"Like it? It's wonderful. I never heard of anything so--so--all it should be for--a girl like her," Hugh exclaimed, lamely enough, yet with a certain eloquence of inflection which meant more than his choice of words. He turned to Richard. "I can't tell you," he went on, flushing with the effort to convey to his friend his deep feeling, "how fortunate I think you are, and how I hope--oh, I hope you and she will be--the happiest people in the world!"
"I'm sure you hope that, old fellow," Richard answered, more touched by this difficult voicing of what he knew to be Hugh's genuine devotion than he should have been by the most felicitous phrasing of another's congratulations. "And I can tell you this. There's nobody else I know whom I would have brought here to see my preparations--nobody else who would have understood how I feel about--what I'm doing to-day. I never should have believed it would have seemed so--well, so sacred a thing to take a girl away from all the people who love her, and bring her to a place like this. I wish--wish I were a thousand times more fit for her."
"Rich Kendrick--" Benson was taken out of himself now. His voice was slightly tremulous, but he spoke with less difficulty than before. "You are fitter than you know. You've developed as I never thought any man could in so short a time. I've been watching you and I've seen it. There was always more in you than people gave you credit for--it was your inheritance from a father and grandfather who have meant a great deal in their world. You've found out what you were meant for, and you're coming up to new and finer standards every day. You _are_ fit to take this girl--and that means much, because I know a little of what a--" Now _he_ was floundering again, and his fine, then face flamed more hotly than before--"of what she is!" he ended, with a complete breakdown in the style of his phraseology, but with none at all in the conveyance of his meaning.
Richard flung out his hand, catching Hugh's, and gripping it. "Bless you for a friend and a brother!" he cried, his eyes bright with sudden moisture. "You're another whom I mustn't disappoint. Disappoint? I ought to be flayed alive if I ever forget the people who believe in me--who are trusting me with--Roberta!"