Brow Yin,
Bellefonte, Pa., January 13, 1928.
WHAT IS AGE?
By the late Rev. William V. Kelly, LL. D.
I could not learn from words of men
The real significance of “old” and
“young,”
And so I asked the mountains,
‘What is age?
They said: “O, child of Days,
Thou canst not know what age is;
Neither can we know,
For earth is not yet old but in its prime:
And, though our brows are furrowed deep
with time,
‘We hope to see -full many a thousand
years
Before our day of dissolution come.
A century is but one tick of the great
clock
‘Which counts our years.
“And as for men,
They grow not old on earth—
They have not time;
They but begin to live.
They do not even come to ripeness here,
But only yonder in the Great Unseen.
It takes a million years to make a man!
“This earth is but man’s cradle;
A man of fourscore is a babe,
Peering, perhaps, over his cradle’s edge,
But the wide world of his existance
Is yet to roam through and to widen in.
Life is before him, greatness is to come!
After a while he shall vacate his cradle,
And go forth to seek the fortune
God reserves for him.
“But man on earth knows nothing of
Old Age.
Man's longest earthly life
Is but a ripple lapping at our base.
We see the generations come and go,
And men say we are old:
Yet are we young beside God
And His angels, which excel in strength.
And Paul is young yet,
And John and Moses, too,
Walking the hills of everlasting life.
Immortals grow and grow, but ne'er
grow old!
“What man gets on earth
Is just a Start in Life,
And it is well with him, whate’er his
years,
Who is well started—
Has learned the speech of truth,
The trade of righteousness,
The love of God,
The hope of deathless glory.
“He lives by heavenly plan.
His hands are clean and kindly,
His heart is gentle and his word is true;
Men honor, angels love him,
And his name is writ on high.
He grows, but grows not old!”
So said the mountains; and I said:
“Thank God, who gives His children,
An eternal youth, which knows advance
But never knows decay!
All hail, eternal youth!
Eternal Life, that knows not youth nor
age,
grows
Now!”
—From the Christian Advocate
———— ee ——
IN SPITE OF HIMSELF.
But on through an everlasting
Not to put too fine a point on it,
Baird Carruthers was by way of get-
ting himself disliked. He was be-
coming known as a woman-hater, a
designation which has lost its pre-
war kick. He was the debutantes’ de-
spair, the fly in the pomade of the
younger married women and the zero
hour of anxious mothers. Otherwise,
he wasn’t a bad sort. .
The trouble with Carruthers was
that he was cursed with that dark,
scornful appearance which is a nat-
ural temptation to the huntress of ev-
ery woman. In addition to this, he
was distinctly eligible as far as fam-
ily, background and money were con-
cerned. And no woman likes to be
hated by an eligible bachelor.
Carruthers was a hater of modern
womanhood only. He had a frown for
the lip-stick, a distaste for the girlish
hip-flask, a horror of feminine pro-
fanity. But he was terribly in love
with the dear, dead women of another
generation, the women his forefa-
thers had courted and married
against a setting of old rooms, dusky
with tradition, and an accompaniment
of harp-strings touched to sentiment-
al melody in dim twilights.
These long-haired and alluring
ghosts had been modest and womanly,
and for their vanished sakes Carruth-
ers was a throw-back and he knew
it. There were times when he wist-
fully fancied that if he threw back
far enough one of them might come
to life and let him do the pursuing
and the wooing—a procedure which,
he had heard, was not routine today.
It should be understood, perhaps,
that Carruthers’s major, if unadmit-
ted, reason for his general grudge
against the present-day girl had been
blond and ultra, and had happened
five years previously. His backbone
had been stiff with the starch of his
ideals, and although the minx had
loved him more than a little, she had
seen the unwisdom of life on an un-
comfortable pedestal—hers were dan-
cing feet if of common clay—and so
she had sent him away, and later
married a man of less critical nature.
When Carruthers was very bored
he could depart to a camp in the Ad-
irondacks where he maintained a
whiskery and taciturn caretaker, or
he could sail for Capri where he had
a villa, or he could look on a cottage
at Southampton or a bungalow at
Palm Beach; or, all else failing, he
could drop into his down-town office
and see how much money his late
father’s business had made for him
up to any sunny Saturday afternoon.
In the autumn of 1927, having cel-
ebrated his thirty-second birthday, he
elected for the camp, took his guns
and departed. He was tired of being
hunted and determined to revenge
himself somewhat upon more inno-
cent and easier game.
The camp was panacea. He spent
a week of tramping, shooting, grow-
ing a beard and eating fried food,
and wondering why he had been born.
He had also dreamed a little, in the
healing hush of the woods—dreamed
of the girl who did not and could not
exist. He fancied her beside him, and ' boy, Carruthers had them all stopped
ighed to think that strapped slippers
SL muslins and old laces would be,
somehow, what is wrong with this
picture.
It is rather hard to make a com- |
panion of an ideal. :
But Carruthers, musing upon what
appeared to him a doomed celibacy,
was not altogether unhappy, for it is
at least soothing to the vanity to re-
main faithful to a Cynara you have
never met,
He was trampling through a
hushed noon, under a soft gray sky—
a noon so still that no branch stirred
and he seemed to himself to be the
last man upon a deserted star—when
he was startled by a husky adolescent
voice near by, which said, conspicu-
ously, “Confound it!”
Carruthers stood still. Presently
he saw, crashing through the tangled
underbrush, weaving around the great
trunks of trees, the slim figure of a
boy with a head of rough red curls,
a gun in the hollow of his arm and
a dead cirgaret between lips that
smiled.
“Oh! Hello, there!” spoke the boy
in amiable accents. “Have you a
match? I dropped my infernal light-
er some miles ago.” :
Carruthers answered the greeting
and the smile, produced a light and
held it. Inhaling, the boy looked up
at him from tilted green eyes, and
Carruthers perceived that his new
acquaintance had a tanned and merry
face, and that across a short and in-
solent nose there was a bridge of gold-
en freckles.
“Am I shooting over your proper-
ty?” asked the youth casually. “If
so, I'm not sorry. Let's go!” .
“My property, yes, as it happens,
Carruthers answered pleasantly. But
yours to shoot over, of course. I'd
be glad of your company, if you care
to trail along with me. Where are
ou from?”
’ “Temporarily or chronically? If the
former, I'm staying at the Hastings
camp. You're Baird Carruthers, nat-
urally.” Sen
“Why naturally?” inquired Car-
ruthers, faintly amused.
“I've seen you—in town. I'm Les-
lie, Thorne, by the way”
Carruthers thought a moment.
Thorne? The railroad people, very
likely. More than likely, as old
Thorne was Hastings’s closest friend.
He said smiling:
“I'm glad to know you. I've met
your father and mother—and you've
a sister, haven’t you? I've heard—’
He broke off, vaguel embarrased.
The Thorne girl figured much in the
press. She was a polo, golf and ten-
nis-playing hoyden, with a string of
medals and cups to her everlasting
discredit. He trusted that face did
not reflect to her little brother what
he, Carruthers, though of this hard-
living, probably hard-smoking and
drinking female of the species.
The boy, walking on beside him, an-
swered, with a small crow of myster-
ious amusement: .
“A sister? Rather—” .
“She’s with you at the Hastings?”
“Yeos.?
Carruthers made fonversation
the net-that-I-give-a-hang manner.
Se erie is‘ a great athlete, IT
believe. I've not met her, but as I
said, one can’t help hearing—"
“She’s not so bad,” agreed the red-
headed boy and, throwing away his
cigaret, demanded joyously: “Well,
where do we go from here?”
They went to a number of places,
and Carruthers was impressed with
his companion. The boy had a steady
hand and a keen eye and such hon-
ors as there were fell to him. His
talk. slangy and witty, was enter-
taining. He had a strain of sound
common sense, and great physical en-
durance for his physique. Carruthers
found himself liking him immensely,
and judged him to be about seven-
teen, but wise for his years, though
not with the wisdom of the sleek-
haired specimens which Carruthers
had distastefully encountered at
home and abroad. .
They lunched on sandwiches and
chocolate, produced from Carruthers’s
ample pockets, and shared the con-
tents of a small coffee thermos. Lat-
er, as a premature dusk fell and the
first flakes of snow drifted downward
through the still air and the hushed
world grew cold, Carruthers, a little
reluctantly, offered his small flask
and, moralizing inwardly, watched
the boy take a moderate drink.
The not particularly successful ex-
pedition ended near the Carruthers
camp, and the two turned in there
to find the comfort of a blazing log
fire and old Hutchins busily engaged
at the cook-stove.
“Why do you go back to the Hast-
ings’ tonight?” Carruthers wished to
know. “It’s something of a tramp,
and I think we're in for a storm. I've
smelled snow all day, and it’s com-
ing down thicker.” 4
Young Thorne, half asleep in his
long chair, raised a flushed brown
cheek from his hand and slanted his
green eyes at his host. He said,
“Thanks, I'd like to,” and relapsed
into semi-slumber.
Carruthers observed him, half
amused half irritated. Youth was—
rather wonderful but exasperating,
somehow. “Hadn’t you better let
them know ?” he suggested. “We have
phones, you know.”
“They won’t worry, argued the boy
drowsily, but presently he staggered
sleepily to the instrument and called
the Hastings camp.
When the connection was estab-
lished Carruthers heard him ask for
Miss Thorne.
“Leslie speaking. I won't be back
tonight—stumbled into another
camp.” There was a pause, and then
the boy chuckled, “Baird Carruthers
in
«+. No—no. Keep your hair on
darling, do!” :
He hung up and went back to his
chair without comment. Presently
Hutchins had supper ready and his
customers did him justice, after
which Carruthers and his guest played
double Canfield at a cent a point un-
til nine o’clock, when, finding them-
selves putting red tens on red knaves,
they decided it was bedtime.
Carruthers accepted an I O U for
his inconsiderable winnings, and rose
to stretch luxuriously by the mantel.
Thorne watched him, noting the
breadth of shoulder and the trained
slimness of waist and hip. There
was no doubt about it, mused the
lon I es
Presently Thorne found himself the
recipient of pajamas sizes too large
for him, a shabby bath-robe and a
new tooth-brush. Carruthers escorted
him to the narrow guest-room, bade
him good night and left. When the
door had closed behind his host Les-
lie Thorne sat down on the edge of
a camp cot and regarded his calloused
palms thoughtfully. It was then that
Carruthers heard his guest’s laugh-
ter through the thin walls, and smiled
in sympathy and frowned in bewilder-
ment.
By midnight the wold about the
camp was a ghost world, and two
hours later the wind had risen and
was singing in the branches of the
patient trees. At seven the next
morning Leslie Thorne rose to look
out upon a driving wilderness of
white,
It snowed for four days, and for
that time the Carruthers camp was
habitation enforced for young Thorne.
Carruthers ran out of cigarets, and
his guest, with a nose slightly ele-
vated took bravely to one of his
host’s weathered pipes. But the days
passed, for Carruthers at least, with
astonishing speed. The boy was an
entertaining companion. He said lit-
tle about himself, and in answer to
Carruthers’s questions about school
answered “Tutors,” and let it go at
that. But he appeared to have been
all over the face of the globe, and
Carruthers was amused by his casual,
sometimes caustic and always shrewd
comments upon the ways of earth and
life in general.
He had, of course, the cynicism of
the very young, but hand in hand
with it there went a tolerance that
Carruthers himself had not yet
reached and, therefore, marveled ac-
cordingly.
The wires were down, of course,
and there was no communication with
the Hastings camp.
“Well,” remarked Carruthers com-
fortably, “as they know you are with
me, it’s all right,” and wondered why
Thorne laughed out suddenly, rifling
the pack of cards he was holding in
quick brown fingers, his eyes intent
upon the pasteboards, his red head
bent.
Cards! Every game the two could
play—with the blue smoke of tobacco
above the table and the flame gossip-
ing on the hearth, and Hutchins shif-
fling in and out, his lean face grave
as he pondered on their larder and
the possibility of another week of
storm. And in between Canfield and
Russian bank, spit-in-the-ocean. two-
handed bridge and cribbage, Carruth-
ers and the boy talked and laughed.
It was on the evening of the last day
that, the talk having turned on wom-
en, Carruthers found himself speak-
ing of the girl who did not exist.
“I'm a fool,” he said, laughing, sor-
everywhere—and she just isn’t—not
in this day and age.”
Thorne leaned forward, his elbows
on the table, a home-made cigaret in
his wide laughing mouth. He had
found cigaret papers and now rolled
his own from Carruthers’s pipe to-
bacco, cheerfully enough, ‘“Hock-bet-
fully, “and darned few guts!”
Carruthers whistled.
“You don’t like the word,” said
the youngster, and tossed his mop of
rough red curls, “and you hate to
hear it applied to women.” He ac-
cepted Carruthers’s silence as assent,
and went on doggedly, “But that’s be-
cause you don’t live in this world at
all, Carruthers, or you'd realize that
women have to have—well, you know
what—to get through at all. Life
hasn’t been made much easier for
them—freedom hasn’t helped them
much—and they aren’t so many gen-
erations removed from your girl with
the smelling-salts. They have to fall
in love and get married and have
children, don’t they? They have to
die—I suppose you’ll admit that? I
can’t see so much difference—--"
ness. He said gravely: “ Perhaps
you're right. I don’t know. How do
you know so muck, at your age?
“I have a sister——"
“I never had one. Does it alter the
view-point? I should have thought
that your sister was so much the
modern type that——"
“Modern!” The boy laughed, un-
apologetic for his interruption. “Be-
cause she’s considered a pretty good
sport? That's not modern. Even
some of your genteel ladies were
good sports—in another way, per-
haps. They didn’t jazz it up, of
course—" :
“Nevertheless,” said Carruthers,
“you’ve not converted me.”
“I didn’t expect to,” Thorne an-
swered quickly, “but all this chatter
about the present generation makes
—I mean, if I were thinking of get-
ting married, I would draw the line
at some sappy girl who would sit
around and coo at me and tell me how
wonderful I was all the time. That’s
what you want, isn’t it, boiled down?
I'd want a girl who knew a little
about life and wasn’t afraid of it—
a girl who was—a—well, a gentle-
man, if you understand what I mean.
One thing you'll have to say for the
sort of girls your sort of man knows
—they aren’t forever leaning on some
man’s neck for purposes of support,
as it were. They stand on their own
feet.” .
“Sometimes they—slip,” suggested
Carruthers, with unworthy cynicism.
He was amazed to see the green
eyes darken and the widen mouth
straighten. And when the breathless
defense came, he was amused at the
boy’s championship—and, obscurely
a little touched.
“Well, if they do,” said the young-
ter, and his voice shook, “they don’t
go around yapping about ‘the woman
pays,” do they? They take their med-
icine and they shut up. They don’t
put all the blame on the other bozo—
they play pretty darned fair nowa-
days. They don’t ‘stand for mar-
riages at the point of a gun and a cur-
tain ring off the minister's draperies
for a ‘pledge of undying love’—they
don’t go and weep on a man’s door-
step backed up by their entire fam-
ilies. They admit that they were as
much at fault as the other fellow.
They're sorry—which doesn’t undo
ry he had spoken, “but I look for her |
the boy flushed with his own earnest- |
me sick at my stomach. If I were a |
matters—and they try to be on the
square.”
“You're arguing,” remarked Car-
ruthers, “in favor of—well let's call
them light women. The double stand-
ard may be a pity, but it’s a pretty
steadfast institution.”
“I'm not arguing for light women,
as you call them,” the boy said hot-
ly. I'm arguing for—all women. I
take off my hat to 'em. And if there's
a double standard—and even you half
admit that there shouldn’t be -who
set it but you men!”
*““You men,” ” repented Carcuthers,
and laughed. “You're forgeltirg your
own sex, aren’t you?!”
¢ boy flushed,
slowty “No, I'm not.” He grinred a
iitt'e very impishly. “2nd anyway,
I'nt not quite adult enough to be in
vour ciass.”
“Hoy come,” asked Carruthers laz-
ily, “that the flapper has sach a
charapion in you?’
Thorne shook his head. “I'm not
champing for anyone,” he replied,
“but I like girls who see straight and
don’t wear corsets on their minds or
their bodies—who aren’t afraid of
their own shadow—or anyone else's.
I like girls who can be friends with
a man, too, comrades——"
“There aren’t any—nowadays.”
“Were there any in the days you
are thinking about?” asked the boy
quickly. “I don’t mean the pioneer
women—those were women, if you
like. I mean the girls of yesterday
you were talking about a moment
ago—all frills and stays and curls,
sitting around waiting for some man
to come and support them. Talk
about sex appeal today! Why those
women were sex appeal incarnate—
that’s about all they were too.”
“Well, I must say—” began Car-
ruthers, somewhat scandalized.
Thorne laughed. “I'm sorry. I
suppose I've been awfully rude. For-
get it. If this storm keeps up much
longer, Ill have to borrow one of
your shirts—this one of mine isn’t
so good.”
“You're welcome to my entire
wardrobe,” said Carruthers heartily.
“All you have to do is help your-
self.”
“I probably won't need to. It’s
stopped snowing, really and I should
be able to make the Hastings camp
tomorrow on snow-shoes. Hutchins
showed me a stack of ’em. Mind if
I borrow a pair?”
“No. But I'll miss you,” comment-
ed Caruthers sincerely.
He looked across the card-table and
reflectad that he never had been as
and answered
Kids were pretty fine, after all. He
found himself wishing, suddenly, that
he were a few years older, with a
son of his own like this boy—clean
and laughter-loving and fearless. Ev-
en his mistaken championships were
| somehow, endearing.
He went to bed with this thought
"in his mind and wondered if he were
| growing sentimental, and laughed as
{ he substituted “goofy” for the softer
i term, “Goofy” was the guest's favor-
| ite insult.
i When Carruthers woke the next
{ morning he found himself planning
ot- | not to lose Leslie Thorne—not to let |
tle shoulders,” he commented scorn- (him go, altogether. He'd surely see |
[the boy sometimes. They’d got on so
{ well together in their enforced in- |
timacy—surely Leslie wouldn’t mind
a game of golf now and then.
After breakfast, which was unus-
{ually silent, Thorne announced his
| immediate departure. The world was
i blanketed with snow, but the wind
{was down and the sun shining—it
‘would be no trick at all to get back
to camp.
i “I'll come along,” said Carruthers.
i For the first time he saw Thorne
(ill at ease as he answered reluctant-
i “If you wish, of course. But
i there’s no need. I’ll have no trouble
| finding my way back.”
| The husky voice that was more
i contralto than baritone was cool, and
| to steady green eyes which were not
entirely—friendly. He stiffened a lit-
tle. Of course if the youngster was
bored with him . . .
| Irritated out of all proportion, he
‘answered, as coolly as the boy,
! “That’s all right, then.”
| Leslie busied himself with prepara-
| tions for departure, and a rather hos-
tile silence hovered over the two. But
{when they were out on the door-sill,
rand Thorne was set to go, he turned
i back to give his hand to Carruthers
‘ for the second time.
“Thanks,” he said, “a lot and
was gone before Carruthers could ask
him how long he would be at the
Hastings’. .
That, however, was easily reme-
died. He would ring up in a few days,
he thought; when the wires were
available again, and talk to the boy.
They’d been too good friends to part
quite as casually as that.
It was three days before he estab-
' lished communication with the Hast-
ings camp and Carruthers was able
to call up He found himself talking
to Mr. Hastings’s secretary.
“I wonder if I might speak to Mr.
Thorne.”
“Mr. Thorne? Mr. Thorne is not
here,” the answer came in a ladylike
and Bostonian accent.
“He has left, then?”
“He has never been here” was the
weary reply. “His daughter and sis-
ter——"
“Oh, I see,” cut in Carruthers. “I
didn’t mean the elder Mr. Thorne. I
meant his son, Leslie.”
Apparently she didn’t get that, for
she said, with a sort of gasp, “You
mean Miss Thorne—Miss Leslie
Thorne? She left for New York yes-
terday.
She waited for Carruthers to make
some comment or, perhaps, to say
good-by. All she heard was the
click of the instrument as Carruthers
slammed it down.
Miss—Leslie—Thorne . .
Confound it, she looked like a boy
-—the slim, straight figure and the
2”
mop of curls! And talked like a boy,
too, in her husky adolescent sort of
voice! And acted like a boy!
What the so-and-so did she mean
by putting him in such a ‘position?
he asked himself furiously. And what
would her people think, what would
they say, knowing she had spent four
days with him, snowed in, away from
%
EER
contented during the last four days. |
rather blunt features and the rough:
lal the world—four days and nights
of blizzard?
Her aunt knew—he supposed now
that was her aunt with whom she
had spoken when she telephoned—
and the Hastings, of course.
Her reputation! Well, what was
her reputation to him? He hoped
he’d never see her again.
And he went back to New York
raging, aware that he was hurt as
well as angry. For he missed the
boy who had been his comrade and
his companion—the boy who had giv-
en him back his belief in Youth—the
boy he had wished was his own son.
The thought of that made him laugh,
very angrily. The boy had never
existed. There had been only a mod-
ern young woman with a boy’s head
and a boy’s figure—a young woman
who had shot straight, taken her
whisky neat, who had sworn and
laughed and played with him—who
had taken advantage of his natural
mistake at their first meeting to
make a fool of him.
He had been fond of the boy. He
hated the girl.
Back in New York, a note from her
reached him. In it was the check for
his consistent winnings at cards, and
a line or two:
Dear Baird Carruthers:
By now you’ye found out, of
course. I'm sorry if you're an-
gry, but I know you are. Don't
forgive me—and don’t forget me.
Blame it on the modern woman,
if you wish, and be gratified that
the Other Generation girl would
never have done such a thing.
As for me, I'm not as ashamed
as I should be—and I had an aw-
fully good time. Take this for
the bread-and-butter letter that
is due you.
Very sincerely yours,
Leslie Thorne
In the same mail was a note from
Hutchins to the effect that Mr.
. Thorne had had the snow-shoes sent
over from the Hastings camp.
| Carruthers tore up the check—a
; very senseless procedure and very an-
.noying to any good bank. Then he
burned the letter viciously.
Not long after, he went abroad.
And ore reason he went was because,
picking up a smart magazine devoted
i to the doings of any unusual person,
he found a page of pictures—pictures
of Leslie Thorne. He threw the mag-
azine in a corner, and then went and
picked it up again. Leslie in a rid-
ing-habit; Leslie in a shooting kit—
the kit he knew; Leslie astride a
pony with a polo mallet in her hand;
Leslie walking down the Avenue in
| a tailor-made; and Leslie in an even-
| ing gown—skirts bouffant as flow-
jer petals, a tight little bodice, her
short, curly hair haloing her face.
As straight as a boy’s eyes, her eyes;
as straight as a boy’s back, her back;
"and yet—her lips and the curve of her
woman.
| Carruthers buried the magazine
, under a pile of newspapers and—went
i abroad.
He was in Capir when the first ru-
| mors reached him. He was lunching
jat a hotel with some friends when he
heard women talking at the next ta-
ble. He heard her nanie ‘mentioned,
‘and he caught much of the general
| heads-together buzz which followed.
“A week, I understand ... Yes,
| all alone in a camp . . . Well, I must
| say, girls nowadays ... No, I don’t
| know who the man was... If I
thought that my Sophie would!” . .
et cetera.
Carruthers felt his eyes and his
face burn. Leslie! Leslie Thorne!
The fearless eyes and the proud
small head—the eyes wounded and
cast down—the head bowed ... He
shuld think it—he dared not think
1t.
i The lovely room, as colorful and
as animated as a flower garden,
turned black and misty. Carruthers
pulled himself together and turned to
. speak to the woman in his party, the
. wife of one friend and the sister of
Carruthers was amused to see how | Carruthers found himself looking in- | another. She too, had heard, for she
leaned toward him, her pretty face
alight with malice.
“They’re talking about Leslie
Thorne, of course. But then, every-
body is. It was more than a nine-
days’ wonder.”
“What about her?” asked Carruth-
ers, in a voice strange to himself.
“My dear, don’t tell me you haven't
heard! Where on earth have you
been? Even Basil”’—she nodded at
her husband—*“knows, and he’s gen-
erally deaf, dumb and blind to gos-
sip. But this isn’t gossip. She was
visiting at the Hastings camp last
winter, and went out alone with her
gun—she’s always done fool things
like that. She wandered into some
man’s camp—one doesn’t hear wheth-
er by accident or design; opinions as
to that vary—and she stayed there
alone with him for four days. I
don’t know who the man was. The
Hastings know, and her people do.
Her people, by the way, have sent
her to Coventry. They've always let
her do much as she pleased, but
they're a proud pair and hate scandal
-—always have—and this was cer-
tainly a large, virile blot on the
scutcheon. So, for once, they called
a halt, and I have heard she doesn’t
go out any more.
“Her father wanted to get after
the man—with a good old-fashioned
horsewhip, I understand—but Leslie
threatened all sorts of terrible things
if the man were even approached.
She said it wasn’t his fault, that he
had taken her for a boy, and it wasn’t
up to her to disillusion him—even at
the price of her reputation. Well,
one wasn’t born yesterday, so one
doesn’t quite believe that. But rath-
er than have her leave home—she
has her own income—and cause more
an worse talk, the Thornes agreed to
leave the man out of it. I never did
like Leslie Thorne,” interpolated Mrs.
Howard plaintively and virtuously.
Carruthers lost the rest of the
monolog.
That night, under a dark blue Ital-
ian sky, he had it out with himself.
What a mess she had made of it
all! And it was her fault. But she
was, he conceded grudgingly, what
she once had told him she admired in
women. She was a sport and a gent-
leman.
It was curious that he had never
thought seriously of gossip—like un-
to a band-wagon—following the epi-
sode? At first, when he learned who
his late guest was, he had thought of
it angrily and fieetingly, like a small
sullen boy, “She’ll be sorry, and I
don’t care!” But after that he had
been too busy trying to salve the
wound to his pride—for she had made
a fool of him, hadn’t she?
Here he stopped short and reflected
that she might have made a fool of
him—but not a knave. Too busy, his
thoughts went on, trying to escape
her—remembrance of the boy in
camp, the comrade boy with the slant-
ed green eyes and the laughter-loving
mouth—too busy cursing the editors
of magazines which printed her pic-
tures, to think about gossip.
Now he had to think about it. There
was only one way: he reflected fur-
iously, to have his just revenge, to
ut her in her place—woman’s place
eing, as he had always held, in the
home.
He sailed for New York, and
stayed there long enough to discover
that the Thornes were on Long
Island, “in,” as some said cattily, “se-
clusion.”
He went to Long Island and he
saw Mr. Thorne. He sent in his card
with a message written firmly be-~
neath his name, a message potent
enough to give him access to the
great library overlooking the Sound
where old Thorne stood—not so old,
after all—frowning over the imcred-
ible audacity of the fellow.
What was said then, in the room
that smelled of leather bindings and
violets and salt, no one ever told—
not Thorne and not Carruthers. There
were grave words and deferential
words, and then laughter and the
sound of elderly profanity. And at
the end, a hand-clasp.
Then Carruthers went out to find
Leslie.
She was not “going out” That
much her family insisted upon. So
he found her, alone on the beach, in
a suit of that amazing scarlet which
does not quarrel with red curls and
wondered, as she sprang to her feet
and faced him, why he had ever
thought her a boy.
.The slim straight body was deli-
ciously faintly curved, and a strap
had slipped over one shoulder, show-
ing a band of skin the color of cream.
“You!”
He wasted no words.
ing to marry me!”
“I am not!”
They stood and glared at each oth-
er,
Carruthers said, choked: “You dear,
darned little fool! As if I'd let you
g0 _on—being chivalrous!”
She said, flushed: “I'm to make an
honest man of you, then?”
.He was so angry at that that he
simply walked up to her and took
her in his arms and kissed her, tem-
porarily, he let her go, and said:
“If you want to put it like that.”
“But—but—"
“Keep quiet!”
He silenced her effectively, for the
moment. She said after a pause:
“I—fell in love with your looks—
ages ago. I nearly shot myself out
of sheer excitement when I met you
—there, in the wood.”
“We'll go back for our honeymoon.
I can still beat you at Canfield.”
After another entirely marvelous
interval she said, suddenly very
grave: “But I'm not your type of gir}
at all. You hate everything I do—
everything I stand for—everything I
am. Look at me, Baird!”
He looked—at the tanned, square
face, at the green eyes, tilted, and
the wide mouth, which was now
touched with an unnatural, glowing
scarlet. And he kissed her again . .
and again... and once more. . .
“You're everything I love—and
like. I liked that boy. He was my
friend. I thought——Leslie, darling,
I thought—if I could have a son like
that!” of
She closed her eyes and leaned her
head against his shoulder. And hold-
ing her, he bade good-by to the dear
ghosts of another day—the ghosts
who could not have given him the
gay, sexless companionship of four
snowy days—the ghosts who would
not have taken all the blame had they
ventured to an escapade and been
found out—the lady ghosts who
would not have been gentlemen.
He said—and found that he meant
it, and meant it for the rest of the
lovely, exciting, undreamed-of life
which lay before him:
“You're all IT ever wanted .. ”
—By Faith Baldwin in the Cosmopolitan
msg
“You're go
he said furiously.
Shortening Motor Routes in the Old
Keystone State.
Completion and opening to traffic
of two pieces of road construction
work in Pennsylvania, has shortened
the former Philadelphia-Baltimore
route by eight miles. The former
road is earried over the top of the
new Conowingo dam, in Maryland,
while the latter road is reconstructed
over what was once an old stage trail.
The other construction work was
on the William Penn Highway, be-
tween Amity Hall and Newport, west
of Harrisburg. The cut-off is built
over the old stage road which follows
the Juniata River, but which was
abandoned in 1889 after it had been
damaged by heavy floods. Whereas
the old road was a few inches above
the stream’s water level, the new
road is 20 feet higher.
With the opening of the cut-off the
motorist will follow the Juniata River
for about 60 miles, through some of
the most beautiful of Pennsylvania’s
scenery, from Clark’s Ferry Bridge
to Lewistown.
Practically Arrived.
Hiram had walked four miles over
the Great Smokies to call on his lady
fair. For a time they sat silent on
a bench by the side of her log cabin,
but soon the moon, as moons do, had
its effect and Hiram slid closer to
her and patted her hand.
“Mary,” he began, “y’know I got
a clearin’ over thar and a team an’
wagon an’ some hawgs an’ cows, an’
I ’low to build me a house this fall
an’~-"
Here he was interrupted by Mary’s
mother who was awakened.
“Mary,” she called in a loud voice,
is that young man thar yit?”
Back came the answer: “No maw,
but he’s gettin’ thar.”