“Here’s Dory Hargrave, Del,” cried Arthur, and went on into the house, leaving them facing each other.

“So glad you’ve come,” said Adelaide, her tone and manner at their friendliest.

But as she faced his penetrating eyes, her composure became less assured.  He looked straight at her until her eyes dropped—­this while they were shaking hands.  He continued to look, she feeling it and growing more and more uncomfortable.

“Why did you send for me?” he asked.

She would have liked to deny or to evade; but neither was possible.  Now that he was before her she recalled his habit of compelling her always to be truthful not only with him but—­what was far worse—­also with herself.  “Did Arthur tell you I asked him to bring you?” she said, to gain time.

“No,” was his reply.  “But, as soon as he asked me, I knew.”

It irritated her that this young man who was not at all a “man of the world” should be able so easily to fathom her.  She had yet to learn that “man of the world” means man of a very small and insignificant world, while Dory Hargrave had been born a citizen of the big world, the real world—­one who understands human beings, because his sympathies are broad as human nature itself, and his eyes clear of the scales of pretense.  He was an illustration of the shallowness of the talk about the loneliness of great souls.  It is the great souls that alone are not alone.  They understand better than the self-conscious, posing mass of mankind the weakness and the pettiness of human nature; but they also appreciate its other side.  And in the pettiest creature, they still see the greatness that is in every human being, in every living thing for that matter, its majesty of mystery and of potentiality—­mystery of its living mechanism, potentiality of its position as a source of ever-ascending forms of life.  From the protoplasmal cell descends the genius; from the loins of the sodden toiler chained to the soil springs the mother of genius or genius itself.  And where little people were bored and isolated, Dory Hargrave could without effort pass the barriers to any human heart, could enter in and sit at its inmost hearth, a welcome guest.  He never intruded; he never misunderstood; he never caused the slightest uneasiness lest he should go away to sneer or to despise.  Even old John Skeffington was confidential with him, and would have been friendly had not Dory avoided him.

Adelaide soon fell under the spell of this genius of his for inspiring confidence.  She had not fully disclosed her plans to herself; she hesitated at letting herself see what her fury against Theresa and Ross had goaded her on to resolve.  So she had no difficulty in persuading herself that she had probably sent for Dory chiefly to consult with him.  “There’s something I want to talk over with you,” said she; “but wait till after din—­supper.  Have you and Artie been playing tennis?”

“No, he found me at home.  Estelle Wilmot and I were playing with a microscope.”