He had begun to hope for a friendship which would endure, and now--the house of cards fell at a single touch.
He could scarcely comprehend the situation; how a girl of her apparent refinement and gentility could ever be attracted by a rough, brutal type such as Ned Beaton so evidently was.

Why, the man's lack of taste in dress, the expression of his face, his ungrammatical language, stamped him as belonging to a distinctly lower order.
There surely must be some other cause drawing them together.

Yet, whatever it was, there was no doubt but that he had been very properly snubbed.

Her words stung; yet it was the manner in which she had looked at him and swept past at Beaton's side which hurt the most.

Oh, well, an enemy more or less made small difference in his life; he would laugh at it and forget.