"Well, at any rate, you can think best when you're alone."
"O John!"
"Well, father could. I can't. I need to rub against men. You don't."
"Oh!—h—h—John!" But when Mrs. March saw the intent was only figurative she drew her lips close and dropped her eyes.
Her son reflected a minute and spoke again. "Why, mother, just that Yankee's being here peeping around and asking his scared-to-death questions has pulled my wits together till I wonder where they've been. Oh, it's so! It's not because he's a Yankee. It's simply because he's in with the times. He knows what's got to come and what's got to go, and how to help them do it so's to make them count! He belongs—pshaw—he belongs to a live world. Now, here in this sleepy old Dixie——"
"Has it come to that, John?"
"Yes, it has, and it's cost a heap sight more than it's come to, because I didn't let it come long ago. I wouldn't look plain truth in the face for fear of going back on Rosemont and Suez, and all the time I've been going back on Widewood!" The speaker smote the family Bible with Leggett's document. His mother wept.
"Oh! golly," mumbled John.
"Oh! my son!"
"Why, what's the trouble, mother?"