It happens at times that a big, attractive, self-possessed man
is secretly as shy, as fanciful, as the shyest girl--if he cares.
Once and again indeed the idea flashed into the mind of Johnny
McLean--that perhaps she had been so sorry that she did not dare
look at him. But he flung that aside with a savage half-thought.
"What rot! It's probable that I was important enough for that,
isn't it? You fool!" And about then he was likely to get up with
a spring and attack a new book on pillar and shaft versus the block
system of mining coal.
The busy days went on, and the work grew more absorbing, the
atmosphere more charged with an electricity which foretold
tempest. The president knew that the personality of the young
superintendent almost alone held the electricity in solution
that for months he and his little musical club and his large
popularity had kept off the strike. Till at last a day came
in early May.
We sit at the ends of the earth and sew on buttons and play cards
while fate wipes from existence the thing dearest to us. Johnny's
father that afternoon mounted his new saddle-horse and rode
through the afternoon lights and shadows of spring. The girl,
who had not forgotten, either, went to a luncheon and the theatre
after.
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