A few days later, Mr. Farnham attended a meeting of the library board,
and presented the name of Miss Matchin as a candidate for a subordinate
place in the library. There were several such positions, requiring no
special education or training, the duties of which could be as well
filled by Miss Maud as by any one else. She had sent several strong
letters of recommendation to the board, from prominent citizens who
knew and respected her father, for when Maud informed him of her new
ambition, Matchin entered heartily into the affair, and bestirred
himself to use what credit he had in the ward to assist her.
Maud had not exaggerated the effect of her blandishments upon Dr.
Buchlieber. The old gentleman spoke in her favor with great fluency;
"she was young, healthy, active, intelligent, a graduate of the high
school."
"And very pretty, is she not?" asked a member of the board,
maliciously.
The Doctor colored, but was not abashed. He gazed steadily at the
interrupter through his round glasses, and said:
"Yes, she is very fine looking--but I do not see that that should stand
in her way."
Not another word was said against her, and a ballot was taken to decide
the question. There were five members of the board, three besides
Farnham and Buchlieber. Maud had two votes, and a young woman whose
name had not been mentioned received the other three. Buchlieber
counted the ballots, and announced the vote. Farnham flushed with
anger. Not only had no attention been paid to his recommendation, but
he had not even been informed that there was another candidate. In a
few sarcastic words he referred to the furtive understanding existing
among the majority, and apologized for having made such a mistake as to
suppose they cared to hear the merits of appointees discussed.
The three colleagues sat silent. At last, one of them crossed his legs
anew and said:
"I'm sure nobody meant any offence. We agreed on this lady several days
ago. I know nothing about her, but her father used to be one of our
best workers in the seventh ward. He is in the penitentiary now, and
the family is about down to bedrock. The reason we didn't take part in
the discussion was we wanted to avoid hard feelings."
The other two crossed their legs the other way, and said they
"concurred."
Their immovable phlegm, their long, expressionless faces, the dull,
monotonous twang of their voices, the oscillation of the three large
feet hung over the bony knees had now, as often before, a singular
effect upon Farnham's irritation. He felt he could not irritate them in
return; they could not appreciate his motives, and thought too little
of his opinion to be angry at his contempt. He was thrown back upon
himself now as before. It was purely a matter of conscience whether he
should stay and do what good he could, or resign and shake the dust of
the city hall from his feet. Whatever he recommended in regard to the
administration of the library was always adopted without comment; but,
whenever a question of the sort which the three politicians called
"practical" arose, involving personal patronage in any form, they
always arranged it for themselves, without even pretending to ask his
or Buchlieber's opinion.
The very fact of his holding the position of chairman of the board was
wounding to his self-love, as soon as he began to appreciate the
purpose with which the place had been given him. He and some of his
friends had attempted a movement the year before, to rescue the city
from the control of what they considered a corrupt combination of
politicians. They had begun, as such men always do, too late, and
without any adequate organization, and the regular workers had beaten
them with ridiculous ease. In Farnham's own ward, where he possessed
two thirds of the real estate, the candidates favored by him and his
friends received not quite one tenth of the votes cast. The loader of
the opposing forces was a butcher, one Jacob Metzger, who had managed
the politics of the ward for years. He was not a bad man so far as his
lights extended. He sold meat on business principles, so as to get the
most out of a carcass; and he conducted his political operations in the
same way. He made his bargains with aspirants and office-holders, and
kept them religiously. He had been a little alarmed at the sudden
irruption of such men as Farnham and his associates into the field of
ward politics; he dreaded the combined effect of their money and their
influence. But he soon found he had nothing to fear--they would not use
their money, and they did not know how to use their influence. They
hired halls, opened committee-rooms, made speeches, and thundered
against municipal iniquities in the daily press; but Jacob Metzger,
when he discovered that this was all, possessed his soul in peace, and
even got a good deal of quiet fun out of the canvass. He did not take
the trouble to be angry at the men who were denouncing him, and
supplied Farnham with beefsteaks unusually tender and juicy, while the
young reformer was seeking his political life.
"Lord love you," he said to Budsey, as he handed him a delicious
rib-roast the day before election. "There's nothing I like so much as
to see young men o' property go into politics. We need 'em. Of course,
I wisht the Cap'n was on my side; but anyhow, I'm glad to see him
takin' an interest."
He knew well enough the way the votes would run; that every grog-shop
in the ward was his recruiting station; that all Farnham's tenants
would vote against their landlord; that even the respectable Budsey and
the prim Scotch gardener were sure for him against their employer.
Farnham's conscience which had roused him to this effort against
Metzger's corrupt rule, would not permit him to ask for the votes of
his own servants and tenants, and he would have regarded it as simply
infamous to spend money to secure the floating crowd of publicans and
sinners who formed the strength of Jacob.
His failure was so complete and unexpected that there seemed to him
something of degradation in it, and in a fit of uncontrollable disgust
he sailed for Europe the week afterward. Metzger took his victory
good-naturedly as a matter of course, and gave his explanation of it
to a reporter of the "Bale-Fire" who called to interview him.
"Mr. Farnham, who led the opposition to our organize-ation, is a young
gen'l'man of fine talents and high character. I ain't got a word to say
against him. The only trouble is, he lacks practical experience, and he
ain't got no pers'nal magn'tism. Now I'm one of the people, I know what
they want, and on that line I carried the ward against a combine-ation
of all the wealth and aristocracy of Algonkin Av'noo."
Jacob's magnanimity did not rest with merely a verbal acknowledgment of
Farnham's merits. While he was abroad some of the city departments were
reorganized, and Farnham on his return found himself, through Metzger's
intervention, chairman of the library board. With characteristic
sagacity the butcher kept himself in the background, and the committee
who waited upon Farnham to ask him to accept the appointment placed it
entirely upon considerations of the public good. His sensitive
conscience would not permit him to refuse a duty thus imposed, and so
with many inward qualms he assumed a chair in the vile municipal
government he had so signally failed to overthrow. He had not long
occupied it, when he saw to what his selection was attributable. He was
a figure-head and he knew it, but he saw no decent escape from the
position. As long as they allowed him and the librarian (who was also a
member of the board) to regulate the library to their liking, he could
not inquire into their motives or decline association with them. He was
perfectly free to furnish what mental food he chose to two hundred
thousand people, and he felt it would be cowardice to surrender that
important duty on any pitiful question of patronage or personal
susceptibility.
So once more he stifled the impulse to resign his post, and the meeting
adjourned without further incident. As he walked home, he was conscious
of a disagreeable foreboding of something in the future which he would
like to avoid. Bringing his mind to bear upon it, it resolved itself
into nothing more formidable than the coming interview with Miss
Matchin. It would certainly be unpleasant to tell her that her hopes
were frustrated, when she had seemed so confident. At this thought, he
felt the awakening of a sense of protectorship; she had trusted in him;
he ought to do something for her, if for nothing else, to show that he
was not dependent upon those ostrogoths. But what could be done for
such a girl, so pretty, so uncultivated, so vulgarly fantastic? Above
all, what could be done for her by a young and unmarried man?
Providence and society have made it very hard for single men to show
kindness to single women in any way but one.
At his door he found Sam Sleeny with a kit of tools; he had just rung
the bell. He turned, as Farnham mounted the steps, and said:
"I come from Matchin's--something about the greenhouse."
"Yes," answered Farnham. "The gardener is over yonder at the corner of
the lawn. He will tell you what is to be done."
Sam walked away in the direction indicated, and Farnham went into the
house. Some letters were lying on the table in the library. He had just
begun to read them when Budsey entered and announced:
"That young person."
Maud came in flushed with the fresh air and rapid walking. Farnham saw
that she wore no glasses, and she gained more by that fact in his
good-will than even by the brilliancy of her fine eyes which seemed to
exult in their liberation. She began with nervous haste:
"I knew you had a meeting to-day, and I could not wait. I might as well
own up that I followed you home."
Farnham handed her a chair and took her hand with a kindly earnestness,
saying,
"I am very glad to see you."
"Yes, yes," she continued; "but have you any good news for me?"
The anxious eagerness which spoke in her sparkling eyes and open lips
touched Farnham to the heart. "I am sorry I have not. The board
appointed another person."
The tears sprang to her eyes.
"I really expected it. I hoped you would interest yourself."
"I did all I possibly could," said Farnham. "I have never tried so hard
for anybody before, but a majority were already pledged to the other
applicant."
She seemed so dejected and hopeless that Farnham, forgetting for a
moment how hard it is for a young man to assist a young woman, said two
or three fatal words, "We must try something else."
The pronoun sounded ominous to him as soon as he had uttered it. But it
acted like magic upon Maud. She lifted a bright glance through her
tears and said, like a happy child to whom a new game has been
proposed, "What shall we try?"
Simple as the words were, both of them seemed to feel that a certain
relation--a certain responsibility--had been established between them.
The thought exhilarated Maud; it seemed the beginning of her
long-expected romance; while the glow of kind feeling about the heart
of Farnham could not keep him from suspecting that he was taking a
very imprudent step. But they sat a good while, discussing various
plans for Maud's advantage, and arriving at nothing definite; for her
own ideas were based upon a dime-novel theory of the world, and
Farnham at last concluded that he would be forced finally to choose
some way of life for his protegee, and then persuade her to accept it.
He grew silent and thoughtful with this reflection, and the
conversation languished. He was trying to think how he could help her
without these continued interviews at his house, when she disposed of
the difficulty by rising briskly and saying, "Well, I will call again
in a day or two, about this hour?"
"Yes, if it suits you best," he answered, with a troubled brow. He
followed her to the door. As she went out, she said, "May I pick a
flower as I go?"
He seized his hat, and said, "Come with me to the rose-house in the
garden, and you shall have something better."
They walked together down the gravel paths, through the neat and
well-kept garden, where the warm spring sunshine was calling life out
of the tender turf, and the air was full of delicate odors. She seemed
as gay and happy as a child on a holiday. Her disappointment of an hour
ago was all gone in the feeling that Arthur was interested in her, was
caring for her future. Without any definite hopes or dreams, she felt
as if the world was suddenly grown richer and wider. Something good was
coming to her certainly, something good had come; for was she not
walking in this lovely garden with its handsome proprietor, who was,
she even began to think, her friend? The turf was as soft, the air as
mild, the sun as bright as in any of her romances, and the figure of
Farnham's wealth which she had heard from her father rang musically in
her mind.
They went into the rose-house, and he gave her two or three splendid
satiny Marechal Niels, and then a Jacqueminot, so big, so rich and
lustrous in its dark beauty, that she could not help crying out with
delight. He was pleased with her joy, and gave her another, "for your
hair," he said. She colored with pleasure till her cheek was like the
royal flower. "Hallo!" thought Farnham to himself, "she does not take
these things as a matter of course." When they came into the garden
again, he made the suggestion which had been in his mind for the last
half hour.
"If you are going home, the nearest way will be by the garden gate into
Bishop's Lane. It is only a minute from there to Dean Street."
"Why, that would be perfectly lovely. But where is the gate?"
"I will show you." They walked together to the lower end of the lawn,
where a long line of glass houses built against the high wall which
separated the garden from the street called Bishop's Lane, sheltered
the grapes and the pine-apples. At the end of this conservatory, in the
wall, was a little door of thin but strong steel plates, concealed from
sight by a row of pear trees. Farnham opened it, and said, "If you
like, you can come in by this way. It is never locked in the daytime.
It will save you a long walk."
"Thanks," she replied. "That will be perfectly lovely."
Her resources of expression were not copious, but her eyes and her
mouth spoke volumes of joy and gratitude. Her hands were full of roses,
and as she raised her beautiful face to him with pleasure flashing from
her warm cheeks and lips and eyes, she seemed to exhale something of
the vigorous life and impulse of the spring sunshine. Farnham felt that
he had nothing to do but stoop and kiss the blooming flower-like face,
and in her exalted condition she would have thought little more of it
than a blush-rose thinks of the same treatment.
But he refrained, and said "Good morning," because she seemed in no
mood to say it first.
"Good-by, for a day or two," she said, gayly, as she bent her head to
pass under the low lintel of the gate.
Farnham walked back to the house not at all satisfied with himself. "I
wonder whether I have mended matters? She is certainly too pretty a
girl to be running in and out of my front door in the sight of all the
avenue. How much better will it be for her to use the private entrance,
and come and go by a sort of stealth! But then she does not regard it
that way. She is so ignorant of this wicked world that it seems to her
merely a saving of ten minutes' walk around the block. Well! all there
is of it, I must find a place for her before she domesticates herself
here."
The thought of what should be done with her remained persistently with
him and kept him irritated by the vision of her provoking and useless
beauty. "If she were a princess," he thought, "all the poets would be
twanging their lyres about her, all the artists would be dying to paint
her; she would have songs made to her, and sacred oratorios given under
her patronage. She would preside at church fairs and open the dance at
charity balls. If I could start her in life as a princess, the thing
would go on wheels. But to earn her own living--that is a trade of
another complexion. She has not breeding or education enough for a
governess: she is not clever enough to write or paint; she is not
steady enough, to keep accounts,--by the Great Jornada! I have a
grievous contract on my hands."
He heard the sound of hoofs outside his window, and, looking out, saw
his groom holding a young brown horse by the bridle, the well-groomed
coat of the animal shining in the warm sunlight. In a few moments
Farnham was in the saddle and away. For awhile he left his perplexities
behind, in the pleasure of rapid motion and fresh air. But he drew rein
half an hour afterward at Acland Falls, and the care that had sat on
the crupper came to the front again. "As a last resort," he said, "I
can persuade her she has a voice, and send her to Italy, and keep her
the rest of her life cultivating it in Milan."
All unconscious of the anxiety she was occasioning, Maud walked home
with her feet scarcely aware of the pavement. She felt happy through
and through. There was little thought, and we may say little
selfishness in the vague joy that filled her. The flowers she held in
her hands recalled the faint odors she had inhaled in Farnham's house;
they seemed to her a concrete idea of luxury. Her mind was crowded and
warmed with every detail of her visit: the dim, wide hall; the white
cravat of Budsey; the glimpse she caught of the dining-room through the
open door; the shimmer of cut glass and porcelain; the rich softness of
the carpets and rugs, the firelight dancing on the polished brass, the
tender glow of light and repose of shadow on the painted walls and
ceilings; the walk in the trim garden, amid the light and fragrance of
the spring; the hot air of the rose-house, which held her close, and
made her feel faint and flushed, like a warm embrace; and through all
the ever-present image of the young man, with his pleasant,
unembarrassed smile, the white teeth shining under the dark mustache;
the eyes that seemed to see through her, and yet told her nothing; and
more than all this to poor Maud, the perfect fit and fashion of his
clothes, filled her with a joyous trouble. She could not dwell upon her
plans for employment. She felt as if she had found her mission, her
true trade,--which was to walk in gardens and smell hot-house roses.
The perplexities which filled Farnham's head as to what he should do
with her found no counterpart in hers. She had stopped thinking and
planning; things were going very well with her as it was. She had lost
the place she had wished and expected, and yet this was the pleasantest
day of her life. Her responsibility seemed shifted to stronger hands.
It had become Farnham's business to find something nice for her: this
would be easy for him; he belonged to the class to whom everything is
easy. She did not even trouble herself to think what it would be as she
loitered home in the sunshine. She saw her father and informed him in a
few words of her failure; then went to her room and sat down by her
window, and looked for hours at the sparkling lake.
She was called to supper in the midst of her reverie. She was just
saying to herself, "If there was just one man and one woman in the
world, and I had the picking out of the man and the woman, this world
would suit me pretty well." She resented being called into other
society than that of her idle thoughts, and sat silent through supper,
trying to keep the thread of her fancies from breaking. But she was not
allowed to go back undisturbed to her fool's paradise.
Sleeny, who had scarcely removed his eyes from her during the meal,
rose with a start as she walked into the little sitting-room of the
family, and followed her. She went to the window with a novel to make
use of the last moments of daylight. He stood before her without
speaking, until she raised her eyes, and said sharply:
"Well, Sam, what's the matter?"
He was not quick either of thought or speech. He answered:
"Oh! nothin'. Only----"
"Only what?" she snapped.
"Won't you go and take a walk by the Bluff?"
She threw down her book at once. She liked exercise and fresh air, and
always walked with pleasure by the lake. Sam was to her such a nullity
that she enjoyed his company almost as much as being alone. She was
ready in a moment, and a short walk brought them to the little open
place reserved for public use, overlooking the great fresh-water sea.
There were a few lines of shade trees and a few seats, and nothing
more; yet the plantation was called Bluff Park, and it was much
frequented on holidays and Sundays by nurses and their charges. It was
in no sense a fashionable resort, or Maud would never have ventured
there in company with her humble adorer. But among the jovial puddlers
and brake-men that took the air there, it was well enough to have an
escort so devoted and so muscular. So pretty a woman could scarcely
have walked alone in Bluff Park without insulting approaches. Maud
would hardly have nodded to Sleeny on Algonquin Avenue, for fear some
millionaire might see it casually, and scorn them both. But on the
Bluff she was safe from such accidents, and she sometimes even took his
arm, and made him too happy to talk. They would walk together for an
hour, he dumb with audacious hopes that paralyzed his speech, and she
dreaming of things thousands of miles away.
This evening he was even more than usually silent. Maud, after she had
worn her reverie threadbare, noticed his speechlessness, and, fearing
he was about to renew the subject which was so tiresome, suddenly
stopped and said:
"What a splendid sunset! Did you ever see anything like it?"
"Yes," he said, with his gentle drawl. "Less set here, and look at it."
He took his seat on one of the iron benches painted green, and
decorated with castings of grapes and vine leaves. She sat down beside
him and gazed out over the placid water, on which the crimson clouds
cast a mellow glory. The sky seemed like another sea, stretching off
into infinite distance, and strewn with continents of fiery splendor.
Maud looked straight forward to the clear horizon line, marking the
flight of ships whose white sails were dark against the warm brightness
of the illumined water. But no woman ever looked so straight before her
as not to observe the man beside her, and she knew, without moving her
eyes from the spectacle of the sunset, that Sam was gazing fixedly at
her, with pain and trouble in his face. At last, he said, in a timid,
choking voice,
"Mattie!"
She did not turn her face, but answered:
"If it ain't too much trouble, I'd like to have you call me Miss when
we're alone. You'll be forgetting yourself, and calling me Mattie
before other people, before you know it."
"Hold on," he burst out. "Don't talk to me that way to-night--I can't
stand it."
She glanced at him in surprise. His face was pale and disordered; he
was twisting his fingers as if he would break them.
"Your temper seems to be on the move, Mr. Sleeny. We'd better go home,"
she said quietly, drawing her shawl about her.
"Don't go till I tell you something," he stammered hastily.
"I have no curiosity to hear what you have to say," she said, rising
from her seat.
"It ain't what you think--it ain't about me!"
Her curiosity awoke, and she sat down again. Sleeny sat twisting his
fingers, growing pale and red by turns. At last, in a tremulous voice,
he said:
"_I_ was there to-day."
She stared at him an instant and said:
"Where?"
"Oh, I was there, and I seen you. I was at work at the end of the
greenhouse there by the gate when you come out of the rose-house. I was
watchin' for you. I was on the lawn talkin' with the gardener when you
went in the house. About an hour afterward I seen you comin' down the
garden with him to the rose-house. If you had stayed there a minute
more, I would ha' went in there. But out you come with your hands full
o' roses, and him and you come to the gate. I stopped workin' and kep'
still behind them pear trees, and I heard everything."
He uttered each word slowly, like a judge delivering sentence. His face
had grown very red and hot, and as he finished his indictment he drew a
yellow handkerchief from his pocket and mopped the sweat from his
forehead, his chin, and the back of his neck.
"Oh!" answered Maud, negligently, "you heard everything, did you? Well,
you didn't hear much."
"I tell you," he continued, with a sullen rage, "I heard every word. Do
you hear me? I heard every word."
The savage roughness of his voice made her tremble, but her spirits
rose to meet his anger, and she laughed as she replied:
"Well, you heard 'Thank you, sir,' and 'Good-morning.' It wasn't much,
unless you took it as a lesson in manners, and goodness knows you need
it."
"Now, look'ye here. It's no use foolin' with me. You know what I heard.
If you don't, I'll tell you!"
"Very well, Mr. Paul Pry, what was it?" said the angry girl, who had
quite forgotten that any words were spoken at the gate.
"I heard him tell you you could come in any time the back way," Sam
hoarsely whispered, watching her face with eyes of fire. She turned
crimson as the sunset she was gazing at, and she felt as if she could
have torn her cheeks with her fingernails for blushing. She was aware
of having done nothing wrong, nothing to be ashamed of. She had been
all day cherishing the recollection of her visit to Farnham as
something too pleasant and delicate to talk about. No evil thought had
mingled with it in her own mind. She had hardly looked beyond the mere
pleasure of the day. She had not given a name or a form to the hopes
and fancies that were fluttering at her heart. And now to have this
sweet and secret pleasure handled and mauled by such a one as Sam
Sleeny filled her with a speechless shame. Even yet she hardly
comprehended the full extent of his insinuation. He did not leave her
long in doubt. Taking her silence and her confusion as an
acknowledgment, he went on, in the same low, savage tone:
"I had my hammer in my hand. I looked through the pear trees to see if
he kissed you. If he had 'a' done it, I would have killed him as sure
as death."
At this brutal speech she turned pale a moment, as if suddenly struck a
stunning blow. Then she cried out:
"Hold your vile tongue, you----"
But she felt her voice faltering and the tears of rage gushing from her
eyes. She buried her face in her hands and sat a little while in
silence, while Sam was dumb beside her, feeling like an awkward
murderer. She was not so overcome that she did not think very rapidly
during this moment's pause. If she could have slain the poor fellow on
the spot, she would not have scrupled to do so; but she required only
an instant to reflect that she had better appease him for the present,
and reserve her vengeance for a more convenient season.
She dried her eyes and turned them on him with an air of gentle, almost
forgiving reproach.
"Sam! I could not have believed you had such a bad, wicked heart. I
thought you knew me better. I won't make myself so cheap as to explain
all that to you. But I'll ask yon to do one thing for me. When we go
home this evening, if you see my father alone, you tell him what you
saw--and if you've got any shame in you you'll be ashamed of yourself."
He had been irritated by her anger, but he was completely abashed by
the coolness and gentleness which followed her burst of tears. He was
sorely confused and bewildered by her command, but did not dream of
anything but obeying it, and as they walked silently home, he was all
the time wondering what mysterious motive she could have in wishing him
to denounce her to her father. They found Saul Matchin sitting by the
door, smoking a cob-pipe. Maud went in and Sam seated himself beside
the old man.
"How'd you get along at Farnham's?" said Saul.
Sam started, as if "the boss" had read his uneasy conscience. But he
answered in his drawling monotone:
"All right, I guess. That doggoned Scotchman thinks he knows it all;
but it'll take nigh on to a week to do what I could ha' done in a day
or two, if I worked my way."
"Well," said Saul, "that ain't none o' your lookout. Do what Scotchee
tells you, and I'll keep the time on 'em. We kin stand it, ef they
kin," and the old carpenter laughed with the foolish pleasure of a
small mind aware of an advantage. "Ef Art. Farnham wants to keep a
high-steppin' Scotchman to run his flowers, may be he kin afford it. I
ain't his gardeen."
Now was Sleeny's chance to make his disclosure; but his voice trembled
in spite of him, as he said:
"I seen Mattie up there."
"Yes," said the old man, tranquilly. "She went up to see about a place
in the library. He said there wasn't none, but he'd try to think o'
somethin' else that 'ud suit her. He was mighty polite to Mat--give her
some roses, and telled her to run in and out when she liked, till he
got somethin' fixed. Fact is, Mat is a first-rate scholar, and takes
with them high-steppers, like fallin' off a log." Saul had begun to
feel a certain pride in his daughter's accomplishments which had so
long been an affliction to him. The moment he saw a possibility of a
money return, he even began to plume himself upon his liberality and
sagacity in having educated her. "I've spared nothin'--Sam--in giving
her a----" he searched an instant for a suitable adjective, "a
commodious education." The phrase pleased him so well that he smoked
for awhile contemplatively, so as not to mar the effect of his point.
Sam had listened with, a whirling brain to the old man's quiet story,
which anticipated his own in every point. He could not tell whether he
felt more relieved or disquieted by it. It all seemed clear and
innocent enough; but he felt, with a sinking heart, that his own hopes
were fading fast, in the flourishing prospects of his beloved. He hated
Farnham not less in his attitude of friendly protection than in that
which he had falsely attributed to him. His jealousy, deprived of its
specific occasion, nourished itself on vague and torturing
possibilities. He could not trust himself to talk further with Matchin,
but went away with a growing fire in his breast. He hated himself for
having prematurely spoken. He hated Maud for the beauty that she would
not give him, and which, he feared, she was ready to give to another.
He hated Saul, for his stolid ignorance of his daughter's danger. He
hated most of all Farnham, for his handsome face, his easy smile, his
shapely hands, his fine clothes, his unknown and occult gifts of
pleasing.
"'Tain't in natur," he growled. "She's the prettiest woman in the
world. If he's got eyes, he knows it. But I spoke first, and he shan't
have her, if I die for it."