The Chanute times. [volume] (Chanute, Kan.) 1897-1913, 1910-10-14
81 Mean 1t, ! Mean It," He Assured Her.

before she dared uncover the jewel
But he wouldn't move. In spite of all
she had done, he wouldn't
Across the room that very after
noon she caught the twinkle of his re-
sisting smile. He had had her letter
then for two days, and still he had
come here, though he'd been hidden
to stay away; though he had been
warned to keep away from all places
where she, or these people around
her, might find him; though he had
been implored to go, finally, as far
away as the round surface OF the
world would let him.
BY what he had heard and seen in
the red room that night, he must
know her warning had not been ride
ulous. And there was another threat
less apparent ON the surface of things,
but evident enough to her. 1t was the
change in Clara after she had begun
her attack on the Buffers, her appear
ance of being busy with something,
absorbed with, intent upon, something
which, if she had not secured it yet
at least she had well in reach. And
that thing-suppose it had to do with
the Crew Idol; and suppose Clara
should play into Harrys hands!
For Kerr's escape Flora had been
holding the ring, fighting off events,
and yet all the while she had not
wanted TO lose the sight of him. Well
now. when she had made up her mind
finally to resign herself to the dreari-
ness of that, might he not at least
have done his part of it and decently
disappeared? So much he might have
done for her.
He was playing her own trick on
her, but her chances for getting at
him again were fewer than his had
been with her. She could not besiege
him in his abode; and in the places
where they met, large houses crowded
with people, the eye of the world was
upon her. For how long had she for
gotten it-she who had been all her
life so deferential toward it! Even
now she remembered it only because
it interfered with what she wanted
to do.
For the eye of her small society
WAS very keenly upon Kerr. She re-
allied, all at once, that he had be-
come a parsonage; and then, by
smiles. by lifted eyebrows, by glances,
she gathered that her name was be-
ing linked with his. She was aston
ished. How could their luncheon to-
gether at the Purdies'. their words
that night in the opera box, their few
minutes talk in the shop, have crys-
tallized into this gossip? 1t vexed her
alarmed her, how it had got about
when she had seen him so seldom,
had known him scarcely more than
a week. 1t was simply in the air. 1t
was in her attitude and in his, but
how far it had gone she did not
dream, until in the,dense crowd Of some
ones at-home she caught the words
of a young girl. The voice was so
sweet and so prettily modulated that
at its first notes Flora turned invol-
UNFAIRLY to glimpse the speaker,
slender. creature in a delicate mist OF
muslin, with an indeterminate chin
and the cheek of a pale peach.
Just think" Flora heard her say
ing, "he went to see her three times
in two days, but to-day, did you no
tice, he wouldn't look at her until she
went up and spoke to him. | don't
see how a girl can! Harry Cressy-"
She moved away and the words
we're lost. Flora looked after her. For
the moment she felt only scorn for
the creatures who had clapped that