The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1925-04-02

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Muriel urges him to forget her, warn
ing him that If she (Brena) should like
him he is in danger Of vanishing
like the others
The smile disappeared the moment
the electric lamp above the outer door
just behind the French windows threw
down its light like an overturned
bucket of yellow liquid. A woman was
standing there, and Peter believed that
as she had stood in the dark, unseen,
she had been looking straight into his
face. She wore no hat and her hair
piled up in immense snake-like coils
was the color of certain frost-turned
leaves of autumn which are neither
red nor gold, but both colors at once.
Her Irish mother !" he almost said
aloud. He knew by her hair and her
great dark eyes in which, even from a
distance, there appeared the eXpec-
fancy or fear described by young Ben
ham. The British officer had not over
drawn her beauty. There was a still
grandeur about it, a permanence, a
thing making it awful as well as allur-
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sculpture dug from the dust and trans
formed by miracle into living warmth
glowing through a skin which, com
pared to Muriel's fine cold white, was
as heavy cream is to SKINNED milk.
She stood in the posture which Peter
learned later to know was characteris-
tic-a posture of one who waits with
resignation. For what? Heaven knows.
Perhaps for a reipcarnation into a life
less troubled, less besmirched with
small affairs.
That she a white draped gown
over which a wrap of flame color hung
from her half-bare shoulders Devote
did not notice. She was one who can
not be described in detail, and her
clothes made no impress, though their
illuminated colors and contrast in any
other case might have left a vivid pic
ture. One never saw her except as a
whOle-a wOman too short of stature,
if one measured, but the height Of a
goddess if one only looked; a girl
whose face, though capable Of a great
range of expression, nevertheless
changed its moods as slowly as the
clouds in the sky change their con
tours; a human being whose PERSONAL
ity belonged, it appeared, to the kind
of personalities which are found usu-
ally only in a deep forest, or belong
to a %pinnacled mountain range. Any
detail was nothing.
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said Muriel.
$50 she has!" admitted Mrs. Ben
ham, beaming out through the window.
u might have known who it was.
heard a high-powered car. But she
doesn't like TO be driven almost into
u dining room, so she stopped on the
South wing. Let's go into fathers den,
Peter, Bring the cigars in there, Lucy"
No protest appeared possible. Mrs.
Benham had beamed and nodded, and
the American could not very graciously
say "Oh, no. 1 want to stay"
He turned once as he left the dining
room. The woman outside was still
waiting at the door for Mrs. Benham to
waddle to the latch, the waterfall of
light still covering her, still looking in,
apparently at Peter, and with a smile
and warmth thrown toward him like a
message from her great dark eyes.
He could not wipe away the impress
sion of that look. In it there had been
a call, an understanding, a password, a
magic formula. To shake it off he
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old study, stopping before the photo
graphs of members of the house of
commons who had been Benham's
friends, but were like the ends of so
many empty spools to Peters eyes at
this moment. He read an inscription
on a portrait of General Wolseley, he
touched an ivory idol from Benares.
Lets light the fire." suggested Mu-
riel in a weak and trembling voice.
"All right" said Peter, and struck a
match.
He did not smoke.
"Why not?' asked the girl.
81 have a-headache,' he said with a
laugh.
'Come here, then. Lie down on ia
theirs sofa. 1 don't mind Be comfort
able, Peter"
He stretched out upon the springs
bent and sagred by years of pressure
of the fox-hunting bankers solid
weight. and closed his eyes.
Muriel, who had drawn up a stool
sat down upon it, staring into the fire
light. There In the study behind the
heavy door, which s.la had closed, the
two seemed suddenly very remote.