The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1886-09-25


You will sing for me once more,
will you not, Miss Virgie? Remem-
Der, | 60 in the morning, and who
can say whether or not we will
ever meet again?'
Lazily, languidly he said the
words, lying full length at her feet on
the sunlit sands; but the dark eyes
of the girl turned on his handsome
face while her olive cheeks lost
their rich color.
She was only sailors daughter,
born and bred beside the sea, 1.-the
of limb, and pure of heart, with
glancing lights in her dark eyes,
and free laughter on her lips; he
was an idler from the world she did
not know, who had been drifted
by fate to that quiet spot, where he
had fingered for a whole long sum-
mer.
Had it been chance that sent
him to the little cottage on the
cliff seeking board, when, arriving
late in June, he found the Beach
Hotel filled with guests? Who can
tell? He had thoroughly enjoyed
the summer, and now it was past,
and he had asked this wild-bird for
a song, ere he bade her farewell for
ever.
"You will not come back, then?"
she asked breathlessly-" you will
never come back? Oh surely you
30 not mean that?"
He smiled little and turned his
golden head, resting it more COM
fortably in his clasped hands.
81 am afraid / do mean that"
he said carelessly; one summer is
enough to spend away from civil
cation. No, Miss Virgie, / will
never come back; so sing to me
one of your quaint old ballads as
final farewell. l will rise with
the lark in the morning and fit
back to my world"
He saw how his light words
moved her, but felt no pity for the
girl who would miss him so sadly
for, perhaps, her whole life long.
Her young heart-what would its
pain be to him, while he followed
his fancy, and said his low mean
ingless words in dainty ears?
He had said many low words to
this innocent child-words that had
walked her soul, and now her idola
try; but now the amusement was
past, and he left no fraction of his
heart with her.
If she allowed hers to 60 with
him, what was that but a proof that
they had not talked folly when, in
his set, they called him irresisti-
BILE?
"As final farewell"
The girl said his words over
slowly, incredulously; then, with
hands locked rigidly, and face as
white as marble through all its tan,
she leaned in silence against the
rocks. He watched her curiously,
lazy amusement in his eyes.
"She is proud enough for
duchess but she feels this parting
very keenly," he told himself, as
the sun laid its last kiss on the
waters before them-a kiss which
turned their sheen to crimson.
"You have never hesitated when
asked you to sing" he said with
soft reproach in his low tones ;
" why do you do SO now? You
have sung for me often here just at
this hour. Let me hear your sweet
voice again. Sing me that plaintive
thing you love so-that farewell of
the lord to the shepherdess, whose
beauty had made him want her for
his bride. Egad ~ with a low
laugh, as he watched the sweet face
above him, "it will be almost an
appropriate parting-song. You are
very lovely, child. But sing"
For three months she had but
lived to obey him, to minister to
his selfishness, to alnuse or inter-
est him; it all came back as she
looked away from him, and out to
the foam-crests of the sea; came
to both perhaps-to her with word
less pain, to him with idle amuse-
ment.
A sudden short breath burst sob