"Poor Jim!" echoed Beth tenderly.
"He can stand it," testily rejoined the object of their sympathy.
"I don't know that I shall feel at home here, after being a countryman so long," said Mather. "Will you tell me all that has happened down-town in my absence. Judith?"
Without answering, she threw him a glance, meaning that she could—if she would! In the hall Ellis turned abruptly away, and gathered up his hat and coat.
"No, I won't come in," he said to the Colonel, and went away at once.
His hold on Blanchard, now that it was gained, seemed unaccountably small. It would grow, Ellis had no doubt of that, for the Colonel was on the road down hill; and yet the relationship promised less than it might. For though by this means Ellis might win possession of Judith, he wanted more than that; he must have her esteem. And Mather had taken her mind from him! Ellis grew hot and cold with that strange feeling whose name he could not discover, while yet its disturbances were stronger from day to day.
For the Colonel another act of his opera began with a pleasant jig; cheered, he retired to his study, and began to plan how to double Ellis's note. Jim took Beth away into the back parlour, where presently the light grew dim. As the two went, Judith saw Beth's upward glance into her lover's face, and her own thoughts changed and grew soft; she turned to watch Mather as he sat before what had been, earlier in the evening, a wood fire.
She noticed how natural it seemed for him to gather the embers together, put on wood from the basket, and start a little blaze. The action first carried her back to the period before he was her declared lover; next it drew her thoughts forward to a time when he might be—what Jim was to Beth. And Mather, unconsciously working at the fire, started for Judith a train of musing.