But he
saw that her strength failed her, and that, besides, things were getting
less clear to her; to his considerable relief, inasmuch as, though he
would not have objected to joining hands, the expression of Miss
Chancellor's figure and her averted face, with their desperate collapse,
showed him well enough how _she_ would have met such a proposal. What
Miss Birdseye clung to, with benignant perversity, was the idea that, in
spite of his exclusion from the house, which was perhaps only the result
of a certain high-strung jealousy on Olive's part of her friend's other
personal ties, Verena had drawn him in, had made him sympathise with the
great reform and desire to work for it. Ransom saw no reason why such an
illusion should be dear to Miss Birdseye; his contact with her in the
past had been so momentary that he could not account for her taking an
interest in his views, in his throwing his weight into the right scale.
It was part of the general desire for justice that fermented within her,
the passion for progress; and it was also in some degree her interest in
Verena--a suspicion, innocent and idyllic, as any such suspicion on Miss
Birdseye's part must be, that there was something between them, that the
closest of all unions (as Miss Birdseye at least supposed it was) was
preparing itself. Then his being a Southerner gave a point to the whole
thing; to bring round a Southerner would be a real encouragement for one
who had seen, even at a time when she was already an old woman, what was
the tone of opinion in the cotton States.
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