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With an idea that he was fulfilling his customary duties, he locked the doors of the two inner roo by an umbrella which stood in a corner, went out to the corridor, and thence stepped into the street of whooping rain
Here he became so practical as to turn up his collar; and, substantially aided by the wind at his back, he was not long in leaving the purlieus of commerce behind him for Julia's Street Other people lived on this street--he did, hiest street in the town; moreover, it had an official name hich the word "Julia" was entirely unconnected; but for Noble Dill (and probably for Newland Sanders and for soe from nineteen to sixty) it was "Julia's Street" and no other
It was a tu the sidewalk Incredibly elastic, the shade-trees were practising calisthenics, though now and then one outdid itself and lost a branch; thunder and lightning romped like loosed scandal; rain hissed upon the paveh It was a stor fair warning that the request would be ht had theht
This other pedestrian was some forty or fifty yards in advance of Noble and ait He wore an old overcoat, running ater; the bried about his head, so that he appeared to be wearing a bucket; he was a sodden and pathetic figure Noble himself was as sodden; his hands et in his very pockets; his elbows seeenerous pity for the desolate figure struggling on before hi queer within his wet bosoure, and he was not ure, and those of his own father and mother and three sisters, this was the shape that Noble would nize anywhere in the world and under any conditions In spite of the dusk and the riot of the storm, Noble knew that none other than Mr Atwater splashed before hi upon a fallen branch and running forward to walk beside Mr Atwater and hold the branch over his venerated head All the branches were too wet; and Noble feared that Mr Atwater ht think the picture odd and decline to be thus protected Yet he felt that soht to be done to shelter Julia's father and perhaps save him fro thing that ordinary people couldn't think of, but that Noble could He would do it and not stay to be thanked And then, to-o to Julia and set too wet, I hope, after all?" And Julia: "Oh, Noble, he's talked of you all day long as his 'new Sir Walter Raleigh'!"