For a moment this seemed likely, as there was a short colloquy with Thomas at the door before the visitor was admitted, and even after that he lingered to remove his overcoat and rubbers in the hall, with a deliberation that implied a degree of familiarity that Margaret could not identify as belonging to any visitor at the house whom she had yet met. The next moment, as Louis Gaston and herself were both watching the door-way, Major King appeared, tall, gaunt, and awkward, but eminently self-possessed. His loosely hung, impractically tall figure was clad in the inevitable shiny black “best clothes,” that poor Margaret knew so well, even to the cut of the long frock-coat, with its flapping tails behind and its bagging, unhindered fronts, between which was displayed, through a premeditated opening in the vest, a modicum of white shirt-front, interrupted for an inch or so by the fastening of the upper buttons, only to reveal itself in more generous expansiveness higher up upon the Major’s manly bosom. Margaret’s quick eye at once perceived the incongruity of the whole situation, and warned her of the necessity of effort on the part of all to reconcile and overcome it. She went forward and received Major King with the perfect politeness which was as natural to her as breathing, and then turned to present Mr. Gaston, who, with the folding-doors of the library opened wide, was quite as if he were in the same room. Gaston’s aspect, at the first glance she gave him, was absolutely startling to her. His whole bearing had changed. He had risen from his seat and turned toward the drawing-room, and was standing by the table, very erect and still. The expression of his face was repellant to the last degree, the brows were contracted in a slight but perceptible frown, and the lips were shut with a firm severity. Margaret, as she mechanically named the two men to each other, could not help drawing a swift mental contrast between the gaunt Southerner, whose features were, in reality, the handsomer of the two, and the Northern man, in his quiet evening dress, and wondering why the latter looked so greatly the superior. Mr. Gaston’s attitude, despite its stiffness, was dignified and impressive, and Major King’s, notwithstanding its ease, was slouching and ungainly. But the most significant point of contrast came when each man, after his kind, acknowledged the introduction. “Glad to meet you, sir,” said Major King, in loud, reverberating tones, and made a motion forward, as if to extend his hand. This impulse was repressed, however, by the short, supercilious bow with which the other responded, pronouncing the two words, “Good-evening,” with a chilling and clear-cut utterance that formed the strongest possible contrast to the stranger’s bluff and off-hand style of address. Margaret observed that he did not pronounce Major King’s name at all.