"Yes," answered the Illinoisan.
"You thought, no doubt, that it was a first meeting. And so it was, on her part, for she had never before met Horace Townsend, to know him. But what would you think if I should tell you that I had seen and loved her, many months before—that she was then engaged to be married to a very different person, though a man in the same profession—that I love her so madly as to make my life one long torture on her account—that I am throwing myself into her company, under circumstances that if she knew them would make her shrink away from me with loathing—and that such a barrier exists between us that I have not much more hope of winning her than of bending down one of yon mountain peaks to kiss me, while I can no more avoid the trial than the drunkard can keep away from his glass or the madman escape his paroxysm!"
"Is all that true?" asked Rowan, who had been looking at the speaking face with still increasing wonder.
"Every word of it, and more!" was the reply.
"Then my situation is nothing, and I have been whining like a school-boy before I was half whipped!" exclaimed the Illinoisan. The effect intended by the other had been produced: he had been made to see that there could be even worse barriers between man and woman, than differences of family and fortune. And once teach any man that there is something worse that might have happened to him, than that which has indeed happened—much is achieved towards bringing him to resignation if not to content.
"I have told you all this," said the lawyer, "partially because I felt that I had no right to be acquainted with so much in your situation while you knew nothing of mine, and partially because I was really anxious to show you that others than yourself sometimes find rocks in the bed of that pleasant stream which the poets call 'true love.' And now that I have gone so far, involving reputation as well as happiness, I know that you will do me the only favor I ask in return, and forget that I have said a word on the subject."
"I have forgotten it already, so far as repeating it to any mortal man is concerned," replied the Illinoisan. He paused an instant, as his friend had done before, and then he added: "Meeting you has been the pleasantest—no, one of the pleasantest incidents of my days among the mountains, and I am glad that you have made me feel so much nearer to your confidence at the moment of parting."
"Parting? What, are you going away already?" asked Townsend.
"At once," answered Halstead Rowan. "I should think, though, that you would scarcely need to ask the question! My friends and myself are going to start back for Littleton immediately after dinner, and on to Montreal to-morrow. Do you think that I could sit at that table, as I feel just now, more than one meal longer, and think of the vacant chairs? No—I am a baby, I suppose, and God knows whether I shall ever grow any older and wiser!"
"God forbid that you ever should grow so old and so wise as to be able to master your heart altogether!" said the lawyer. "I am sorry to part with you, for I too, have made a pleasant acquaintance. But you are right, no doubt. Try a little change of scene; and you will be calmer next week, if not happier."