Dick felt that this was the sum of what Mr. Long had sought to impress upon him, and he also felt that this great truth had long ago been revealed to Betsy Linley. It was in the spirit of this spirit of love that she had kissed him the previous evening; and now he felt that he had no longing for any love but this. She had set his feet upon the way to this goal, and he was assured that should he falter, should he look back, she would be by his side to put a hand in his, to bid him take courage and press forward to that goal which she had pointed out to him.
He did not at that time make even an attempt to consider such questions as he would have suggested a few days before, to any one who might have come to him telling him all that Mr. Long had just said in his hearing. Mr. Long had encouraged him to love Betsy Linley—to continue loving her; and he had not shrunk from suggesting the possibility of the girl’s returning his love. A few days before Dick would have been inclined to ask any one who might have come to him telling him this, if Mr. Long was encouraging another man to love the girl whom he himself meant to marry. But now this seemed to him to be a point unworthy of a thought. So deeply impressed was he by what Mr. Long had just said to him, he could not give a thought to anything less spiritual. The splendid light that came from that heaven to which his eyes had been directed, so dazzled him with its effulgence as to make him incapable of giving any attention to matters of detail.
It never occurred to him to ask himself if it was Mr. Long’s intention to marry Betsy immediately. Whatever answer might be given to such a question, it could not possibly affect the reality of the religion of love as stated by Mr. Long. Of this he was satisfied. He knew that whoever might marry Betsy Linley, his own love for her had become part of his life, and its influence upon his life was real.
He went to his home looking neither to the right hand nor the left, and when he reached his room he was conscious of very different thoughts from those which had been his a few mornings before, when he had thrown himself on his bed in a passion of tears after seeing, though but for a moment, Betsy by the side of Mr. Long in the gardens. At that time the pangs that he felt—the vexation that he felt—were due, in a large measure, to the blow which his vanity had sustained, and it was his vanity that had suggested to him, with a view of recovering its equilibrium, as it were, the advisability of his adopting the tone and playing the rôle of a cynical man of the world, who has seen the foolishness—the ludicrous foolishness of what is called love.
But now—
Well, now he was kneeling by his bedside.
CHAPTER XXI
Dick was greatly surprised when, on going out to take the air the next day, he was met by one of his acquaintance—a young Mr. Vere, who shook him warmly by the hand, offering him his congratulations.