The Little River news., 1921-03-02

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 haps you think they mirror the lie. 1 Why. sladge, the taunts that those l girls fling indifferently at virtue and l at vice are so vile that they couldn't
 be repeated even among half-decent
 men. And the other way, the private
 door for the private secretary. That's
 road o6 burned bridges. Every
 man. decent or indecent, feels a queer sinking of the heart when he hears Of
 a woman taking 1t" He looked at her shrewdly. "And yet you may do It," he said, half to himself. If you arc one o1 the hungry women, God help l you. for they all walk blindfolded" "They don't walk. said Madge. flushing and her eyes gfeaming strangely. That's just the point: they rush, whiri, and - N "And crash,". finished Bobby. That's the very word" said Madge If youT only keep on the way you've started, I'd love to talk to you all night"
 'sNo chance of that- said Bobby, straight-lipped- "rm through, and I'm going" He turned toward the door.
 Mot without kissing me good-by, Bobbyi" cried Madge.
 He looked over his shoulder with a polite but impersonal smile.
 I'm not much on kissing strange women" he said lightly. Tt would take me years to learn to kiss you again"
 He left the room and the house. With his top-hat pushed back on his head, the ends of his muff1er flying loose. his overcoat half unbuttoned, he swung up the deserted lower reaches of the Avenue, punctuating his thoughts with the solid rap of his stick on the pavement. It might be supposed that he was thinking and mourning over the sudden demise of the Miss Van Tellier he had thought he had known for many years, but such was not the case.
 Mr. Randolph was not built on mourning lines; at the moment under review, he was thinking about himself and the strange fate that had made him foster-child of fortuness He pro ceeded to look back ten years. Just decade ago he had had his one meet ing with the young lady whose disap- pearance had brought him an unstable afluence. It had taken place on this very avenue and less than forty short blocks away. He had reason to re- member the encounter, for 1t had brought into sudden conjunction a lovely Persian cat, lovely wire-haired terrier. lovely child, and himself. The cat had dashed from proud front door to cross FOrty-something street under the nose of a taxi-cab; the dog had flown in yapping pursuit and, in the act, yanked his young mis- tress off her pins. He, Mr. Randolph, had seized one of her fyirg feet, hauled her and the terrier back to safety, and no sooner placed her up right and smoothed down her absurdly short skirts than he, she, and especial ly it, the dog, became the center and circumference of an animated pin wheel.
 Her unshaken determination to hold to the leash, whatever happened, brought disaster. The said leash wound three times round her ankles and those oft MT. Randolph, bringing them both down kerplunk and facing each other. My. what bump!" she had cried, in startled tones, and then thrown back her curly head and laughed.
 It was so that he remembered her. child of ten or eleven summers and no winters, merry as sunny day, dark-haired, dark-eyed, pink checked, pampered but unspoiled. She had risen and taken his hand. told him
 her name, thanked him, ordered a Hurried nurse to thank him, shaken her finger at the terrier, and said, "Good-by'' and Come on, Maggie" all while he was still rubbing the seat of his first long trousers.
 On that day she had been Miss Imo. gene Pamela Thornton, petted darling of the gods and MT. Brewster Thorn ton, banker and widower; two months later had come Thornton's financial smash and, immediately afterward. his spiritual, moral and bodily collapse. Everything that had made for life in him having been swept away. he died as matter of course. and was buried. For sole inheritance, little Genie Thornton found herself possessor and possessed of one Maggie O'Rourke. a nurse of long standing. of earnest and faithful face. and monster heart im- prisoned in pitifully thin chest. It had taken Genie's great-uncle. tsa Thornton, six more months to for get quarrel of sixteen years stand ing with his nephew, and by that time child and nurse had been seeped into vhat lower world which can't afford morning and afternoon editions and is too busy praying for daily bread to look for rain of mama in the daily press,
 In short, Maggie and her charge, traced down the ladder of reputable. disfeputable and impossible lodgings.
 had slipped ultimately from sight and the ken of people with addresses. and, | o A n roct,I+ Mr pnhav< IIn~rovv Dcr