But it was not so to be. A swift and sudden stroke smote him down. In the dead of night, and alone, he met the angel for whose summons all of us are waiting, and went his way without a struggle. The morning sun, as its rays shot in between the blinds, lighted the seamed and careworn face of an old man, resting as in a serene, dreamless sleep.
* * * * *
Mr. Tonsor found, on consulting the best legal authorities, that he could not maintain his claim upon the notes he had received of Sandford; and, rather than subject himself to the expense of a lawsuit in which he was certain to be beaten, he relinquished them to Monroe, and filed his claim for the money against Sandford's estate. Ten per cent. was the amount of the dividend he received; the remainder was charged to Profit and Loss,—Experience being duly credited with the same amount.
* * * * *
It was with the greatest difficulty that the judicious Easelmann prevented his friend from making a second visit in the evening of the same day. Greenleaf had come to a full conviction, in his own mind, that his difference with Alice ought to be settled, and he could not conceive that it might take time to bring her to the same conclusion. Some people adapt themselves to circumstances instantly; the aversion of one hour becomes the delight of the next; but those who are guided by reasoning, especially where there is a shade of resentment,—who are fortified by pride of opinion, and by the idea of consistent self-respect,—such persons are slow to change a settled conviction; the course of feeling is too powerful and too constant to be arrested and turned backward. Easelmann thought—and perhaps rightly—that Alice needed only time to become accustomed to the new view of the case; and he believed that any precipitation might be fatal to his friend's hopes.
"Give her the opportunity to think about it," he said; "if she loves you, depend upon it, the wind will change with her. Due east to-day, according to all you have told me; and the violets won't blossom till the sun comes out of the sullen gray cloud and the south wind breathes on them.—The very contact with a lover, you see, makes me poetical."
"But her thoughts may take another direction. Who can tell what impression that malicious vixen has made upon her?"
"Alice, I fancy, is a sensible young woman; and Miss Sandford, in her rage, must have shown her hand too freely. To be sure, Alice might wonder how you could ever have been captivated; but she could not blame you for getting out of reach of such a Tartar. Besides, the exemplary widow is your friend, you know, and I'll warrant that she will set the matter right. Marcia won't trouble you again; such a mischance couldn't happen twice. You are as safe as the sailor who put his head into the hole where a cannon-shot had just come through. Lightning doesn't strike the same tree twice in one shower."
Greenleaf was at length persuaded to wait and let events take their course. If he remained inactive, however, Easelmann did not; from Mrs. Sandford he heard daily the progress of affairs, and at length intimated to his friend that it might be judicious to call again.
Once more Greenleaf was seated in the drawing-room of the boarding-house. At every distant footstep his heart beat almost audibly; and when at last the breezy rustle of a woman's robes came in from the hall, he thought, as many a man has, before and since,—