His first impulse was to turn and ride away, but this would be silly and unmanly, and he continued his way to the stile.  His disposition to treat the matter with contempt made him feel how important the matter was to him.  The gentleman on the platform first saw Lawrence, and announced to the lady that some one was coming.  Miss March turned around, and then rose to her feet.

“Upon my word!” she exclaimed, elevating her eyebrows a good deal more than was usual with her, “if that isn’t Mr Croft!”

“Who is he?” asked the other, also rising.

“He is a New York gentleman whom I know very well.  He was down here last summer, but I can’t imagine what brings him here again.”

Lawrence dismounted, tied his horse, and approached the steps.  Miss Roberta welcomed him cordially, coming down a little way to shake hands with him.  Then she introduced the two gentlemen.

“Mr Croft,” she said, “let me make you acquainted with Mr Keswick.”

The afternoon, or the portion of it that was left, was spent on the porch, Mr Brandon joining the party.  It was to him that Lawrence chiefly talked, for the most part about the game and scenery of North Carolina, with which the old gentleman was quite familiar.  But Lawrence had sufficient regard for himself and his position in the eyes of this family, to help make a good deal of general conversation.  What he said or heard, however, occupied only the extreme corners of his mind, the main portion of which was entirely filled with the chilling fear that that man might be the Keswick he was looking for.  Of course, there was a bare chance that it was not, for there might be a numerous family, but even this little stupid glimmer of comfort was extinguished when Mr Brandon familiarly addressed the gentleman as “Junius.”

Lawrence took a good look at the man he was anxious to study, and as far as outward appearances were concerned he could find no fault with Roberta for having accepted him.  He was taller than Croft, and not so correctly dressed.  He seemed to be a person whom one would select as a companion for a hunt, a sail, or a talk upon Political Economy.  There was about him an air of present laziness, but it was also evident that this was a disposition that could easily be thrown off.

Lawrence’s mind was not only very much occupied, but very much perturbed.  It must have been all a mistake about the engagement having been broken off.  If this had been the case, the easy friendliness of the relations between Keswick and the old gentleman and his niece would have been impossible.  Once or twice the thought came to Lawrence that he should congratulate himself for not having avowed his feelings toward Miss Roberta when he had an opportunity of doing so; but his predominant emotion was one of disgust with his previous mode of action.  If he had not weighed and considered the matter so carefully, and had been willing to take his chances as other men take them, he would, at least, have known in what relation he stood to Roberta, and would not have occupied the ridiculous position in which he now felt himself to be.