Finally, Jim, in thanking him for his proffered assistance, inquired diplomatically after the thing which weighed upon the Captain’s mind.
“I may be mistaken, suh,” said he, drawing himself up, and thrusting one hand into the tightly-buttoned breast of his black Prince Albert, “entiahly mistaken in the premises; but I have the impression that diffe’ences of a pussonal nature ah in existence between youahself and a gentleman whose name in this connection I prefuh to leave unmentioned. Such being the case, I assume that occasion may and naturally will arise foh the use of a friend, suh, who unde’stands the code—the code, suh—and is not without experience in affaiahs of honah. I recognize the fact that in cehtain exigencies nothing, by Gad, but pistols, ovah a measu’ed distance, meets the case. In such an event, suh, I shall be mo’ than happy to suhve you; mo’ than happy, by the Lord!”
“Captain,” said Jim feelingly, “you’re a good fellow and a true friend, and I promise you I shall have no other second.”
“In that promise,” replied the Captain gravely, “you confeh an honah, suh!”
After this it was thought wise to permit the papers to print the story of Cornish’s retirement; otherwise the Captain might have fomented an insurrection.
“The reasons for this step on the part of Mr. Cornish are purely personal,” said the Herald. “While retaining his feeling of interest in Lattimore, his desire to engage in certain broader fields of promotion and development in the tropics had made it seem to him necessary to lay down the work here which up to this time he has so well done. He will still remain a citizen of our city. On the other hand, while we shall not lose Mr. Cornish, we shall gain the active and powerful influence of Mr. Charles Harper, the president of the Frugality and Indemnity Life Insurance Company. It is thus that Lattimore rises constantly to higher prosperity, and wields greater and greater power. The remarkable activity lately noted in the local real-estate market, especially in the sales of unconsidered trifles of land at high prices, is to be attributed to the strengthening of conditions by these steps in the ascent of the ladder of progress.”
Cornish, however, was not without his partisans. Cecil Barr-Smith almost quarreled with Antonia because she struck Cornish off her books, Cecil insisting that he was an entirely decent chap. In this position Cecil was in accord with the clubmen of the younger sort, who had much in common with Cornish, and little with the overworked and busy railway president. Even Giddings, to me, seemed to remain unduly intimate with Cornish; but this did not affect the utterances of his paper, which still maintained what he called the policy of boost.
The behavior of Josie, however, was enigmatical. Cornish’s attentions to her redoubled, while Jim seemed dropped out of the race—and therefore my wife’s relations with Miss Trescott were subjected to a severe strain. Naturally, being a matron, and of the age of thirty-odd years, she put on some airs with her younger friend, still in the chrysalis of maidenhood. Sometimes, in a sweet sort of a way, she almost domineered over her. On this Elkins-Cornish matter, however, Josie held her at arms’ length, and refused to make her position plain; and Alice nursed that simulated resentment which one dear friend sometimes feels toward another, because of a real or imagined breach of the obligations of reciprocity.
One night, as we sat about the grate in the Trescott library, some veiled insinuations on Alice’s part caused a turning of the worm.
“If there is anything you want to say, Alice,” said Josie, “there seems to be no good reason why you shouldn’t speak out. I have asked your advice—yours and Albert’s—frequently, having really no one else to trust; and therefore I am willing to hear your reproof, if you have it for me. What is it?”