No matter what Mr. Hopper's politics, he would always be to her a
low-born Yankee, a person wholly unworthy of notice.

At the corner of Olive Street, a young man walking with long strides
almost bumped into them. He paused looked back, and bowed as if uncertain
of an acknowledgment. Virginia barely returned his bow. He had been very
close to her, and she had had time to notice that his coat was
threadbare. When she looked again, he had covered half the block. Why
should she care if Stephen Brice had seen her in company with Mr, Hopper?
Eliphalet, too, had seen Stephen, and this had added zest to his
enjoyment. It was part of the fruits of his reward. He wished in that
short walk that he might meet Mr. Cluyme and Belle, and every man and
woman and child in the city whom he knew. From time to time he glanced at
the severe profile of the aristocrat beside him (he had to look up a bit,
likewise), and that look set him down among the beasts of prey. For she
was his rightful prey, and he meant not to lose one tittle of enjoyment
in the progress of the game. Many and many a night in the bare little
back room at Miss Crane's, Eliphalet had gloated over the very event
which was now come to pass. Not a step of the way but what he had lived
through before.

The future is laid open to such men as he. Since he had first seen the
black cloud of war rolling up from the South, a hundred times had he
rehearsed the scene with Colonel Carvel which had actually taken place a
week before. A hundred times had he prepared his speech and manner for
this first appearance in public with Virginia after he had forced the
right to walk in her company. The words he had prepared--commonplace, to
be sure, but carefully chosen--flowed from his lips in a continual nasal
stream. The girl answered absently, her feminine instinct groping after a
reason for it all. She brightened when she saw her father at the doors