that enveloped everything in the region where war had dropped its litter of furies. Colonel Asbury might have practiced law: he did practice it, in fact; but it was like building a windmill over a dry well.
Cousin Rebecca Tumlin finally solved the problem by announcing that she purposed to take boarders. No one ever knew what it cost her to make that announcement. Envious people suspected the nature of the struggle through which she passed,—the hard and bitter struggle between pride and necessity,—and some of them predicted it would do her good. The colonel, who was proud after his own fashion, and also sympathetic, was shocked at first and then grieved. But he made no remark. Comment was unnecessary. He walked back and forth on the colonnade, and measured many a mile before his agitation was allayed. More than once he went down the long graveled avenue, and turned and gazed fondly at the perspective that carried the eye to the fine old house. It seemed as if he were bidding farewell to the beauty and glory of it all. But he made no complaint. When he grew tired of walking, he went in with the intention of taking
