at house was a strange one. It was, however, his
own note, and had a certain distinction, a ring of independence, of
the knowledge of self-worth. Dinner at Weathersfield we youngsters had
usually found rather an oppressive ceremony, with its shaded lights
and precise ritual over which Mr. Kyme presided like a high priest;
conversation had been restrained. That night, as Johnnie Laurens
afterwards expressed it, "things loosened up," and Mr. Watling was
responsible for the loosening. Taking command of the Kyme dinner table
appeared to me to be no mean achievement, but this is just what he did,
without being vulgar or noisy or assertive. Suavitar in modo, forbiter
in re. If, as I watched him there with a newborn pride and loyalty, I
had paused to reconstruct the idea that the mention of his name would
formerly have evoked, I suppose I should have found him falling short
of my notion of a gentleman; it had been my father's opinion; but Mr.
Watling's marriage to Gene Hollister's aunt had given him a standing
with us at home. He possessed virility, vitality in a remarkable degree,
yet some elusive quality that was neither tact nor delicacy--though
related to these differentiated him from the commonplace, self-made man
of ability. He was just off the type. To liken him to a clothing
store model of a well-built, broad-shouldered man with a firm neck, a
handsome, rather square face not lacking in colour and a conventional,
drooping moustache would be slanderous; yet he did suggest it.
Suggesting it, he redeemed it: and the middle western burr in his voice
was rather attractive than otherwise. He had not so much the air of
belonging there, as of belonging anywhere--one of those anomalistic
American citizens of the world who go abroad and make intimates of
princes. Before the meal was over he had inspired me with loyalty
and pride, enlisted the admiration of Jerry and Conybear and Johnnie
Laurens; we followed him into the smoking-room, sitting down in a row on
a leather lounge behind our elders.

Here, now that the gentlemen were alone, there was an inspiring
largeness in their talk that fired the imagination. The subject was
investments, at first those of coal and iron in my own state, for Mr.
Watling, it appeared, was counsel for the Boyne Iron Works.

"It will pay you to keep an eye on that company, Mr. Kyme," he said,
knocking the ashes from his cigar. "Now that old Mr. Durrett's gone--"

"You don't mean to say Nathaniel Dur