blazoned by the declining sun, he walked with his stately abbess.
He knew that she was the sort of wife who would help him to capture a bishopric. He persuaded himself that, with all her virtue, she would eventually be interesting to kiss. He noted that they "made a fine couple." He told himself that she was the first woman he had ever found who was worthy of him. . . . Then he remembered Sharon. . . . But the pang lasted only a moment, in the secure village peace, in the gentle flow of Cleo's voice.
Once he was out of the sacred briskness of his store, Mr. Nathaniel Benham forgot discounts and became an affable host. He said, "Well, well, Brother," ever so many times, and shook hands profusely. Mrs. Benham—she was a large woman, rather handsome; she wore figured foulard, with an apron over it, as she had been helping in the kitchen—Mrs. Benham was equally cordial. "I'll just bet you're hungry, Brother!" cried she.
He was, after a lunch of ham sandwich and coffee at a station lunch-room on the way down.
The Benham house was the proudest mansion in town. It was of yellow clapboards with white trim; it had a huge screened porch and a little turret; a staircase window with a border of colored glass; and there was a real fireplace, though it was never used. In front of the house, to Elmer's admiration, was one of the three automobiles which were all that were to be found in 1913 in Banjo Crossing. It was a bright red Buick with brass trimmings.
The Benham supper was as replete with fried chicken and theological questions as Elmer's first supper with Deacon Bains in Schoenheim. But here was wealth, for which Elmer had a touching reverence, and here was Cleo.
Lulu Bains had been a tempting mouthful; Cleo Benham was of the race of queens. To possess her, Elmer gloated, would in itself be an empire, worth any battling. . . . And yet he did not itch to get her in a corner and buss her, as he had Lulu; the slope of her proud shoulders did not make his fingers taut.
