“One moment, if you please,” said the stranger.  “The course you indicate would certainly be the proper one, in an ordinary morning call.  But my business is private, personal, and somewhat peculiar.  Now, in a community like this, I should judge that any little occurrence is likely to be discussed rather more minutely than would quite suit my views.  I refer solely to myself, you understand, and without intimating that it would be other than a matter of entire indifference to the lady.  In short, I especially desire to see her in private.  If her habits are such as I have known them, she is probably often to be met with in the woods, or by the river-side; and I think you could do me the favor to point out some favorite walk, where, about this hour, I might be fortunate enough to gain an interview.”

I reflected that it would be quite a supererogatory piece of Quixotism in me to undertake the guardianship of Zenobia, who, for my pains, would only make me the butt of endless ridicule, should the fact ever come to her knowledge.  I therefore described a spot which, as often as any other, was Zenobia’s resort at this period of the day; nor was it so remote from the farmhouse as to leave her in much peril, whatever might be the stranger’s character.

“A single word more,” said he; and his black eyes sparkled at me, whether with fun or malice I knew not, but certainly as if the Devil were peeping out of them.  “Among your fraternity, I understand, there is a certain holy and benevolent blacksmith; a man of iron, in more senses than one; a rough, cross-grained, well-meaning individual, rather boorish in his manners, as might be expected, and by no means of the highest intellectual cultivation.  He is a philanthropical lecturer, with two or three disciples, and a scheme of his own, the preliminary step in which involves a large purchase of land, and the erection of a spacious edifice, at an expense considerably beyond his means; inasmuch as these are to be reckoned in copper or old iron much more conveniently than in gold or silver.  He hammers away upon his one topic as lustily as ever he did upon a horseshoe!  Do you know such a person?” I shook my head, and was turning away.  “Our friend,” he continued, “is described to me as a brawny, shaggy, grim, and ill-favored personage, not particularly well calculated, one would say, to insinuate himself with the softer sex.  Yet, so far has this honest fellow succeeded with one lady whom we wot of, that he anticipates, from her abundant resources, the necessary funds for realizing his plan in brick and mortar!”

Here the stranger seemed to be so much amused with his sketch of Hollingsworth’s character and purposes, that he burst into a fit of merriment, of the same nature as the brief, metallic laugh already alluded to, but immensely prolonged and enlarged.  In the excess of his delight, he opened his mouth wide, and disclosed a gold band around the upper part of his teeth, thereby making it apparent that every one of his brilliant grinders and incisors was a sham.  This discovery affected me very oddly.