The Washington times., 1905-04-16
CHAPTER K.

What's a week. To the lazy man II
means merely a number of days with
a Sunday at each end 1t has come ana
gone before he has decided Whether ne
will write or telegraph to his tailor Ior
hive or gray clothes. But what's
week 20 decide such momentous ques-
tion as that2 To those who have en-
ergy-the stuff that makes the world
go round-many things may happen
in week: to those whose blood flows
like a mountain torrent after the melt
ing of the SHOWS, while that OF the
lazy man slushes along at the rate or
the Mississippi river after dry sea-
son: to those many things may happen
in the short space Of a week. Ana
what is more, they do not wait Ior
these things to happen to them. Ihey
oo ont TO meet them. They are not OF
the men in the woods who live on
ham day in and day out merely De
cause it is too much trouble TO get
out before sun-up for fresh meat
A week had passed since Madame
Won Bruenen had been commanded by
the prince to play the card she heio
in the game whose stakes were peace
and the honor of man. against the
overthrow Of an empire, and in that
week much had in the language OF the
fairy stories, come TO pass A week
in which. while the Maltese Cross had
apparently lain dormant, new plot
against Senator Langhorne had been
hatched, in which, by some odd chance,
the Senator had seen Madame Won
Bruenen at least once every day, and
had at last admitted TO hlmSef that
he was honestly in love with her In
spite of his elaboration, the Senator
was not the man to linger on the road
Besides he realized-how few men do
that he was getting older every day.
Consequently he had pressed his suit
in the numerous ways which come
readily to the courteous man of the
world. Is there a woman who would not
have been fiattered to have this man
at her feet? A man who led one of the
greatest countries in the world. Who
knows. perhaps. But though she felt
fiattered. and though she admired the
man immensely, Madame Won Bruenen
had rather have cut off her beautiful
hair or done some other thing equally
disfiguring than receive his attentions,
knowing as she did the part she must
play, and another thing: he talked well
and brilliantly; she listened well ard also
brilliantly, which is sometimes a more
difficult task Though there are COM
paratively few takers in the world
with apologies to the wonderland the
great ma ajority listen, there are not
many good listeners, for the simple
reason that men and women are too
much interested in the thinFs that con-
Germ themselves 10 pay attention TO the
interests of others. If a listener looks
interested, however, what moro can
anyone ask
Strangely enough Billy Hale did not
notice the Senator's suit for the hand
of his cid friend. If the truth be told
Hale was exceedingly interested in the
merry chase which a certain debutante
was leading him But if he were blind
not so Marjorie. Does she want all the
men," Marjorie had said TO herself wher
she had come upon the Senator and
Madame Won Bruenen seated in the dusk
of mad2me's drawing room.
OF all the capricious young womeI
Billy had ever known, and as he haC
known many girls, it is 10 be presumed
that he knew not few, Marjorie, III
decided, was the most changeable. In {
savage moment when she had tried hin
more than usual he said slangily to him
self: She has a chameleon beaten
mile" But this did not make him care
less. The morning after he returned
from his flying trip TO New York, wheI
his timely telegram had saved the peace
party ard Senator Langhorne. he fount
that Marjorie had apparently lost al
interest in the adventures she had beer
80 anxious to hear the night before