The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1899-12-21

and tell yon 80. You are my only pos
sible means Of reaching Esther Thorn
dixie. and you must help me. You must.
That's all there is to it. =
Stanton took pains to have definite
statements appear, in the two Journals
which all Americans read, that he had
left Paris for Spain and Italy, whence
he should sail for America late in No
vember, without returning to the cap
ital.
IF we meet again it will be your own
fault now, and you will have to listen
to me. See?'' he observed; but the
weeks slipped away without such an
incident, and he found himself in Ma
pies upon the eve of sailing home.
Home? l
How he had longed for that time to
come!
Now it suddenly appeared to him that
he had no home.
The stately, old-fashioned mansion
that he loved would be well aired and
warmed to receive him on the 9th of
December. for he had already sent the
order, to Sam and his wife, But was
that all there was of home?
The good old couple would welcome
him blackjack to sleep and bath and
breakfast. But even that would in
crease their cares, and necessitate more
servants in the house to annoy them.
1t could not prove any real pleausre to
them. -s.'.
"What is there, after all, in this going
home that I've been longing for?" he
asked himself, and the loneliness in
him answered: Nothing"
He was sitting at one of the little
tables, smoking, in that wondrously
picturesque garden stretching between
the broad and beautiful Chiaja and the
Incompatible Bay Of Naples. s-
San Martina looked down from the
hill behind; Capri lay bright dot on
the blue water, and flashed, as the sun
went down, like a diamond set in a
mirror of ruby and sapphire. The black
murderer Of Pompeii and Herculaneum
drew a royal Tyrian mantle about his
rugged sides and shrank away in the
deepening gloom till only his grim.
lava shadow stood in the cleaning
against the sky, under the eternal pill
lar of smoke, and down the long garden
10000 lamps flashed out, enhancing its
marvellous beauty.
Even the walters seemed happy as
they dispensed the delicious creams
and fragrant coffee to those sitting at
the tables. From the grand pavilion
one of the finest of Italian orchestras
rendered such music as might almost
have thrilled the frozen souls of the
marble gods and goddesses.
In the extravaganza of dreams Rob-
ert Stanton dreamed, not of the home
that would be, but of the home that
might be. He dreamed of Esther
Thorndike there, his wife-his real
wife.
Suddenly the bankers daughter
usurped the place, and the home
changed to his Office. He heard her
voice. He saw her eyes.
She is here" he muttered, and, turn
ing as though some one had spoken, he
looked, as he knew that he should look,
directly into her eyes. And yet it
caught his breath, and for a moment
he could not move.
Her father was beside her. at one OF
the little tables. He was listening to
the music.
She seemed unconscious, almost as
though asleep and dreaming, dream
ing some delightful dream from which
it would be cruelty to rouse her.
For a moment Stanton's very life
seemed to stand still-as a boat at the
vortex of the Norwegian pool stops
for an instant, shudders, draws back
handbreadth, then plunges and is en-
quilted. And the whirling pool was
those flashing eyes.
1t would have been easy to make the
plunge. It required superhuman
struggle to drag himself back from the
spell.
This is not asking her to help me o.
win my wife," he muttered Grinding