His bed was moved beside the low window, from which he could not only
view the veranda but converse at times with its occupants, and even
listen to the book which Miss Macy, seated without, read aloud to him.
In the evening Bradley would linger by his couch until late, beguiling
the tedium of his convalescence with characteristic stories and
information which he thought might please the invalid. For Mainwaring,
who had been early struck with Bradley's ready and cultivated
intelligence, ended by shyly avoiding the discussion of more serious
topics, partly because Bradley impressed him with a suspicion of his
own inferiority, and partly because Mainwaring questioned the taste of
Bradley's apparent exhibition of his manifest superiority. He learned
accidentally that this mill-owner and backwoodsman was a college-bred
man; but the practical application of that education to the ordinary
affairs of life was new to the young Englishman's traditions, and grated
a little harshly on his feelings. He would have been quite content if
Bradley had, like himself and fellows he knew, undervalued his training,
and kept his gifts conservatively impractical. The knowledge also that
his host's education naturally came from some provincial institution
unlike Oxford and Cambridge may have unconsciously affected his general
estimate.
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