With the appearance of young Carter Ritchie, the neighbors arrived at the decision that Parker Willett would not return, and that eventually this cousin of his would take his clearing. Indeed, Carter himself gave this impression, for it was not long before he knew the whole country-side, and had taken his place as a resident. His first visit, after seeking out Dod Hunter, was to the Kennedys, and though the questions which Agnes put were few, Carter was not reticent, and being always glad of listeners, he chatted on, revealing many things, and not hesitating sometimes to draw somewhat upon his imagination so that his stories might be the more effective. He was a bright, attractive young fellow, nineteen or twenty years of age, with a fresh, boyish face, pleasant manners, and a soft Southern voice. He was not slow in finding out the prettiest girls in the neighborhood, and his gallantries were soon the cause of many heartburnings.
He greeted the Kennedys as old friends. “Oh, I’ve heard about you all from Park,” he said, “and I don’t feel a stranger at all. When is Park coming back? I don’t know. Never, I reckon; there are too many things to keep him at home. He is at Colonel Southall’s every day, and the colonel has two pretty daughters. Blest if I don’t think Nell is prettier than Alicia; she is not of your touch-me-not kind, like Alicia, and is always ready for a good time. The colonel’s fond of Park; he has no sons, you know, and I shouldn’t wonder if Park found it a good thing to settle down right there; that is what everybody thinks he will do.” The color which had dyed Agnes’s cheeks a crimson at the hearing of Parker’s name now retreated, and she was very pale.
“Aunt Lucy seems a little better since Parker came,” Carter went on, “but she can’t live very long, a year maybe at the longest; she’s in a consumption, you know.” He talked on, answering questions and giving information, till the listeners knew more of Parker’s family and his affairs than they had learned in all their acquaintance with him. “Say, Miss Agnes,” the lad said as he arose to go, “you and I will have real good times. Park told me he had a boat, and I am in for rowing or any kind of sport. Do you like to ride? Have you a saddle-horse? Never mind, I can get one, I reckon.” And before she knew it, Agnes found herself promising to go riding, boating, walking, or anything else of the kind that Carter proposed.
“That young man’s not goin’ to wear out his sowl by greetin’ for his home,” said Polly; “it’s aye grist ’at comes to his mill, an’ he’ll be dancin’, whoever pipes.”
“He certainly seems to have a flow of spirits,” Mrs. Kennedy agreed.
“An’ pleasant manners, an’ he’s pleasant spoken. I’ll be tachin’ him a rale Irish jig before the year’s out, ye’ll see. I foretell he’ll make friends, but, to my mind, his cousin Park’s more the man. I’d be sorry not to see him again.”
“I think you will,” returned Mrs. Kennedy.
The color came back to Agnes’s face, and she gave her mother a grateful look, yet her poor little heart was very sore. Alicia! and he had not forgotten; the old love was the strongest. If he had never gone back, perhaps all would have been well, but now he believed her pledged to Archie, and he would return to his first love. Why had she so stubbornly allowed him to think her indifferent to him, and to believe her heart was all Archie’s? She could scarce keep her thoughts from straying at family prayers that evening, but when her father read the parable of the foolish virgins, Agnes gave a deep sigh and applied it, maiden-like, to her own case; it was too late and the door was shut.
But youth, though it is easily dispirited, is also elastic, and Agnes could not be continually moping. She was ready to take such pleasures as came to her, and really enjoyed life, though she had her pensive moments when she had romantic dreams of dying young, of touching the heart of her loved one by going into a decline, but she was too healthily minded and too busy to allow these thoughts to recur very often. She found Carter Ritchie good company; he was so full of fun, so energetic and buoyant, and likewise so pleasure-loving that he was ready at any time to leave his work for a frolic, and at last Archie became possessed by the demon of jealousy, and glowered upon his sweetheart till she brought him to account.
“What do you mean, Archie M’Clean, by looking at me as if you’d cast an evil eye upon me? What have I done that you should glower so?”