back was toward it, so that she was only an outline to him, and he would
have been startled and touched to the quick, could he have known that her
lip quivered and her eyes filled with tears as she spoke the last words.
He was happy as he had not been since his short June day; it was enough to
be with her again. Nothing, not even Brainard Macauley, could dull his
delight. And, besides, for a few minutes he had forgotten Brainard
Macauley. What more could man ask than to sit in the gloom with her, to
know that he was near her again for a little while, and to talk about
anything--if he talked at all? Nonsense and idle exaggeration about young
Fisbee would do as well as another thing.

"The young gentleman is an exception," he returned. "I told you I owed
everything to him; my gratitude will not allow me to admit that his
ability is less than his stature. He suggested my purchase of a quantity
of Mr. Watts's oil stock when it was knocked flat on its back by two wells
turning out dry; but if Mr. Watts's third well comes in, and young Fisbee
has convinced me that it will, and if my Midas's extra booms the stock and
the boom develops, I shall oppose the income tax. Poor old Plattville will
be full of strangers and speculators, and the 'Herald' will advocate vast
improvements to impress the investor's eye. Stagnation and picturesqueness
will flee together; it is the history of the Indiana town. Already the
'Herald' is clamoring with Schofields' Henry--you remember the bell-
ringer?--for Main Street to be asphalted. It will all come. The only
trouble with young Fisbee is that he has too much ability."

"And yet the daily will not succeed?"

"No. That's too big a jump, unless my young man's expressions on the
tariff command a wide sale amongst curio-hunters."