and
standards that by his own hand he was keeping her out of the heaven of
happiness she might have otherwise inherited? He feared so.
He bowed his head with the others but he did not pray. He could not. He
was too unhappy. And yet who knows? Perhaps his unwonted clarity of
vision and humility of soul were acceptable that morning in lieu of
prayer to Sandalphou.
As he ate his solitary dinner his despondency grew upon him. He felt
almost positive Philip would fail in his mission, that Carlotta would go
her willful way to regret and disillusionment, and all these things gone
irretrievably wrong would be at bottom his own fault.
Later he endeavored to distract himself from his dreary thoughts by
discoursing with his neighbor on the veranda, a tall, grizzled, soldierly
looking gentleman with shrewd but kind eyes and the brow of a scholar.
As they talked desultorily a group of khaki clad youngsters filed past,
Philip Lambert among them, looking only an older and taller boy in their
midst. The lads looked happy, alert, vigorous, were of clean, upstanding
type, the pick of the town it seemed probable to Harrison Cressy who said
as much to his companion.
The other smiled and shook his head.
"You are mistaken, sir," he said. "Three months ago most of those fellows
were riffraff--the kind that hang around street corners smoking and
indulging in loose talk and profanity. Young Lambert, the chap with them,
their Scout-master, picked that kind from choice, turned down a
respectable church-mothered bunch for this one, left the other for a man
who wanted an easier row to hoe. It was some stunt, as the boys say. It
took a man like Phil Lambert to put it through. He has the crowd where he
wants them now though. They would go through fire and water if he led
them and he is a born leader."
Harrison Cressy's eyes followed the departing group. Here was a new light
on his hoped-for son-in-law. So he picked "publicans-and sinners" to eat
with. Mr. Cressy rather liked that. He hated snobs and pharisees,
couldn't stomach either brand.
"It means a good deal to a town like this when its college-bred boys come
back and lend a hand like that," the other man went on. "So many of them
rush off to the cities thinking there isn't scope enough for their
ineffable wisdom and surpassing talents in their own home town. A number
of people prophesied that young Lambert would do the same instead of
settling down with his father as we all want
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