partly because of his disgust at the means Plausaby was using, partly because he thought the possession of the county-seat would only enable Plausaby to swindle more people and to swindle them more effectually, partly because he knew that Perritaut was more nearly central in the county, and partly because he made it a rule to oppose Plausaby on general principles.  Albert was an enthusiastic and effective talker, and it was for this reason that Plausaby had wished to interest him by getting him to “jump” Whisky Jim’s claim, which lay alongside the town.  And it was because he was an enthusiastic talker, and because his entire disinterestedness and his relations to Plausaby gave his utterances peculiar weight, that the Squire planned to get him out of the county until after the election.

Mrs. Plausaby suggested to Albert that he should go and visit a cousin thirty miles away.  Who suggested it to Mrs. Plausaby we may not guess, since we may not pry into the secrets of a family, or know anything of the conferences which a husband may hold with his wife in regard to the management of the younger members of the household.  As an authentic historian, I am bound to limit myself to the simple fact, and the fact is that Mrs. Plausaby stated to Albert her opinion that it would be a nice thing for him to go and see Cousin John’s folks at Glenfleld.  She made the suggestion with characteristic maladroitness, at a moment when Albert had been holding forth on his favorite hobby of the sinfulness of land-speculation in general, and the peculiar wickedness of misrepresentation and all the other arts pertaining to town-site swindling.  Perhaps Albert was too suspicious.  He always saw the hand of Plausaby in everything proposed by his mother.  He bluntly refused to go.  He wanted to stay and vote.  He would be of age in time.  He wanted to stay and vote against this carting of a county-seat around the country for purposes of speculation.  He became so much excited at what he regarded as a scheme to get him out of the way, that he got up from the table and went out into the air to cool off.  He sat down on the unpainted piazza, and took up Gerald Massey’s poems, of which he never tired, and read until the light failed.

And then came Isa Marlay out in the twilight and said she wanted to speak to him, and he got her a chair and listened while she spoke in a voice as full of harmony as her figure was full of gracefulness.  I have said that Isabel was not a beauty, and yet such was the influence of her form, her rhythmical movement, and her sweet, rich voice, that Charlton thought she was handsome, and when she sat down and talked to him, he found himself vibrating, as a sensitive nature will, under the influence of grace or beauty.

“Don’t you think, Mr. Charlton, that you would better take your mother’s suggestion, and go to your cousin’s?  You’ll excuse me for speaking about what does not concern me?”

Charlton would have excused her for almost anything she might have said in the way of advice or censure, for in spite of all his determination that it should not be, her presence was very pleasant to him.