Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1913-01-09


drunken imbecile." If a portrait of
him existed, Fortune had not yet seen
ii. She visited his lonely grave once
year, in the Protestant cemetery,
and dreamily tried to conjure up what
manner of man he had been. One day
she piled her old Italian nurse with
questions.
Handsome? Yes, but it was all so
long ago, cara mia, that l can not
describe him to you"
did he drink" Behind this ques-
ton there was no sense of moral
obloquy as applying to the dead.
"Sainted Mary! didn't all men drink
their very souls into purgatory those
unreligious days?"
Had he any relatives?"
81 never heard of any"
! ''Was he rich?"
mo; but when the signora, your
mother, married him she thought he
was"
1t was not till later years that For
tune grasped the true significance of
this statement. 1t illumined many
pages. She dropped all Investigations,
concluding wisely that her mother, If
she were minded to speak at all, could
supply only the incidents, the details.
1t was warm, balmy, like May in the
northern ATTITUDES. Women wore
white dresses and carried sunshades
over their shoulders. A good band
played airs from the new light-operas,
Of cid ~ he e nd
were tea-tables under dazzling linen.
Fashion was out. Not all her votaries
enjoyed polo, but it was absolutely
necessary to pretend that they did.
When they talked they discussed the
Spanish dancer who paraded back
and forth across the tea-lawn. They
discussed her jewels, her clothes, her
escort, and quite frankly her morals,
which of the four was by all odds the
most popular theme. All agreed that
she was handsome in bold way. This
modification invariably distinguishes
+he right sort of women from the
lrong sort, from which there is no ap-
eal to a higher court. They could
)ell afford to admit of her beauty,
nee the dancer was outside what is
elled the social pale, for all that her
ewest escort was a prince incognito.
hey also discussed the play at bridge,
the dullness of this particular season,
the possibility of war between Eng
land and Germany. And some one
asked others who were the two WELL
igowned women down in front, sitting
on either side of the young chap in
Ipearl-grey. No one knew. Mother and
daughter, probably. Anyhow, they
knew something about good clothes.
lCertainly they. weren't ordinary tour
lists. They had seen What's-his-name
tip his hat; and this simple act would
pass any one into the inner shrine,
for the general was not promiscuous.
There, the firsthaf was over. All
down for teal Thank goodness!
George was happy. He was proud,
too. He saw the glances, the mods of
approval. He basked in a kind of
Sunshine that was new. What an ass
he had been all his life! To have
been afraid of women just because
he was PerciVal Algernon! What he
should have done was to have gone
forth boldly, taken what pleasures he
found, and laughed with the rest of
them.
There weren't two other women in
all Cairo to compare with these two.
The mother, shapely, elegant, with
the dark beauty of high-class Span.
lard, possessing humor, trenchant COM
ment, keen deduction and application;
worldly, cynical, high-bred. The stu
dent of nations might have tried In
vain to place her. She spoke the
French of the Parisians, the Italian
of the Florentines, the German of the
Hanoverians, and her English was the
envy of Americans and the wonder OF
the Londoners. The daughter fell be,
hind her but little, but she was more
reserved. The worldly critic called
this good form; no daughter should
try to outshine her widowed mother.
AS Fortune sat beside the young col
lector that afternoon, she marveled
why they had given him Percival AZ
gernon. Jones was all right, solid and
substantial, but the, other two turned
1t into ridicule Still, what was the
matter with Percival Algernon? His.
tory had given men of these names
mighty fine things to accomplish.
Then why ridicule? Was 1t due to the
perverted angle of vision created by
wits and humorists in the comic week.
lies, who were eternally pillorying
these unhappy prefixes to ordinary
cognomens? And why this pillorying?
She hadn't studied the subject SUI
fciently to realize that the business
of the humorist is not so much to
amuse as to warn persons against be-
coming ridiculous. And Percival AL
gernon Jones was all of that. It re-
DolVed itself into matter of values,
hen. Had his surname been Mont
borency, Perciyal Algernon would
ave fitted as key to its lock. She
miied. No one but fond mother