Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1915-12-01
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GheAMAIEUR CRAFTSMAN.

| went out. Did ever. tell you how It
| was 1 first came across old Venus
Potts."
He had told her at great length, to
! the exclusion of about every other
topic, in the second of the annual let
ters; and throughout the series the IN
evitable name Of Venus Potts. had sell
dom cropped up without some allusion
| to that Homeric encounter. But it was
we'll worth while having it all over
again with the intricate and picturesque
! embroidery of g. tongue far mightier
( than the pen hitherto employed upon
the incident. Poor Blanche had almost
to hold her nose over the primary
cause of battle; but the dialogue was
delightful, and Cazalet himself made
. most gallant and engaging figure as
he sat on the sill and reeled 1t out
Twenty minutes later, and old Venus
Potts was still on the magic tapls,
though Cazalet had dropped his boast
| ing for a curiously humble, eager and
yet Intellectual vein.
"Old Venus Potts." he kept ejacu-
| lating. you couldn't help liking him.
And he'd like you, my world"
us his wife nicer" Blanche wanted
to know; but she was looking so in
| tently out her window, at the opposite
end of the bow to Cazalet's, that
| man of the wider world might have
thought of something else to talk
| about.
Out her window she looked past
willow that had been part of the old
life, in the direction of an equally
typical silhouette of patient anglers
anchored in q punt; they had not
raised a rod between them during all
this time that Blanche had been out IN
Australia; but as a matter of fact she
never saw them, since, vastly to the
credit of Cazalet's descriptive powers.
she was out in Australia still.
"Nelly Potts?" he said. "Oh, = jolly
good sort; you'd be awful pals"
Should we?" said Blanche. just
smiling at her invisible anglers.
II know yonawould," he assured her
with immense conviction. "Of course
she can't do the things you do; but
she can ride, my word! So she ought
to. when she's lived there all her life.
The rooms aren't much, but the veran-
das are what count most; they're bet
ter than any rooms::1 -
She was stpl out there, cultivatlng
Nelly Potts on a very deep veranda,
though her straw hat and straw hair
remained in contradictory evidence
against a very dirty window on the
Middlesex bank of the Thames. It
was a shame of the September sun
to show the dirt as it was doing; not
only was there great steady pool OF
sunshine on the unspeakable floor, but
a doddering reflection from the river
on the disreputable ceiling. Cazalee
looked rather desperately from one to
the other, and both the calm pool and
the rough were broken by shadows,
one more impressionistic than the
other, of a straw hat over . stack OF
straw hair, that had not gone out to
Australia-yet.
And of course just then = step
soulded outside somewhere on some
gravel. Confound those caretakers!
What were they doing, proving
about?
II say, Blanchie!" he blurted out. Il
do believe you'd like it out there,
sportswoman like you! l believe
you'd take to it like duck to water
He had floundered to his feet as
we'll. He was standing over her, feel
ing his way like great fatuous cow
ard. so some might have thought But
it really looked as though Blanche was
not attending to what he did say; yet
neither was she watching her little
anglers stamped in jet upon the Sill
very stream, nor even seeing any more
of Nelly Potts in the Australian YER
anda. She had come home from Aus
tralia, and come in from the river, ana
she was watching the open door at the
other end of the old schoolroom, listen
ing to those COMPOUNDED steps coming
nearer and nearer-and Cazalet was
gazing at her as though he really afao
said something that deserved an an
sWer. All
"Why, Miss Blanche!" cried voice.
And your old lady-in-waiting figured
should find you fown!"
Hilton Toye was already a lands
man and a Londoner from top to toe.
He was perfectly dressed-for BOND
Strickland his native simplicity OF
bearing and address placed him as
surely and firmly in the present pic
ture. He did not look the least bit out
Of it. But Cazalet did, in an Instant
his old bush clothes changed at once
into a merely shabby suit of despica-
BILE cut; the romance dropped out OF
them and their wearer, Gs he stood
like trussed turkey-cock, ana
watched a bunch of dollhouse flowers
presented to the lady with little gem
of a natural, courteous, and yet char
acteristically racy speech.
To the lady, mark you; for she was
one, on the spot; and Cazalet was a
man again, and making mighty effort
to behave himself because the hour
of boy and girl was over.
"Mr. Cazalet,' said Toye, Il guess
you want to know what in thunder
I'm doing on your tracks SO soon Its
hog-luck, sir, because l wanted to see
you quite a lot, but I never thought
ctr VIII rioIf horo hid Won