Cleveland County herald., 1920-01-08


 the History of the City," He had glanced at it absently, merely noticing the title and subtitle, and wandered out of the room, thinking of other things and feeling no curiosity about the book. But he had thought of it several times since with a faint, vague uneasiness; and now when he entered the lobby he walked directly into the parlor where he had seen the book. The room was empty, as it always was on Sunday mornings, and the flamboy- ant volume was still upon the table evidently fixture as a sort of local Almanach de Gotha, or Burke, for the enlightenment of tenants and boarders.
 He turned to the index where the names of the five hundred Most Promi- nent Citizens and Families in the His tory of the City were arranged in al- phabetical order, and ran his finger down the column of As: Abbett, Ab- bolt, Abrams, Adams, Adams, Adler, Akers, Albertsmeyer, Alexander, Allen, Ambrose, Ambuhl, Anderson, Andrews, Appenbasch, Archer, Arszman, Ash Cra1C, AuSCln, AVey.
 Georges eyes remained for some time fixed on the thin space between the names "Allen" and Ambrose" Then he closed the book quietly, and went up to his own room, agreeing with tine elevator boy, on the way, that it was getting to be a mighty nasty wet and windy day outside.
 The elevator boy noticed nothing un- usual about him and neither did Fanny, when she came in from church with her hat ruined, an hour later. And yet something had happened-a thing which, years ago, had been the eager est hope of many, many good citizens of the town. They had thought of it, longed for it. hoping acutely that they might live to see the day when it would come to pass. And now it had hap pened at last: Georgie Minafer had got his come-upance.
 He had got it three times filled and running over. The city had rolled over his heart, burying it under, as it rolled over the Majors and buried it under The city had rolled over the Amber sons and buried them under to the last vestige; and 1t mattered little that George guessed easily enough that most of the five hundred Most Promi- nent had paid something substantial ito defray the cost of steel engraving, etc."-the Five Hundred had heaved the final shovelful of soot upon that heap of obscurity wherein the Amber sons were lost forever from sight and history. "Quicksilver in nest of cracks i'
 Georgie Minafer had got his come upance, but the people who had so longed for it were not there to see it, and they never knew it. Those who were still living had forgotten all about it and all about him.
 
 George had seen Eugene only once since their calamitous encounter. They had passed on opposite sides of the street downtown; each had been aware that the other was aware of him, and yet each kept his eyes straight forward, and neither had shown a perceptible alteration of coun- tenance. It seemed to George that he felt emanating from the outwardly im- perturbable person of his mothers old friend a hate that was like hot wind.
 At his mothers funeral and at the Majors he had been conscious that Eugene was there: though he had aft erward no recollection of seeing him, and, while certain of his presence, was uncertain how he knew of it. Fanny had not told him, for she understood George well enough not to speak to him of Eugene or Lucy. Nowadays Fanny almost never saw either of them and seldom thought of them-so sly is the way of time with life. She was passing middle age, when old in- tensities and longings grow thin and flatten out, as Fanny herself was thin ming and fiattening out; and she was settling down contentedly to her apart ment-house intimacies.
 The city was so big, now, that peo- pie disappeared into it unnoticed, and the disappearance of Fanny and her nephew was not exceptional. People no longer knew their neighbors as a matter of course; one lived for years next door to strangers-that sharpest of all the changes since the old days and a friend would lose sight of a friend for year, and not know it.
 One May day George thought he had a glimpse of Lucy. He was not cer- tain, but he was sufficiently disturbed, in spite of his uncertainty. A promo ton in his work now frequently took him out of town for week, or longer, and it was upon his return from one of these absences that he had the strange experience. He had walked home from the station, and as he turned the cor her which brought hin in sight of the apartment house entrance, though two blocks distant from it, he saw q charm ing little figure come out, get into shiny landaulet automobile, and drive away. Even at that distance no one could have any doubt that the little fo,,ro xn-oc bo and bniUbf