cities. And ennui (which causes more harm in the world than many a more evil passion) began imperceptibly to take possession of him.
However, they continued to live on together. St. Clair was fairly regular at his work; and all went well for more than a year.
IV.
No year, probably, of James McMurtagh's life had he been so happy. It delighted him to let St. Clair away early from the bank; and to sit alone over the ledgers, imagining St. Clair's hurrying home, and the greeting kiss, and the walk they got along the shells of the beach before supper, with the setting sun slanting to them over the wide bay from the Brookline hills. When they took the meal alone, it delighted Jamie to sit at Mercy's right and have her David help him; or, when they had "company," it pleased the old man almost as much to stay away and think proudly of them. Such times he would sit alone on the Common and smoke his pipe, and come home late and let himself in with his latch-key, and steal up quickly to his own bedroom at the top of the house.
