"My husband is very kind," she said gently.
She had hardly spoken the words when Gordon came in. He stopped a moment
on seeing Bernard, glanced at his wife, blushed, flushed, and with a
loud, frank exclamation of pleasure, grasped his friend by both hands.
It was so long since he had seen Bernard that he seemed a good deal
moved; he stood there smiling, clasping his hands, looking him in
the eyes, unable for some moments to speak. Bernard, on his side, was
greatly pleased; it was delightful to him to look into Gordon's honest
face again and to return his manly grasp. And he looked well--he looked
happy; to see that was more delightful yet. During these few instants,
while they exchanged a silent pledge of renewed friendship, Bernard's
elastic perception embraced several things besides the consciousness of
his own pleasure. He saw that Gordon looked well and happy, but that he
looked older, too, and more serious, more marked by life. He looked as
if something had happened to him--as, in fact, something had. Bernard
saw a latent spark in his friend's eye that seemed to question his
own for an impression of Blanche--to question it eagerly, and yet
to deprecate judgment. He saw, too--with the fact made more vivid by
Gordon's standing there beside her in his manly sincerity and throwing
it into contrast--that Blanche was the same little posturing coquette of
a Blanche whom, at Baden, he would have treated it as a broad joke that
Gordon Wright should dream of marrying.
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