THE STEADFAST HEART
Social Rainbow was not aware of his existence. It was a jolly town which, compelled to manufacture its own pleasures, was rich in picnics, sleigh-rides, dances, “home-talent” plays and parties. These, however, were for those who possessed caste, and almost everybody in town except Angus was enough of a Brahmin for these. He knew men during their business hours, men who tolerated him because they were compelled to tolerate, but whose attitude was not friendly; their homes he saw only from without. The younger folks he knew not at all, because their orbits did not touch his. Only two women did Angus meet in a social way—Lydia Canfield and Mary Browning, and to leave him alone with either of them was to strike him with silence and with discomfort. Mary was always gentle, solicitous, motherly, and Angus repaid her with a warm, unexpressed affection; to Lydia he was not quite a human being to be dealt with as a human being. He was different, set apart, something which had not been born, but manufacured. Somehow she felt she had had a part in his manufacturing and therefore was highly interested…. Angus admired her as one might admire a distant star. The thought of friendship with her never occurred to him. She was Lydia Canfield! And Lydia Canfield was an uncertain, tempestuous, incomprehensible
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