Then, as if afraid that his "owld woman" might overhear his confession, he bent toward Jim, and half whispered:
"The women is all smarter nor the men, Jim; but ye mustn't let 'em know that ye think it. Ye've got to call 'em yer owld women, or ye can't keep 'em where ye want 'em. Be gorry! I wouldn't let me owld woman know what I think of 'er fur fifty dollars. I couldn't kape me house over me head inny time at all at all, if I should whishper it. She's jist as much of a leddy as there is in Sivenoaks, bedad, an' I have to put on me big airs, an' thrash around wid me two hands in me breeches pockets, an' shtick out me lips like a lorrd, an' promise to raise the divil wid her whiniver she gits a fit o' high flyin', an' ye'll have to do the same, Jim, or jist lay down an' let 'er shtep on ye. Git a good shtart, Jim. Don't ye gin 'er the bit for five minutes. She'll rin away wid ye. Ye can't till me anything about women."
"No, nor I don't want to. Now you jest shut up, Mike. I'm tired a hearin' ye. This thing about women is one as has half the fun of it in larnin' it as ye go along. Ye mean well enough, Mike, but yer eddication is poor; an' if it's all the same to ye, I'll take my pudden straight an' leave yer sarse for them as likes it."
Jim's utter rejection of the further good offices of Mike, in the endeavor to instruct him in the management of his future relations with the little woman, did not sink very deep into the Irishman's sensibilities. Indeed, it could not have done so, for their waters were shallow, and, as at this moment Mike's "owld woman" called both to dinner, the difference was forgotten in the sympathy of hunger and the satisfactions of the table.
Jim felt that he was undergoing a change—had undergone one, in fact. It had never revealed itself to him so fully as it did during his conversation with Mike. The building of the hotel, the study of the wants of another grade of civilization than that to which he had been accustomed, the frequent conversations with Miss Butterworth, the responsibilities he had assumed, all had tended to lift him; and he felt that Mike Conlin was no longer a tolerable companion. The shallowness of the Irishman's mind and life disgusted him, and he knew that the time would soon come when, by a process as natural as the falling of the leaves in autumn, he should drop a whole class of associations, and stand where he could look down upon them—where they would look up to him. The position of principal, the command of men, the conduct of, and the personal responsibility for, a great enterprise, had given him conscious growth. His old life and his old associations were insufficient to contain him.
After dinner they started on, for the first time accompanied by Mike's wife. Before her marriage she had lived the life common to her class—that of cook and housemaid in the families of gentlemen. She knew the duties connected with the opening of a house, and could bring its machinery into working order. She could do a thousand things that a man either could not do, or would not think of doing; and Jim had arranged that she should be housekeeper until the mistress of the establishment should be installed in her office.
The sun had set before they arrived at the river, and the boats of the two guides, with Jim's, which had been brought down by Mr. Benedict, were speedily loaded with the furniture, and Mike, picketing his horses for the night, embarked with the rest, and all slept at Number Nine.
In three days Jim was to be married, and his cage was ready for his bird. The stoop with its "settle," the ladder for posies, at the foot of which the morning-glories were already planted, and the "cupalo," had ceased to be dreams, and become realities. Still, it all seemed a dream to Jim. He waked in the morning in his own room, and wondered whether he were not dreaming. He went out upon his piazza, and saw the cabin in which he had spent so many nights in his old simple life, then went off and looked up at his house or ranged through the rooms, and experienced the emotion of regret so common to those in similar circumstances, that he could never again be what he had been, or be contented with what he had been—that he had crossed a point in his life which his retiring feet could never repass. It was the natural reaction of the long strain of expectation which he had experienced, and would pass away; but while it was upon him he mourned over the death of his old self, and the hopeless obliteration of his old circumstances.
Mr. Balfour had been written to, and would keep his promise to be present at the wedding, with Mrs. Balfour and the boys. Sam Yates, at Jim's request, had agreed to see to the preparation of an appropriate outfit for the bridegroom. Such invitations had been given out as Miss Butterworth dictated, and the Snow family was in a flutter of expectation. Presents of a humble and useful kind had been pouring in upon Miss Butterworth for days, until, indeed, she was quite overwhelmed. It seemed as if the whole village were in a conspiracy of beneficence.
In a final conference with Mrs. Snow, Miss Butterworth said: