It was the absence of a moment. I was recalled by a greeting given in Harry's cordial voice. Tabitha stood in the doorway. She studied the stranger with a long look, and then, advancing in her stateliest manner, bestowed on him an emphatic and elaborate welcome. He listened with grave and courteous attention, as a prince on a progress might receive the harangue of a village mayor, and answered with simple thanks, which she, satisfied with having performed her own part, accepted as an ample return, and applied herself to more practical hospitality.
Harry had been intent on some purpose when Tabitha intercepted him. He now went quickly out, brought in the knapsack he had thrown down beside the door on his first arrival, and began to undo the straps. I felt myself interested, for there was a happy earnestness in his manner which told of a pleasure on the way for somebody, and it seemed to be my turn. I was not mistaken. He drew out a book, and then another and another.
"These are from Selden."
He watched me as I read the title-pages, entering warmly into my satisfaction, which was great enough, I am sure, to be more than a reward for the weight Selden's gift had added to his pack.
"It does not take long to know Harry Dudley. Dear, affectionate boy, in what Arcadia have you grown up, that you have thus carried the innocence and simplicity of infancy through your twenty years!" This I said within myself, as I looked upon his pure forehead, and met the sweet, confiding expression of his beautiful eyes. Yet, even then, something about the mouth arrested me, something of deep, strong, resolute, which spoke the man who had already thought and renounced and resisted. It does not take long to love Harry Dudley, but I have learned that he is not to be known in an hour. Selden might well leave him to make his own introduction. I can understand, that, to those who are familiar with him, his very name should seem to comprehend a eulogium.
Tabitha gave Dr. Borrow no such ceremonious reception as she had bestowed on Harry. She was hospitable, however, and gracious, with a touch of familiarity in her manner just enough to balance the condescension in his. As he had not been witness of the greater state with which Harry was received, he was not, I trust, sensible of any want.
We sat up late that evening. The hours passed rapidly. Dr. Borrow had laid aside his preoccupations, and gave himself up to the pleasures of discourse. He passed over a wide range of topics, opening freely for us his magazines of learning, scientific and scholastic, and displaying a power of graphic narration I was not prepared for. He aids himself with apt and not excessive gesture. In relating conversations, without descending to mimicry, he characterizes his personages for you, so that you are never in doubt.
Selden, telling me almost everything else about the Doctor, had said nothing of his age; but he spoke of him as of a friend of his own, and is himself only twenty-seven; so I had supposed it to lie on the brighter side of thirty. It did, indeed, seem marvellous that the stores of erudition attributed to him could have been gathered in so early, but I made allowance for Selden's generous faculty of admiration.
Dr. Borrow must be forty, or perhaps a little more. He is of middle height, square-built, of a dull complexion, which makes his open blue eyes look very blue and open. You are to imagine for him a strong, clear voice, a rapid, yet distinct utterance, and a manner which denotes long habit of easy and secure superiority.