in something, he cared not what. He
stifled such rebellious promptings,--called them morbid. He called it
morbid, too, the passion now that chilled his strong blood, and wrung
out these clammy drops on his forehead, at the mere thought of this
girl below.

He shut the door of his room tightly: he had no time to-day for
lounging visitors. For Holmes, quiet and steady, was sought for, if
not popular, even in the free-and-easy West; one of those men who are
unwillingly masters among men. Just and mild, always; with a peculiar
gift that made men talk their best thoughts to him, knowing they would
be understood; if any core of eternal flint lay under the simple,
truthful manner of the man, nobody saw it.

He laid the bill of sale on the table; it was an altogether practical
matter on which he sat in judgment, but he was going to do nothing
rashly. A plain business document: he took Dr. Knowles's share in the
factory; the payments made with short intervals; John Herne was to be
his endorser: it needed only the names to make it valid. Plain enough;
no hint there of the tacit understanding that the purchase-money was a
wedding dowry; even between Herne and himself it never was openly put
into words. If he did not marry Miss Herne, the mill was her father's;
that of course must be spoken of, arranged to-morrow. If he took it,
then? if he married her? Holmes had been poor, was miserably poor yet,
with the position and habits of a man, of refinement. God knows it was
not to gratify those tastes that he clutched at this money. All the
slow years of work trailed up before him, that were gone,--of hard,
wearing work for daily bread, when his brain had been starving for
knowledge, and his soul dulled, debased with sordid trading. Was this
to be always? Were these few golden moments of life to be traded for
the bread and meat he ate? To eat and drink,--was that what he was
here for?

As he paced the floor mechanically, some vague recollection crossed his
brain of a childish story of the man standing where the two great roads
of life parted. They were open before him now. Money, money,--he took
the word into his heart as a miser might do. With it, he was free from
these carking cares that were making his mind foul and muddy. If he
had money! Slow, cool visions of triumphs rose before him outlined on
the years to come, practical, if Utopian. Slow and sure successes of
science and art, where his brain could work, he