Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1917-02-08
CHAPTER XII.
see.


lotta Harrison and Max Wilson had
taken together. Carl0tta had selected
for her vacation a small town within
easy motoring distance of the city,
and two or three times during her two
weeks off duty Wilson had gone out to
see her. He liked being with her. She
stimulated him. For once that he could
see Sidney, he saw Carlotta twice.
She had kept the affair well in hand.
She was playing for high stakes. She
knew quite well the kind of man with
whom she was dealing-that he would
pay as little as possible. But she
knew, too, that, let him want a thing
enough, he would pay any price for it,
even marriage.
She was very skillful. The very ar
dor in her face was in her favor. Be
hind her eyes lurked cold calculation.
She would put the thing through, and
show those pulling nurses, with their
ptOus eyes and evening prayers, a
thing or two.
During that entire vacation he never
saw her in anything more elaborate
than the simplest Of white dresses
modestly open at the throat, sleeves
rolled up TO show her satiny arms.
There were no other boarders at the
little farmhouse. She sat for hours
IN the summer evenings in the square
yard filed with apple trees that Dor
| dered the highway, carefully posed
| over book, but with her keen eyes
always on the road. She read Brown
lag, Emerson, SWinburne, Once he
found her with o book that she has
thy concealed. He insisted on seeing
1t, and secured it. 1t was a book on
brain surgery. Confronted with it, she
blushed and dropped her eyes. His de-
lighted vanity found in it the most in
stdlOus of compliments, as she had in
! tended.
~ feel such an idiot when 1 am with
| YOU" she said. 81 wanted to know a
little more about the things you do"
That put their relationship on new
and advanced basis. Thereafter he
occasionally talked surgery instead of
sentiment. He found her responsive,
| intelligent. His work, sealed book
| to his women before lay open to her
Now and then their professional dis
! cussions ended in something different.
| The two lines of their interest con-
verged.
"Gad!" he said one day. 81 look
forward to these evenings. I can talk
shop with you without either shocking
or nauseating you. You are the most
| intelligent woman I knoW-and one of
the prettiest."
The one element Carlotta had left
| out of her calculations was herself
| She had known the man, had taken the
situation at its proper value. But into
her calculating ambition had come a
new and destroying element. She who.
| like X. in his little room on the Street,
had put aside love and the things
| thereof, found that it would not put
her aside. By the end Of her short va
cation CarlOtta Harrison was wildly in
! love with the younger Wilson.
They continued to meet. not as
often as before. but once a week, per-
| haps. The meetings were full of dan
ger now; and if for the girl they lost
by this quality, they gained attraction
for the man. She was shrewd enough
to realize her own situation. The thing
! had gone wrong. She cared, ard he
did not. 1t was his game now, not
| hers.
All women are intuitive; women in
| Ar
she knew that his passion for her was
| not the real thing, SO also she realized
that there was growing up in his heart
| something akin to the real thing for
Sidney Page. Suspicion became GER
tainty after a talk they had over the
supper table at a country roadhouse
| the day after Christines wedding
"How was the wedding-tiresome?
Thrilling! There's always some
thing thrilling to me in man tying
himself up for life to one woman.
| Its-it's so reckless"
Her eyes narrowed. "Thats not ex-
actly the Law and the Prophets, is it?'
IT'S the truth. To think of select
| ing out Of all the world one woman,
and electing to spend the rest of ones
| days with her Although"
His eyes looked past Carlotta into
| distance.
Sidney Page was one of the brides
maids" he said irrelevantly. "She was
/ lOvelier than the bride"
Pretty, but stupid" said Carlotta.
Il like her. I've really tried to teach
her things, but-you know" She
| shrugged her shoulders.
| Doctor Max was learning wisdom.
| II there was a twinkle in his eye, he
yelled it discreetly. But, once again
| in the machine, he bent over and put
| his cheek against hers.
you little catl You're Jealous" he
| said eXultantly.
Nevertheless, although he might
smile, the image of Sidney lay very
| close to his heart those autumn days.
| And Carlotta knew it.
Sidney came off night duty the mid
die Of Noyember. The night duty had