It is not very remarkable, if, in view of his success, young Gerald stepped on the platform with something of the victor in his mein--his head thrown back, and his coat unbuttoned, flapping away from the expanded chest, while his eyes looked forth on the world at large, with the broad imperial gaze of a new-crowned conqueror, while Muriel leaned on his arm perhaps a shade more clingingly than she was aware. It struck Betsey Bunce, at least, who, according to her custom, was awaiting the city train, to espy the new arrivals, and pick up any fragments of news dropped by her acquaintance--it struck Betsey that summer day, that Gerald was a far finer and handsomer fellow than theretofore she had thought him. She bowed and waved her hand with much empressement; she even stepped forward to welcome him to St. Euphrase at that unusual hour; but Gerald did not see her. His head was in the clouds, and he inhaling that upper ether where swim the stars and the souls of the most blest, to whom the gods have granted all their desire. He was dazzled by the brightness of his own felicity--alas, that the felicity should be as fleeting as its power to dazzle--and saw little of what passed around him. Only he felt, and felt only the pressure of a slender hand resting on his arm. And so, unwittingly, he strode past Betsey Bunce; and Muriel, too, being with him, and somewhat overcome, looking down, and with her mind disturbed with new and confusing thoughts, and feelings which, if not so altogether new, were yet now first acknowledgedly to herself permitted to harbour there.
And Betsey believed herself to have been slighted, and her wrath grew hot against the young man, and her envy greener-eyed against the girl, who continued to secure so many things which in justice should have been hers; but having a "spirit," as she considered, she only tossed her head, and walked forward through the arriving passengers in search of other acquaintance.
It was the same train which carried home the directors of the mining association after their board meeting. Podevin was the first to alight. He appeared a happier man than when setting out in the morning. With him was Belmore, who had sunk through the whole gamut from confidence to despair, and whose barometer of feeling had again risen to "tranquil." His golden hopes for the future, indeed, had vanished, but he expected under Stinson's direction to sell out without loss, and by aid of the village notary to make everything snug in case of after litigation. Joe Webb alone looked troubled and oppressed. The dangers to his investment, and of his position as director, had now for the first time been disclosed to him, and he was at a loss how to act; and yet to take professional advice seemed to his scrupulous mind to be a breach of confidence towards his fellow directors, while to act with them appeared dishonest to the shareholders and the general public. It was useless to open his mind to Belmore and Podevin; they were resolved to save themselves at whatever cost to other people. He felt that he must not breathe a word among his neighbours, and at home he was a lonely bachelor with only his faithful pipe to soothe counsel and console him. It was with something akin to gratitude, therefore, that he received the friendly greeting of Betsey Bunce. Had his dog been near to lick his hand in that hour of darkness he would have been thankful; how much more when human sympathy and goodwill were offered him.
"You are back from town early to-day, Mr. Joe," cried Betsey, holding out her hand with demonstrative cordiality. She had felt snubbed before the eyes of all St. Euphrase by her "cousin Gerald," as she called him when out of hearing, not having noticed her, and she owed it to herself, she fancied, to show that she did not care, and had plenty of other young men to speak to.
"Yes," said Joe with a sigh, clasping the proffered hand as a drowning man lays hold on a straw. Anything is good to catch at when one is sinking.
"And you look tired," she added with plaintive sympathy.
"Worried, any way. Those town folks, you know. Miss Betsey, ain't like us here in the country."
"Ah! worried. I know the feeling so well; when one does not quite know, perhaps, what it is one wants, and yet is quite sure that what they would have is what we don't want. I know it, and town folks are so selfish."
It is marvellous how some big broad-shouldered fellow, with a fist of his own and the will to use it, who ruffles it among his peers and holds unabated his manly front before odds, opposition, and misfortune, will wilt and weaken into drivelling self-pity for a few soft words, spoken, mayhap, in doubtful sincerity, by some insignificant dot of a woman, and one for whom he feels no more than friendship. Is it a survival of the habit in childhood of bringing his pains and troubles to his mother's lap? Or is it that man needs woman to complete his being?--drawing courage from her sympathy in his hour of darkness, even as she needs the protection of his strength in hers? It is a fact, at least, that the bands which knit him in his pride, soften like wax before her, and bully Bottom lays his honest ass's head contentedly upon any Titania's knee, smiling in fatuous content as she twiddles his long ears between her dainty fingers.
"Town folks are very selfish," said Betsey again.