“I scarcely dare to read a paper now,” Isabel once replied. “It drives me nearly mad with longing to get back among people again. I only read heavy things, classic poetry and history—and then, thank Heaven, there is this embroidery.”
It was at John’s, or rather on the way there, that Seth met one day a man of whom he was in after life accustomed to say, “He altered the whole bent of my career.” Perhaps this was an exaggerated estimate of the service Richard Ansdell really rendered Seth; but it is so difficult, looking back, to truly define the influence upon our fortunes or minds by any isolated event or acquaintance, and moreover, gratitude is so wholesome and sweet a thing to contemplate, and the race devotes so much energy to civilizing it out of young breasts, that I have not the heart to insist upon any qualification of Seth’s judgment.
Mr. Ansdell at this time was nearly forty years of age, and looked to be under thirty. He was small, thin-faced, clean-shaven, dark of skin and hair, with full, clear eyes, that by their calmness of expression curiously modified the idea of nervousness which his actions and mode of speech gave forth. He was spending his fortnight’s vacation in the vicinity, and he was strolling with his friend the school-teacher, Reuben Tracy, toward the village when Seth overtook them. Seth and Reuben had been very intimate in the old farm days—and here was a young man to the latent influence of whose sobriety of mind and cleanliness of tastes he never fully realized his obligation—but since his return they had not met. After greetings had been exchanged, they walked together to the village, and to the Banner of Liberty office.
It was the beginning of the week, and publication day was far enough off to enable John to devote all his time to his visitors. There was an hour or more of talk—on politics, county affairs, the news in the city papers, the humors and trials of conducting a rural newspaper, and so forth. When they rose to go, John put on his hat, and said he would “walk a ways” with them. On the street he held Seth back with a whispered “Let us keep behind a bit, I want to talk to you.” Then he added, when the others were out of hearing:
“I have got some personal things to say, later on. But—first of all—has Albert said anything since to you about the farm?”
“Not a word.”
“Well, I have been thinking it all over, trying to see where the crookedness comes in—for I feel it in my bones that there is something crooked. But I am not lawyer enough to get on to it. I’ve had a notion of putting the whole case to Ansdell, who’s a mighty bright lawyer, but then again, it seems to be a sort of family thing that we ought to keep to ourselves. What do you think?—for after all, it is mostly your affair.”
“I can’t see that Albert isn’t playing fair. It must be pretty nearly as he says—that he has put as much money in the farm as it was worth when he took it. It’s true that father’s will leaves it to him outright—and that wasn’t quite as Albert gave us to understand it should be—but Albert pledges us that our rights in it shall be respected, and it seems to me that that is better than an acknowledged interest in a bankrupt farm would be, which we hadn’t the capital to work, and which was worthless without it.”
“Perhaps you are right.” John paused for a moment, then began again in a graver tone: “There’s something else. How are you getting on on the Chronicle?”
“Oh, well enough; I get through my work without anybody’s finding fault. I suppose that is the best test. A fellow can’t do any more.”