Mr. Henderson

“ Henderson looked amused. “You know in the city the gospel is that everybody is to be done.”
“Well,” said Edith, not to be diverted, “but, Mr. Henderson, what is it all for—this conflict? Perhaps, however, you are fighting the devil?”
“Yes, that's it; the devil is usually the other fellow. But, Mrs. Delancy,” added Henderson, with an accent of seriousness, “I don't know what it's all for. I doubt if there is much in it.”
“And yet the world credits you with finding a great deal in it.”
“The world is generally wrong. Do you understand poker, Mrs. Delancy? No! Of course you do not. ”

“ Henderson?"
"Yes, the very man; now when I recollect. Stay, was there any handkerchief found on him?"
"Yes; that," said an officer, producing a red silk handkerchief.
"Why, I gave him that," said Mr. Henderson. "It cost me 4s. 6d.; and it was that he had over his face when he robbed me of my hard-earned money!"
"It is true," said Charles; "and sorry am I for the frolic, which my companions forced me into."
"A frolic with five pounds at its credit," said Mr. Henderson. "Where is the money, sir?"
"Ah! I know, dear uncle," cried the watchful Jeannie, in a piercing treble of the clearest silver. ”

“ You see it's the party that's hit that knows when a blow is struck. You see, Mr. Henderson, it isn't merely you, but everybody, from the London Spectator down, when they get on their preaching-caps, and come forth to right the wrongs of society, begin about us—our dressiness, our expensiveness, our idleness, our extravagance, our heartlessness. The men, poor, dear creatures, are led astray and ruined by us. It's the old story of Adam: 'The woman beguiled me.'"
"You see," said Ida, laughing, "Eva's conscience troubles her; that's why she's so sensitive." ”

“ Mary Bell caught Henderson's arm as he stood baffled and silent.
"Mr. Henderson!" she said eagerly, "don't you give in! While we're waiting for the others we can try for the boys along the fences! There's no danger, that way! We can go way down into the marsh, holding on,—and keep calling!" ”

“ Sydney's ear—you understand me."
"My dear Mrs. Van Arsdel, is it possible that anything has been said?"
"Now, now, don't agitate yourself, Mr. Henderson; I know what you are going to say—no, nothing of the kind. But you know that we elderly people, who know the world and just what stupid and unreasonable things people are always saying, sometimes have to give you young folks just the slightest little caution. Your conduct in this family has been all that is honorable, and gentlemanly, and unexceptionable, Mr. Henderson, and such as would lead us to repose the most perfect confidence in you. ”

“ He promised to write to his uncle when he went away, and if I get you his address, do you think you would do something to oblige me, Mr. Henderson?”
[Pg 194]
“I will do anything,” replied Henderson, eagerly, grasping at the meaning of her words.
“Well, you see, a lady can’t make certain inquiries, but a young man can. If I got you John Temple’s address could you go and find out what he is doing? ”

“ He isn't quite such a rattle-cap as Jim, but one trusts him more."
"Well," said Eva, "I don't like a professed joker. A man that never is in earnest ought to wear the cap and bells, as the court fools used to do in old times."
"O, bless you, child," said Alice, "that's what Jim is for; he always makes me laugh, and I like to laugh."
"Don't you think that Mr. Henderson would do nicely for Ida," said Aunt Maria.
"Oh, as to that," said Alice, "neither he nor Jim Fellows are marrying men. You see they haven't anything, and of course that they can't be thinking of such things." ”

“ Can you have a real friendship for a person and enjoy his society, and not care in the least whether you have it or not? Of course you can't. We were friends—quite good friends, and I'm not ashamed to say I miss him, very much, and then to have such an unaccountable mystery about it. I should think you'd miss him too."
"I do somewhat," said Ida, "but then you see I have so much more to think of. I have my regular work every day for papa, and I have my plan of study, and to say the truth, so far as I am concerned, though I liked Mr. Henderson very much, yet I don't miss him." ”

“ A certain Mr. Henderson shared with him the responsibility of being judge at the finish, but the glory of office President John took to himself. In his eyes Henderson was but the zero which added to one makes ten. He himself was both the one and the ten.
On a heap of sweaters in a corner of the open room of the boat-house lay stretched the Westcott crews, awaiting, under pretence of calmness, the moment for carrying out their boats. They could not start until the arrival of the launch which was to bear the officials. ”

“ Fribble, Lear, and Hastings, Alonzo and Alzuma; and Mr. Henderson was an established Bath favourite.
At this time, Henderson was five-and-twenty years of age. Descended from Scottish Presbyterians and English Quakers, with a father who was an Irish factor, Henderson is the sole celebrity of the street in which he was born, in March 1747, [47] Goldsmith Street, Cheapside. The father died too soon for his two sons to remember him in after life; but the boys had an excellent mother, who unconsciously trained one of her sons to the stage, by making him familiar with the beauties of Shakspeare. ”

“ Henderson.”
“And where is Mr. Henderson?”
“He is the baron's man, sir. I should not presume to inquire where he was. Beg pardon, sir, but are you staying here to-night?”
“This is a friend of mine,” I interposed. “He will stay the night; but you need not trouble about that now.”
“A smart fellow like you can keep his mouth shut,” continued the inspector, sweetly. “You wouldn't go shouting all over the house if you were let into a secret—now, would you?”
“Oh no, sir; on my word I wouldn't.”
And so Peace told him of the projected arrest, of the murder, and of his own identity. ”

“ I've known Henderson since he came fresh into the Street. He'd rarely knife a friend when his first wife was living. Now, when you see the old frank smile on his face, it's put on.”
It was half-past eight when Mr. Henderson with Mrs. Delancy on his arm led the way to the diningroom. The procession was closed by Mrs. Henderson and Mr. Delancy. The Van Dams were there, and Mrs. Chesney and the Chesney girls, and Miss Tavish, who sat on Jack's right, but the rest of the guests were unknown to Jack, except by name. ”

“ Henderson was a student in the Upper Iowa University, where she met her future husband, David B. Henderson, the able and brilliant representative of the 3rd District of Iowa since 1883. In 1866 she became Mr. Henderson's wife in West Union, the home of her parents. From there they went to Dubuque, where they now live. Alive to all the interests of the day and their ever increasing demands for attention, she has the qualities of mind and heart, a true sympathy, clear discernment and sound decision, that belong to those whom fate and fortune call out as leaders. ”

“ But though thousands of these unsophisticated insects singe their wings every evening, the thousand-and-first one comes to the charge with a light heart in his bosom, and quite as satisfied of his good fortune as I was when Mrs. Van Arsdel with the sweetest and most motherly tones said to me, "I know, Mr. Henderson, the lonely life you young men must lead when you first come to cities; you have been accustomed to the home circle, to mother and sisters, and it must be very dreary. ”

“ Henderson has been dead forty-two years. He only lived three months after he married Aunt Adeline, and her crêpe veil is over a yard long yet. Men are the dust under her feet, but she likes Dr. John to come over and sit with us, because she can consult with him about what Mr. Henderson really died of, and talk with him about the sad state of poor Mr. Carter's liver for a year before he died. I just go on rocking Billy and singing hymns to him in such a way that I can't hear the conversation. ”

“ Do you know mamma has just been into my room with a letter from Mr. Sydney. He is coming into the field again, and has written to mamma, and mamma has been in talking to me till I am just ready to cry. Now, Ida, you know all that took place between Mr. Henderson and me yesterday in the Park; we are engaged, are we not, as much as two people can be? ”

“ And here's Wat Sydney, who, everybody says, is always perfectly sober and correct."
"Well, mamma dear, if it is only a sober, correct man that you want me to have, there's that Mr. Henderson, just as sober and correct, and a great deal more cultivated and agreeable."
"How absurd of you, my daughter! Mr. Henderson has [368] not anything to support a wife on. He is a good moral young man, I admit, and agreeable, and has talent and all that; but my dear Eva, you are not fitted to contend with poverty. You must marry a man that can support you in the position that you have always been in." ”

“ It's a Mr. Henderson that is now in New York, engaged on the staff of "The Great Democracy." We girls have noticed him once or twice walking with Jim Fellows— (you remember Jim;) Jim says he is a perfect hermit, devoted to study and writing, and never goes into society. Well, wasn't it odd that the fates should have thrown this hermit just in my way?
[180]
The other morning I came over from Brooklyn, where I had been spending three days with Sophia, and when I got into the car who should I see but this identical Mr. Henderson right opposite to me. ”

“ And yet, Belle, they wrong us who are called fashionable girls, when they take for granted that we are not capable of thinking seriously, and that we prefer those whose conversation consists only of flattery and nonsense. It is mainly because I feel that Mr. Henderson has deep, serious purposes in life, and because he appreciates and addresses himself to the deepest part of my nature that his friendship is so [287] valuable to me. I say friendship advisedly, dear Belle, because I insist upon it that there can be friendship, pure and simple, between a gentleman and a lady ”

“ Henderson was the holder of a large amount of stock in the Northeastern, inherited from his father. Facts of no special significance, and not printed in the weekly newspapers. Mr. Henderson lived in a gloomy Gothic house on High Street, ate three very plain meals a day, and drank iced water. He had been a good husband and a good father, and had always voted the Republican ticket. He believed in the gold standard, a high tariff, and eternal damnation. ”

“ Bludsoe drove them aft with his pistol points.
"Thank you, lad," he said, as he passed me, "I owe my life to you!"
I peered down into the forecastle. Under the smoky lamp lay Mulligan—a huge, motionless mass. Blood flowed from his temple.
The wind had died; the sun was hidden in haze; the sky darkened; the barometer fell. "We'll be in the midst of a tempest soon," Samuel Childs whispered to me, "if the rebels had held out they might have had the ship at their mercy."
"Call all hands to shorten sail," the skipper said calmly to Mr. Bludsoe. ”

“ That fund had helped the widow of Burns—"The Bonnie Jean" of immortal song—and after the lapse of a century it again helped the editor and biographer of the poet. Mr. Henderson was of a shy and retiring nature, yet to his few intimate friends he was known as a man of high and pure character, ever ready to help with his knowledge those who asked his aid. ”

“ No man of all those who sought Miss Henderson's favor had the godlike grace of Miles Dawson, combined with the strong intellectuality of Henry Webster, with the added virtues of wealth and amiability, steadfastness of purpose, and all that. It seemed sometimes to Miss Flora Henderson, as it had often seemed to Mr. Augustus Richards, that the standard set was too high, and that an all-wise Providence was no longer sending the perfect being of the ideal into the world, if, indeed, He had ever done so. ”

“ John Henderson, a noted man of the same community, had gone to Oxford, and that he had died there. In the course of the next day, Mr. Henderson called to take leave of her, saying he was going to Oxford to study a subject concerning which he could not obtain the information he wanted in Bristol. Mrs. Masey said to him, 'John Henderson, thou wilt die there.'
"Some time afterwards, Mrs. Masey woke her husband one night, saying, 'Remember, John Henderson died at Oxford at two o'clock this morning, and it is now three.' Her husband, Philip Masey, made light of it ”

“ Instead of men being a fallen race, they are a rising race, and never so high as now; and then, what becomes of the Garden of Eden, and St. Paul? Now, for my part, I told Mr. Henderson I wasn't going to give up all the splendid poetry of Milton and the Bible, just because Mr. Darwin took it into his head that it was not improbable that my seventy fifth millionth grandfather might have been a big baboon with green nose and pointed ears!"
"My dear Eva, you have capital reasons for believing and not believing. You believe what seems most agreeable and poetic."
"Exactly, Ida ”

“ I am truly glad to hear it. I always was fond of Osborne; and, do you know, I never really took to Roger; I respected him and all that, of course. But to compare him with Mr. Henderson! Mr Henderson is so handsome and well-bred, and gets all his gloves from Houbigant!'
It was true that they had not seen anything of Osborne Hamley for a long time; ”