The Forest Republican. [volume] (Tionesta, Pa.) 1869-1952, 1881-05-04

all there was of them," was the indif-
ferent reply.
Mrs. Burdett picked up her embroi-
dery again.
"Of course / was foolish even to
think Of it," she said to herself.
The next day the sun shone brightly !;
it was the first day they had seen it for
two weeks. They went out immediately
after breakfast, but Zaida soon tired,
and, leaving her mother in one of the
stores, started Jor home.
Sometimes we were so near our fate
that we could call out into the unknown
and get back an answer, but we do not
know it.
Zaida hurried on block after block,
and behind her, block after block, un-
consciously following her, came long,
swinging strides. People turned and
looked after him as he passed. His su-
perb proportions and eccentric dress
would have attracted attention in even
q denser crowd.
He wore sombrero, and no coat save
a dark blue broadcloth circle, one end
of which was tucked under his arm and
the other swung over his shoulder.
By the time Zaida had reached her
door, he was near enough to see the
swing of her dress as she entered. 1t
was nothing that he had ever seen her
wear before, and the crowd was SO great
that he had not discovered her as she
walked. There was nothing to remind
him of her, he had simply seen the fold
of waman's dress and then lost it.
Perhaps it was the mere fact of losing
it in the very act of seeing that made
him stop when he came in front of the
closed door; perhaps it was because
she had come into and gone from his
life in just such wise Perhaps it was
fate Who can tell?
Several in the crowded thoroughfare
half-halted, as if to see where he was
going He saw that he was being OBJ
served. He had been looked at great
deal since he left the prairies, but he
had never been conscious of it until
that moment.
He rang the bell with q curious smile
under his yellow mustache, and no de-
finite idea of what he should say when
it was answered. He did it for the sake
of the passers-by. Thus through the
simplest and most opposite motives, we
sometimes work out our destiny.
The little Englishwoman opened the
door, A moment later some one sought
admittance to Mrs. Burdett's parlor.
Zaida knew the rap as the landlady's;
In fact, no one else ever raped save the
washwoman. The girl was inexpressibly
lonesome that morning. She was glad
of the thought of seeing any one, so she
hastily threw open the door.
"Oh, Miss Burdett, the king has
come ! knew him the moment I saw
him, before ever he opened his mouth /"
exclaimed the landlady, excitedly; but
Zaida was looking right over the little
woman's head, up into the gentle eyes
of Norman Lamar.
The landlady turned and saw that he
had followed her, then quite unobserved
stole downstairs, taking with her the
memory of Zaida's face, and saying to
herself: "She loves him, and who could
help it?"
An hour latei, when Mrs. Burdett
quietly opened her parlor door and en-
tered, Norman Lamar stood upon her
hearth just as she had loved to remem-
ber him standing upon his own on the
prairies, only with one difference, which
was SO great one that, for a moment,
it seemed to stop her breath. One arm
rested lightly over Zaida's shoulders,
and his fair, noble face bent toward her,
all full of new bright lights.