The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1919-04-29

So he went along, except for an oc-
casiOnal twinge, rather easily, until the
night when his incautious reference to
little Major March, and his equally
incautious neglect to bring home a
pay envelope, brought him up stand
ing against fact and on the thres-
hold OF a surmise. The fact was that
his pretended willingness to tell Celia
when the occasion should arise, was
completely false. She's given him the
occasion, and instead of taking it, he
had, in panic, deliberately lied to
her--made up a hasty excuse about
having had his salary raised, so OBJ
viOusly flimsy and extemporaneous,
that. it was wonder she hadn't seen
through it.
And the surmise was that Celia was
not so happy-nOt, at least, so con-
tented with their present way of liv-
ing-as he'd supposed. The way her
mind had played with the possibility
that the inventor might make their for
tune after alias if, for some reason,
a fortune were desirable thing-hau
kept him awake for hours that night.
And when at last, discovering that she
was awake too, he had nerved himself
to ask her, pOint-blank, il she was
getting tired of the way they lived
of the hardships and deprivatiOns of
it all, and she had told him eagerly
that she was nOt-She had begun to
say something that would qualify her
answer, and then stopped. Only -
1t had taken all his resolution to ask
her to go on. "Only what?' And
shed said, "Nothing-yet."
Yet. There was an immense lot
to think about behind that one small
word.
Chapter X
INTERVENTION
Barring one bad moment just after
she entered the store, when the floor
walker came up and asked, rather me-
chemically, what he could do for her,
Celia found no difficulty in carrying
out the first item Of her program
namely, the sale of her JeWeis.
Old Colonel Forsythe, the senior
partner or the hrm, mad known ner
father for years, and her since she was
little girl, and from the moment she
was shown into his office. everything
was easy for her. He had, probably,
a. bad moment OF his own a1.er sneu
told him her errand, which she did
complete, in one sentence, as she held
out her parcel to him. fa ~
II want to sell these things for two
thousand dollars" she said. She add
ed, oyer the look Of acute unhappineys
she saw come into his face, Il mem
hope they're worth that much.' W ~
He explained, while he was cutting
the string and opening the package,
why it was that the amount things had
cost was not a trustworthy guide to
what, they might be worth when one
wanted to sell them. 1--WE can't sell
secondhand jewelry, you know, and
all we can pay for is the unset stones
and the. bullion value Of the setting"
His face cleared instantly, though,
when he saw the contents of her treas
ure-box. Alfred's taste, luckily, had
been, primitive. 1t hadn't run to en-
crusted butterflies and things like
that-nad confined itself to what%ssa
gambler or. a professional baseball
player would speak of as rocks. ~ *.
These things are worth consider
ably more than two thousand dollars
said the jeweler. III
ooh, that's NICE" said Celia COM
fOrtably. But it's just two thousand
that 1 want So if you'll pick out what
comes to that, I'll take the rest back. y
The thing could be done on, that
basis, but not, it seemed, so instan
taneously as Celia had supposed. To
his offer to mail her a check during
the day. and send the residuum back
to her by special messenger, she de-
INJURED. She'd like to wait for the
money, if she might, and take it away
in cash.
To her surprise, he hesitated over
this request. frowned, drummed his
fingers on the, desk-,seemed on the
point of making some sort of protest
and then instead, said something that
struck her, for a moment, as utterly
irrelevant, about the wild uncertain
ties of the stock market.
The course she and Alfred had been
taking in the movies during the past
three months, supplied her suddenly
with an explanation, and she laughed.
"Oh, I'm not going to. speculate with
it," she told him, and his face cleared
IF only you knew hSw many of them
do that behind their husbands backs
women who ought to know better
AND put me in a position of having to
choose between being an officious med
dler, and particeps criminis-"
do they, really!' sara Celia, prop
erly scandalized. But how silly OF