The Minneapolis journal., 1906-07-11
CHAPTER x
The Accident Upon the Road. =.

The Accident upon the hoad.
Was Eta Romney dead or would
the months re-create her9
Evelyn believed that they would.
The intolerable ennui of her life at
Melbourne festered the atmosphere in
which such dreams as hers were born
and reared She had that in her blood
which no make-believe could prison.
Had the whole truth been told, it
would have set her down for a gypsy
Of gypsies-a true child OF the road
side and the caves. But the truth was
Just the one thing her father hid from
her: 49,,
~ met your mother at Vienna,' he
ha told her once when an illness had
moved him to that affectionate conf
dence which weakness is apt to pro-
woke. "She was Dora d'Istran, the
most beautiful woman in the city and
one most run after. You are like her
sometimes, Evelyn; you have her; eyes
and hair, and Just such manner. She
understood me as no one else in the
world has ever, done, not even my
little daughter. I married her in the
face Of my family and never regretted
the day. She died when you were
that hour which took her from me
every day of my ife.'s -.
Here was no weak confession. Thru
ont his life this man had been seek
ing a good woman's love. Knowing
in his heart that he had done things un-
worthy of it, he sought it yet more ar
IDENTIFY for that very reason. One
woman, his wife, had understood him
and given him Of her whole soul gener-
once more. In vain he, a miser to
others, lavished generous gifts upon
Evelyn, his child. "She would love
me if she could, y he told himself, "but
there is a chord in her nature I can
not strike.' A keen observer of in
tpitive faculty would have said that
the man s nature, not the woman IS, in
Evelyn Forester forbade her to re-
spond to his affection.
X Of this Evelyn herself remained quite
unconscious. Fret as she might against
her fathers unjust and inexplicable
treatment of her, she would have re-
sented hotly the suggestion that she
had not a daughter g love for him. Her
very obedience. she thought, must be
made prisoner Of her, she rarely ut
tered complaint. His varying moods,
now Of doting affection, now Of irrita-
ton and temper, found her patient and
silent. When he, did a mean thing she
shuddered, but rarely spoke Of it, be-
cause she knew that words would not
help her. Her own life had been lived
rs
with all her heart that it had not been
80; but she could not Justly blame her
self for circumstances she was in no
way able to control
This had been her attitude before her
great escapade in London; it remained
her attitude upon her return to Derby.
shire. She met her father each morn
ing at the breakfast table; dined with
him in solemn state at night-occasion
s ally received visits from their neigh.
bors, and was sometimes the guest OF
the vicar of the parish, pleasant old
Cambridge don, by name Harry Fill
more. But in the main Evelyn lived
alone in the wild glades of the beauti
full park, down. by the silent pool OF
the just as she had lived and
dreamed in the old days of the longing
for the world. it's glamor and its glo
ries. And now she had great secre
to take to the green woods with her
Day by day, as some sylph of the thick
cts, the true Romany child reacted th'
triumph in London. Her hair wili
| about her shoulders, her eyes reflect
ing the dreams, she would crouch by tn