Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1902-04-05
THAT GENTLEMANLY
PICEPOCKET. ~
BY R. NORMAN SILVER.
n DEAR, 1 can't find it anywhere,
and / had IL q moment arnIo

and had it moment ago!'
The fresh young lips of the speak
er had turned suddenly pale, and
pair of hazel eyes gained startled
glow that heightened their grave,
fawnlike pathos. Their owners
gloved fingers futtered from a muff-
bag to a parcel of wraps, from that
to the pockets of her small, smart
coat and neat cloth skirt, then back
again to the silken interior of the
muffbag.
The collector on the step of the
second-class compartment of the
English train, as if to avoid adding
to her embarrassed confusion, leant
out casually to glance up and down
the line of vestibuled coaches that
composed the American special. The
keen breath of a frost-bound morn
ing sharpened the air under the
great arch of the express departure
platform at Euston, and to it's glass
span there assembled from $50
threats, a dozen transatlantic &C
cents.
Elise Haughton paused upright by
her seat, one hand to square white
temple, rejecting distressfully. The
collector regained his expectant po-
sition with a jerk, and regarded her
alphabetically.
Il seem to have lost both my purse
and my ticket faltered Elise, her
cultivated English utterance con-
trasting oddly with the piercing in
Elections about her; cant I send on
the-the money? 1 must go by this
train, I have to meet friends who
are seeing me to New York.
A quiet voice anticipated the really
of the hesitating official-a voice
firm and masculine, yet with the
characteristic information of the true
Yankee, the American from the
northeastern states.
Permit me-" it said, 'to offer a
practical suggestion-two practical
suggestions"
Elise looked round, eagerly. 1t was
her opposite neighbor who had in
tervened, a tall, gaunt, brown
skinned parsonage wearing a long
dark overcoat of typically transat-
lantic cut. He had extended palm,
smooth and delicate as a duchess.
In its broad hollow there lay SOW
ereign and shilling.
The girl surveyed him with a swift,
cold pride of the well-bred English
woman. 1t collapsed before the
thunder of banging doors and the
shouts of porters-the train was al
most under way.
"a trifiing loan," pursued her res
cuer, nonchalantly. Il sail by the
Superbia, as presumably you do
you will repay me on rejoining your
friends. Say, look lively nOw,'' he
added to the collector.
That official, not being forbidden,
accepted the coins and began to
scribble a receipt-the whistle had
blown and the crowded special was
starting. At the extremity of the
platform he shut the door and passed
in the himsy sheet by the window,
fumbling for the change.
80, keep the changed" said the
American, impatiently, and drew up
the pane as the train ran out of the
station.
Toward the incident thus conclud-
ed their fellow travellers had as
sumed peculiarly diverse degrees of
interest. One of the two, for there
were no more than a quartette in
the comfortable compartment-an
alert, middle-class matron with Eu-
ropean railway labels on sundry ar
ticles of Typographical merciless-
ly it's shy heroine. The other, a
stout, prosperous figure in an ample
ulster, dozed indifferently-h hands
thrust into fur-lined gloves, repos-
ing on his knee. Elise noticed that
he wore a thick gold albert and a
fine Diamond pin.
AS the train settled to its mo-
notonous clank and roar she bent
forward to the American-he was
young, well-featured enough to be
handsome, and extremely self-pos-
sessed.
81 am much obliged to you," she
said-the rattle of the coach wheels
making the remark sound subdued and
confidential; 81 can't think what has
happened to my purse"
ssDon't mention it," desired her
vis-a-vis; my privilege, 1 assure you. -
He got out pigskin wallet. and gave
her a card; it bore the inscription:
civilian w. Leland" my NAME" he
told her, explanatory; May not learn
yours, and then we can consider our
selves formally introduced-by cir
cumstances."
Elise flushed. His tone took too
much for granted. She had been driven
to accept his aid, but it did not follow
that he was necessarily suitable ac-
quaintance. With a stiff little bow
she felt for her own card case, deliv-
cred him a glossy pasteboard. put
away his, and, murmuring a further
- l. L
scat and opened a copy of the Gentle
woman,