CHAPTER XVI

It was not till our hero reached Paris, on his return from the distant East, that the rumor I have just mentioned acquired an appreciable consistency.  Here, indeed, it took the shape of authentic information.  Among a number of delayed letters which had been awaiting him at his banker's he found a communication from Gordon Wright.  During the previous year or two his correspondence with this trusted--and trusting-- friend had not been frequent, and Bernard had received little direct news of him.  Three or four short letters had overtaken him in his wanderings--letters as cordial, to all appearance, if not as voluminous, as the punctual missives of an earlier time. Bernard made a point of satisfying himself that they were as cordial; he weighed them in the scales of impartial suspicion.  It seemed to him on the whole that there was no relaxation of Gordon's epistolary tone.  If he wrote less often than he used to do, that was a thing that very commonly happened as men grew older. The closest intimacies, moreover, had phases and seasons, intermissions and revivals, and even if his friend had, in fact, averted his countenance from him, this was simply the accomplishment of a periodical revolution which would bring them in due order face to face again.  Bernard made a point, himself, of writing tolerably often and writing always in the friendliest tone. He made it a matter of conscience--he liked to feel that he was treating Gordon generously, and not demanding an eye for an eye. The letter he found in Paris was so short that I may give it entire.

"My dear Bernard (it ran), I must write to you before I write to any one else, though unfortunately you are so far away that you can't be the first to congratulate me. Try and not be the last, however.  I am going to be married-- as soon as possible.  You know the young lady, so you can appreciate the situation.  Do you remember little Blanche Evers, whom we used to see three years ago at Baden-Baden? Of course you remember her, for I know you used often to talk with her. You will be rather surprised, perhaps, at my having selected her as the partner of a life-time; but we manage these matters according to our lights.  I am very much in love with her, and I hold that an excellent reason.  I have been ready any time this year or two to fall in love with some simple, trusting, child-like nature.  I find this in perfection in this charming young girl.  I find her so natural and fresh. I remember telling you once that I did n't wish to be fascinated-- that I wanted to estimate scientifically the woman I should marry. I have altogether got over that, and I don't know how I ever came to talk such nonsense.  I am fascinated now, and I assure you I like it!  The best of it is that I find it does n't in the least prevent my estimating Blanche. I judge her very fairly--I see just what she is.  She 's simple-- that 's what I want; she 's tender--that 's what I long for. You will remember how pretty she is; I need n't remind you of that. She was much younger then, and she has greatly developed and improved in these two or three years.  But she will always be young and innocent--I don't want her to improve too much. She