Though the affair of the Point continued to agitate the village of Templeton next day, and for many days, it was little remembered in the Wigwam. Confident of his right, Mr. Effingham, though naturally indignant at the abuse of his long liberality, through which alone the public had been permitted to frequent the place, and this too, quite often, to his own discomfort and disappointment, had dismissed the subject temporarily from his mind, and was already engaged in his ordinary pursuits. Not so, however, with Mr. Bragg. Agreeably to promise, he had attended the meeting; and now he seemed to regulate all his movements by a sort of mysterious self-importance, as if the repository of some secret of unusual consequence. No one regarded his manner, however; for Aristabulus, and his secrets, and opinions, were all of too little value, in the eyes of most of the party, to attract peculiar attention. He found a sympathetic listener in Mr. Dodge, happily; that person having been invited, through the courtesy of Mr. Effingham, to pass the day with those in whose company, though very unwillingly on the editor's part certainly, he had gone through so many dangerous trials. These two then, soon became intimate, and to have seen their shrugs, significant whisperings, and frequent conferences in corners, one who did not know them, might have fancied their shoulders burthened with the weight of the state. But all this pantomime, which was intended to awaken curiosity, was lost on the company in general. The ladies, attended by Paul and the Baronet, proceeded into the forest on foot, for a morning's walk, while the two Messrs. Effinghams continued to read the daily journals, that were received from town each morning, with a most provoking indifference. Neither Aristabulus, nor Mr. Dodge, could resist any longer; and, after exhausting their ingenuity, in the vain effort to induce one of the two gentlemen to question them in relation to the meeting of the previous night, the desire to be doing fairly overcame their affected mysteriousness, and a formal request was made to Mr. Effingham to give them an audience in the library. As the latter, who suspected the nature of the interview, requested his kinsman to make one in it, the four were soon alone, in the apartment so often named. Even now, that his own request for the interview was granted, Aristabulus hesitated about proceeding until a mild intimation from Mr. Effingham that he was ready to hear his communication, told the agent that it was too late to change his determination. "I attended the meeting last night, Mr. Effingham," Aristabulus commenced, "agreeably to our arrangement, and I feel the utmost regret at being compelled to lay the result before a gentleman for whom I entertain so profound a respect." "There was then a meeting?" said Mr. Effingham, inclining his body slightly, by way of acknowledgment for the other's compliment.