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The Measure of a Man
The Measure of a Man
The Measure of a Man
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The Measure of a Man

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Janet Grayson and Harley Bruce grew up as playmates in the small village of Springdale. Their bond remained strong until Harley left for college; but after several years in Europe, Harley has finally returned home, and he has brought with him a loud, thoughtless group friends.
It’s up to Janet to remind Harley that he has a higher calling than merely seeking a good time with his friends from town. If only she can get him to attend church, and maybe even teach the boys in his old Sunday-school class, she’s certain she can remind Harley of principles by which he once lived.
But there are many people vying for control of Harley Bruce, and Janet can only pray for the strength she’ll need to help her friend regain his faith in God.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateMay 14, 2019
ISBN9788834111314
The Measure of a Man
Author

Grace Livingston Hill

Grace Livingston Hill was an early–twentieth century novelist who wrote both under her real name and the pseudonym Marcia Macdonald. She wrote more than one hundred novels and numerous short stories. She was born in Wellsville, New York, in 1865 to Marcia Macdonald Livingston and her husband, Rev. Charles Montgomery Livingston. Hill’s writing career began as a child in the 1870s, writing short stories for her aunt’s weekly children’s publication, The Pansy. She continued writing into adulthood as a means to support her two children after her first husband died. Hill died in 1947 in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

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    The Measure of a Man - Grace Livingston Hill

    MAN

    Copyright

    First published in 1918

    Copyright © 2019 Classica Libris

    Chapter 1

    The house was old-fashioned, and darkly pleasant, set back from the street with a stretch of lawn, and a wide veranda in front of one wing. There was moss on the roof where the tall elms hung over, and there was a quiet air of dignity about it. A comfortable hammock swung between two resinous pines near the dining-room veranda, with a carpet of needles beneath; a couple of magazines and a book lay in the hollow of the hammock ready for use.

    At the left of the quaint old front door with its double-settled stoop a young girl in white was stooping over a pansy bed picking the riotous bloom, and above her in the tallest elm a thrush was uttering translucent notes. They seemed to thrill and find an echo in her heart. She made a lovely picture against the dark of the old house with the morning light playing over her hair and bringing out red and gold threads in its brownness.

    Suddenly a whistle, clear and sweet as the bird’s, interrupted the thrush, and the color sprang to the girl’s cheeks. This was what she had been half waiting, hoping for, fearful lest it would not come. She turned and rose, her hands overflowing with pansies, her eyes bright with welcome. Yes, there he was, her old friend and comrade of the childhood years, come back after four years of college abroad for his summer at the old family country-seat, and he had not forgotten her! He had come the first morning, at once, to see her!

    He swung the gate open joyously, shouting. I thought I’d find you here, Janet, and stepped aside to let his companion pass—a girl in pink with a fluffy parasol. Janet had not noticed the other girl until then. A kind of cool dignity seemed to fall upon her as she looked, and she came forward slowly, with welcome in her face but with a reserve in her eyes that had not been there a moment before.

    The girl at the gate had apparently not seen her at all. She was mincing along on her little high-heeled white pumps and discoursing most absorbedly with the young man, giggling contagiously, and gazing up into his face from beneath her tilted parasol in a most compelling way, fairly obliging him to pay some attention to her in spite of the fact that he was evidently all eagerness to greet his old friend. She was golden-haired, blue-eyed, with a ravishing artificial complexion; her costume was most elaborate and diaphanous, well calculated to make the natives of the simple village stare.

    Janet had full opportunity to study her, and to note the changes that four years had made in her old friend, Harley Bruce, before the three were actually face to face and the young man had grasped her hand and was eagerly looking into her eyes. There was something in his look that might have made her catch her breath had they been alone, but she was conscious of an appraising stare from the eyes of the baby-doll by his side that steadied her self-control.

    Let me make you acquainted with Lotta Lomond, said young Bruce lightly, as if to get rid of a trifling duty; and the beauty by his side swept her lashes down and up again, with an impertinent tilt to her chin, in acknowledgment of the introduction, and continued to stare appraisingly, impudently, half resentfully, at Janet, as if she were an annoying interruption that must be got rid of.

    There was nothing, however, about Janet’s costume to merit the criticism of her visitor. Her linen frock with its simple lines was of a cut and fashion that showed it had never been bought nor made in that town. Lotta Lomond’s eyes lingered on the details of pocket and girdle and button long enough to be surprised at that. The white suede rubber-soled, heelless oxfords and silk stockings were irreproachable, and the face of this country girl was undeniably beautiful. As she stood there beside the visitor with her fresh complexion, her easy graceful manner, the sunlight falling over her rich brown hair and her hands over-flowing with pansies, it was like a rose looking at a bunch of cotton flowers on a last year’s hat.

    Lotta Lomond, half conscious of the disadvantage, stared to disconcert the other girl. It was an old weapon of hers against all rivals. It seldom failed. But there was something about this cool gray-eyed girl that seemed impervious to a stare. It was Lotta Lomond, not Janet Grayson, who felt uncomfortable. Nevertheless she succeeded in creating an atmosphere that Harley Bruce had never known before when he was in Janet’s company, and he looked uneasily from one girl to the other and wondered what was the matter.

    Hello! Is that the same old hammock? he cried. Shan’t we go over and have a good old-time talk? Can I get some chairs, Janet?

    But Lotta Lomond asserted herself decidedly. Indeed, Harley, that’s quite impossible; I’m in a great hurry to get back with that embroidery silk for mamma. You said you were coming in for a minute on an errand. Come, get it done and let us go on to the store quickly! Her tone was quite possessive, as if Harley were her special property.

    Janet looked at her wonderingly. Could it be that Harley had chosen her, was engaged to her, perhaps? Her eyes widened with the thought.

    Lotta Lomond turned to the simple country girl with a half-contemptuous simper. Men are so irresponsible, aren’t they, Miss Grayson? Come, Harley, hurry up! and she poked him playfully with her parasol.

    Harley frowned, but his natural courtesy forbade his showing his annoyance further. If his mother had taught him anything, if was to be polite.

    Oh, I beg your pardon, Lotta. I didn’t know you were in a hurry. Of course, if you must, but that hammock looks good to me. However, it’s only a delayed pleasure. We’ve a great deal to talk over, you know, Janet. Four years is a long time. Well, if I must hurry—we came over to tell you the plans for the day. Mother’s got a crowd over at the house and we’re to take an auto trip right after lunch, returning in time to dress for dinner. This evening I believe they have an impromptu play on hand. We want you to join us, of course. Don’t say you’ve anything else on hand, for we simply won’t take no for an answer. And we’ll call a little after one for you. Will that be all right? If I get a chance I’ll run over again this morning just to talk over old times a bit. But you’ll be ready at one, anyway, Janet?

    Although Janet gave a tacit consent she was inwardly seized with an aversion to accepting the invitation, and she watched the two go down the walk—Lotta already simpering and gazing absorbedly into her companion’s face—with a growing feeling that the afternoon’s excursion would not be to her liking. As they opened the front gate she almost called after Harley to say she would not go, and then held herself gently in reserve, questioning her own motives severely. What was this feeling struggling wildly in her heart? Jealousy? Was she jealous of Harley’s friendliness with this offensive young person? If it was jealousy she must take herself in hand and put a stop to it. This was no broadminded way to go into life, stopping aggrieved because some other girl had come on the scene. Harley had been away four years. It stood to reason he would have new friends. He might even be engaged. She had told herself that before she knew he was coming, yet it had not hurt, not like this. What was it that made her heart freeze up at sight of this over-dressed doll walking with Harley? Was it because she did not look his equal, did not appear to be a friend worthy of her old friend?

    She walked slowly over to the hammock and sat down trying to think it out. She hoped this was the reason. She did not like to think she was just plain jealous of any girl that happened to have his friendship. There had never been any love-making between herself and Harley Bruce. It had just been a delightful boy and-girl comradeship, a rare one, in which each shared the other’s pleasures and joys, studies and interests, holidays and work; but still no romance about it. Janet liked to think a friendship like that could have outlasted the separation and come back unchanged, without anything to spoil it. Whatever the future held for them, she wanted to keep the past. Harley grown up, with a foreign education, and herself grown up, with a college education in one of the finest American institutions, might not be so perfectly suited to one another’s ideals as the boy and girl Harley and Janet had been; but she liked to think that the past, beautiful as it had been, would not be hurt in any way. And here, right off at the start, she was putting up a show of jealousy toward a little pink and white butterfly of a girl that she didn’t know the first thing about! What in the world was the matter with her? Well, she would go that afternoon and try to get a different attitude. She would show them all that she and Harley were grand friends, and she would show that Lotta Lomond girl that she was broader than to mind her foolish little impertinences. She would be herself and make them all like her, and show Harley she was his old comrade, ready to join in with his friends as she had been to love his dogs and horses and stray rabbits in the old days.

    Nevertheless, it was not

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