Savannah courier. (Savannah, Tenn.) 1885-1979, 1901-11-15
The Serpent
IN Eden ~ Xx
BY GwENpoLEN ovERToN

ny 1WENpoLEN ovERToN
n GREAT deal of unhappiness would
n be spared us in this world IL the
pagan In us would stop cropping up in
our tendency to consider ourselves as
picked out individually as marks for
The shafts of the gods-if we would but
ADAPT ourselves to broader modern.
view OF life. II for instance, Miss Bab-
pihgton had been willing to consider
ferrier's case impersonally, in the light
oi the triumph of environment over
heredity, both she and Ferrier would
probably have been very much better
oH-or even had she realized that it
was primarily her own fault, In any
event.
She would have married him and
have gone west with him when he
wanted her to go. He urged as much.
rate and physicians conspired together
10 send him to the jumping-off place;
'hs least she could do would be to 60
along, he said. But Miss Darlington
was cast in the same mold as that
queen who ended upon the guillotine
because she would not fly from France
without her necessaire. She urged the
essentially Of trousseau. Ferrier
said things about clothes in general
That only the fact that he was i'll and
not himself could have excused-things
that no woman might hear unmoved.
A final quarrel threatened, but it end
ed in compromise.
Ferrier would go to the Pacific coast,
as he had been bid, and, the trousseau
being completed, Miss Babbington
should take along her mother and it,
and marry him there. 1t would be
somewhat unconventional, but Cali
fornia itself was that, so no one would
have reason to be shocked. Moreover,
the prospect of separation from Fer
rier for year or so was thing Miss
Babibngton did not like to contem-
plate. She cared for him a good dea,
more than her insistence upon the
trousseau would lead one not versed in
the workings of the feminine mind to
believe.
She came into the garden and found
Ferrier sitting there. 1t was carna-
tion garden, just sheltered and inland
enough to get none of the freshening
braeza from tba cao TIE N; - ,ro . ,., -,
and languid and thick with scent--the
scent of carnations that spread for
acres upon acres away; of the hello
trope that hung mass of purple redo
lence above bis head; of the honeysuck-
lie that loaded the roof of the green
house near by; of an orange grove in
blossom to windward somewhere.
There were humming-birds hanging a
the fower-cups, bluebirds and black
birds drifting about. Ferrier watched
them with heavy eyes. The love-tale
he had brought with him lay neglected
upon his knee. He was recollectng po-
etry. He murmured drowsily, half
aloud, of "beds of amaranth and moly,"
of warm airs lulling, blowing slowly,
and half-dropped eyelids STILL"
And this was, in the nature of things,
the time for Eve to appear. She 9oated
into his line of vision by way of the
gravel path. She wore no garments of
leaves, but sky suggestion of cloud
white and faintest blue. She was hat
less, her parasol hung low over her
shoulder, and her brown hair cleaned
in the SUM-,
Ferrier watched her coming toward
him between two rows of La France
rose-bushes in full bloom. He was
sure that she would stop there
where she was and sit beside him
upon the bench. Which was exactly
what she did; but, lest anyone
should suppose that she was not a
thoroughly nice girl in every way, be
it said-it was not by any means the
first time she and Ferrier had met.
They had spent mornings together
upon the beach, and afternoons upon
the verandas of the hotel, and their in
timacy was just one degree short of
where Ferrier thought it necessary to
make her acquainted with any of his
purely personal affairs.
"Shall l tell you"-said Eve, and her
voice, like the voices of the poem, was
thin and far away-"shall tell you
what you were thinking about? You
were thinking that all the ties of the
past are as frail as cobweb strands, are
nothing stronger now than thread of
mist--like that up there" She raised
her eyes to one faint line of cloud that
lay upon the sky.
"Yes," said Ferrier, drowsily, as one
who is under a spell, "but how does it
happen that you know?
For answer she turned her eyes to
him. After which that happened
which happened in Heaven once; there
was silence for the space of half an
hour, or rather less, perhaps.
A blackbird, FURNISHED and glowing
till its wings and breast flashed prism
hues again, lighted among the pink
branches of the oleander-tree, and
preened its wings and considered them,
A mocking-bird sang from far away in
the heart Of the orange grove. Then
Ferrier spoke at last. "Why should il
matter to either of us" he said, "that
there has been yesterday"
Her hand was lying upon the bench
His own closed gently over it, and she
did not draw away. He drew her closer
TO him, SO close that it lay, at length
against his shoulder, the head with the
plinting brown hair. He looked at the
lips. They were warmly red, and it is
with lips even as with wine, there il
danger in looking upon them when they
are red.
There was a cheerful human whistle
af al, l.,