Connecticut western news., 1916-07-13


 To marry at one fell A ogp into si% solid pages of "I'irst I'a,. .ics - ,mcl ica," to say nothing: a" +ho pages de voted to the AGdisonS. v.as glory anG honor beyond all whooning.
 The passing of th> " ,As which fo:. lowed RCsemary'.s le;tc.' tD her !rr2..ti ! announcing her cnGagemsrt dil Eot serve to decrease the perturbation of her mother.
 The more she thought Of the ultra. marine blood of Addison Van Arte. wade the more brilliant appeared her own cardinal corpuscles. She gazed about the walls of her rococo man. sion and beheld expensive examples of modern art and one alleged old master, but nowhere did there gaze down upon Ter family portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds. Peale. Gilbert Stuart or Ben jalain West.
 In Imagination Mrs. Tower wandered through the stately galleries of the Van Artevaades and saw upon their walls portraits which stared down upon her stonily because she could not point to Tower pictures of an equal worth.
 She felt keenly the humiliation or their scornful looks. She would give anything to be on an equal pictorial footing with her future son-in-law. But what was there to do?
 When the grand idea came to her one might we'll believe that it struck her amidships with great violence.
 Down she clumped into Louis Quinze chair, almost shattering that frail piece of furniture; grew red in the face, gasped for breath and, notwith- standing her delight, mentally consign- ed her maid to torrid climate for having laced all but a few cubic inches of breath out of her.
 But she had laid violent hands upon an idea which was we'll worth a near stroke of apoplexy.
 It was this:
 The Tower money would he sent into the markets of the world to buy credi- ble and creditable portraits in oil of Tower-and Smith-ancestors.
 That was the idea, an idea worthy of the progressive wife of Peter Tower The money would not be poured into
 
 to bull the market. That was not the Tower way.
 It would be sent forth covertly through alien hands. But presto. when the coup was accomplished the barren Tower walls would blossom with the fairest flowers!
 The lady's only regret was that this ,l, in the reporters and give them the de- tails with the usual Tower plenitude and embellishments.
 Plans for the wedding progressed and with them progressed Mrs. Tow CTS plans regarding the ancestral DOT. traits. An estate in Westchester coun- ty had been purchased by Peter Tower at his wife's solicitation and presented to Rosemary. s
 Wishing to have as brilliant we'd ding socially as possible, Mrs. Tower ruthlessly killed a fictitious distant relative, closed her western mansion because she was in mourning and trans ferred her activities to New York
 Being in mourning meant that Rose mary was to be married quietly at n fashionable New York hostelry. The real significance of this was that the western hoi polloi received announce ment cards, and the guests were limit ed to Addison Van. Artevaades own caste. -. ..#..
 There had been another reason for this move. Mrs. Tower had decided to dover Rosemary with the new an cestors., To have placed the portraits in her own residence would have ad- vertised their falseness to those who knew the Tower antecedents.
 To hang them on the walls of her daughters new home would only invite admiration and awe on the part of her daughters husband and friends and relatives.
 Several weeks before the wedding Mrs. Tower had an interview with confidential agent who had learned somehow or other that she was in the market for colonial portraits.
 He was q dapper young chap, with q sympathetic and intuitive understand ing. He had the politeness of French man, the artistic temperament of an Italian and the hustle of an American.
 His calling card was graced with the name of Sartoris Belmore. In those circles wherein he indulged in the vul- gar game of pinochle he signed to his checks the unromantic name of Isadore Feinsilver.
 You understand now, Mir. Belmore?" came in rich, fluty tones from the mas saged throat of Mrs. Tower.
 Madam has been as explicit as only she can be-" MT. Sartoris Belmore bowed with the grace of a dancing master. Your husbands fad is the collecting of early American portraits. You wish to surprise him on his birth day by augmenting his collection. It shall be as you wish
 One might think that Mir. Sartoris Belmore was ignorant of the purpose to which the pictures were to be put. He was not. Such commissions came to him as a