For over two months, Hooker was a constant visitor at the Blaythwaite home. He became intimately acquainted with every book in the library; he could tell the exact date of publication of the early printed volumes; the place where it was printed; the name of the binder, and other useless information.
Even Miss Blaythwaite caught some of the contagion. She, who had formerly cared nothing for her father's "playthings," became interested in them. Sometimes she would take down from a shelf a volume of old English poetry, and become absorbed in the lyrical sweetness of the verse. Occasionally, she would read aloud to Hooker some beautiful poems that she had discovered in Ben Jonson, in Crashaw, or in Herrick; and he would tell her of his aspirations, and of the Museum that existed only in his mind. He told her of the wonderful things he already possessed.
Although Hooker had known Miss Blaythwaite for some time, she was to him always, the Lady of the Breviary.
When he felt the delicious warmth of her hand, he thought of the missal; when she was seated near him, poring over some old volume of forgotten lore, his mind turned to its wonderful binding, or its miraculous miniatures. Strange as it may seem, Miss Blaythwaite was nothing more to him than the guardian and sole owner of a book that his soul desired. Sometimes, when they were reading together some volume of Elizabethan verse, another caller would be announced; Hooker would be presented, and then he would retire gracefully to her father's library, leaving the field clear to his rival. This, of course, was not flattering to Miss Blaythwaite!
One night, Jack Worthing was there before him. He was a clean-cut, manly fellow, interested first in sports, and after that in business. He had known Miss Blaythwaite for years. The talk turned, as it will always turn, when bibliophiles are present, upon books.
"I don't understand you fellows," said Worthing. "You think more of an old book than many people of their children!"
"Of course! Children often grow up into ill-mannered youths and conceited young ladies. Books always remain young and delightful!"
"But, confound it! You never read them. You have thousands around you all the time, and I bet you don't read ten a year."
"Rare books are meant to be carefully nurtured during our lives, and passed on after our death to those who will appreciate them. Only college professors, students, scholars, and such people ever read books," answered Hooker, contemptuously.
"I think book-men the most foolish class of persons on earth," retorted Worthing. "Give me some good old sport, like boxing, or foot-ball, that makes your heart tingle, that causes the red blood to shoot through your veins—that makes life worth living! Man wasn't created to spend his life roaming around a dusky old library, when he can go out into God's pure air and enjoy the fields and the streams, the forests and the lakes!"