The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1877-12-06
HER HEARTS SECRET.

"If you refuse Duncan Holcroft you
are a complete idiot, Georgina Gilroy,
and I wash my hands of your affairs
altogether"
Mrs. Cassowin sails maiestically from
the room where Georgina, her niece,
remains nervouslv clasping and unclasp-
ing her slender white fingers, and Won
dering why matrimony should be a
positive duty in the cole by which she
had been educated. She is only twenty
sixteen, with her waving golden hair and
soft. brown eyes.
She has two hundred pounds year,
all her own. and why can't she be allowed
to live quiet life unmolested.
Since her own parents died, about
three years ago. she had been dragged
from the country parsonage, in which
her father lived and died, saving the lit
tie fortune for Georgina by close econo-
my, to her aunt's fashionable home ,such
as her mother pined for throughout all
Georgina's childhood.
"When you marry, I hope you will
return to your proper sphere" Mrs
Gilroy would say whenever she spoke of
Georgipa's future but she never needed
much in those days.
Sitting in Mrs. Cassowin's grand
drawing-room, waiting for Duncan Hol.
croft to come and propose to her, as her
aunt informed her he had requested
permission to do, Georgina, timid and
gentle, felt her whole being rise in re-
volt.
Was life to be 10 her what it was to
her aunt, round of calling, shopping,
party-going, party-giving, interviews
with dressmakers and milliners2 Could
she not escape to some locality where
there were nobler aims and desires?
Where?
Mrs. Cassowin had expostulated in
vain. Hitherto, Georgina had been
gently firm.
But on this day even her courage failed
before her aunt's wrath at the proposal
to dismiss Duncan Holcroft.
He came across the wide drawing
room as she sat thinking, his football
unheard upon the soft carpet.
He was tall, erect, handsome, past
fifty, yet not old his eyes clear MS a
boys, his iron-gray hair curly and abun-
dant, his gray moustache giving mill
barry air to his well-cut features.
Faultless in attire, courteous in man.
ner, he also possessed half million at
fractions in solid investments.
But all else seemed to him worthless
compared to the possession of the slen-
der, pale child, who half buried in O
deep armchair, realized as yet nothing
of the yearning love in the large, dark
eyes fixed upon her.
1t was scarcely to be supposed that
Duncan Holcroft, bachelor as he was,
had travelled over fifty years of life
with untouched heart, but he had lived
over all other love till this one came
and conquered him.
1t stirred his heart with a sick pain,
when Georgina, looking up, paled to her
lips, while her eyes were full Of fear and
trouble, seeing him.
She had always given him frank,
cordial greeting, and he had hoped to
win sweeter tokens still from her foft
eyes and sweet lips, and instead he had
lost what was already given.
Did you not expect me p he said,
gently; "you looked startled"
"I did not know you were here, and
il did startle me to see you so close be-
side mel" Georgina said, q flaming
color shooting now over cheek and brow,
as she wished herself thousand miles
away. asa
He spoke to her gravely then, and
very, very gently, wooing her most ten
derly, considerate of her youth, her b.
midity; and heartily ashamed, she could
only sob and shiver.
"Ohild," he said at last, edo dis
tress you? Am I 30 hateful to you
that"
But she interrupted him quickly:
You are not hateful to me-" she
said, impulsively. "I like you ever
ever SO much, only-oh, why do you
want to marry me?"
He could not keep back a smile.
though his heart throbbed heavily with
pain.
"I love you, DEAR" he said: 81 love
you far too we'll to wish to grieve Won.
Shall we be friends stili?"
"Oh, if you will" she said, eagerly.
ignorant of the stab in every word
"let us forget to-day"
As if he could.
But he was a true gentleman, sin
cere, unselfish lover, and he led her on
tp talk Of other matters till the ashy