My fears for the driver were dissipated with the rising moon.  A familiar sound had assured me of his presence in the full possession of at least one of his most important functions.  Frequent and full expectoration convinced me that his lips were as yet not sealed by the gag of highwaymen, and soothed my anxious ear.  With this load lifted from my mind, and assisted by the mild presence of Diana, who left, as when she visited Endymion, much of her splendor outside my cavern—­I looked around the empty vehicle.  On the forward seat lay a woman’s hairpin.  I picked it up with an interest that, however, soon abated.  There was no scent of the roses to cling to it still, not even of hair oil.  No bend or twist in its rigid angles betrayed any trait of its wearer’s character.  I tried to think that it might have been “Mariar’s.”  I tried to imagine that, confining the symmetrical curls of that girl, it might have heard the soft compliments whispered in her ears which provoked the wrath of the aged female.  But in vain.  It was reticent and unswerving in its upright fidelity, and at last slipped listlessly through my fingers.

I had dozed repeatedly—­waked on the threshold of oblivion by contact with some of the angles of the coach, and feeling that I was unconsciously assuming, in imitation of a humble insect of my childish recollection, that spherical shape which could best resist those impressions, when I perceived that the moon, riding high in the heavens, had begun to separate the formless masses of the shadowy landscape.  Trees isolated, in clumps and assemblages, changed places before my window.  The sharp outlines of the distant hills came back, as in daylight, but little softened in the dry, cold, dewless air of a California summer night.  I was wondering how late it was, and thinking that if the horses of the night traveled as slowly as the team before us, Faustus might have been spared his agonizing prayer, when a sudden spasm of activity attacked my driver.  A succession of whip-snappings, like a pack of Chinese crackers, broke from the box before me.  The stage leaped forward, and when I could pick myself from under the seat, a long white building had in some mysterious way rolled before my window.  It must be Slumgullion!  As I descended from the stage I addressed the driver: 

“I thought you changed horses on the road?”

“So we did.  Two hours ago.”

“That’s odd.  I didn’t notice it.”

“Must have been asleep, sir.  Hope you had a pleasant nap.  Bully place for a nice quiet snooze—­empty stage, sir!”

THE MAN OF NO ACCOUNT