The Cincinnati daily star. [volume] ([Cincinnati, Ohio]) 1875-1880, 1879-11-19

PEN BRADSHAWE,

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fig for you, you're at liberty to do so.
very we'll, Pen"
Mr.. Give Souldfd spoke very quietly,
and bent his handsome eyes on the girl
with an expression of mingled nonchal-
ance and amusement.
81 don't consider it very well, Mr..
Soulard," she went on, nettled by his
quietude. at may be well for you, who
marry me for my money, and so get all
you want. It's bad. and wicked, and
cruel, and you know it,"
"Ah? Indeed, Pen, | was not aware
that the advantages of this arrangement
were not mutual. am sure, supposed
it "A purely business matter on both
sides"
''To be sure. but you have everything
else to gain, and everything to lose"
The shadow Of flush arose in Give
Soulard's cheek, but it was gone before
Penelope Bradshawe saw it, and he
answered in the light, careless tone he
had used all along:
"If you mean by gain that give up
poverty for wealth, the miseries of bach
elorhood for married blessedness, l don't
know but you're right about that, but
even then what do gain that yon don't?
You can have the money without me,
more than can have the money without
you, and really, Pen. if you are lovely as
Peri, think l may lay some claim to
the good looks of Antinous-eh, Pen9'
running his slender white fingers through
the halo of bronze brown curls that COW
cred his handsome head, and senoing a
laughing glance into the mirror opposite,
that reflected face beautiful almost as a
woman's. ".
"Tush," said Pen, cooring with impa-
tience, II don't think this is any time to
talk nonse nseand make fun"
perhaps not" he replied, with a
hopelessly comical sigh, "but l can't
help being jolly, dear; it isn't every day
one gets fortune and wife in breath,
and without the trouble of asking for
her, either"
"You haven't got the wife yet, Give
Soulard, and if you were man you
wouldn't take her on such conditions"
conditions? l didn't know there
were any. It's the money is conditional,
not the wife"
Poor Pen was ready to cry with vexa-
ton. The handsome, provoking fellow
only lau9hed at her, whatever she said.
She might protest as much as she liked
against the match which her uncle had
planned so arbitrarily, making the inher-
ltance OF his money conditional on these
two marrying. Give Soulard only
laughed at her, and made jesting re-
sponses to all her appeals.
Penelope Bradshawe had been brought
up as the adopted child and heiress of her
uncle, Reese Bradshawe.. A year before
this uncle had died, leaving will, which
was not to be opened till he had been
dead twelve months.
That will, being read at the appointed
time, proved to contain the somewhat
arbitrary dictum that his beloved niece
should not have his money without she
married his beloved cousin, Give Soul
ard, the said Give being still single at the
opening of the will.
Pen. Bradshawe was an exceedingly
pretty girl, but contrary, captious and
self-willed, as pretty girls are apt to be,
and she frowned in the most decided
manner upon the unexpected tenor of her
uncle's will. If he had given Give half
the property she wouldn't have minded
but to force her to make her choice be-
tween poverty and Clive-to oblige
saucy little flirt like her to marry any
body-was abominable.
She forgot, even in her own mind. to
add to the sum of her grievances on the
subject the fact that the provoking will
cut short the most delightful little firta-
tion Miss Pen. had ever INDUCED in.
She had known Give all her life, in
deed, they were distant cousins, and
Give Lad spent good share of his boy
hood, and most of his vacations, during
school and college days, at Uncle Brad
shawes house, where pretty Pen al
ternately petted and plagued the life
out of him.
1t was bad enough to be nubbed and
coaxed by so pretty girl as Pen while
he was in jackets and she in pinafores,
but to have such a state of things con-
tinue-well, it was so highly unpleasant
to Mr.. Give Soulard that he could not
conceal his exultation at the turn which
was necessarily given to affairs by the
terms of Uncle Reese's will.
He at once dropped the suppliant air,
and became nonchalant, careless, and at |
his ease-provokingly so one must allow,
under the circumstances. Pen Bradshawe
could scarcely be blamed for not liking
the tables turned upon her in this sum-
mary manner.
She persisted that she didn't like Give
one bit, not in that way, but she couldn't |
give up her heiress-ship and be a poor
sewing girl like Kitty Brice, or a music |
teacher like Ellen Steele, or in short, be |
poor at all; and so she told Give she'd
marry him just for that one reason, and !
no other. If he had mind to take her, |
knowing she didn't love him, and never
expected to, and that she thought it a
shameful piece of business altogether
a cruel conspiracy against a poor girl
who couldn't help herself-why, he
could.
= For her part, she should be afraid to
marry anybody that felt toward her as
Il