But, after all, the hopes that were strongest and most abiding were formed in the Tramlay parlor, while Lucia was apparently only acting the part of a listener. The young man occasionally found himself expressing his own opinion freely, and to great extent, on subjects that interested him, and the flow of language was interrupted only by badly-concealed yawns from Mrs. Tramlay and Margie. Where to them could be the interest in the latest campaign against the Indians, or methods of ventilating schoolrooms, or the supposed moral purpose underlying England’s continued occupation of Egypt? Such questions were fit only for men, thought Mrs. Tramlay and her second daughter: the mother sometimes said, after excusing herself from impromptu lectures on these or kindred topics, that the young man from the country loved to hear himself talk, and Margie half believed that Phil only began what she denominated “harangues” in order to clear the room, so that he might have Lucia to himself. But to all that Phil said, no matter how heavy the subject, Lucia listened patiently, attentively, and often with an air of interest. Sometimes she attained sufficient grasp of a statement to reconstruct it, in words, though not in facts, and return it to the original maker, who, in the blindness of bliss, immediately attributed it to Lucia’s mental superiority to the remainder of the family. Had he seen her afterward perplexedly pinching her brow as she appealed to cyclopædia or dictionary to make his meaning clearer, he might have revised his opinion as to her intellect, yet he would have been the surer of what to him, just then, was more desirable than the collective intellect of the world. CHAPTER XX. AN OLD QUESTION REPEATED. Mr. Marge had breathed a gentle sigh of relief when he heard of Philip Hayn’s sudden departure from the metropolis: had he known the cause of the young man’s exit he would in gratitude have given a fine dinner to the male gossip who had said in Phil’s hearing that Marge was to marry Lucia. Not knowing of this rumor, he called at the Tramlay abode, ostensibly to invite Lucia and her mother to the theatre, and from the manner of the ladies he assumed that Phil, with the over-confidence of youth, had proposed and been rejected. Marge’s curiosity as to what the head of the family could want of the young man was allayed by Mrs. Tramlay’s statement that the visit was due wholly to her husband’s ridiculous manner of inviting each country acquaintance to come and see him if he ever reached New York; his subsequent hospitality to Philip was only for the purpose of keeping on good terms with some old-fashioned people who might some day again be useful as hosts, and who could not be managed exactly as professional keepers of boarding-houses. But Marge’s curiosity was rearoused the very day after he received this quieting information, for he chanced to meet the merchant with the young man’s father, and was introduced to the latter.