Mexico Missouri message., 1910-11-24

thin but rosy lips, and a hard look in
her blue eyes. But the young men in
the case could hardly have been ex-
pected to see this. There were two
OF them-and a number more, but
Gene Turner and Ebe Fisher we're
ahead-or 1t looked that way. Also
1t looked as If Gene was having the
best of 1t, IL by best is meant the
lady's favor 1t was odd, too, accord
ing to the ideas of the other girls at
the Cosmopolitan department store.
They would have thought Suzanne
born Susan Jane-would require
some sort of real style in fellah!"
Gene was not stylish, but he was
young, and straight, and wore his
working clothes with a jaunty grace.
He even carried dinner bucket, as If
that were a matter to be graced In
the doing. And he earned thrice, at
carpentering, what Ebe Fisher did
behind dry goods counter. Ebe had
style. He was a good dancer and
dresser, a matter which must have
absorbed most Of his salary, had the
girls stopped to think about 1t.
Suzanne, whose final name was
Ryan, had somehow escaped the
warm-heartedness of her race, which
was pity. But she was a good
clerks, with an undesirable pert pref
tines, a wealth of reddish hair, a
milky skin and large, moist, bright
eyes. And she herself had all sorts
of style. She was the best dancer in
the store. She lived with an old aunt
to whom she gave three dollars out
of her weekly seven dollars, and to
whom she paid scant attention. The
front room" was, she made 1t under
stood, for her own especial use, and
she tricked 1t out with some cheap
tides and albums, a lot of photographs
of everybody who would give her one,
and bright rug and settee bought
on the installment plan. For the rest,
she owed it to herself to dress like
a lady.
Her immense self-confdence gave
her certain charm to the circle in
which she moved-she was gay,
saucy, independent, with that little
touch of feline cruelty which men
laugh at and love in a pretty girl,
not realizing its real significance
unless they marry her!
All winter she had danced and
fiirted and-worked. Ebe, as the most
desirable man in her train, she had
taken pleasure in playing with. She
liked to make herself envied by the
other girls who counted Ebe Fisher
sort of prize, but snubbing him In
favor of Gene, who was nonchalant
and independent as herself. 1t was
this recklessness of consequences
which made the store figuratively
hold its breath. They began, the girl
clerks, and the men, too, to bet on
which would be the lucky man.
Even Gene had become really in
terested in the game. He liked to
see how, carelessly enough, he could
get two dances to Ebe's one, two
walks to his one, the privilege of tax
ing her out to the theater or a park
oftener than Fisher could. At first
he had been not at all in earnest,
simply amusing himself. He made
love to no girl, for he had an old
mother to support who was the apple
of his eye, and he was paying for a
little lot and cottage.
And Suzanne? She had merely used
him for foil; there had been only
Irritation, less clumsy than his, but
certainly, even then, none too subtle.
She would not, at first, have dreamed
of marrying him, but somehow he
was not a man to pick up and drop.
He left his mark, the mark of per-
sonality which is hard to erase. And
his independence matched her own.
Late in the spring Gene took to
running over in the evening, once a
week or so, and sitting in the front
room with the girl and chatting her.
Finally he made himself welcome in
the little kitchen, which old Mollie,
the aunt, kept shining and comfort
able and which, with its old furni.
ture, handmade by her dead hus-
band, and her old blue dishes, was
far prettier and more characteris-
tic than all Suzanne's cheap frippery.
1t irked the girl that the handsome,
laughing young fellow should spend
good hour of his call sitting with
the old woman, making her chuckle at
his jokes, mending thing for her,
doing bit of hammering or saving
and always in jolly companionable
way
Once the girl joked-rather serious
ly--at him ON the subject. "A body'd
think you were dead stuck on Aunt
Mollie," she said.
II am" he retorted. She's almost
half as nice as mother-I'm used to
old ladies an like them. Come out
home with me some night and visit
mother. She's bit lonely, and try
to stay home with her good deal"
The girl tossed her head. she had
no mind to fuss with the old lady.
But, secretly, she did want to see his
house. She had in the back of her
bead notion that a strong, indie