“I make a pretty good thing of arguing, though,” answered the other. “It’s my trade, you see, and it is not yours. You lay down the law; it is my business to make a living out of it.”
“I wish I could lay it down, as you say, and lay it down according to my own ideas,” said John. “I would have something to say to you railroad men.”
“As for that, I should not care. Railroad law is stronger than iron and more flexible than india-rubber, and the shape of it is of no importance whatever. So long as there is enough of it to work with, you can twist it and untwist it as much as you please.”
John laughed.
“It would simplify matters to untwist it and cut it up into lengths,” he said. “But then your occupation would be gone.”
“I think my occupation will last my life-time,” answered Vancouver, laughing in his turn.
“Not if I can help it,” returned John. “But we can provide you with another. Good-by. I am going to Cambridge.”
They shook hands cordially, and John Harrington turned down Charles Street, while Vancouver pursued his way up the hill. He had been going in the opposite direction when he met Harrington, but he seemed to have changed his mind. He was not seen again that day until he went to dine with Mrs. Sam Wyndham.
There was no one there but Mr. Topeka and young John C. Hannibal, well-dressed men of five-and-thirty and five-and-twenty respectively, belonging to good families of immense fortune, and educated regardless of expense. No homely Boston phrase defiled their anglicized lips, their great collars stood up under their chins in an ecstasy of stiffness, and their shirt-fronts bore two buttons, avoiding the antiquity of three and the vulgarity of one. Well-bred Anglo-maniacs both, but gentlemen withal, and courteous to the ladies. Mr. Topeka was a widower, John C. Hannibal was understood to be looking for a wife.
They came, they dined, and they retired to Sam Wyndham’s rooms to don their boots and skating clothes. At nine o’clock the remaining ladies arrived, and then the whole party got into a great sleigh and were driven rapidly out of town over the smooth snow to Jamaica Pond. John Harrington had not come, and only three persons missed him–Joe Thorn, Mrs. Sam, and Pocock Vancouver.