Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-11-23


the digestion of an ostrich. Most red-haired
| people have. Maisie's a bilious little body.
| THEY'LL eat like lone women-meals at all
hours and tea with all meals. l remember
how the students in Paris used to pig along.
She may fall i'll at any minute, and shan't
be able to help. Whewl this is ten times
worse than owning a wife,"
Torpenhow came into the studio at dusk,
and looked at Dick with his eyes full of the
austere love that springs up between men
who have tugged at the same oar together
and are yoked by custom and use and the
intimacies OF toll. This is good love, and,
since it allows, and even encourages, strife,
recrimination, and the most brutal sincerity,
does not die, but increases, and is proof
against any absence and evil conduct.
Dick was silent after he handed Torpen-
how the filled pipe of council. He thought
of Maisie and her possible needs. 1t was a
new thing to think of anybody but Torpen-
how, who could think of himself. sHere at
last was an outlet for that cash balance.
He could adorn Maisie barbarically with
jeweIry-a thick gold necklace round that
little neck, bracelets upon the rounded
arms, and rings of price upon her hands
the cool temperate ringless hands that he
had taken between his own. 1t was an abb
surd thought, for Maisie would not even
allow him to put one ring on one finger, and
she would laugh at golden trappings. 1t
would be better to sit with her quietly in the
dusk, his arm around her neck and her face
on his shoulder as beftted husband and
wife. TorDenhow's boots creaked that night,
and his strong voice Jared. Dicks brows
| contracted and he murmured an evil word,
because he had taken all his success as a
right and part payment for past discomfort,
and now he was checked in his stride by a
| Ia ol, o11 fho I'D
did not instantly care for him.
81 say, old man." said Torpehow, who
had made one or two vain attempts at con-
versation, 81 haven't put your back up by
anything I've said lately, have / 2"
"Youl No. How could you?"
"Liver out of order ?"
"The truly healthy man doesn't know he
has liver. I'm only bit worried about
things in general. suppose it's my soul. /"
1.-THE truly healthy man doesn't know he
has soul. What business have you with
luxuries of that kind?
at came of itself. Who's the man that
says that we're all islands shouting lies to
| each other across seas of misunderstanding"
Hes right, whoever he is-except about
the misunderstanding. 1 don't think we
could misunderstood each other"
The blue smoke curled back from the
ceiling in clouds. Then Torpenhov, insinu-
atingly-
"Dick, is it q woman?"
"Be hanged if it's anything remotely re-
sembling a woman; and if you begin to talk
| like that I'll hire a red-brick studio with
white paint trimmings, and begonias and
| petunias and blue Hungarias to play among
| three-and-sixpenny pot-palms, and I'll
mount all my pics in aniline dye plush
| plasters, and I'll invite every woman who
m nd M hot
her guide books tell her is art, and you
shall receive 'em, Torp-in a snuff-brown
velvet coat with yellow trousers and an
orange tie. You'll like that"
"Too thin, Dick. A better man than you
denied with cursing and swearing on q
memorable occasion. You've overdone it,
| Just as he did. It's no business of mine, OF
course, but it's comforting TO think that
somewhere under the stars there's saving up
for you tremendous thrashing. Whether
it'll come from heaven or earth, 1 don't
know. but it's bound to come and break you
up little. You want hammering."
Dick shivered. "All right" said he,
"When this island is dlsintegrated it will
call for you"
81 shall come round the corner and help
to disintegrate it some more. We're talk
ing nonsense. Come along to theater."
Some weeks later, on very foggy SUM-
day, Dick was returning across the park to
his studio. This" he said, sis evidently
the thrashing that Torp meant. 1t hurts
more than 1 expected; but the queen can do
no wrong; and she certainly has aome
notion of drawing"
He had just finished a Sunday visit to
Maisie-always under the green eyes Of the
red-haired impressionist girl whom he
learned to hate at sight-and was tingling
with keen sense OF shame. Sunday after
Sunday, putting on his best clothes, he had
walked over to the untidy house north of
the Park, first to see Maisie's pictures and
then to criticise and advise upon them as he
realized that they were productions on
which advice would not be wasted Sunday
after Sunday, and his love grew with each
visit, he had been compelled to cram his
heart back from between his lips when it
prompted him to kiss Maisie several times
and very much indeed. Sunday
after Sunday, the head above the
was not yet attainable, and that
1t would be better to talk as connectedly as
| possible upon the mysteries of the craft that
was all in all to her. Therefore it was his
fate to endure weekly torture in the studio
built out over the clammy back garden of a
frail and stuffy little villa, where nothing
was ever in its right place. and nobody ever
called-to endure and to watch Maisie NOV
ing to and fro with the teacups. He ab-
horred tea, but since it gave him little
longer time in her presence he drank it de-
voutly, and the red-haired girl sat in an IN
tidy heap and eyed him without speaking.
She was always watching him. Once, aud
only once, when she had left the studio,
BIaisie showed him an album that held
few poor cuttings from provincial papers
the brietest of hurried notes on some of her
pictures sent TO outlying exhibitions. Dick
stopped and kissed the paint-smudged thumb
on the open page. "Oh, my love, my love-"
he muttered, 'do you value these things?
Chuck 'em into the waste-paper basketP'
Not till L get something better" said
Maisie, shutting the book.
Then Dick, moved by no respect for his
public and very deep regard for the
maiden, did deliberately propose, in order
to secure more OF these coveted cuttings, that
he should paint picture which Maisie
should sign.
"That's childish" said Maisie, "and
| didn't think it of you. 1t must be my work.
Mine-mine-minep'
go and design decorative medallions for
rich brewers houses. You are thoroughly
good at that" Dick was sick and savage
Better things than medallions, Dick, I"
was the answer, in tones that recalled.
gray-eyed atoms fearless speech to Mrs.
Jeunett. Dick would have abased himself
utterly, but that the other girl trailed in.
Next Sunday he laid at Maisie's feet small
gifts of pencils that could almost draw of
themselves, and colors in whose permanence
he believed, and he was ostentatiously at
tentive to the work in hand. 1t demanded,
among other things, an exposition of the
faith that was in him. Torpenhow's hair
4