Palestine daily herald. [volume] (Palestine, Tex.) 1902-1949, 1906-10-08
While They
Waited IS
By Virginia Leila wentz
Copyright, 1906, by c. H. sutcliffe

from the station.
"Pshawr' he exclaimed irasGbly, and
then to the sleepy looking. contented
ticket agent, when does the neXI
train leave for New York;
1.-TWO hours" replied that individual
laconically.
Maverick Oliver wasn't a man to cry
over spilled milk. He sat himself
philosophically down in a shady recess
of the waiting room and extracted a
notebook. He would look over some
memoranda he had jotted down for his
solicited article for the Review and
then take stroll along the country
hedges. There seemed to be rather
attractive bit of woodland just beyond.
"How long must | wait for connoc-
tons for Rosecliff?"
Something in the woman's voice, half
contralto, half alto, made the man with
the notebook suddenly start. He'd
been so engrossedly coming his mem
oranda that he had scarcely noticed
the incoming train. with all its attend
ant hustle. Now, however, single
woman's voice made him start and
caused the Review article to be as far
from his thoughts as the military af-
fairs of nations B. G.
phe woman's back was turned to-
ward Oliver, but he knew it was Flea
nor. Who else in all the world had
that queenly carriage, that soft slope
of shoulder, that bewitching mass Of
coiled chestnut hair?
"For Rosecliff?" came the ticket
agents monotonous voice as he caress-
ed his wrinkled forehead with the
back of his hand. "A half hour
ma'am. Trains sixteen minutes late"
The woman turned impatiently away
frem the window.
1t was then they came face to face.
f'Your' cried Oliver, springing up.
She stood there in the barren waiting
room, filling its emptiness with the
richness of her charm. To the mans
hungry eyes she was food of the most
satisfying as well as of the most deli
cate sort
She did not hold out her hand. Never
: theleSs she encountered him not in her
old imperious fashion, but with smile
including him in some mood too large
to be wholly personal.
How you have changed, Eleanor
he cried involuntarily.
.''Are you, too, waiting for a train?"
Z she answered softly in return. I'm
which direction do you go?1
SFs1rF>to Kew 15lrks: said Oliver.
"And your
ITO Roseclihfe, fourteen miles east"
Oliver took her umbrella and tiny
suit case from her, and then they
walked slowly up and down the plat
form together, man and woman, in
stead of husband and wife, held apart
by some strange fat they had both ac-
cepted.
In the fields, all around, the butter
cups were golden and the wild carrot
was in white, lacelike flower. Over
In the woods beyond some song birds.
waking from their summer siesta, were
beginning to MARBLE. 4 group of tray
cling men was lounging on the railing
at the far end Of the platform, eX-
pectorating copiously to punctuate the
points in their stories.
Oliver busted the platform steps at
the other end of the walk with his
handkerchief, and the woman sat Sc
renely down, her delicate profile out
lined against the clear blue of the sky
/, ,I
always been beautiful. though. 1t
wasn't that which made the man ex-
claim again irrepressibly:
you've changed so, Eleanorr 1t was
true. 1t was no mere fancy of his
imaginative writer's eye that discov-
cred new meanings in the face before
him. 1t had undergone n vague but
very gracious Transformation.
Changed" repeated she. with
curious tenderness. 1--WE tried to
change-tried. do you understand?
Since last winter. when we agreed TO
separate, I've been trying-so hard,
Maverick-to take control of my own
stunted nature, turn it where II
twists
Dear" broke in Oliver. with a bit
ter humility, I'VE were both TO blame
BOTH do you hear? And I'm afraid
you've been cleverer than / If you've
unsnarled things where they failed to
fit the pattern. I've not changed much.
I'm afraid"
Under her black lashes the woman
smiled at him with reverence he
might have translated chad he been
high plumed) as some loyal acquies-
ceDce in his former state. What Oil
yer felt now, however, was curiosity in
his young WIFE not in himself So
"Iell me-" he burst forth. what has
changed you sof'
She rolled up her absurd little hand
kerchief into a string and, throwing it
over her knee, pulled il unconsciOusly
by both ends, gazing steadfastly into
the blue distance above divers head.
Il don't know whether | ought to
tell you" she began.
Oliver recalled that delicious little
habit she used TO have Of tempting the
fates shyly, of hesitating when she
meant to be right down outrageous.
"0f course you ought" he urged
"You always do in the end, you know,
and il will save time" Under her