"I'll bring down your presents to-morrow," he told her, avoiding any
further present discussion of his marriage. "Has father failed, do you
think? His tempers are vigorous as ever."

"He seems baggier about the eyes and throat. He is just as quick, but it
exhausts him more. Things would be much better if he were only content to
let William manage at the countinghouse. Times are shifting so quickly
with these new clipper ships and direct passages and political changes."

"There's no longer any doubt about the clippers," Gerrit declared; "the
California gold rush will attend to that."

In his room he found Taou Yuen, in soft white silk worked with bamboo
leaves, on the day bed, smoking. She rose immediately as he entered; and,
coming close to him, ran her cool fingers through his hair. He stood
gazing out at the dim oil flares that marked the confines of Washington
Square, considering all that Rhoda had said. Strangely enough it led his
thoughts away from his wife; they reverted to Nettie Vollar.

He had been, he realized, very nearly in love with her: what he meant by
that inaccurate term was that if the affair had continued a little longer
he would have insisted on marrying her. Nettie was not indifferent to
him. An impersonal feeling had attracted him to her--a resentment of her
treatment by the larger part of Salem, particularly the oblique
admiration of the men. His supersensitiveness to any form of injustice
had driven him into the protest of calling and accompanying her, with an
exaggerated politeness, about the streets. It had not been difficult; she
was warm-blooded, luxurious, a very vivid woman. Gerrit, however, had
made a point of repressing any response to that aspect of their