The Opelousas courier., 1886-12-25
A HAPPY OCCASION.

Az s"t Az q temperature Va AVU NCS4cCS
in the shade, on the veranda of his Ind
ian bungalow.
"Do not come too late" he muttered
to himself. By Jove, as if it were prob.
able that he would dawdle now! 1t
was just like Mrs. Lennox to send such q
chatting wire as this. He might have
been a long time making up his mind,
but it was made up now, and he meant
to go home and marry her. 1t was her
last letter that had settled this matter
the letter in which she limited that Lord
shorthorn was awiulIy mashed" No,
he wasn't going to stand by and see
Dorothy Lennox married to a cad like
Shorthorn. He had been a whole year,
he reminded himself, in this station, with
its furnace heat, its insane gossip and its
eternal tennis and polo. How he
loathed the sight of his majors wife,
with her white eyelashes, her
malicious giggle and her flirting man.
nersl
And then he thought Of Mrs. Lennox.
He remembered the first night he had
met her-in the ballroom of a great
house in London-and how he had seen
her surrounded by a dozen other fellows.
and how he had t'made the run
ming" and had cut out all those put
siders. And he recollected the call he
had paid next day at her tiny house in
Park street, when she had been so sweet
and graceful, and had talked to him as
no woman had ever talked before. He
didn't go in for brains or any of thar
rot, but, by Jovel Dorothy Lennox
made him feel another fellow. He
thought of the cool, amber-tinted room
where she always sat with its dropping
palms, its masses of a~zaleas, it's Raion
ethings and its blue and white Nankir.
It was always cool and cosey in Mrs.
Lemons house and she had a way of
taking a fellows hand and looking him
seriously in the eyes which was quite
irresistible. He remembered how it had
become almost a habit to drop in of an
afternoon, to lounge on her soft divan,
and listen to her half-chafing talk and
her low, delicious laugh. And when a
woman is good looking as well as clever,
why. what is afellow to do2 Perhaps
it was wrong to make love in quite such
q serious way as she did, but, hang it'll.
wasn't a kitten, and she might have
known he wasn't the marrying sort.
Ali that was a year ago, but he hadn't
forgotten her q bit-worsc luck. And
her letters-how awful nice they were!
how like h~erselfl Not spoony, like tn SO
he wrote to her; but frank, humorous.
and thoroughly non cansGrade. Hang it
ALL It was much easier to keep heart
whole in London than in this sslery ana
m~onotonous hole. He had managed to
evade compromising himself definitely
even when he had gone to bill Mrs. Len
nox good-by, although he Lad been per-
ilously near proposing TO her that last
evening; but he had got away and moth
ing had been said which would have
tied him down to an engagement.
Dick, in his rowing lfo had committed
every folly except that which be consid-
cred the hugest folly Of all--the folly Of
tying yourself to one woman for life.
He remembered how he had congratu-
lated himself on all this when hc went
on board the Ju9aaa. Was. he, the best
looking fellow end keenest sportsman in
the 150th Hussars, to knock under like
any spoony young sub, the moment he
met . pretty woman9 But now things
were changed. He had never bar
gained, somehow, for her marry
again; he had got to look upon
her more or less as his own. When
she had written that letter with all the
illusions to Shorthorn in IL, his blood
had fairly boiled. He didn't regret q
bit the letter he had written in reply.
telling her he was leaving India the
very day be could get leave, and asking
her to be his wife. After MI, why
shouldn't he marrya He was over
and he had had, Is be remem-
bered with . smile. his fling The
other fellows in his regiment, used to
chaif him and call him CASUAL and
said that be never did to-day what he
could put OF till to morrow. But that
was all nonsense. BE could make up
his mind like other men. even to matri-
mony. And here was her answer to his
DO not CONS too late.p Well,
be had got his leave, and would be with
her In three weeks.
Mrs. Lennox was che ss7t DIT woman
about whom peoples tongues are always
wagging. Hardly was her late husband
borne beneath nodding plumes 10 Kensal
Green than she was married, ID perspec-
tive, to Ut leaat q dozah admirers. She
was q great success IN society, for be-
being i charming woman, she was .
fashionable poetess, writing words for
Tosttss songs. and Publishing small
volumes u vaNe bound ID whlta parch-