"I think, Cora, my dear, that the idea came vaguely into my mind, as a mere possibility, after my father's death. It occurred to me that there was no absolute necessity for my remaining longer at the works. You see, Cora, however much I might have wished for a change in my life, I never could have vexed my father by even expressing such a wish, while he lived. After his death I thought of it vaguely."
"Oh! why didn't you tell me?"
"My mind was not made up; therefore I spoke of the matter to no one. I only hinted something to you, when on bidding you good by at North End Junction I told you that you might possibly see me before you would expect to do so."
"Yes; I remember that well. I thought you only said that to comfort me. And you really meant that you might possibly follow me?"
"Yes, my dear; that is just what I meant. I could not speak more plainly because I was not sure of my own course. I had to think of Fabian."
"Yes. How, at last, came you to the conclusion of following your poor niece?"
"Fabian and myself could not agree upon a certain policy in conducting our business. There was no longer the father's controlling influence, you see, and Fabian is the head of the firm; and I could not do business on his principles," said Mr. Clarence, flushing up to his brow.
"No; I suppose you could not," said Cora, meditatively; and then she was sorry that she had said anything that might imply a reproach to the good-humored uncle she had left behind.
"Still, I said nothing about a dissolution of partnership until Fabian complained that I, or my policy, was a dead weight around his neck, dragging him down from the most magnificent flights to mere sordid drudgery. Then I proposed that we should dissolve partnership. And he said he was sorry. And I believe he was; but also glad, inconsistent as that seems. For he was sorry I could not come into his policy, and stay in the firm; but since I could not so agree with him, he was relieved when I proposed to withdraw from it. We disagreed, my dear Cora, but we did not fall out; we parted good friends and brothers with tears in our eyes. Poor little Violet cried a good deal. But you know she has such a tender heart, poor child!—Look at that herd of deer, Cora, standing on the top of that swell of the land to the right, and actually gazing at the trail without a motion or a panic. I hope nobody will shoot at them!" exclaimed Mr. Clarence, suddenly breaking off in his discourse to point to the denizens of the thicket and the prairie, until upon some sudden impulse the whole herd turned and bounded away.
So they fared on through that glorious autumn day—over the vast, rolling, solitary prairie—now rising to a smooth, gradual elevation that revealed the circle of the whole horizon where it met the sky; now descending into a wide, shallow hollow, where the rising ground around inclosed them as in an amphitheater; but everywhere along the trail, the prairie grass, dried and burnished by the autumn's suns and winds, burned like gold on the hills and bronze in the hollows, giving a singularly beautiful effect in light and shade of mingling metallic hues.