The next, he opened the
newspaper in his hand. What part in the eternal order could THAT
hold? or slavery, or secession, or civil war? No harmony could
be infinite enough to hold such discords, he thought, pushing the
whole matter from him in despair. Why, the experiment of
self-government, the problem of the ages, was crumbling in ruin!
So he despaired, just as Tige did the night the mill fell about
his ears, in full confidence that the world had come to an end
now, without hope of salvation,--crawling out of his cellar in
dumb amazement, when the sun rose as usual the next morning.
Knowles sat, peering at Holmes over his paper, watching the
languid breath that showed how deep the hurt had been, the maimed
body, the face outwardly cool, watchful, reticent as before. He
fancied the slough of disappointment into which God had crushed
the soul of this man: would he struggle out? Would he take Miss
Herne as the first step in his stair-way, or be content to be
flung down in vigorous manhood to the depth of impotent poverty?
He could not tell if the quiet on Holmes's face were stolid
defiance or submission: the dumb kings might have looked thus
beneath the feet of Pharaoh. When he walked over the floor, too,
weak as he was it was with the old iron tread. He asked Knowles
presently what business he had gone into.
"My old hobby in an humble way,--the House of Refuge."
They both laughed.
"Yes, it is true. The janitor points me out to visitors as
`under-superintendent, a philanthropist in decayed
circumstances.
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