Anne O'Hagan

“ Imposing drives cut its long stretch of lawn; pale wistaria clung to its rough sides; back of it, an orchard was beautiful. It was so fair, so peaceful a place that Miss Crystal forgot, in her content with it, to be envious of those to whom it belonged. A kindly glow pervaded her for the bride who was to go forth from a shelter so perfect as this to the dearer one that love should make for her. ”

“ He was still blushing over the access of sentiment which had prompted his offering, but he whistled and switched the more strenuously to hide his embarrassment.
"Some time I am coming to see you," declared Miss Crystal, earnestly, as the station-agent shambled out to flag the train. She was a woman of impulses. The half-hour in the dim grove, with the sweetness of the earth in her nostrils and the sight of the children in her eyes, seemed to her now miraculous, a sacred wonder wrought for her salvation. "I am coming to see you surely. ”

“ Even through a telephone receiver, McCready thought, a man must perceive and appreciate the finality of Miss Crystal's tones.
"I'm sorry, Mr. McCready," began Miss Crystal, appearing at the desk. "I forgot to get the names of the ushers and the list of the guests. I—I felt suddenly ill during the ceremony, and came away."
"Let it go," mumbled McCready. "Big strike ordered at the cotton works in Fall River; no room for weddings, anyway, to-morrow. And now. Miss Crystal, Mrs. McCready wants you to come up to dinner with us to-night—oh, yes, perfectly informally. No one else there but Walton. ”

“ Dick, look up trains to Glen Ridge for Miss Crystal."
When, finally, the door of the city room closed upon her departing figure, McCready ruminated: "See how that'll strike her. Wedding—'Voice that breathed'—tum, tum, te-tum!—'Cherish so long as ye both shall—' Maybe, she'll come to her senses. She can't want to do wrong, and there's no half-way with Duncan—not for a woman in her position. ”

“ The door of the telephone booth was open. McCready noticed with a grim amusement that Miss Crystal went at once to it, and did not go to her desk to begin work when she came in. He heard her call. Indeed, it must be recorded that McCready did not conscientiously try to avoid hearing the call.
"Is that Mr. Duncan? Yes? This is Miss Crystal, Mr. Duncan. I shall not be at home this evening. You remember I promised to let you know. No, no. Oh, no, thank you! No. It is quite impossible. To-morrow? ”

“ They always do, no matter what they pretend," said McCready, with the conviction of a man who does not have to put his faith to the test. Miss Crystal did not attempt to controvert the favorite axiom of her editor, unless her colorless smile could be construed as argument. ”

“ Later, lunching with Williamson, the advertising man, he had anxiously inquired—veiling both question and anxiety under gruff declaration—if women were not always sentimentalist—turned into the paths of peace or of disquietude by the mere influence of the moment, played upon by the [moods] , likely to become as little children [as they] heard an old tune. And when Williamson indifferently agreed McCready banished the furrow from his face and the fear from his heart, telling himself again that "the wedding service would fetch her."
Commonly, Miss Crystal loathed her work. ”

“ Ladies, the conscientious brilliancy of whose complexions and jewels ought to have atoned for the somewhat tarnished luster of their minds, ate and drank expensively with escorts of callow ecstasy or of satiated self-indulgence, while other women studied them with frank insolence, or ignored them blandly. ”

“ He had said, once or twice, that there was enough cheap flippancy, enough mock pathos and enough sham philosophy in the paper, and that her clear, cool English was a joy after the perfervid rhetoric of the "stars." ”

“ It was monstrous that she, working hard, working alone, so wretched and companionless that she could contemplate temptation without shrinking—it was monstrous that she should be sent to witness the prosperous—oh, the very highly prosperous!—wedding of the man whom she had once expected to marry herself! That she should have to report the wedding of Owen Bromley! How had it happened? She tore at her purse, jerked the clipping from it. Idiot that she had been not to have looked before! The statement was perfectly clear:
On Tuesday, April 26, Miss Henrietta Greyer, the youngest daughter of Mr. ”