The Wichita daily eagle., 1891-10-25
TWO OF A KIND.

had come on from New York that
morning, and was lucky in not having be-
fore read Kipling's "Plain Tales from the
Hills" | was rushing from one short
story to the next, as had fallen into the
pounding meter of the express train, and,
all the while was tortured by subcon-
sciousness that presently would come to
the end and be angry with myself for
squandering all the stories in one morn
| ing The extravaganza was worse than
foolish. Tor i was missing the best of it by
not giving myself, after each story, that
pause of smiling reminiscence in which the
bouquet of the drained cup comes back
with suffusing sense of delight.
When we drew into the long, dark sta
ton at Philadelphia laid the book down
ION the pit of its stomach" more than half
of the pages were on the wrong side.
There was the usual shifting of passen-
! gers. Most of the old lot got off and new
ones came on, but the slight woman who
! had sat in front of me since we left New
York did not move. | had only noticed
that the contour of her cheek was fat. and
that her manner had the unexacting pas
sivity of woman who makes no claim to
attractiveness.
picked up Kipling at the "Bisara of
Poorie," and wished that we might get out
into the light. The car door opened, and
large woman came in. She walked up the
center of the car, passing several vacant
half seats and sat down, with a sharp
jangling of her jet wrap, in the seat in
front of me, beside the small woman who
yielded her room Perhaps she chose this
seat because she took up broad space.
She had a well groomed fatness, which
she carried off. in her tight fitting clothes,
with something of aswagger. She looked
little handsome in the dim light.
The engine jerked all the slack coupling
pins taut. and we began that long, backing
maneuver that the Pennsylvania trains
make in going south from Philadelphia.
As we came out into the light the large
woman shone like freshly gilded sign.
Her hair was we'll blondined, only showing
a shade darker at the roots than at the
brassy ends. 1t was very perfectly ar
ranged in layers of fiat curls beneath her
small bonnet of twisted black and scarlet
velvet. The thick lobes of her ears were
penetrated by fine diamond screws. Her
embroidered handkerchief unfolded scent !
of heliotrope There was an air of pros !
pcIOuS vitality dDOul Lu0 WuOl0
After little while she turned and looked |
her neighbor over had gone back to my |
book, when heard her say good naturedly: |
BEN travelin longS"
mo, only about two hours"
New York9'
"Yes. | came from New York"
New York's a fine place | know it
well Lived here over twenty years"
/ loSf and ha larUa
went on:
Yes, indeed; | ought to know it pretty
well, and do. like it. like the people
Pm sociabIe by nature Now there's lots
of folks that would have rode by you all
the way to Baltimore and never once
opened their mouth / amt that kind
Pm willin to talk. and get as good as i
take, and better too" Then, lowering her
voice TO awhisper that had three times the
carrying power of the well oiled voice in
which she had been speaking, she added,
"You see it's in my line
The other started and turned toward
her. so that for The first time saw her full
face. 1t was very thin and long, with that
beauty of skin that still suggests disease.
The eyes We're beautiful, and looked ont
from the painful, sensitive ugliness of the
other features as if in perpetual appeal
from it,
How do you mean?" she asked.
well, don't care if do tell you. You
see, | write stories and novels, and when
talk like Pm talking to you hear things
that give me an idea That's all | want
an idea. when | once get the start Pm all
right"
THAT is very interesting. Have you al
ways been an authoress?"
For the last ten years. l have been at
it pretty constant. and yet you wouldn't
think it; but if it hadn't been for a kind of
an accident never would have dreamed ]
had 1t in me Never had a notion that |
had the gift, and that makes me say that
you're fool to ever say you can't till
you've tried "
AN accident?"
Yes 1t was this way: That was long
about 1850, and | was saleslady at Macy's
You know Nacy's, corner of Fourteenth
street and Sixth avenues But of course
rou do-JuSt listen to mel forgot you
'aid you were from New York Well, |
was a great reader. | used to read every :
hing | had a chum at Macy'S, an awful
lice girl, and when business was sort of
lack / would tell her about the stories | ,
lsed TO tell 'em like they really had hap
'sned-you see, we were at the perfumery :
counter. You know Macys-the perfum- !
ry counter Is right by one of the Four
eenth street doors Well, we could see =
verybody that came in and went out. I'd
ay: Maud see that lady in the seal plush =
vrap' | know all about how she came to
,et married, and I'd start right in and tell !
he last story I'd resd, like it was all gos- !,
'el truth. Then the girls would get around,
nd they sorJer half believed il was all so; !,
'ut Maud, she knew better One day we
7ere sort of running each other a little,
nd Maud said: :
i suppose you know all about Two =
Hundred and Three's fsmily-knew her .
1other intimately before she was married,
idn't youp
Two hundred and Three was Just going
v, swinging her basket. She was the
I y |