The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1876-11-10
Hallie's Hair.
BY MADGE Carroll.

1Ou uOll huOW uOW kldu L was
when Mrs. Kepler told me she expects
to keep your cousin with her until
Christmas. l shall so enjoy knowing
her better. What beautiful hair she
] has"
Beautiful and expensive, too, the
color is so rare. Dealers say it is almost
impossible to get it,"
"Do you mean 1 should understand
that Miss Dewing's hair"
Excuse me, Mr.. Traquair. see ma
has waited up for me, and need not de-
tain you. Goodnight"
! Seeing her daughter in an unusual
state of excitement, Mrs. Dewing ven
tured question
"What ails you, Dena? Has Mr..
Traquair proposed ?"
"Don't be Ridiculous" was the sharp
reply, and, fiinging her hat one way
and gloves another, Dena retired to her
own room.
Beginning with falsehood and end
ing in disrespect, Dena Dewing's intro
ductiOn is not a favorable one. II
serves, however, to show the girl as she
really was, not as Mr.. Traquair knew
her when she met him, one year after
having fallen in love with his picture.
Hallie's hair again, and Dena gave
her own vicious tug; was it always to
be Hallie's hair? Was that golden web
to be woven across her every path
| This very night it caught the one pair
Of eyes in all the world she longed to
hold; might not the glittering threads
next eutangle the only heart she cared
to call her own? How vividly she re-
called the night that brought her Or
| phaned, stranger cousin from the far
| = fn flnaIr A hNV,
where, up to that fateful day, she ruled
alone, an only, Notwithstanding
child. A picture of Halle, as she stood
one moment apart on the crimson
| hearth-rug, bistered the envious, ieal-
Gus heart that held it. A slight, shy
| figure some thirteen summers crowned,
with face delicate as a wind flower,
and a wealth of wondrously bright hair
| flowing to the very hem of her mourn
ing dress. Grandma, aunts, uncles and
cousins assembled to welcome David's
orphaned and only child, held their
Oreaths in something akin to awe. II
seemed as though sprite had leaped
| from the canuel GOALS heart-sOme
! fire-fairy, sable and gold, glitter and
| gloom, that whisper would wing into
her red courts never to be tempted out
| again. For an instant this impression
prevailed, then grandma iuaugurated a
rush upon her by crying out: "Come
here, little Girl Gold Locks, let me have
the first kiss and touch that lovely hair
TO make sure it's not wings tharll fly
away with you tomorrow"
Yes, Hallie's hair. Always Hallie's
hair! Dena Dewing, falling to grasp the
real charm her cousin carried with heI,
came to believe that, like Samson's, her
strength lay in her locks. Deprived OF
these she was powerless. A whisper
went the family rounds that Dena had
Ince attempted to clip, next actually to
burn those beautiful braids. No foun-
iation for this rumor was ever dis
covered other than the fact that Hal
lie secured home in another city, and
ner hair for a time lost its FURNISHED
avenness.
"Dear little lambkin," bewailed
Grandma Dewing, "she ought never to
nave stayed an hour under the same
roof with that envious, ill-tempered
Dena."
However, everybody agreed that since
ler eighteenth birthday-she was now
twenty, six months Hallie's junior
there was a marked change in Dens
Dewing. A clever cousin declared bel
/
order to catch Mr.. Traquair Whatever
the cause, the girl-with the exception o.
ner personal appearance-was certainly
improved. With dead-white complex.
on, faded eyes and hair, meally eye
Orows and lashes, and more than a sus-
picion of freckles, the Quaker colori
aud simplicity she had adopted, in gir
parlance, "killed" Dena Dewing. Sht
persisted in this species of self-destruc
zion, even to the extent of laying asid,
heavy braid of ashy red hair ant
friZzes, then faced a generation of switch
hurdened women with GOODNESS ant
courage as remarkable as it was rare.
"Agnes," said Mr.. Traquair, prepared
as was his custom, to give an accoun
IF his evenings entertainment to hi
invalid sister, 81 met tonight the frs
lady that over won upon my soul
seemed to draw it out after her as mem
, souls should go out after the wOmel
they marry. 1 brought what you cal
3 my microscopic gaze to bear upon her
and could discover nothing false. He
: style of dress, bearing, manner, every
o thing about her, challenged unlimite
. admiration; yet 1 am obliged to believ
that, like the majority of her sex, sh
f owes something to art. How much it i
impossible to estimate. Everybod
r knows my fixed, unalterable opinion o
q these feminine devices. One form c
a deceit is as surely indicative of other:
r as one downright falsehood is of pre-
q disposition to lying. could no NOR
n trust woman wearing false hair tina
4 [ could trust woman wearing falls
smiles and making mock professions.
o "Well, having found your ideal, afte
= thirty years. seeking, in Dena DewinG
a by what right does your soul run OF
;, after another woman ?'
, "You mistake, Agnes. I have nc
!, found my ideal. Miss Dewing please
+ one in that she owes nothing to art, an
n in little else. have somehow drifte
d into near relations with her. She
n useful to me in the mission school an
v in other ways; we are co-worker
y friends, that is ALL"
NJ "Pm glad to hear it, for I don't liB
o her, yet can't tell why. Nor do liB
Q this Mrs. Kepler, at whose house yo
spent last evening; although l new
saw her, she impresses me unfavorably.
,e "And me. She ought to have bee
!. born in the French court; nothing d.
- lights her more than plotting an
10 contemplating, even in such trivi
E matters as getting two persons togethe
u or keeping them apart. 1 never feel
E ease in her house."
"a "And yet you seem to be frequel
III visitor"
Dr ayes; her husbands one of our mo
y active members, and she herself, q
Sc though a woman of the world, Civ