who had taken her fancy; and he could not be sure that her fancy had ever been his, even if this had not happened.  He had no proof at all that she had ever cared or could care for him except gratefully, respectfully, almost reverentially, with that mingling of filial and maternal anxiety which had hitherto been the warmest expression of her regard.  He tried to reason it out, and could not.  He suddenly found himself bitterly disappointed that he had missed seeing her, for if they had met, he would have known by this time what to think, what to hope.  He felt old—­he felt fully thirty-six years old—­as he passed his hand over his crown, whose gossamer growth opposed so little resistance to his touch.  He had begun to lose his hair early, but till then he had not much regretted his baldness.  He entered into a little question of their comparative ages, which led him to the conclusion that Cynthia must now be about twenty-five.

Almost at the same moment he saw her coming up the walk toward him from far down the avenue.  For a reason, or rather a motive, of his own he pretended to himself that it was not she, but he knew instantly that it was, and he put on his hat.  He could see that she did not know him, and it was a pretty thing to witness the recognition dawn on her.  When it had its full effect, he was aware of a flutter, a pause in her whole figure before she came on toward him, and he hurried his steps for the charm of her beautiful blushing face.

It was the spiritual effect of figure and face that he had carried in his thought ever since he had arrived at that one-sided intimacy through his study of her for the picture he had just seen.  He had often had to ask himself whether he had really perceived or only imagined the character he had translated into it; but here, for the moment at least, was what he had seen.  He hurried forward and joyfully took the hand she gave him.  He thought he should speak of that at once, but it was not possible, of course.  There had to come first the unheeded questions and answers about each other’s health, and many other commonplaces.  He turned and walked home with her, and at the gate of the little ugly house she asked him if he would not come in and take tea with them.

Her father talked with him while she got the tea, and when it was ready her brother came in from his walk home out of Old Cambridge and helped her put it on the table.  He had grown much taller than Westover, and he was very ecclesiastical in his manner; more so than he would be, probably, if he ever became a bishop, Westover decided.  Jombateeste, in an interval of suspended work at the brick yard, was paying a visit to his people in Canada, and Westover did not see him.