“He may; but I’d lay long odds against it.”
“I must be going.” Miss Elton rose. “The crowd is thinning, and Mrs. Lenox looks impressively in my direction. We are going out together on the train. Their new country place is near us, you know. And you, ungrateful one, I suspect, have not even spoken to Mr. Early yet. Go and ‘make your manners,’ like a good boy. I’ll expect you to-morrow afternoon. Mr. Norris, Dick has promised to bring you with him to dinner to-morrow. Till then, good-by.”
“Come, Ellery, we’ll face the music, now that the real attractions are gone,” said Dick.
Mr. Early extended two hands, ponderous in proportion to the rest of his body, in fatherly greeting.
“Ah, Percival, my dear fellow, so you are done with Yale and back again in St. Etienne? I welcome you out of the fetters of mere bookishness into the freedom of real life, where it is man’s business to serve, and not to absorb.”
Dick blushed guiltily as several surrounding ladies turned their lorgnettes on him, but Mr. Early went on, undisturbed and very audible:
“I do not introduce you to Swami Ram Juna, because introductions belong to the world of conventionalities, and he lives in that world where real human relations are the only things that count; but I put your hand in his, in token of the contact in which your spirit may meet his great soul.”
“Very good of you, I’m sure,” murmured Dick, as the Swami bent his head and gave him a penetrating look.
“You, too, then, are a seeker?” Ram Juna inquired in a low tone, but with his delicate and distinct enunciation.
“Ah—I hope so,” Dick answered hastily, and with an evident desire to push the topic no further. “And this, Mr. Early, is my old chum, Norris, who has come West to be on the editorial staff of the Star.”