The Elk Mountain pilot., 1921-12-08

ne ever got to ally domestic matter,
and Isabelle confided to her almost all
her duties and cares Nina, insatiably
curious, had gathered no more than
that Miss Harriets father had been a
college professor of languages, and
that her only relative was married
sister, Linda, much older, who had
four children. and lived in New Jer-
sey.
She was master of the art of keep
ing silent, this young woman, and but
for her beauty she might have been
as inconspicuous as she sincerely
tried to be. But her simple gowns and
her plainly massed hair only served
to emphasize the extraordinary dis
tinction of her appearance, and her VI
most effort to obliterate herself could
not quite keep her from notice. Old
Mrs. Carter, who for reasons perfectly
comprehensive in an old lady who
had once been handsome herself, de-
tested Harriet, and said to her
daughter-in-law that in her opinion
there was something queer about the
girl.
She was of that always-arresting
type that combines warm dusky skin
with blue eyes and fair hair. The
eyes, in her case, were soft smoky
blue, set in thick and inky black
lashes. and the hair was brassy gold,
banded carelessly but trinity about her
rather broad forehead. Her mouth
was wide, deep crimson, thin-lipped; /;
it was a mouth of secrets and of mys-
terry, of character, mouth that had
known the trembling of pain and grief,
perhaps, but u firm mouth now, and
u beautiful one.
Looking at her, an artist would
have fancied her bold and charming
and boyish-looking little girl, fifteen
years ago, with that Greek chin and
that tawny name; would have seen her
sexless and splendid in her early teens,
with a fiat breast and an untamed eye.
And n romancer might have wondered
what paths had led her, in the superb
realization of her beautiful woman.
hood, at twenty-seven, to this subor
dinate position in the home of a self
made rich man, and this conventional
tea table on terrace over the Hud
son.
Nearly half-past five, Nina. she
said, presently. $50 and change ant
brush, that's darling! You lool
rather tumbled."
Nina, reaching for a marron. obedi
emily wandered away, and immediatel!
the empty chair beside Harriet was
taken by newcomer, Richard Garter
himself. the owner of all this smiling
estate, who had come up from the
little launch at the landing. hat
changed hastily into white fiannels
Harriet saw at glance, and had un
expectedly Joined them for tea.
"Tea, Mr.. Carter?p Harriet ven
tured.
He was watching his wife with Q
sort of idle interest. She had to re
peat her invitation.
"If you please, Miss Field! Tea
sounded right, somehow, to me today
It's been u terrible day!"
II can imagine iti" Harriet's voice
was pleasantly commonplace. But the
moment had its thrill for her. This
lean, tall. tired man, with his abstract
manner, his perfunctory courtesies. his
nervous, clever hands, loomed In oddly
heroic proportions in Harriet's life
His face was keen and somewhat
lined under smooth crest of slightly
graying hair; he smiled very rarely,
but there was a certain kindness in
his gray eyes, when Nina or Ward
or his wife turned to him, that Har-
riet liked.
For Harriet he had hardly dozen
words year. He merely smiled
kindly when she thanked him for the
Christmas gift that bore his un-
touched card; if she went to her sis
ter for day or two, he gave her only
nod of greeting when she came back
Now and then he asked with sharp
interest about Nina's teeth or his
mothers headache.
But Harriet had known other types
of men, and for his very silences, for
his Indifference, she had begun to ad.
mire him long ago. She had not been
born in this atmosphere of pleasure
and ease and riches; she was not en-
tirely untitled to judge a man.
Isabelle was always breezily civil to
bfi Hc lOlS ago VIII
ished as completely from among the
vital elements of her life as if he were
dead, perhaps more than if he were
dead. She thought-if she thought
about him at all-that he never saw
her little affairs; she supposed. him
perfectly satisfied with his home and
children and club and business, and
incidentally with his beautiful figure
head of wife. They had quarreled
distressingly, several years ago, when
he had bored her with references to
her duty" and her influence over
Nina. and her obligations to her true
self. But that had all stopped long
since, and now Isabelle was free to
sleep late, to dress at leisure, to make
what engagements she pleased, to see
the persons who interested her. Rich
ard never interfered; never was there