“At last,” she said, “you’re here!”
He felt her tremble, and he held her more closely. When he released her she put her hands up to his shoulders and held him away from her, while she scanned him critically.
“You’ve grown broader,” she said, “and heavier, and—oh, so much handsomer!”
The Blairs filed in presently, and Marley had the curious sense of this very scene having been enacted in his presence before, but it lacked the usual baffling effect of this psychological experience, for he was able to recall, in an incandescent flash of memory, that it was almost a repetition of their good-bys that night when he had gone away; Mrs. Blair was as tender, and if Connie and Chad were a little shy of his new importance, Judge Blair was as dignified, and as anxious as ever to get back to his reading. Marley felt once more that permanence of things in Macochee; this household had remained the same, and it made him feel more than ever the change that had occurred in him.
In lovers’ intense subjectivity, he and Lavinia discussed this change seriously. They reviewed their old dreams, and now they could laugh at their defeated wish to live, even in an humble way, in Macochee.
“It was funny, wasn’t it?” said Marley. “I was very young then,—nothing, in fact, but a kid.”
“Are you so very much older now?” asked Lavinia with a slight hint of teasing in her tender voice.
“Well,” Marley replied, with a seriousness that impressed him, at least, as the ripe wisdom of maturity, “I am not much older in years, but I am in experience, and in knowledge of life. You see, dear, you can measure time by the calendar, but you can’t measure life that way. And Weston says that there is no calling that will give a man experience so quickly as newspaper work. You know we see everything, and we get a smattering of all kinds of knowledge. Weston says that is all that reconciles him to the business; he says a man learns more there than he ever does in college. He considers the training invaluable; he says it will be of great help to him in literature, if he can ever get into literature—he isn’t sure yet that he can. He can tell better after his book is published. And he says a newspaper experience will help me in the law, too, that is,” Marley added, with a whimsical imitation of Weston’s despairing uncertainty, “if I can ever get into the law.”
“You think a great deal of Mr. Weston, don’t you?” said Lavinia.
“He’s the finest fellow in the world, and the best friend I ever had.”