"Don't worry. Everard will pull through all right. Look at the Randalls over there, starting for the hall. Leave your windows open, Millie, and you'll soon hear them all cheering for Everard. The moon won't rise till late, but it will be full to-night. Listen, the band's going into the hall now."
The Judge rested his cheek for a moment against his wife's soft, smooth hair, the decorous, satisfying caress of a decorous generation, then he raised his head with a long, tired sigh.
"I wish I was young," he said. "I wish I was young to-night."
"I wish I was young," the Judge had said, with a thrill and hunger that was the soul of youth itself in his voice. At the moment when he said it, a boy who had the privilege that the Judge coveted, and was not enjoying it just then, was leaning against the court-house railing, and watching Green River crowd into Odd Fellows' Hall.
Another boy had pushed his way across the square to his side, and was not heartily welcomed there, but was calmly unconscious of it.
"Some night, Donovan," he remarked,
"Some night, Willard," Neil agreed gravely.
"Going in? Good for three hours of hot air?"
"I'm not going. No."