【正文】 ing but the most open and candid treatment from me, mamma.It39。s you that wants to play fast and loose with him. And, to tell youthe truth, I believe he would like that a good deal better。 I believethat, if there39。s anything he hates, it39。s openness and candor.Alma laughed, and put her arms round her mother, who could not helplaughing a little, too.II.The winter did not renew for Christine and Mela the social opportunitywhich the spring had offered. After the musicale at Mrs. Horn39。s, theyboth made their partycall, as Mela said, in due season。 but they did notfind Mrs. Horn at home, and neither she nor Miss Vance came to see themafter people returned to town in the fall. They tried to believe for atime that Mrs. Horn had not got their cards。 this pretence failed them,and they fell back upon their pride, or rather Christine39。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。 and she had planned the words and the behavior with which shewould have punished them if they had appeared then. Neither sisterimagined herself in anywise inferior to them。 but Christine wassuspicious, at least, and it was Mela who invented the hypothesis of thelost cards. As nothing happened to prove or to disprove the fact, shesaid, I move we put Coonrod up to gittun39。 it out of Miss Vance, at someof their meetun39。s.If you do, said Christine, I39。ll kill you.Christine, however, had the visits of Beaton to console her, and, ifthese seemed to have no definite aim, she was willing to rest in thepleasure they gave her vanity。 but Mela had nothing. Sometimes she evenwished they were all back on the farm.It would be the best thing for both of you, said Mrs. Dryfoos, inanswer to such a burst of desperation. I don39。t think New York is anyplace for girls.Well, what I hate, mother, said Mela, is, it don39。t seem to be anyplace for young men, either. She found this so good when she had saidit that she laughed over it till Christine was angry.A body would think there had never been any joke before.I don39。t see as it39。s a joke, said Mrs. Dryfoos. It39。s the plain truth.Oh, don39。t mind her, mother, said Mela. She39。s put out because her oldMr. Beaton ha39。r39。t been round for a couple o39。 weeks. If you don39。t watchout, that fellow 39。ll give you the slip yit, Christine, after all yourpains.Well, there ain39。t anybody to give you the slip, Mela, Christine clawedback.No。 I ha39。n39。t ever set my traps for anybody. This was what Mela saidfor want of a better retort。 but it was not quite true. When Kendrickscame with Beaton to call after her father39。s dinner, she used all hercunning to ensnare him, and she had him to herself as long as Beatonstayed。 Dryfoos sent down word that he was not very well and had gone tobed. The novelty of Mela had worn off for Kendricks, and she found him,as she frankly told him, not half as entertaining as he was at Mrs.Horn39。s。 but she did her best with him as the only flirtable materialwhich had yet e to her hand. It would have been her ideal to have theyoung men stay till past midnight, and her father e downstairs in hisstockingfeet and tell them it was time to go. But they made a visit ofdecorous brevity, and Kendricks did not e again. She met himafterward, once, as she was crossing the pavement in Union Square to getinto her coupe, and made the most of him。 but it was necessarily verylittle, and so he passed out of her life without having left any trace inher heart, though Mela had a heart that she would have put at thedisposition of almost any young man that wanted it. Kendricks himself,Manhattan cockney as he was, with scarcely more out look into the averageAmerican nature than if he had been kept a prisoner in New York societyall his days, perceived a property in her which forbade him as a man ofconscience to trifle with her。 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。 and it made her sacred, in spite of her willingness tofool and to be fooled, in her merely human quality. After all, he sawthat she wished honestly to love and to be loved, and the lures she threwout to that end seemed to him pathetic rather than ridiculous。 he couldnot join Beaton in laughing at her。 and he did not like Beaton39。s laughingat the other girl, either. It seemed to Kendricks, with the code ofhonor which he mostly kept to himself because he was a little ashamed tofind there were so few others like it, that if Beaton cared nothing forthe other girland Christine appeared simply detestable to Kendrickshe had better keep away from her, and not give her the impression he wasin love with her. He rather fancied that this was the part of agentleman, and he could not have penetrated to that aesthetic and moralplexity which formed the consciousness of a nature like Beaton39。s andwas chiefly a torment to itself。 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。 but Kendricks, though a sage oftwentyseven, was still too young to understand this.Beaton scarcely understood it himself, perhaps because he was not yettwentyseven. He only knew that his will was somehow sick。 that it spentitself in caprices, and brought him no happiness from the fulfilment ofthe most vehement wish. But he wa