The Newark star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1909, 1909-08-03
ESTHER AND LUCIA CHAMBERLAIN

had dimE felt her world to be a crea-
ture of a keen, a fairly cruel humor, for
all things that did not pertain to the
essence of life it struggled for. The
wonder of the western flare of day, the
magic in the white eyes of the stars be-
fore sunrise. the mystery in the pulse
OF the pounding mine heard in the dark
of such it had been as ruthless as this
new world that looked as narrowly forth
at as starved a prospect with even
keener ridicule. Instinctively she had
turned to both the hard, bright face
they required. 1t seemed that in the
world at large this fecIlty of hers was
queer. And to be queer, to have any,
thing that other people had not, except
money, was to be open to suspicion.
And yet from the first she had had TO
be queer.
Fatherless, motherless, alone upon the
pinnacle of her fortune, she had known
that such an extraordinary entrance.
even at this rather wide social portal,
would only be acceptable If toned down,
CLOSED over and drawn out by a per-
sonality sufficiently neutral, sufficiently
potent and sufficiently In need of what
she had to give. The successive fickers
of the gas-lamps through the carriage
window made of Clara's profile so hard
and fine a little medallion that it was
impossible to conceive it in need of any
thing. And yet it vas just their mu-
tual need that had drawn these two
women together, and after three years
1t was still the only thing that held
them. AS much of a fight as she had
put up with the Pest-the people who had
taken her in-she had put up the hard
est with Clara. Yet of them all Clara
was the only one she had failed to cap
ture. Clara was always there in the
middle of her affairs. but surveying
them from a distance, and Flora's
struggle with her had resolved itself
INTO the attempt to keep her from see
ing too much, from seeing more than
she herself saw. Clara's seeing. thus
Tar, had always been to help, but Flora
sometimes wondered whether in an
emergency this help could be depended
on-whether Clara could give anything
without exacting a price.
Their dubious intimacy had created
for Flora a special sort of loneliness
loneliness which lacked the security Of
solitude; n 1t was partly as an escape
I'm 'il5 thdl she mar dCC6pLeu 6dTTy
Cressy. BY herself she could never
have escaped. The initiative was not
hers. But he had presented himself. he
had insisted, had overruled her objec-
lions, had captured her before she knew
whether she wanted it or not-and held
her now, fascinated by his very sue
cess in capturing her, and by his beau
tiful ruddy masculinity. She did not
ask herself whether women ever mar
ried for greater reasons than these.
She only wondered sometimes If he did
not stand out more brilliantly against
Clara and the others than he intrin-
sically was. But these moments when
she was obliged to defend him to her
self were always when he was not with
her. Even in the dusky carriage she
had been as aware of the splendor OF
his attraction as o when they had
stopped between the high lamps Of the
club entrance, and she saw clearly the
broad lines Of his shoulders and the
'sfro~ ~ his ~~c,sa-e~s~t - ~