Waterbury evening Democrat., 1891-01-16
O.. U
BY HOWARD FIELDING.

ment in his face. She was much dis turbed, and yet she waited for his words with an appearance of calmness.
 ''Alice," said he, ''the life have been leading fills me with disgust. want to change it for something better"
 "l hope, indeed, you may" said Alice, eff it has failed to satisfy you"
 "It has failed in hundred ways," he replied. Ut has failed to give me peace of mind or liberty. I have been the slave to it. It has failed of any good object except one, which I now see was far too high-was never to be reached by any path that have found."
 "Get into the better path at once, then," said she, smiling. And then gravely: ''l think, perhaps, you have not been in tho right road during the last year. Forgive my saying so; we have bcen-we are-very good friends. and it has given mo pain to see that you have been unhappy. I have seen far less of you than formerly, but it has been enough to show me that you were careworn and weary. A great many young men grow old very fast in these days, and have feared that you would be one of them"
 ''I feel as if were old. Perhaps it is because have lived two lives already, and have made failures of them both. You know that before l met you had for seven or eight years lead the most monotonous existence ever endured by mortal man, outside prison. I thought that there was happiness in blind routine, but one day I awoke to find that it was misery. Then, in a wild de- termination, threw myself into a life of the most restless activity. That has burned itself out, and hardly know what remains"
 "There remains the middle path" said Alice. Many wise men have thought it the best"
 "I fear I can not walk in it," said Russell, sadly. ''It requires caution which have lately thrown away, and a faculty of rationally hoping, which I do not think I ever possessed. Moreover, tho middle path in these days can hard ly be said to exist. It is overgrown, because so few travel in it. If I give up my present life, I must go back to poverty, and that means isolation"
 Ut means no isolation so far as we are concerned" said Alice, warmly. "Whatever life you choose our doors VIII DC always open to you
 "Alice, they must be forever closed to me. The reason, will not insult your intelligence by pretending to conceal. You read it in my face, as I can read the Knowledge of it in yours. l love you; and you know it; and you also know a thousand reasons why l should not say it"
 II know not one," said Alice, in voice that struggled to be calm, eff it be true"
 Ut is all the truth I know. It has been the one clear certainty in a myriad of chimeras. It has been the influence that has kept the little good in me alive to fight its lost battle with the evil. If I had not loved you. ] should have come here to-day and asked you in set phrases to be my wife. should have counterfeitcd the emotion which I am now struggling to suppress. Ishould have met, no doubt, the contempt which l deserved, but which hope to escape by asking you no more than to bid me fair goodbye, and to think of me as trying to deserve the very small share in your kindly remembrance which is all l dare to hope for"
 Alice had preserved the semblance of composure during most of this conver- sation, but there is something in tho word goodbye which strikes straight at Q woman's heart, if she loves. And Alice loved Russell. There will be no mystery with the reader on that point. She saw the serious purpose in his looks, and the tears blinded her eyes. She sank into chair and covered her face. Russell saw the sign, and he was over- whelmed with consternation.
 II am brute to have grieved you so, " he exclaimed. "I was a madman to have come here at all, bringing my miserable story of weakness and irreso- ution to your ears"
 He began to pace the room, but as he approached the door, she looked up, hastily crying: ''Oh, please, not yet; I have much more to say"
 Alice, what do these tears mean? Is l 1t possible that you have thrown away your heart upon so poor creature as l am?'
 Don't talk so of yourself. It is pos sible. It has been true, I can't say how long, and I thought"
 Russell groaned aloud.
 | ''If there were any possible atone ment, but what can do? I could prom. | ise a hundred reformations. I could picture dozen ways of life in every one of which I should certainly fail"
 My father does not think so of you. ] What have you done to make you sc hopeless of yourself?"
 "For two years have led life wholly artificial, which, as look back NM