She was Everything. Until he found her, he could not help
adoring others who possessed little pieces and suggestions of her--her
brilliancy, her courage, her short upper lip, "like a curled roseleaf," or
her dear voice, or her pure profile. He had no recollection of any lady
who had quite her eyes.
He had never passed a lovely stranger on the street, in the old days,
without a thrill of delight and warmth. If he never saw her again, and the
vision only lasted the time it takes a lady to cross the sidewalk from a
shop door to a carriage, he was always a little in love with her, because
she bore about her, somewhere, as did every pretty girl he ever saw, a
suggestion of the far-away divinity. One does not pass lovely strangers in
the streets of Plattville. Miss Briscoe was pretty, but not at all in the
way that Harkless dreamed. For five years the lover in him that had loved
so often had been starved of all but dreams. Only at twilight and dusk in
the summer, when, strolling, he caught sight of a woman's skirt, far up
the village street--half-outlined in the darkness under the cathedral arch
of meeting branches--this romancer of petticoats could sigh a true lover's
sigh, and, if he kept enough distance between, fly a yearning fancy that
his lady wandered there.
Ever since his university days the image of her had been growing more and
more distinct.
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