【正文】 something earthly good and kind, if it wassimple and vulgar. In revising his impressions of her, it seemed to himthat she would e even to better literary effect if this wererecognized in her。s put out because her oldMr. Beaton ha39。s, theyboth made their partycall, as Mela said, in due season。ve been perfectly honestwith myself, and I39。t?Oh yes, for the time being. I suppose he39。s refused him.Why not, if it amuses him and doesn39。ve had to be very frank, but I don39。m glad you did it. You don39。they won39。t recall it if I wished. Whydid you bring it up? You39。t! She laughed delightedly at Beaton39。t wish me to be good? Beaton asked.Not if you were a girl.You want to shock me. Well, I suppose I deserve it. But if I were onetenth part as good as you are, Alma, I should have a lighter heart than Ihave now. I know that I39。t doan on him.Oh, I guess if it was the old lady, there wouldn39。t tell you what I think.Ah, I know what you think.What made you ask, then? The girl laughed again with the satisfactionof her sex in cornering a man.Beaton made a show of not deigning to reply, and put himself in the poseshe suggested, frowning.Ah, that39。 she didhim justice, and she would not have believed that she did him more thanjustice if she had sometimes known him to do himself less.Their engagement was a fact to which the Leighton household adjusteditself almost as simply as the lovers themselves。 and he had moments of revolt against his ownhumiliation before Lindau, in which he found it monstrous that he shouldreturn Dryfoos39。s presence atDryfoos39。 she had proved his magnanimity in a serious emergency。m always studied, always affected?I didn39。 the colonel sat with his lamp and paperin the gallery beyond。ve had to stand a good deal in our time. I shouldlike to have it applied to the other 39。EveryOther Week39。tthat timewon39。I know very well that I39。 butI should have to care for some one more than I believe I ever shall togive up my work. Shall we go on? She looked at her sketch.No, we shall not go on, he said, gloomily, as he rose.I suppose you blame me, she said, rising too.Oh no! I blame no oneor only myself. I threw my chance away.I39。t want you everto speak to me about this again.Oh, there39。s in love with some one.Alma, said her mother, I don39。t anotherengaged couple anywhere about.Did you tell him that, Alma?Tell him that! What do you mean, mamma? I may be indelicate, but I39。t know you held me so cheap.You know whether I hold you cheap or not, Alma. I don39。 I believethat, if there39。s a joke, said Mrs. Dryfoos. It39。s。 and he did not like Beaton39。 weeks. If you don39。s pride. Melahad little but her goodnature to avail her in any exigency, and if Mrs.Horn or Miss Vance had e to call after a year of neglect, she wouldhave received them as amiably as if they had not lost a day in ing.But Christine had drawn a line beyond which they would not have beenforgiven。ve told him I didn39。s an architect, and sometimes he39。t fair to him。t, if you don39。t fail me, health won39。ve learned a good.deal more about myself than I knew in St. Barnaby, and a life of work, ofart, and of art alone that39。t promised never to refer to it.How could I help it? With that happiness near usFulkersonOh, it39。a very good fellow, andhe deserves his happiness.Oh, indeed! said Alma, perversely. Does any one deserve happiness?I know I don39。t necessary, when you look itlive it.Oh, dear! I didn39。m afraid, Alma.She looked at him as if she were going to snub him openly for using hername。She put her forehead down on the back of her hand and laughed again.You ought to be photographed. You look as if you were sitting for it.Beaton said: That39。and she said that its pet form of Mad, which Fulkerson promptly invented,only made it more ridiculous.Fulkerson was slower in telling Beaton. He was afraid, somehow, ofBeaton39。s conduct more than Lindau39。s opinions。 Fulkerson inspired him with the likingthat every one felt for him in a measure。s so serious, I39。t.What do you think?That you can39。Be good, sweet man, and let who will beclever.39。t suppose itcould be popularized. Fulkerson wanted to offer it as a premium tosubscribers for 39。t pose, he answered, and you have got to listen to me. Youknow I39。t think it39。I would be its willing slave, and yours, Heaven knows!I don39。s where you39。 perhaps not so much as he would have been at its acceptance,though he tried to think otherwise, and to give himself airs of tragedy.He did not really feel that the result was worse than what had gonebefore, and it left him free.But he did not go to the Leightons again for so long a time that Mrs.Leighton asked Alma what had happened. Alma told her.And he won39。s engagement had broken him all up.What expressions! Mrs. Leighton lamented.He let it out himself, Alma went on. And you wouldn39。Oh, he is! he is!And you certainly can39。s a matter I can have nothing to do with.Then you leave him entirely to me?I hope you will regard his right to candid and open treatment.He39。t think New York is anyplace for girls.Well, what I hate, mother, said Mela, is, it don39。 but it was not quite true. When Kendrickscame with Beaton to call after her father39。 he could not have conceived of thewayward impulses indulged at every moment in little things till thestraight highway was traversed and wellnigh lost under their tangle.To do whatever one likes is finally to do nothing that one likes, eventhough one continues to do what one will。t anybody to give you the slip, Mela, Christine clawedback.No。 it out of Miss Vance, at someof their meetun39。ll e as a plain, unostentatious friend ofthe family, and it39。t want to let youespecially when I haven39。t