The old gentleman was a partial paralytic,
whimsical, and not especially sociable. He was known to have lived in
princely style at Richmond, formerly. He was said to have met for some
years past with continual reverses, in the loss of property, in
sickness, and in the death of friends. The farm was bought with almost
the last remnants of a great fortune.
As Barwood strode down the piazza, a young lady rose from her reading to
give him her hand.
Blonde beauty is slightly indefinite. The edges are, as it were, too
much softened off into the background. The figure before Barwood was
fresh, distinct, clear-cut,--pre-Raphaelitish, to take a word from
painting. In all the details, from the ribbon in her feathery brown hair
to the pretty buttoned boot, there was the ineffable aroma of a pure,
delicate taste.
To a man of Barwood's temperament falling in love was difficult. He
analyzed too closely. To ask the tender passion too many questions is to
repel its advances.
Nevertheless, after two years of intimate association, in which he had
discovered in Nina Holbrook a frankness and loveliness of character
commensurate with her personal graces, he had arrived at this
condition.
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