The story winds up where it started, with Weigall's love for Gifford, which sure makes the story interesting to read today, when we like to associate homosociality with homosexuality (and may not be wrong to do so, especially with this story that makes such a to-do over Weigall's affection for Gifford and indifference towards women). There was no face.' You've got to love that jump from Weigall peering into his face to that bald sentence that there's no there there.

wait, what? We get a long sentence of Weigall being nervous and thinking something is wrong, and then, 'But he sprang to the side of the man and bent down and peered into his face.

only when Gifford is rescued, Weigall notices that Gifford has no face!

after the mystery and the flashback, we're back with the mystery, as Weigall wanders the land, comes to a dangerous river, and discovers Gifford's body trying to get out.

and it also raises the question: why do rich gentleman always talk about metaphysics in this sort of story?.after the introduction of the present-day mystery, we get a flashback to their friendship, which emphasizes their talks about metaphysics, about the relationship of body to soul and the relation of soul to self which ends with Gifford noting that he wants to separate from his body and would even do so if he came back to find his body somehow disabled, which pretty much tells you how the story will go.the story makes no bones about how close Weigall is to Gifford, introducing Gifford as 'His intimate friend, the companion of his boyhood, the chum of his college days, his fellow-traveller in many lands, the man for whom he possessed stronger affection than for all men.'.the story begins with a mood and a mystery: Weigall is visiting a friend's country house, but is bored by the usual activities (shooting, talking to boring women)-but he's actually more interested in the mystery of his disappeared schoolboy friend, Wyatt Gifford.It is a bit unfair to judge older works as formulaic since they may actually be part of the original thrust that laid down the formula for later works.

And thank god, too, because while the author and others consider this story to be Atherton's best, I found it a little formulaic, with the one note of weirdness to be more confusing than exciting. The note at the beginning of this story, about the strained friendship between Atherton and Ambrose Bierce, is worth the price of admission (free!). Gertrude Atherton, 'The Striding Place' (1896) from American Fantastic Tales:

Gertrude atherton the striding place