He laid the bill of sale on the table; it was an altogether
practical matter on which he sat in judgment, but he was going to
do nothing rashly. A plain business document: he took Dr.
Knowles's share in the factory; the payments made with short
intervals; John Herne was to be his endorser: it needed only the
names to make it valid. Plain enough; no hint there of the tacit
understanding that the purchase-money was a wedding dowry; even
between Herne and himself it never was openly put into words. If
he did not marry Miss Herne, the mill was her father's; that of
course must be spoken of, arranged to-morrow. If he took it,
then? if he married her? Holmes had been poor, was miserably
poor yet, with the position and habits of a man, of refinement.
God knows it was not to gratify those tastes that he clutched at
this money. All the slow years of work trailed up before him,
that were gone,--of hard, wearing work for daily bread, when his
brain had been starving for knowledge, and his soul dulled,
debased with sordid trading. Was this to be always? Were these
few golden moments of life to be traded for the bread and meat he
ate? To eat and drink,--was that what he was here for?
As he paced the floor mechanically, some vague recollection
crossed his brain of a childish story of the man standing where
the two great roads of life parted. They were open before him
now. Money, money,--he took the word into his heart as a miser
might do.
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