Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1888-10-19


stranger with her worldly wealth, Janet
had already begun to give him the treas
ures which she had received direct from
heaven. All the love which lies hidden
in the heart of good and pure old maid,
all the vast abyss of sensibility which ex-
lists in feminine nature that has
found no natural outlet, had in her
case been stirred to the profoundest
depths by the penniless, friendless,
handsome, clever youth whom she had
saved from death. Useless to struggle
against the infatuation it had COM
menced too insidiously as mere human
ity; then it had crept on too slyly in the
guise of mere charity. Oh, how cunning
it had beenl All at once there was
flaming transformation, and she found
herself the victim of first passion, as
much in love as if she were a young girl.
ResistY She tried in vain to do so.
Run away? She could not give up her po-
sition, lest she should thereby fail to
complete her cousins education, and leave
| him to starve. Once more self sacrifice;
though all her life had been self sacri-
fee, she must go on with it; she must
love and suffer and be silent. And so the
mischief proceeded at terrible rate, for
every day added to its magnitude What
made things worse was that Ernst was
IlODlN COuSClOuS VI Ills ODllSdilOllS, dLu
profuse in thanks, in praises, in the most
delicate and charming attentions. If he
met her on the street he took his hat en-
tirely off his comely head and saluted her
as school ma'ams are not always saluted.
If he walked with her he had the air of
escorting n duchess. He would leave his
beautiful labor at any moment to greet
her return to the house with smile or
to run on her errands. His whole deport-
ment toward her was continual burning
of incense.
She had never before known such fin
ished gentleman; more than that, she had
never met a sweeter and finer nature
She comprehended at last that even his
attempted suicide was proof of his high
self respect and sense of honor inasmuch
as it was an effort to escape from the
degradation of living by mourning debts
which he could not discharge. That stoi-
cal declaration IF | could hat bald my
room rent | would hat gone on another
month" seemed to her now something
like patent of nobility Unaware
of her own grandeur of character,
she worshlped his grandeur of character.
Finally, she worshiped his genius, which
had begun to show her the universe of
glory that there Is in art, and which was
able to seize ideas scarcely perceptible to
her Impractical aesthetic vision. and place
them before her in the resurrection robes
of drawing and color.
All WE'LL she was desperately in love
with him, and she could not help admit
ting it to her accusing conscience, and
could not put aside the scornful finger of
her sense of womanly shame. But did he
know it2 AS yet she was sufficiently her
self to hope that he did not. Although
she could not meet him without feeling
blush run through her whole face al
though his praises and the touch of his
hand made her tremble from head to foot,
she trusted that she was keeping her fiery
secret And so she was: young man
does not easily suspect that woman thir-
teen years his senior has a passion for
him; and if Ernst noticed her tremors
and changes of color, he imputed them to
woman delicacy and Puritan shyness.
: While Janet, locked in her own room, was
looking in the glass at her pale face, high
cheek bones, square jaws, straight mouth
and incipient wrinkles, while she was
wishing with both tears and shame that
: all that supportable plainness were beauty
and youth, he, steadily at work, did not
: think of her at all, or only thought of her
as his "goot vriend.' His handsome
countenance, now pink and White in color
: as well as classic in outline, was not shad
owed by the slightest cloud from the fires
of love, unless indeed he remembered now
t and then his lost jungfrau in faderland.
About the time that The Rescue las
, Janet christened the scene from Philips
war; reached its finishing point, Ernst
| encountered an American artist named
Stanley Stanley was a portrait painter
in high fashion, who made $4,000 year
5 and spent it all on himself and some poor
aloti Too md cpft hoo ~ n
q to save money, he wanted to study in the
r galleries of Europe without ever having the
4 first spare dollar for the voyage, and talked
t OF launching into genre pictures or high
A art" without ever being able to give W
4 his pot boiling labor in kit -kats. The re
suit of this existence, acting upon this
: kindly spirit, was that while Stanley
t envied the chances Of more famous art
b lists, he honestly admired their produc
4 tons.
o Meeting Ernst at the Academy, he fel
1 into chance conversation with him, liked
s his naive and badly pronounced but judi
a cious criticisms, went with him to his
y lodgings and fell in love with The Res
cue" His aorid face flushed crimson
. with enthusiasm as he exclaimed by
:. Jove! you are ON the road to fame. Yor
k needn't have apologized for your room
d This picture furnishes it like palace.
t wish l was a poor devil. wish | coulC
o live in this style and try to do something
r good. But I can't. l must dress in
@ certain way and go to certain parties ant
4 live in a certain quarter. If | didn't
); should lose my run among certain people
n And then" he added as he thought of hi.
/; mother and aunt, then there would bt
trouble"
). Thenceforward Stanley came often t.
{ Ernst's room to watch the progress O.
| "The Rescue" and to tell him that it wa.
@ sure of success. 1t was not long, either
n before he gave the young German another
startling piece of information.
a THAT old girl down stairs is in love will
v you.' he said.
!: I G m|