Alaska sentinel., 1905-05-18


 at last, and then you sit and twist your mustache and make me guess all the wrong people, and"
 "1 never made you guess anyone" l said. indignantly, removing my hand from my upper lip with a jerk. "I merely informed you that I fell in love yesterday. I suppose there's no objection to that? And when you suggested that it happened at Lady Toilets, I agreed
 We'll" said Eva, in judicial tone, you didn't stay more than three-quar- ters of an hour. Directly you arrived you took me to see the aviary, and the rest of the time you spent in the ros- ary with Molle Richards"
 If I'd known you were watching my movements so carefully" 1 be- gan.
 Elva blushed furlously.
 When people make themselves con- spicuous," she said. frostily, their do- ings are bound to form the subject of comment Mollie Richards always per ssts in wearing maize with her par ticular shade of red-auburn hair, and T could see her from all over the garden"
 Almost without looklng?" suggest ed, carelessly.
 Elva passed over this remark with contempt, but I couldn't help noticing that the flush deepened.
 Well. as its not Mollie," she ob- served, with dignity, and as you've called on purpose, perhaps you'll be obliging enough to tell me who 1t is, so that l may congratulate or condone with you, as the case may be-"
 You'll condone," said I, with con. vIction.
 'Why, please:"
 Because she-thls girl, who isn't Mollle Richards. you know, doesn't care a straw for me-in that way, and the whole thing Is hopeless.'
 Elva softened instantly.
 How can you tell if you've never ahked herr" she demanded. She may be simply pining away for your sake, If you only knew'-her gaze wan dered through the window and settled on a bed of brilliant begonias in the front garden-"girls don't always wear their hearts on their sleeves, even in these matter-of fact days, Monty"
 raised my eyes. They had been busily engaged in tracing the pattern of the carpet.
 Don't you think it's likely" asked, that any girl would really fall in love with man twice her age, if"
 "Oh, she's young" interrupted Elva, hastily. Do you know, I'm rather glad of that"
 held up deprecatlng hand.
 Please let me finish" I implored. Twice her age, when she's tyrannized over him, leased him and looked upon him as an old fogy for the greater part of her natural llfe?"
 Elva eyed me sharply. The color came and went fin her cheeks in way that I had never seen 1t come and go before. I put my eyeglass in or der to better admire the effect
 You said you'd seen her only once or twice" she resumed, severely; but the culver in her voice robbed the se- verity~of any sting.
 waved my hand.
 lovers llcense"' I said, airily. "I couldn't dlvulge everything at once'
 If you've known her so long, how comes 1t that you only-well, discoy- cred the state of your feelings yester. dayg'
 "'There Is a tide in the affairs of men," I quoted. Likewise there is a psychological moment when a man suddenly realizes a fact that may have been staring him in the face for years"
 And that psychological moment ocurred at Lady Follets:"
 occurred at Lady Follet's," I echoed. And then there was a long sl- lence.
 1 let my eyes wander slowly round the room. They fingered vaguely on the ridiculous blue cats with which Eva adorns her mantel shelf, and skinned the photographs of her nu- merous admirers-some of them thrust carelessly into the overmantel and some, the more fortunate, smirking at me from elaborate frames.
 l think Elva's eyes must have been wandering, too, for they came to an- chor at the same moment as mine, and then, without any rhyme or reason, they filled quite suddenly with tears.
 Now, can never see a woman cry without feeling that something-some- thing drastic must be done at once.
 I started up, and then the rest seem- ed to follow as a natural and easy consequence.
 In less time than 1t takes to chron- icle, Elva was crying quietly on my shoulder, and the blue cats were grin ming diabollcally from their several coigns of vantage
 And when," I asked, after we had become more or less normal, and re-