The Shape of Fear

TIM O'CONNOR—who was descended from theO'Conors with one N—— started life as a poet and anenthusiast. His mother had designed him for thepriesthood, and at the age of fifteen, most of his verseshad an ecclesiastical tinge, but, somehow or other, he gotinto the newspaper business instead, and became apessimistic gentleman, with a literary style of great beautyand an income of modest proportions. He fell in with menwho talked of art for art's sake,—though what right theyhad to speak of art at all nobody knew,—and little by littlehis view of life and love became more or less profane. Hemet a woman who sucked his heart's blood, and he knewit and made no protest; nay, to the great amusement ofthe fellows who talked of art for art's sake, he went thelength of marrying her. He could not in decency explainthat he had the traditions of fine gentlemen behind himand so had to do as he did, because his friends might nothave understood. He laughed at the days when he hadthought of the priesthood, blushed when he ran acrossany of those tender and exquisite old verses he hadwritten in his youth, and became addicted to absinthe andother less peculiar drinks, and to gaming a little to escapea madness of ennui.