Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1912-11-28
CHAPTER III.
The Holy Yhiordes.

ne foIy rnioroes.
George drank his burgundy perfume
torily. Had it been astringent as the
native wine of Corsica, he would not
have noticed it. The little nerves
that ran from his tongue to his brain
had temporarily lost the power of COM
munication. And all because of the
girl across the way. He couldn't keep
his eyes from wandering in her d.
rection. She faced him diagonally.
She ate but little, and when the elder
ly gentleman poured out for her a
glass of sauterne, she motioned IL
aside, rested her chin upon her fold
ed hands, and stared not at but
through her vis-a-vis.
1t was lovely head, topped with
coils Of lustrous, light brown hair;
an oval face, of white and rose and
ivory tones; scarlet lips, small, reg
ular nose, and chin the soft round
ness Of which hid the resolute lift to
1t. To these attributes of loneliness
was added a perfect form, the long,
flowing curves of youth, not the abrupt
contours of maturity. George couldn't
recollect when he had been so Inn
pressed by face. From the moment
she had stepped down from the car.
riage, his interest had been drawn,
and had grown to such dimensions
that when he entered the dining-room
his glance Immediately searched for
her table. What luck in finding her
across the way! He questioned IL he
had ever seen her before. There was
something familiar; the delicate pro-
file stirred some sleeping memory but
did not wake 1t.
How to meet her, and when he did
meet her, how to interest her? II she
would only drop her handkerchief, her
purse. something to give him an ex-
cuse, an opening. All, he was certain
that this time the hydra-headed one
should not overcome him. To gain
her attention and to hold 1t, he would
have faced lion, tiger, a wildele-
plant. To diagnose these symptoms
might not be fair to George. Love
at first sight" reads well and sounds
well. but we hoary-headed philoso-
pliers know that the phrase is only
poetical license.
Once, and only once, she looked in
his direction. It swept over him with
the chill Of winter wind that he
meant as much to her as tree, a
fence, meadow, as seen from the
window OF speeding railway train.
But this observation, transient as 1t
was, left with him the indelible i'm
preston that her eyes were the sad
dest he had ever seen. Why? Why
should young and beautiful girl have
eyes like that? 1t could not mean
physical WEAKNESS, else the face
would in some way have expressed it..
The elderly man appeared to do his
best to animate her; he was kindly
and courteous and by the gentle way
he laughed at intervals was trying to
bolster up the situation with Jest or
two. The girl never so much as smiled,
or shrugged her shoulders; she was as
responsive to these overtures as mar
BILE would have been.
Georges romance gathered itself for
a fight. Perhaps 1t was love thwart-
ed and the gentleman with the mus
tache and imperial, in spite of his ami
ability, might be the ogre. Perhaps
1t was love and duty. Perhaps her
lover had gone down to sea. Perhaps
(for lovers are known TO do such
things) he had run away with the
other girl. II that was the case,
George did not think highly of that
tentative gentleman'st taste. Perhaps
and perhaps again; but George might
have gone on perhapsing till the
crack o. doom, with never a solitary
glimmer of the true state of the girls
mind. Whenever he saw an unknown
man or woman who attracted his at
tention, he never could resist the Inn
pulse to invent romance that might
apply.
Immediately after dessert the two
rose: and George. finding that nothing
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