The Mena weekly star., 1913-03-20

newcomers in a hotel, what they are, what they do, where they come from, and where they are going. A fine elderly man of fifty got out. In the square set of his shoulders, the flow ing white mustache and imperial, there was a suggestion of militarism. He was immediately followed by young woman of twenty, certainly not over that age. George sighed wist. fully. He envied those polo-players and gentleman-riders and bridge-eX- perts who were stopping at the hotel. It wouldn't be an hour after dinner before some one of them found out who she was and spoke to her i2 that easy style which he concluded must be a gift rather than an accomplishment. You mustn't suppose for a minute that George wasn't well-born and well-bred, simply because his name was Jones. Many Fitz-Hugh Maurice or Hugh Fftz-Maurice might have been But, no matter. He knew instinctively, then, what elegance was when he saw it, and this girl was elegant, in dress, in movement. He rather liked tho pallor of her skin, which hinted that she wasn't one of those athletic girls who bounced in and out of the din ing-room, talking loudly and smoking cigarettes and playing bridge for six, penny points. She was tall. He was sure that her eyes were on the level with his own. The grey veil that dropped from the rim of her simple Leghorn hat to the tip of her nose ob- scured her eyes, so he could not know that they were large and brown and indefinably sad. They spoke not of a weariness Of travel, but of weari- ness o4 the world, more precisely, of the people who inhabited it.
 She and her companion passed on into the hotel, and if Georges eyes veered again toward the desert over which the stealthy purples of night were creeping, the impulse was me chanical; he saw nothing. In truth, he was desperately lonesome, and he knew, moreover, that he had no busi- ness to be. He was young; he could at pinch tell joke as well as the next man; and if he had never had what he called an adventure, he had seen many strange and wonderful things and could describe them with that mental afterglow which still lin- gers over the sunset of our first ex- pressions in poetry. But there was always that hydra-headed monster. for ever getting about his feet, numbing his voice, paralyzing his hands, and never he topped off a head that an- other did not instantly grow in its place. Even the sword of Perseus could not have saved him, since one has to get away from an object in order to cut it down.
 Had he really ever tried to over come this monster? Had he not wait ed for the prcpitious moment (which
 you and 1 know never comes) to throw off this species from Hades !? It is all very well, when you are old and dried up. to turn to worries and metals and precious stones; but when a fellows youngi You can't shake hands with an ivory replica of the Tai Mahal, nor exchange pleasantries with q Mandarin's ring, nor yet confide joys and ills into a casket of rare emer. aids; indeed. they do but emphasize ones loneliness. If only he had had a dog; but one can not carry a dog half way round the world and back, at least not with comfort. What with all these new-fangled quarantine laws, duties, and fussy ships officers who wouldn't let you keep the animal in your stateroom, travelling with a four footed friend was almost an lmpossi- bility. To be sure, women with poodles. And then, there was the bitter of acid in the knowledge that no one ever came up to him and slapped him on the shoulder with a. Hello, Georgie, old sport; what's the good word?" for the simple fact. that his shoulder was always bristling with spikes, born of the fear that some one was making fun of him.
 Perchanee his mothers spirit, hoy. ering over him this evening, might have been inclined to tears. For they do say that the ghosts of the dear ones are thus employed when we are near to committing some folly, or to exploring some forgotten chamber of Pandora's box, or worse still, when that lady intends emptying the whole contents down upon our unfortunate heads. If so be, they were futile tears; Perciyal Algernon had accom-. plished It's deadly purpose.
 Pandora? We'll, then, for the bene. fit of the children. She was a lady who was an intimate friend of the gods. They liked her ap- pearance so well that they one day gave her a box, casket, chest, or what. ever 1t was, to guard. By some mar. vicious method, known only of gods, they had got together all the trials and tribulations of mankind (and some of the joys) and locked them up in this casket. It was the Golden Age, as you may surmise. You recall Eve and the apple? We'll, Pandora was a forecast of Eve; she couldn't keep her eyes off the latch, and at length her curiosityi Whirrl And everything has been at sizes and at sevens since that time. Pandora is eternally recurring, now here, now there; she Is blonde sometimes, and again she is brunette; and you may take it from George and me that there Is always something left in the casket.
 George closed the book and consult. ed his sailing-list. In short time he would leave for Port Said, thence to