Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1889-12-26
A GREAT TEMPTATION.
How James Forrester's Fortune
Won and Lost an Heir.

A sweet. proud face, crowned with
wavy nut-brown hair, soft clear hazel
eyes, 1.-the young form, clothed in
mourning, and you have Genie Howard
that soft, fair afternoon.
She was standing in the old-fashioned
garden of the Forester homestead, her
soft eyes fixed on the slender, graceful
form coming toward her.
1T must be she;" she murmured, land
Hugh must have missed her somehow. :"
She walked quickly down the broad,
graveled path. and the next moment she
and Eunice Forester were face to face.
You are Eunice Forester" Genie
said, smile of welcome curving her
lips. Il sent Hugh to meet you, but he
must have missed you somehow. L am
not mistaken. am I?''
The newcomer raised the gray travel
ing veil that shaded her face, ard looked
straight in Genie Towards clear eyes.
No. l am Eunice Forester. 1t is
kind of you TOTO welcome me-"
Ito welcome you to your own home"
Genie laughed.
As Eunice raised her veil a cry of
startled wonder almost broke from &C.
MES lips at the beauty of the face her
eyes rested upon-a face perfect in con-
tour, exquisite in coloring, faultless in
every detail.
Il wonder what Colonel Erickson will
think of her?" was Genie's first thought;
and then she wondered vaguely why the
same thought had not crossed her mind
about her lover, Hugh Vernon.
The coming of Eunice Forester to the
quaint old home of the Forresters held
a romance in itself.
The last master of it, who had only
been buried two weeks before, had lived
and died bachelor.
The reason was simply this:
The one woman he had loved in his
life had welded his brother, Clark.
She had been the elder brothers
promised wife, but week before the
wedding day she had fed with the hand
some scapegrace of the family.
James Forester never forgave them,
and when his father, espousing his
cause, died and left him all his posses
sions he refused all intercourse with
Clark or his wife.
Even when Clark died, leaving his fra
gile young wife in poverty-even when
she, dying, left their only child, Eunice,
a lonely orphan, he refused to relent.
Not till he lay on his own death-bed
did the thought of forgiveness enter his
mind.
He had loved the girl who proved
false to him as woman is seldom loved,
and she had wrecked his life by her
treachery.
Dying. however, all bitterness passed
away. 1t would never do to carry that
before the eternal throne, and so, MAX
ing his peace with God, he sent for
Eunice Forester, the little waif his
brother and false love had left behind
them, but before her coming he had
passed away, but not before he had left
her all his earthly possessions, with the
exception OF remembrance gift to his
ward, Genie Howard.
A little later Eunice stood before the
mirror in her own apartments. her ewes
fixed on her own face, strange light in
her eyes.
Suddenly shadow fell over the lovely
face, denser shade in the sapphire eyes.
What has my beauty gained me?"
she said. Nothing but per-
haps l may need it to hold what my
brains have won. After all, what wrong
have dOne?"-walking to the window
and letting her eyes wander over the
fair lands around the homestead-''it Is
only just; they are mine! have right
to them-the best right of any one liv-
ing-no matter what any one would say,
am justified"
Justified But still the shadow lin
gered on her face, the sapphire eyes still
held their look of pain.
When evening came, however, in the
quaint, old-fashioned drawing-room, her
face was bright and cloudless as the
dawn of summer day.
There she met Hugh Vernon, the
naughty handsome, master of Oaklands.
the stately mansion where, people be-
heVed Genie Howard would yet reign
mistress.
There was no promise between them.