The Sunday morning news. [volume] (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1886-1891, 1890-12-21

una neck, ttnu rnen uleu quickly out.
felt deuced queer. Here was alone at
midnight with a tinid White Mouse,
who had suddenly asserted herself. and
told me she did not love the man she was
engaged to, and "did So love somebody
else. There was nobody else except Tom
Jones, now talking terrier with the
groom up stairs, and myself! Great
heavens! conld the girl mean me? No.
nonsensel must be mistaken. smiled
sickly smile to reassure myself. Then
said, 81 on't--that is, yon lnow--I--
could not-you would not suspect me of
jesting about um-yoar sacred feel
ings." She seized my hand impulsiyeIy
and pressed it.
ssThey are sacredF' she cried sacred
as the first worship of a pure girls heart
must ever be. Oh, you know, you must
feel how strong and all absorbing is the
passion that can change me into O self
asserting womanl that can make me
defy prejudice and custom, as you see /
do. when say that | will give up home
and friends--that l viii face all the
world and tell them boldly, as / now do
you, that from the bottom of my heart /
lover
She dropped her face into her hands as
she spoke the last word. but all the rest
she had said with her eye fixed I'M
sweryingly upon mine and looking down
into my very soul. am considered by
most of my friends to be rather modest
man. On this particular occasion / must
confess that | was rather taken aback
and became rather misty in the mind.
But there could be no doubt as to what
the girl meant. Driven to desperation
by her forced engagement, feeling the
unbearable grasp of hated fate tight
ening on her, she was-yes, there was no
room for doubt-she was making love
to mel
For a second the base idea crept into
my mind, Revengel Bette Blythe, the
jilt, the shameless f1irt, cannot triumph
over me if marry the heiress of Shady
nook instead Of the poor lawyers daugh-
ter! For second was on the eve of
clasping the White Mouse in my arms,
and blackening my soul with the per-
jury that adored her--that never had
loved but her!
Thank heavenl it was only for sec
ond, when the unnatural, the frightful
want of modesty stood naked in my
sight. Much as had despised the girl
before, actually loathed her now. But
to tell her so? There was the rub. l
appeal to any young lawyer who has
had an heiress make love to him at mid
night if it isn't q little awkward to re-
fuse herr
Miss Bolton, said at last, looking
into the fire, Il make every allowance
Cor vnnr trials-for your .lr,usual excite
nent that has driven you TO say things to
me you may wish unsaid tomorrow"
Tomorrow / shall glory in them
even more than nowg'
Tomorrow you may regret, con
tinued, needless of the interruption,
s'that you said them to me-
"You are the sole man on earth to
whom I would ever dream of speaking
SOP she broke in hastily; ito no one else
could be SO immodest as to-to''-
Here she melted into perfe.t cataract
of tears don't like tears. They wash
all the manhood out of me; they dissolve
me as If ] were beet root sugar. began
at once to regret the accident that had
made the young woman care for me;
and, to try and be little more gentle,
put myself through a strict cross-ex-
animation as to whether had ever given
her any cause to believe cared for her,
any encouragement, any reason. But a
hastily impaneled jury of conscience,
habit and memory acquitted me mem.
con.
Then, panoplied in the triple conscious
ness of right, ! turned once more upon
the young woman before me.
Miss Belton," l said, with an arctic
frigidity in nay tone, "you will permit
me to say that I am astonished and
~Astonishedl You!"
The invariable recurrence of that pro-
noun and the dreadful emphasis upon it
were beginning to wear my patience out.
| continued rather hastily;
Astonished, surely; and I may say
panied at the--a-the confession of what
| cannot but consider passing "a
caprice"
The White Mouse flashed round at me.
She seemed to expand and dilate in the
Pickering light, and her lips were COM
pressed till they seemed very white in the
reflection
May remind you such suspicion is
injurious to my modesty?' she said, cold
ly; "but l know in my heart I viii prove
to you by my whole future that my love
is part of my being viii end only with
my life!'
Did ever modest man meet such per-
sistence? Icould not strike that girl and
crush her where she stood. Oh how /
longed for man in her place, for had
he been the Benicia Boy should have
pounded him then and there. Morally
certain that the white haired young crea-
ture was dying of love for me, half per-
suaded that she was going to marry me
then and there by force. what could I
say? l stared blankly at her, while a
smile of wonderful sweetness stole round
her lips, as she murmured, half to herself:
''Let the world say what it will; love
like mine puriies all. We will be very,
very happy"
Tender of heart, began to pity the
young woman Laboring under terri