"You are a good fellow as well as a gentleman, Townsend," he said. "I wish I was a gentleman—one of the miserable dawdling things that know nothing else than small talk and the use of their heels. Then, and with plenty of money, I should know what to do."
"And what would you do?" asked the lawyer.
"Marry the woman I loved, in less than a month, or never speak to a woman again as long as I lived!" was the energetic reply. "As it is, I am a poor devil—only a railroad conductor! What business have I, with neither money in my pocket nor aristocratic blood in my veins, to think of a woman who has white hands and knows nothing of household drudgery?"
"A woman, however," said Townsend, "who could and would learn household drudgery, and do it, for the sake of the man she loved—well, there is no use in mincing the matter—for you,—and think it the happiest thing she ever did in all her life!"
"God bless her sweet face! do you think so? do you really believe that personally she likes me well enough to marry me if my circumstances were nearer her own?" He had grasped Townsend by the hand with one of his own and by the arm with the other, with all the impetuosity of a school-boy; but before the latter could answer he dropped the hand and the tone of inquiry, and said: "Pshaw! What use in asking that question?—I know she could be happier with me than with any other man in the world, and that makes the affair all the more painful."
"Heigho!" said the lawyer, "you are not the only man in the world who does not see his way clearly in matrimonial affairs, and you must not be one of the first to mope."
"I suppose not," replied the Illinoisan. "But then you, with your wealth and education—you can know nothing of such a situation except by guess; and so your sympathy is a little blind, after all."
"Think so?" asked Horace Townsend. "Humph! well, old boy, confidence for confidence, at least a little! Look me in the face—do you see any thing like jest or trifling in it?"
"No, it is earnest, beyond a doubt."
"Then listen for one moment. Halstead Rowan, I do not believe that there is any barrier between Clara Vanderlyn and yourself, that cannot be removed if you have the will to remove it. Now for myself. What would you think—" He stopped and seemed to consider for a moment, while the other watched him narrowly and with much interest. Then he went on: "You saw me meet—well, we will mention no names—the lady down at the house, the same night on which you chanced upon your own destiny."