The Kootenai herald. [volume] (Kootenai, Idaho) 1891-1904, 1891-08-22
LOVE AND SCIENCE.

ton and disappointment. A half sigh
rose to her lips, and, with slight con.
traction of her brow that was in reality
indicative of impotence, she drew the
curtain across the large square pane and
walked abstractedly away.
Agatha West was peculiar in some
ways. For year and half she had
been on intimate terms with John Ros-
wick. and in all that time never once had
he been in her presence without feeling a
deep sense of his own inferiority and de-
pendence. Not that she was strong
minded. No one would more quickly re-
sent such an insinuation than she. True.
she wore rimless eyeglasses, and at times
affected a severe simplicity of dress that
was decidedly becoming to her plump,
brunette beauty. Nor was Roswick an
etfeminate creature. He was, however, a
man that easily lost confidence in himself
when in the presence of the opposite sex,
and at such times was liable to become as
awkward and helpless as a badly iointed
aut0maton endowed with only mono
syllable power of speech
Roswick was a man of considerable
wealth. and possessed a strong love for
mechanics. His life, for the past ten
years, had been spent in an elaborate
workshop fitted out in the upper part of
his house on Dodsey street, where, day
after day and night after night, he ham
mered and filed and filed and hammered
at some product of his handiwork. His
great hobby was electricity, and with the
advent of the telephone, electric lighting
and kindred inventions he became so in
fatuated with his chosen work that he
scarcely took time to eat and sleep.
4 4
studies that he became acquainted with
Agatha West just how this was brought
about need not be detailed here, but suf-
fee it to say that before the summer was
gone his work began to be neglected, and
his affections were, i'll part, transferred to
the more complex and hopelessly confus-
ing study of wOmankind.
Agatha was consumed by mighty as
piratiOns when she left Wellesley. Her
horizon was boundless. In the valedictory,
which 1t was her honor to deliver, she ad-
vanced the customary platitudes regard
ing " the dawning life, adown whose
shadowy vista we are now about to make
tracks, or words to similar purport. In
common with the multitude of ladies who
each year blossom simultaneously with
the June roses into 1.-THE stern realities of
life" as they are pleased to term it,
Agatha was filled with the vague idea
that she had mission" that hence
forth this old world, largely through her
influence, was to run on different prin-
ciples. With each succeeding year, how
ever, this inner consciousness slowly died
the death of inanition, until now, at
twenty six, little remained but mild in
terest in the arts and sciences fostered
| by her intimate associations with John
Roswick.
To tell the truth. that evening was the
t@ird consecutive time that Roswick had
called on Miss West with the premeditated
intention of declaring his affection and
asking her to be his wife. For the third
time he had failed ANONYMOUSLY. How
he had managed finally to bid her good
night he had not the remotest idea A
dozen times during the evening had the
all important declaration of love risen to
his lips, and a dozen times had that
dreadful choking embarrassment effect
ually silenced his intended utterance On
commonplace topics he had managed to
acquit himself fairly well, but with an air
OF abstraction that necessitated frequent
apologies to the object of his blind worship.
This, then, was the reason Agatha
watched his retreating form with an air
of vexation, and left the shadow of the
curtain with something dangerously near
a frown on her mobile features. His in
fatuation was no secret to her. To what
woman is her admirers mind as a sealed
book? And the feeling she entertained
toward him, long ago self acknowledged,
only tended to make her less tolerant of
his prolonged silence.
To say that John Bos wick was discour-
aged and vexed with himself would be
but mild statement of facts. On his
homeward walk that night he ragged in
wardly every step of the way, and it was
not until week later that his mental
barometer had risen to- its normal altitude.
| The Tuesday evening following his last
doubly emphasized iasco Roswiclk, secure
in the privacy of his own inner workshop,
dropped his tools for a moment and gave
himself up to profound meditation.
Il am a fool, and l know itl' he ex-
claimed aloud, giving the work bench a
| vigorous thump as he set down a curious
/ looking machine upon which he had been
at work. What's more, Agatha knows
itl' he continued He called her Agatha
! gibly enough when unembarrassed by
her presence. Indeed, this habit of think
! ing aloud had become, through circum-
stances, fixed one, and, as on several
| previous occasions, he recounted the
events of their last meeting.
Il can't stand this any longerl" he ex.
claimed, suddenly. "Ill see her to-mor.
row night and have it all settled in some
way. This foolishness must DO stopped.
The idea! Afraid of a womanl And
know-at least, I'm quite sure-she-she
likes me. Let me see" he continued,
musingly. How can introduce the sub,
jectl knowl" he calculated, with sud.
den inspiration. IN ask her if she thinks