the hurt was almost immediately healed, and a forgiving smile testified
to the kindly judge that all was well again.
Concealed behind Angelo’s modest and unassuming exterior, and unsuspected
by any but his intimates, was a lofty pride, a pride of almost abnormal
proportions, indeed, and this rendered him ever the prey of slights; and
although they were almost always imaginary ones, they hurt none the less
on that account. By ill fortune judge Driscoll had happened to touch his
sorest point, i.e., his conviction that his brother’s presence was
welcomer everywhere than his own; that he was often invited, out of mere
courtesy, where only his brother was wanted, and that in a majority of
cases he would not be included in an invitation if he could be left out
without offense. A sensitive nature like this is necessarily subject to
moods; moods which traverse the whole gamut of feeling; moods which know
all the climes of emotion, from the sunny heights of joy to the black
abysses of despair. At times, in his seasons of deepest depressions,
Angelo almost wished that he and his brother might become segregated from
each other and be separate individuals, like other men. But of course as
soon as his mind cleared and these diseased imaginings passed away, he
shuddered at the repulsive thought, and earnestly prayed that it might
visit him no more. To be separate, and as other men are! How awkward it
would seem; how unendurable. What would he do with his hands, his arms?
How would his legs feel? How odd, and strange, and grotesque every
action, attitude, movement, gesture would be. To sleep by himself, eat
by himself, walk by himself–how lonely, how unspeakably lonely! No, no,
any fate but that. In every way and from every point, the idea was
revolting.
This was of course natural; to have felt otherwise would have been
unnatural. He had known no life but a combined one; he had been familiar
with it from his birth; he was not able to conceive of any other as being
agreeable, or even bearable. To him, in the privacy of his secret
thoughts, all other men were monsters, deformities: and during
three-fourths of his life their aspect had filled him with what promised
to be an unconquerable aversion. But at eighteen his eye began to take
note of female beauty; and little by little, undefined longings grew up
in his heart, under whose softening influences the old stubborn aversion
gradually diminished, and finally disappeared. Men were still
monstrosities to him, still deformities, and in his sober moments he had
no desire to be like them, but their strange and unsocial and uncanny
construction was no longer offensive to him.
This had been a hard day for him, physically and mentally. He had been
called in the morning before he had quite slept off the effects of the
liquor which Luigi had drunk; and so, for the first half-hour had had the
seedy feeling, and languor, the brooding depression, the cobwebby mouth
and druggy taste that come of dissipation and are so ill a preparation
for bodily or intellectual activities; the long violent strain of the
reception had followed; and this had been followed, in turn, by the
dreary sight-seeing, the judge’s wearying explanations and laudations of
the sights, and the stupefying clamor of the dogs. As a congruous
conclusion, a fitting end, his feelings had been hurt, a slight had been
put upon him. He would have been glad to forego dinner and betake
himself to rest and sleep, but he held his peace and said no word, for he
knew his brother, Luigi, was fresh, unweary, full of life, spirit,
energy; he would have scoffed at the idea of wasting valuable time on a
bed or a sofa, and would have refused permission.
CHAPTER IV
SUPERNATURAL CHRONOMETRY
Rowena was dining out, Joe and Harry were belated at play, there were but
three chairs and four persons that noon at the home dinner-table–
the twins, the widow, and her chum, Aunt Betsy Hale. The widow soon
perceived that Angelo’s spirits were as low as Luigi’s were high, and
also that he had a jaded look. Her motherly solicitude was aroused, and