Page:Saxe Holm's Stories, Series Two.djvu/362

352 Among all the men who visited at the house, and who were evident admirers of Susan, the only one whom Edward Balloure feared was Tom Lawton, a distant cousin of Bell's husband. If Professor Balloure had said to any one in the town that Tom Lawton was the one man he thought Susan Sweetser might possibly marry, the remark would have been greeted with exclamations of surprise, and possibly laughter.

Tom Lawton was a lawyer; a plodding, hard working lawyer, not a pleader; there was not a trace of the rhetorician about Tom; he could not have made a speech in court to have saved his life.

He made very few anywhere, for that matter. But for a good, sound, common-sense opinion; for slow, sure, accurate working-up of a case; for shrewd dealing with, and reading of, human nature, men went to Tom Lawton. When Susan and Bell returned from Europe, Tom, being the nearest relative Bell had at hand, drifted very naturally into the position of chief adviser in the affairs of the two women. He was a man of such habitual quiet of manner, that one grew almost immediately accustomed to his presence, and felt at home with him. All dogs and all children ran to him; and his dark, blue-grey eye, which had usually a half stern look, twinkled instantly whenever he stooped to them. He was not good-looking. His face had nothing striking about it, except its expression of absolute honesty, good-will, and a certain sort of