"Indeed I shall," replied Dic in a tone expressive of the fact that he was a fine, true fellow, and would perform that pleasant duty with satisfaction to himself and great happiness to the girl. You see, Dic's great New York journey had caused him to feel his importance a bit.
"I wish you would go up to see her very often," continued our confident young friend; "if I do say it myself, she will miss me greatly. When I return, she shall go home with me. Mrs. Bays has almost given her consent. You will go often, won't you, Billy Little? Next to me, I believe she loves you best of all the world."
Billy watched Dic ride eastward on the Michigan road, and muttered to himself:—
"'Next to me'; there is no next, you young fool." Then he went in to his piano and caressed the keys till they yielded their ineffable sweetness in the half-sad tones of Handel's "Messiah"; afterward, to lift his spirits, they gave him a glittering sonata from Mozart. But it is better to feel than to think. It is sweeter to weep than to laugh. So when he was tired of the classics, he played over and over again, in weird, minor, improvised variations, his love of loves, "Annie Laurie," and tears came to his eyes because he was both happy and sad. The keys seemed to whisper to him, so gently did he touch them, and their tones fell, not upon his ears, but upon his heart, with a soothing pathos like the sough of an old song or a sweet, forgotten odor of a day that is past.
Billy did his best to console Rita, though it was a hopeless task and full of peril for him. There was but one topic of interest to her. Rome and Greece were dull. What cared she about the Romans? Dic was not a Roman. Conversation upon books wearied her, and subjects that a few months ago held her rapt attention, now threw her into revery. I am sorry to say she was a silly, love-lorn young woman, and not in the least entitled to the respect of strong-minded persons. I would not advise you, my dear young girl, to assume Rita's faults; but if you should do so, many a good, though misguided man will mistake them for virtues and will fall at your feet. You will not deceive your sisters; but you won't care much for their opinion.
Soon after Dic's departure, Jim Fisher, Mrs. Bays's brother, renewed his offer to take Mr. Bays as a partner in the Indianapolis store. The offer was a good one and was honestly made. Fisher needed more capital, and to that extent his motive was selfish; but the business was prosperous, and he could easily have found a partner.
One Saturday evening he came up to talk over the matter with his brother-in-law. He took with him to Blue no less a person than Roger Williams—not the original, redoubtable Roger who discovered Rhode Island, but a descendant of his family. Williams was a man of twenty-five. Boston was his home, and he was the son of a father Williams who manufactured ploughs, spades, wagons, and other agricultural implements. The young man was his father's western representative, and Fisher sold his goods in the Indianapolis district. He dressed well and was affable with his homespun friends. In truth, he was a gentleman. He made himself at home in the cabin; but he had brains enough to respect and not to patronize the good people who dwelt therein.
Of course it will be useless for me to pretend that this young fellow did not fall in love with Rita. If I had been responsible for his going to Blue, you would be justified in saying that I brought him there for the purpose of furnishing a rival to Dic; but I had nothing to do with his going or loving, and take this opportunity to proclaim my innocence of all such responsibility. He came, he stayed till Tuesday, and was conquered. He came again two weeks later, and again, and still again. He saw, but did he conquer? That is the great question this history is to answer. Meantime Dic was leading a drove of untamed horses all day long, and was sleeping sometimes at a wretched inn, sometimes in the pitiless storm, and sometimes he was chasing stampeded horses for forty-eight hours at a stretch without sleeping or eating. But when awake he thought of Rita, and when he slept he dreamed of her, though in his dreams there was no handsome city man, possessed of a fine house, servants, and carriages, sitting by her side. Had that fact been revealed to him in a dream, the horses might have stampeded to Jericho for all he would have cared, and he would have stampeded home to look after more important interests.
But to return to Fisher's visits. After supper, Saturday evening, the question of the new store came up.