"Visit Bonaventure?" I said, a little thickly.
"Of course!" said Cotton, with both exultation and surprise in his tone. "Can't you see the best this news may have made possible to me?"
I was thankful that the kindly darkness hid my face, and turned towards the stables without a word; while, after the corporal had mounted, I found it very hard to answer him when he said simply, yet with a great air of friendship: "Although you were irritating sometimes, Ormesby, you were the first man I ever spoke frankly to in this country. Won't you wish me luck?"
"If she will have you, there is no good thing I would not wish for you both," I said; but in spite of my efforts my voice rang hollow, and I was thankful when Cotton, who did not seem to notice it, rode away.
I did not return to the house until long after the drumming of hoofs, growing fainter and fainter, had finally died away, and said little then. I even flung the journals Dixon brought, which were full of the new railroad, unread, away. My rival was young and handsome, generous, and likable, even in his weaknesses. He was also, as it now appeared, of good estate and birth, and granting all that I could on my own side, the odds seemed heavily in favor of Cotton, while a certain knowledge of the worst would almost have been preferable to the harrowing uncertainty as to how the Mistress of Bonaventure would make the comparison. It lasted for two whole weeks—weeks which I never forgot; for I could not visit Bonaventure until I learned whether Cotton's errand had resulted successfully, and he sent no word to lessen the anxiety.
At last I rode in to the settlement, whither I knew Haldane had gone to inspect the progress of the road, and met Boone and Mackay on the prairie. "Has Cotton returned?" I asked.
"He has," said Mackay dryly. "This is his last day's duty. He loitered at the settlement, and ye will meet him presently. I'm not understanding what is wrong with him, but he's uncertain in the temper, and I'm thinking that sudden good fortune does not agree with him."
I met Cotton, riding very slowly and looking straight ahead. He pulled up when I greeted him, and seeing the question in my eyes, ruefully shook his head. "I've had my answer, Ormesby—given with a gentleness that made it worse," he said.
He must have misunderstood my expression, and perhaps my face was a study just then, for he added grimly: "It is perfectly true, and really not surprising. Hopeless from the first—and, I think, there is someone else, though heaven knows where in the whole Dominion she would find any man fit to brush the dust from her little shoes, including myself. Well, there is no use repining, and I'll have years in which to get over it; but it's lucky I'm leaving this country, and—for one can't shirk a painful duty—I'll say good-by to you with the others at Bonaventure to-morrow."
I was glad that he immediately rode on, for while I pitied him, my heart leaped within me. Had it happened otherwise I should have tried to wish him well, and now my satisfaction, which was, nevertheless, stronger than all such considerations, appeared ungenerous.