you begin to understand what a power you have of bringing happiness to
me."
He looked, and indeed, for the transient moment, he felt, like a man who
must have his answer, for better or worse, within the hour. She saw his
look, and her eyes fell before it, not wholly because she knew how to do
that to exactly the best advantage. Few persons would have mistaken Miss
Avery for a wholly inexperienced and unsophisticated girl. But how was
she to know that that same look had risen in the eyes of West, and that
same note, obviously sincere, broken suddenly into his pleasant voice,
for many, many of the fair?
The music died in a splendid crash, and they threaded their way to their
seats, slowly and often stopped, across the crowded floor. Many eyes
followed them as they walked. She was still "new" to us; she was
beautiful; she was her own young lady, and something about her suggested
that she would be slightly unsafe for boys, the headstrong, and the
foolish; rumor made her colossally wealthy. As for him, he was the glass
of fashion and the mould of form, and much more than that besides. Of an
old name but a scanty fortune, he had won his place by his individual
merits; chiefly, perhaps, for so wags the world, by an exterior
singularly prepossessing and a manner that was a possession above
rubies. His were good looks of the best fashion of men's good looks; not
a tall man, he yet gave the effect of tallness, so perfect was his
carriage, so handsome his address. And he was as clever as charming;
cultured as the world knows culture; literary as the term goes; nor was
there any one who made a happier speech than he, whether in the forum or
around the festal board. Detractors, of course, he had--as which of
those who raise their heads above the dead level have not?--but they
usually contented themselves with saying, as Buck Klinker had once said,
that his manners were a little too good to be true. To most he seemed a
fine type of the young American of the modern South; a brave gentleman;
a true Democrat with all his honors; and, though he had not yet been
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