The elder girl touched a button, and a maid came in a moment.
Marie, tell mamma that Miss Marian has returned.
Dont scold, sister. I only ran down to Mme. Theos to tell her to use mauve insertion instead of pink. My costume and Maries hat were just what I needed. Everyone thought I was a shopgirl, I am sure.
Dinner is over, dear; you stayed so late.
I know. I slipped on the sidewalk and turned my ankle. I could not walk, so I hobbled into a restaurant and sat there until I was better. That is why I was so long.
The two girls sat in the window seat, looking out at the lights and the stream of hurrying vehicles in the avenue. The younger one cuddled down with her head in her sisters lap.
We will have to marry some day, she said dreamily both of us. We have so much money that we will not be allowed to disappoint the public. Do you want me to tell you the kind of a man I could love, Sis?
Go on, you scatterbrain, smiled the other.
I could love a man with dark and kind blue eyes, who is gentle and respectful to poor girls, who is handsome and good and does not try to flirt. But I could love him only if he had an ambition, an object, some work to do in the world. I would not care how poor he was if I could help him build his way up. But, sister dear, the kind of man we always meet the man who lives an idle life between society and his clubs I could not love a man like that, even if his eyes were blue and he were ever so kind to poor girls whom he met in the street.
By Courier
It was neither the season nor the hour when the Park had frequenters; and it is likely that the young lady, who was seated on one of the benches at the side of the walk, had merely obeyed a sudden impulse to sit for a while and enjoy a foretaste of coming Spring.
She rested there, pensive and still. A certain melancholy that touched her countenance must have been of recent birth, for it had not yet altered the fine and youthful contours of her cheek, nor subdued the arch though resolute curve of her lips.
A tall young man came striding through the park along the path near which she sat. Behind him tagged a boy carrying a suit-case. At sight of the young lady, the mans face changed to red and back to pale again. He watched her countenance as he drew nearer, with hope and anxiety mingled on his own. He passed within a few yards of her, but he saw no evidence that she was aware of his presence or existence.
Some fifty yards further on he suddenly stopped and sat on a bench at one side. The boy dropped the suit-case and stared at him with wondering, shrewd eyes. The young man took out his handkerchief and wiped his brow. It was a good handkerchief, a good brow, and the young man was good to look at. He said to the boy:
I want you to take a message to that young lady on that bench. Tell her I am on my way to the station, to leave for San Francisco, where I shall join that Alaska moose-hunting expedition. Tell her that, since she has commanded me neither to speak nor to write to her, I take this means of making one last appeal to her sense of justice, for the sake of what has been. Tell her that to condemn and discard one who has not deserved such treatment, without giving him her reasons or a chance to explain is contrary to her nature as I believe it to be. Tell her that I have thus, to a certain degree, disobeyed her injunctions, in the hope that she may yet be inclined to see justice done. Go, and tell her that.
The young man dropped a half-dollar into the boys hand. The boy looked at him for a moment with bright, canny eyes out of a dirty, intelligent face, and then set off at a run. He approached the lady on the bench a little doubtfully, but unembarrassed. He touched the brim of the old plaid bicycle cap perched on the back of his head. The lady looked at him coolly, without prejudice or favour.
Lady, he said, dat gent on de oder bench sent yer a song and dance by me. If yer dont know de guy, and hes tryin to do de Johnny act[211], say de word, and Ill call a cop in tree minutes. If yer does know him, and hes on de square, wy Ill spiel yer de bunch of hot air he sent yer.
The young lady betrayed a faint interest.
A song and dance! she said, in a deliberate sweet voice that seemed to clothe her words in a diaphanous[212] garment of impalpable irony. A new idea in the troubadour[213] line, I suppose. I used to know the gentleman who sent you, so I think it will hardly be necessary to call the police. You may execute your song and dance, but do not sing too loudly. It is a little early yet for open-air vaudeville, and we might attract attention.
Awe, said the boy, with a shrug down the length of him, yer know what I mean, lady. Taint a turn, its wind. He told me to tell yer hes got his collars and cuffs in dat grip for a scoot clean out to Frisco. Den hes goin to shoot snow-birds in de Klondike. He says yer told him not to send round no more pink notes nor come hangin over de garden gate, and he takes dis means of puttin yer wise. He says yer refereed him out like a has-been, and never give him no chance to kick at de decision. He says yer swiped him, and never said why.