opportunity to resume the conversation with Madeline which had been
broken off at such an interesting point.




CHAPTER IV.


The advent of a stranger was an event of importance in the small social
world of Newville. Mr. Harrison Cordis, the new clerk in the drug-store,
might well have been flattered by the attention which he excited at
church the next day, especially from the fairer half of the congregation.
Far, however, from appearing discomposed thereby, he returned it with
such interest that at least half the girls thought they had captivated
him by the end of the morning service. They all agreed that he was
awfully handsome, though Laura maintained that he was rather too pretty
for a man. He was certainly very pretty. His figure was tall, slight, and
elegant. He had delicate hands and feet, a white forehead, deep blue,
smiling eyes, short, curly, yellow, hair, and a small moustache, drooping
over lips as enticing as a girl's. But the ladies voted his manners yet
more pleasing than his appearance. They were charmed by his easy
self-possession, and constant alertness as to details of courtesy. The
village beaus scornfully called him "cityfied," and secretly longed to be
like him. A shrewder criticism than that to which he was exposed would,
however, have found the fault with Cordis's manners that, under a show of
superior ease and affability, he was disposed to take liberties with his
new acquaintances, and exploit their simplicity for his own
entertainment. Evidently he felt that he was in the country.