A side glance, as she let her lashes droop, revealed to Adelaide that grandma alone had heard and seen.  But Percy was a very common-place man.  Certainly he had no such face as had held her glance for more than an instant as the afternoon train began to move from the depot platform.  Percy was slightly above the average height and solidly built, but he was not tall.  His face had often been described as a “perfect blank.”  No one saw anything of what lay within by merely looking into his eyes, and yet there was a certain indescribable something that appealed to one from those eyes.  An elderly German lady once remarked to his mother:  “Ihr Sohn hat so etwas gutes im Auge.”

Percy was not polished in manner, Adelaide admitted.  Professor Barstow had said that he deliberated for half an hour as to whether he should bring his “cawds,” for use on Thanksgiving day, because he feared that the custom in “Vi’ginia” might not be the same as in “No’th Cahlina”; while she doubted very much if Percy had any cards whatever.  She had never heard it said that he was “strong as an ox and quick as lightning,” but perhaps she knew it as well as his schoolmates ever had.  She had not heard that one of the college professors, noted for his short-cut expressions, had once told his class that he wished they would all “keep their thinking apparatus in as good repair as Johnston’s.”  One thing she did know was that Percy’s voice had been trained to talk to a woman, and that no other voice had ever spoken her name as he did.  Reserve force? depth of manhood? confidence in his own words? absolute decision? wealth of tenderness? persistent endurance? unfailing loyalty? boundless affection?  Deep in her heart Adelaide felt that these were among the attributes revealed in Percy’s voice.  When he spoke all listened.  His voice was low-pitched but rich in tone and volume and sincerity,—­that was the word.—­The whole man seemed to feel and speak when he spoke.  He surely can have no secrets.  His mother must know all that he knows of his own self; but were those letters from his mother?  The handwriting was very modern.  Even her father made an old-fashioned C and W in signing his own name.  Had he not looked at the writing on both those letters before he noticed the others? and why did he remain so long in his room before coming down to dinner?  Had he not been in college—­in a great University where there were hundreds of the brightest girls of his own State?  But why should any girl be interested in farming?  Teaching is such a cultured profession.

Only a moment—­just while he was sorting the papers upon which they had made the computations, but a hundred thoughts had passed through her mind.  Now he was speaking.

“You remember we took a sample of the subsoil on the sloping land.  This soil is evidently residual, formed in place from the disintegration of the underlying rock.  The soil may represent only a small part of the original rock, because of the loss by leaching.  Here are the amounts of plant food found in two million pounds of the subsoil: