I saw Young Master admitted to the bar. The court-house was crowded, for an exciting trial was on, but a kind-hearted bailiff let me take a seat wherein I could hear every question asked by the committee of examiners. I knew that he could answer them, and I felt not the slightest fear, but my heart stood still as he tripped over a point almost absurdly simple. I noticed that he had just cast his eyes toward the gallery, and looking that way at the instant of his petty stumble, I beheld a tall and graceful girl, standing with her head leaning against a post, looking at him, and I knew that his divinity had confused him. But he recovered himself, and I saw Old Master swell with pride and Old Miss wipe her eyes. I was in hopes that they would give him an opportunity to make a speech after the examination, but there was no occasion for his oratory, so I walked out to wait for him at the door. Old Master and Old Miss came out to wait also, not caring to push themselves behind the bar among the lawyers, and indeed too proud to let[Pg 205] the neighbors presume that there had been any anxiety concerning the result. Presently Young Master came out with the girl whom I had seen standing in the gallery. The old people shook hands with her when they had shaken hands with him, and upon me the young woman turned her beautiful eyes. "Oh, this is your faithful boy," she said, speaking to Bob, but looking at me. "I am glad to see him out and looking so well."
She had ridden a horse, but Young Master requested the favor of taking her home in his buggy. She said that such an arrangement would please her greatly, and her eyes danced with the delight of the thought. I brought the buggy and was told to sit on the shelf seat behind to lead her horse. She bade the old people an affectionate good-bye, and out the turn-pike we drove, along the stretches of red clover and underneath majestic trees. In the distance to her home, three miles or more, there lay a charm, and they did not suffer the spirited horse to trot. The day was warm, the leather curtain raised, and I could hear distinctly the words that passed between them. I could see that he had not more than hinted at his love for her. Her beauty dazzled him and made him afraid. He would have talked of books, but she leaped lightly[Pg 206] from that subject, and from this I inferred that her mind was not well stored with the knowledge gathered by the busy men of the past. But she was bright and her talk like herself was spirited and pretty, and her observation was minute. She had seen everything about the court-room, an old lawyer with a spot of ink on the sleeve of his linen coat, a tattered book on the floor, a handful of trash swept into a corner.
"The stars shine on all that lies beneath them," said Master, a fine tribute to her eyes, I thought; and she must have thought so, too, for she gave him a laugh that rippled like our creek of a morning when the wind is low. But she protested against his gallantry with a sternness that could not have belonged to her light nature, a plea to him to repeat it, which he did. To his ardent nature, frivolity was a foreign commodity upon which a heavy import tax was laid. He could be argumentative, oratorical, gay, serious and bright for hours at a time, but the silly though pretty chatter which our social life is supposed to dash as spray between the masculine and the feminine mind was far beyond him. In nearly all affairs he was too intense for the perfectly balanced mind. And on this day he strove repeatedly to fasten the young woman down to seriousness, that he might estimate her mental strength, I perceived;[Pg 207] but she flitted about like a humming bird, no sooner attracted by one flower than allured away by another. Still the perfect femininity of her wit, or that which might pass for it, was captivating. A strained and tiresome novelette, now almost forgotten, was then an imported rage, and she had not escaped the infection. She spoke of characters that Bob knew nothing of and was surprised at his frank acknowledgment of ignorance.
"A young man of your standing can't afford not to know that character," she said. "Society demands it of you, and I believe I would pretend to know," she added, laughing.
"We always meet society's demands when we pretend," he replied. "People don't ask us to know a thing but to assume that we know it and not get caught. I haven't had time to sip negus," he went on after a pause; "I have been too busy with drinking a stronger draught. I sit in the glow of the great books, but pass by the little twinkling lights, for I know that soon they must go out."
"Or, in other words," she spoke up, "you tread upon a snow-drop while gazing at a sun-flower."
This remark, and I acknowledge its aptness, was so pleasing to her that she laughed the music of self-compliment; [Pg 208]and the lambs in the grass-land lifted their noses out of the sweet tangle of clover to look at her. I was so close that when she leaned back once a wayward wisp of her hair swept across my face, more like a breath than a tangible touch, it was so silken and soft. I studied the almost imperceptible grain of her pink, plush skin, I was so near her, and yet to me she was so strangely unreal. To look upon her surely was a delight, but turning away and shutting my eyes to recall her features, she seemed a memory far off and shadowy. I could have given her a sort of worship, the romantic adoration compelled by a naiad reposing on a moss-bank at the source of a tinkling stream, but I could not have felt for her the surging passion of a human love. There was nothing supernatural in her grace; in her movement there was the soft and unconscious suppression of a cat's agility; and her bosom bespoke a strong instinct of motherhood, and yet to me she was vaguely unnatural. She was wanting in heart.
A powerful love looks upon itself as hopeless; upon it must be thrown that sort of a light, to complete its deliciousness; and I saw that my master's love was powerful, but I could not see that it was hopeless. She might never give him a woman's complete [Pg 209]devotion, I argued, for I did not believe that her nature could comprehend his finer forces, but I felt that she would give him her hand and what she supposed to be her heart.
"Do you mean to surrender your life wholly to law books?" she asked, giving him a glance in which I could see a charming fear.
"Oh, no. To my mind a law book without poetry behind it is a heap of helpless dust. At first I must agree to take almost any case that may chance to come along, but after a while I will scorn all but the causes that admit of an orator's effort."
"Oh, that will be lovely!" she cried. "And to think that you entertain yourself and then get pay for it. However, if I were a man, I think I would be a preacher. Preachers are nearly always so nice and clean and they say such pretty things to women."
"It was my mother's ambition that I should be a preacher, and I'm sorry now that I did not gratify it," he said.
"Oh, charming of you to say so, Mr. Gradley. You see I don't let such a complimen............