Page:Pratt portraits - sketched in a New England suburb (IA prattportraitssk00full).pdf/161

 "I tell you I shall never marry."

"Have you never wished to?"

Anson sprang impatiently from his seat and strode to the window.

"I wish you'd quit your probing, Dr. Morse. I didn't come to talk about myself."

Dr. Morse rose, more deliberately, and followed him to the window, where the light was still clear. Bennett's face was under better control than his voice, but there was a change in it which the doctor recognized as permanent. A great wave of respect and compassion went through him.

"Young man," he said, in an altered voice, "I should feel it an honor if you would shake hands with me."

Flushing like a boy, Anson turned and looked into the homely face. The two men clasped one another's hands.

The next day Anson sat once more in his father's shop, plying with skilled fingers the handiwork to which he had been trained. Preoccupied as he was with bitter reflections, he was yet not wholly without consolation. His father's welcome was something. Mr. Bennett, garrulous in time of triumph, had few words on this occasion. When they entered the shop together on that first morning, he only said: "It seems real good to have you back, Anson. I've missed you considerable," but Anson felt the grip of the kind hand all day long, and often, in the days to come,