“Look like that.”
She not only looked like that, but more so. “Young man, young man,” she said, “I fear you're wishful of turning a girl's head.”
The throng was thick around them, garrulous and noisy, but they two were more richly alone together, to his appreciation, than if they stood on some far satellite of Mars. He was not to forget that moment, and he kept the picture of her, as she leaned against the big blue tent-pole, there, in his heart: the clear gray eyes lifted to his, the delicate face with the color stealing back to her cheeks, and the brave little figure that had run so straight to him out of the night shadows. There was something about her, and in the moment, that suddenly touched him with a saddening sweetness too keen to be borne; the forget-me-not finger of the flying hour that could not come again was laid on his soul, and he felt the tears start from his heart on their journey to his eyes. He knew that he should always remember that moment. She knew it, too. She put her hand to her cheek and turned away from him a little tremulously. Both were silent.
They had been together since early morning. Plattville was proud of him. Many a friendly glance from the folk who jostled about them favored his suit and wished both of them well, and many lips, opening to speak to Harkless in passing, closed when their owners (more tactful than Mr. Bardlock) looked a second time.
Old Tom Martin, still perched alone On his high seat, saw them standing by the tent-pole, and watched them from under his rusty hat brim. “I reckon it's be'n three or four thousand years since I was young,” he sighed to himself; then, pushing his hat still further down over his eyes: “I don't believe I'd ort to rightly look on at that.” He sighed again as he rose, and gently spoke the name of his dead wife: “Marjie,—it's be'n lonesome, sometimes. I reckon you're mighty tired waitin' for me, ever since sixty-four—yet maybe not; Ulysses S. Grant's over on your side now, and perhaps you've got acquainted with him; you always thought a good deal more of him than you did of me.”
“Do you see that tall old man up there?” said Helen, nodding her head toward Martin. “I think I should like to know him. I'm sure I like him.”
“That is old Tom Martin.”
“I know.”
“I was sorry and ashamed about all that conspicuousness and shouting. It must have been very unpleasant for you; it must have been so, for a stranger. Please try to forgive me for letting you in for it.”
“But I liked it. It was 'all in the family,' and it was so jolly and good-natured, and that dear old man was so bright. Do you know,” she said softly, “I don't think I'm such a stranger—I—I think I love all these people a great deal—in spite of having known them only two days.”