The River Falls times. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1894-1933, 1896-03-09

now you can go. There is no occasion
for you to follow me over the house.
l prefer to look at it alone. By the
bye" she added, [ should advise the
owners of it to put it in other hands.
You evidently don't want to let It"
1t does not take long to look over a
slX-room cottage. In ten minutes the
man was out on the slope of garden
in the rear looking idly ahead of him
across the reach. He had seen in
flash through the staircase window
the rowan berries going up stairs. He
caught in flash now the rowan ber-
ries coming down.
Would she go straight out by the
hall door?' he asked himself, ''or come
into the GARDEN?
A rustic of the silk skirts coming
down the path toward him, a glimpse
of comely figure silhouetted momen-
tarily against the pendant ivy, was
the agreeable answer to this query.
CAS- we have both come very long
distances, and indisputably upon the
same quest" she began, lit is but fair,
indeed, the right and civil thing to do,
l think, to ask you if you have come
to any decision about the house? be-
lieve," here her eyebrows went up and
she showed a CLEAN of teeth, sin all
business matters man takes prece
dence."
But in matters of sentiment" he in
terrupted her, woman
'Sentiment?" she said. do you
think, then, even in her business trans
actions a woman is necessarily Senti-
mental!'
81 certainly do he answered.
She moved on down nearer the flag
ged edge of the reach, and stood look
ing away across it to the green mead
ows opposite, each detail of her charm
ing person duplicated in the water
with distracting accuracy.
''Ah, if you knew me better" she
said, you would find that / am most
prosaic creature. / threw aside senti-
ment ten years ago, when l threw
aside my youth. My head at this mo-
ment, if you could see the workings Of
it, is full of tie prosiest speculations
as to the drainage of the cottage, the
exact character of the soil on which
it stands, for | have q strong SuSpl-
ciOn that it is built upon clay; am
propounding, too, whether | like the
kitchen range. The scullery strikes
me as having been thought Of after
ward; and about the bath room fittings
/ am just wondering. 1t seems to me
they are inadequate, as compared with
the fiOwery suggestion Of sanitary per-
lection conveyed in the Daily Tele-
graph: and-well, the drawing and
dining rooms are certainly rather cir
cumscribed, aren't they?"
yet. at the same time, you are
agreeably pleased on the whole!" he
suggested.
ION the principle that nothing, even
in six-room cottages on the banks Of
the Thames, can entirely reach the
fullness of our expectations, yes
He smiled and spread his hands.
"In that respect the best of us are
but as little children, ever searching
after what is absolutely impossible in
this world-perfection," he answered.
''Yes-why is it? We should not like
it if we could get it, either. Yet we
search search search, and waste our
| whole lives"
She turned her arch glance toward
him and waited.
ut is our disease. Perhaps it is put
there purposely, and here comes the
irony of tiff everything were perfec-
ton We shouldn't know it,
mo. we should want cOunteracting
foils. like milestoneS, to show us it is
perfection" Her eyes travelled up the
green slope toward the house and she
added, reverting to it, But you-you
also like this by no means faultless
bijou residence. Yes, l can see by
your face-your face assures me that
YOU have seen something to-day that
pleases you
He dropped his hazel eyes upon her
and leaned on his cane.
yes" he said slowly; II have GER
tainly seen something that pleases me
to-day. But" he added, quickly, Il
am willing to waive priority, if / have
it, which l doubt, in your favor and
back out of all competition with re-
gard to the bijou residence. After all,
what does it signify? | am bachelor,
anything will do me-"
and l am a spinSter," she said, with
smile. why should not anything do
for me!
For all their never 'avin' met till
this ERE morning, they seem to be
nightly friendly" observed the care
taker. watching their departure down
the shady road together later. 1T
seems to me to be more a question of
taking each other than taking the
house They amt said nothing about
the house one way or fOther, but they
have said a good deal about each other
Judging by their eyes"
The woman picked more wild flowers
as she went back, the man assisting
her. Midway down the dusty lane
they rested on fallen oak, the victim
of a recent cyclone, and told each other
their biographies. AT the inn, close to
the railway, they lunched together in
the inn parlor criticising the proprie-
tors ideas of art afterward, task of