The record-union., 1899-08-27
HIS WIDOWS.

luSy we're hHOWu u DG IT'LL cSilo sup
posed to be eccentric. It is we'll to
have that reputation in neighborhoods
like that Of D. implying complete
liberty of action, combined with per-
feet social consideration. The toilet
| and domestic appointments of Miss
Varney and Miss Leven left nothing for
a censorious world to desire, while their
actions were sufficiently unconventional
to inspire interest and amusement.
| They We're, of course, open to the i'm
putation of being unmarried women of
| a certain age, but there was not the
! slightest hint of anything old fash
| ioned or old maidish in their appear
ance or their surroundings. There were
no tatted or crochet chair covers, no
! painted handscreens, no stamp snakes
| in their drawing room; their clothes
were exquisitely fashionable, and came
down from London, and perhaps Paris
| But the material of these clothes was
invariably black, and they both wore
what looked very like widows caps OF
the same identical pattern. There their
eccentricity came in.
Once a fortnight they paid g. visit
! bearing two similar punches of white
| flowers, to a cemetery on the other
! side of the town of D; but no one
! ever discovered whose grave it was
| that they took an interest in, though
some curious otherwise unoccupied per-
sons had thought it worth while to
play hide and seek with the two women
among the tombs-without success, so
cleverly did the mourners dodge them.
They had not many friends in the
! town N
care to make any; but after while a.
young girl, called Lucy Gray, who had
but recently left school, succeeded in
ingratiating herself where more i'm
portant people had failed. She was
sweet and simple, yet shrewd, and soon
she knew more of the inner life of Miss
Varney and Miss Leven than any one.
She thought them romantic, and said
so openly, and the women did not in
| her case diSdain the tribute Of this
subtle and seductive form of fiattery.
| She used 90 find it delightful to go
| and sit with them in the long winter
evenings over the fire. and to confide
her little doings and little troubles to
their sympathetic ears. She sat on a
low stool exactly between the two, and
talked, and turned her eager face first
| to one and then to the other without
any particular discrimination; for,
though they differed from each other
as much as two unrelated human
beings are likely to do, they seemed,
by skilful modification and adaptation
of habits and idiosyncrasies, to have
made themselves one. To Lucy, in
| point of sympathy, they were as parts
of the same person.
But they differed a good deal in ap-
| pearance. Miss Varney was dark and
eager looking, and a little imperious in
manner She laughed more than Miss
Leven and betrayed a fuller, at times
more cynical, humOr. She read all the
| modern maga zines, and kept herself up
to date. Miss Leven was softer, per-
haps sillier, certainly more sentimental.
| She was a little inclined to be stout,
her complexion was still wonderful; she
took life more easily than Miss Varney
had taken it, for surely during these
last ten years that they had lived in
D. life had stood still for both OF
them.
The life of little Lucy Gray was but
just beginning, in a mild, idyllic way.
She told the women all her innocent
affairs, and they gave her the prompt
est interest and sympathy; but she
came to notice, when she looked up into
the face of either, that their gaze was
| seldom, if ever, bent on her who was
confiding in them. No. their eyes were
generally raised, and fixed, severally,
| on two large framed cabinet photo
| graphs hanging over the bellpull on
either side of the chimneypiece.
There was nothing very odd in this,
except that the-two photographs were
in every respect Identical.
1t was the likeness of man in full
Observation-Disclosures, logged look
ing, with heavy, self-sufficient jaws,
and gentle eyes and an elusive :noath.
Under the print was written, in bold,
decided handwriting, the name Robert
F. Musgrave, and a date, 1860.
Later on, when she came to know
the women better, Lucy Gray was
taken into their bedrooms, and shown
things-Afghan trophies, Indian worries
! Burmese shawls, two of each invari
ably, but what interested the girl most
| was that, though there were two sep
arate rooms the same likeness, en-
larged and colored in this instance,
hung over the bed of each. Lucy Gray
was loving and curious. She put the
story Of her two friends-one story,
two womenl-together as well as she
could, and gloated on it. She realized
that these two women had loved the
same man, and that this was his like
ness. They had lost him, how she
could not guess; but, at any rate, he
was not here, nor had been these ten
years. They mourned him, therefore
but what she could not understand was
that they should mourn him in such
strict concert. 1t seemed to form the
very bond of union between them; now
| according to her simple theories, it
should rather have forced them apart!
/ Was it possible for two human be-
ings so to compound with jealousy
jealousy that is even stronger than
| love?
What grown UP curiosity could never
have achieved, her sweet childish
sentimental sympathy was able to
draw from them She sat one evening
in her accustomed place between the
! two; she had had a little love ad-
| venture of her own that day which she
hoped fondly meant something, and She
had been telling these two kind women
about her innocent hopes and her fears
| Solicitude for her own happiness and
the emotion of confidence had brought
the easy tears to her eyes. She be-
came, unconsciously, silent awhile, and
her brown, liquid, suffused glance was
fixed she knew not why, on the por-
trait of Robert Musgrave. Miss Varney
0ol