He felt equal to it, to anything in it.
He arrived in the middle of the afternoon, and he saw no one at the
hotel except the Harmons till toward dinner-time. Then the ladies
coming in from shopping had a word of welcome for him; some of them
stopped and shook hands at the office, and when they began to come
down to dinner they spoke to him, and there again some of them
offered their hands; they said it seemed an age since he had gone.
The art-students came down with Berry, who shook hands so cordially
with him that perhaps they could not help it. Miss Carver seemed to
hesitate, but she gave him her hand too, and she asked, as the
others had done, whether he had found his family well.
He did not know what to think. Sometimes he felt as if people were
trying to make a fool of him almost. He remained blushing and
smiling to himself after the last of them had gone in to dinner. He
did not know what Miss Carver meant, but her eyes seemed to have
lost that cold distance, and to have come nearer to him.
Late at night Berry came to him where he sat at his desk. "Well,
Barker, I'm glad you're back again, old man. Feels as if you'd been
gone a month of Sundays. Didn't know whether we should have you with
us this _first_ evening."
Lemuel grew hot with consciousness, and did not make it better for
himself by saying, "I don't know what you mean.
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