespeare had been left immersed in Georgia's vituperations.
"I think Browning and Keats are over there under the Encyclopedia Britannica," said Ernestine, roused to the necessity of securing a favourable position for her friends.
"Observe," said Georgia, "how they have begun insisting on their favourite authors. This is one of the early stages."
Ernestine, looking over their shoulders, made some critical remark about the place accorded Balzac's letters to Madam Hanska, which caused Georgia to retort that perhaps it would be better if people arranged their own libraries, and then they could put things where they wanted them. Then after she had given a resting place to what she denounced as some very disreputable French novels, she leaned against the shelves and declared it was time to rest.
"This function," she began, "will make a nice little item for our society girl. Usually she disdains people who do not live on the Lake Shore Drive, but she will have to admit there is snap in this 'Dr. and Mrs. Karl Ludwig Hubers,'"—pounding it out on a copy of Walden as typewriter—"' but newly returned from foreign shores, entertained last night at a book dusting party. Those present were Dr. Murray Parkman, eminent surgeon, and Miss Georgia McCormick, well and unfavourably known in some parts of the city. Rug beating and other athletic games were indulged in. The hostess wore a beautifully ruffled apron of white and kindly presented her guest with a kitchen apron of blue. Beer was served freely
