St. Landry democrat., 1885-01-10
Shells sentiment such a crime in

your eyes2"
I-.sNot a crime, but a source for
ridicule. Promise me not to laugh-not
to think me absurd-and I'll play at
romance like the yeriest lover of them
all. By Heaven, have mighty lean
ing to it!''
She-"some day you'll play it in
earnest, and be the 'Veriest lover of
them all, or am no prophecies
I-"Methinks the day has come-the
hour and the woman! Can you not see
that since I have known you-since that
happy day in Venice
She (naiVely)-''When you returned
my book?''
I-.Ah! You did get the book.
Then it has told you that I have set up
your picture in my heart and fallen
down before it,
All on summers day!' Are you
not getting dangerously near the brink,
Mr.. Cllen-of the lake, l mean? You
might wet your feet"
lido you think I say this in vein
which iustifies tlippant Interruptions,
Miss Gray?"
She EDO you think I treat you in
way which justifes fippant gallantry,
Mr.. Olden?''
I-''You wrong me when you treat as
gallantry the homage of man who
She rs quite as serious as he usual
ly permits himself to be, or he has been
during any summer vacation for the
past half dozen years. Who parodies
Rosalind, and says: "Come, I'll woo
thee, for I'm in holiday humor, and
like enough to be ensnared?'"
I-''Yoa regard me as trifer, I
see.''
She (regretfully) -"And only think
what you might have been! Let us go
home.
Now, what does all this meanp Am
/ in love? And is there chance for
me? AS to the first, yes; and the sec
ond-Well, she scorned the manner and
not the matter of my wooing. There's
some comfort in that. If you can con-
vince q woman that you were a trifler
until you succumbed to her, she is pre-
pared to forgive the first and to regard
the last as very natural.
'sOnly to think what you might have
been" She said it almost mournfully.
Now, don't think / might have been
anything in particular; but shall try to
belt from this time forth, and she shall be
the Judge. How beautiful she isl I'd
give q King ransom to hear her say
There's the breakfast bell!
SoLnoQUY THE FOURTH.
Jangle, jangle, iangle! Confound the
church bellsf A fellow never can
sleep on Sunday morning for their
clamor!
Back to Edinburgh from the Hebrides
back from the land of mist and clouds
and romance, with full determination
to read about, but not visit, it hence
forarwd. Too much fish and Gaelic to
suit me. Three months gone, and the
ground covered with autumn leaves,
since I've been dangling in her train;
and-and fear I've been making q
fool of myself! Does she care for me
at all? Well, Tn sanguine, self
persuasive man; but, putting all that
aside, think am gaining ground q
little.
Why am / not ecstaticaily happy,
thenP I expected to be, andy Joye,
/ will be! [ have lived a quarter of a
century without having seen any woman
so beautiful, so lovable; and | know
she's far too good for me. What a dis
gustingly conceited idiot am! / dare
say it's all my egotism, and she really
never gives me second thought. And
yet when I pulled that reckless young
scapegrace brother Of hers out of Loeb
Maybe, she put both her cold little
hands in mine, and whispered some in
coherent words, of which / could only
catch, Forgive mel know you better
now Pshaw! that was only graft
tude. And yet, when l held her hands,
and tried to tell how gladly | would
take far greater risks for her sake. she
did not take them away, but raised her
eyes to my face so braYely and trust
ingly that trod on air for days after
wards.
She keeps my book, too. / saw the
leaf on which | wrote that absurd
crotchet thrust into her little silk purse.
She had torn it out, and was making a
relic of it. That might be because of
it's oddity, and probably means nothing.
There never was a girl SO proof to flat
terry as not to preserve such a sponta-
neous tribute She treats me just the
same as eyer-is friendly and cordial,
no more. Uncertainty, then, is all ar
rive at uncertainty as to her feelings,
uneasiness as to mine.
Pretty much the same way / felt at
Long Branch three years ago, when |
spent fortnight to determine whether
/ was in love with Lucy Romer, and if
SO whether she would be pleased to
hear it; at the end of which time she
married young Landless, and to my sur
prise / was pleased to hear it!
Suppose this was to result similarly?
think K "a oetrer e nome me-. ana E i:e