ain't
any doubt but what he's got a takin' way with the women. They like him.
He's masterful, and he ain't a fool, and women most gen'ly like a man
that ain't a fool. I guess if he 's got his eye on the girl's prop'ty,
she'll have to come along. He'd begin by havin' his own way about her
answer; he'd hang on till she said Yes, if she did n't say it first-off;
and he'd keep on as he'd begun. I guess if he wants her it's a match."
And Cap'n Billy threw his own into the square box of tobacco-stained
sawdust under the stove.

Mrs. Maynard fully shared the opinion which rocked Dr. Mulbridge's
defeat with a belief in his invincible will. When it became necessary,
in the course of events which made Grace and Libby resolve upon a
short engagement, to tell her that they were going to be married, she
expressed a frank astonishment. "Walter Libby!" she cried. "Well, I
am surprised. When I was talking to you the other day about getting
married, of course I supposed it was going to be Dr. Mulbridge. I did
n't want you to marry him, but I thought you were going to."

"And why," demanded Grace, with mounting sensation, "did you think
that?"

"Oh, I thought you would have to."

"Have to?"

"Oh, you have such a weak will. Or I always thought you had. But perhaps
it's only a weak will with other women. I don't know! But Walter
Libby! I knew he was perfectly gone upon you, and I told you so at the
beginning; but I never dreamt of your caring for him. Why, it seems too
ridiculous."

"Indeed! I'm glad that it amuses you."

"Oh no, you're not, Grace. But you know what I mean. He seems so much
younger."

"Younger? He's half a year older than I am."

"I did n't say he was younger. But you're so very grave and he's so very
light. Well, I always told Walter Libby I should get him a wife, but you
were the last person I should have thought of. What's going to become
of all your high purposes? You can't do anything with them when you're
married! But you won't have any occasion for them, that's one comfort."

"It's not my idea of marriage that any high purpose will be lost in it."

"Oh, it is n't anybody's, before they get married. I had such high
purposes I couldn't rest. I felt like hiring a hall, as George says,
all the time. Walter Libby is n't going to let you practise, is he? You
mustn't let him! I know he'd be willing to do anything you said, but a
husband ought to be something more than a mere & Co."

Grace laughed at the im