J. Storer Clouston

“ No, Halfred, U. D. T. did not mean “Undertake to return,” but bore a much graver significance, and this news made me so thoughtful that at least one pair of bright eyes remarked it at breakfast.
“No bad news, I hope,” said Daisy, as we went together to the door to inspect the weather.
“None that you cannot make me forget,” I replied, with a more serious gallantry than I had yet shown towards her.
A little rise of color in her face did indeed make me forget all less absorbing matters.
“By the time you leave us, you perhaps won't find us still so consoling,” she replied, with a smile. ”

“ I dressed myself with the most scrupulous accuracy, for I was resolved that nothing about me should suggest the novice. My pink coat fitted to within half a little wrinkle in an inconspicuous place, my breeches were a miracle of sartorial art, the reflection from my top-boots perceptibly lightened the room. No one at the breakfast-table cut more dash. I had secured a seat beside Miss Trevor-Hudson and we jested together with a friendliness that must have disturbed Lumme, for he watched us furtively, with a dark look on his face, and never addressed a word to a soul all the time. ”

“ Fisher of the puffy cheek, poor Dugald Cellarini, and these two vast, blue-coated, thief-catching “bobbies” (as with kindly humor the English term their police) ; all save Dugald looking terribly solemn and important. He, poor man, strove hard to give the affair a lighter turn, but what is one artist in a herd of Philistines? I was not appreciated; that is the truth. A man may defy an empire, a papal bull, an infectious disease, but a prejudice—never! “Constable,” says Fisher, “I have caught him.” Both bobbies look at me with much the same depressing glance as Fisher himself. ”

“ Not that I should have objected very strongly to take Halfred's place as audience one day, for these further opportunities of seeing Miss Titch roused in me some sympathy with my valet. Aramatilda was undoubtedly attractive with her hair freed from a too severe restraint, a plump, brown-eyed young woman, smiling in the most engaging fashion when politely addressed. Indeed, I should have addressed her more frequently had not Halfred shown such evident interest in her himself. In these matters I have always held it better that master and man should be separately apportioned. ”

“ To d'Haricot from d'Haricot.—Foolish friend, beware of those things they call eyes, of that substance they term hair, of that abstraction known as a smile, and, above all, beware of those twin lies styled lips. They kiss but in the intervals of kissing others; they speak but to deceive. Nevermore shall I regard a woman more seriously than I do this pretty, revolving ring of cigarette smoke. ”

“ She was like her daughter, smaller and slighter than the muscular race of Shaftheads, gray-haired and very charming and simple in her manner. Daisy stood beside her, and both women glanced anxiously from one to the other of us. What those who knew him could read in Sir Philip's countenance, I cannot say. For myself, I merely professed my entire readiness for lunch and my appreciation of Helmscote, but, surreptitiously catching Daisy's eye, I gave her a glance that was intended to indicate a fair possibility of fine weather. ”

“ N the following morning Kate and I met as usual in the office of the mission; and as usual she appeared three quarters of an hour after the time she was nominally to be expected. She looked more ravishing than ever; the art that conceals art had never more inconspicuously pervaded every line and shade of her garments, every tress of her hair; her smile opened up a long vista of possibilities. ”

“ Since my appearance upon the music-hall stage I have enjoyed the society of my Oxford friends while they remained in town; I have revelled with Teddy; I have had my “burst”; and now the reaction has come. The solace of my most real and intimate friend, Dick Shafthead, is denied me, for he has apparently left London for a time; at any rate, his rooms are shut up and he is not there. No company now but regrets and cynical reflections. A short time ago what bright fancies were visiting me!
“Woman gives and woman takes away,” I said to myself. “But she takes more than she gives!” ”

“ Supposing, then, that Lumme was also hastening to meet me, he might even now be close at hand! I crouched behind a thorn-bush and listened.
It was a still, delightful morning; the sun just risen; the air fresh; no motion in the branches. Every little sound could be distinctly heard, and presently I heard one; a something moving in another thicket not ten paces away. I raised my gun, aimed carefully, and pulled the trigger.
The stealthy sound ceased, and instead a pheasant flew screaming out of the wood. ”

“ This Temple where Dick lived is not a church, though there is a church within it. It is one of those surprising secrets that London keeps and shows you sometimes to reconcile you to her fogs. Out of the heart of the traffic and the noise you turn through an ancient archway into a rabbit warren of venerable and sober red buildings ”

“ I share your sentiments and I judge your case for you. What is life without woman, without love? Would you place your income, your prospects, the sordid aspects of your life, even the displeasure of relations, before the most sacred passion of your heart? Dick, if you do not say to this dear girl, 'I love you; let the devil himself try to part us! ”

“ Dick says—Good shot! Was that the bird you aimed at?”
“Mademoiselle, it was the bird a far-seeing Providence placed within the radius of my shot. 'L'homme propose; Dieu dispose.'”
“I shouldn't trust to Providence too much,” said she.
Well, between Heaven and Miss Shafthead, aided, I must say for myself, by a hand and eye that were naturally quick and not unaccustomed to exercises of skill, I managed by the end of the day to successfully uphold the honor of my country. The light was fading when we stopped the battue, the air was sharp, and the ground crisp with frost. ”

“ I adjusted my shining hat upon my head and went out to look for Halfred. There he was, the centre evidently of considerable interest and admiration, perched high upon one of the gigantic and noble quadrupeds, and grasping the other by the reins. His livery of deep-plum color, relieved by yellow cording, easily distinguished him from all other grooms, while my two steeds appeared scarcely to be able to restrain their generous impatience, for it required three villagers at the head of each to control their exhilaration. ”

“ Again Dick was silent for a minute, and then he went on: “Look here, d'Haricot, old man, this is how it is. I know my father; he's one of the best, but if I've got any prejudices I inherit them honestly. What he likes he likes, and what he doesn't like he doesn't like. He doesn't like Agnes, he doesn't like her family—or didn't like 'em. He doesn't like younger sons marrying poor girls. On the other hand, he does like the 'right kind of people,' as he calls 'em, and the right sort of marriage, and he does like me too well, I think, to see me doing what he doesn't like. ”

“ I interposed amicably, “I have in my overcoat pocket a box of chocolate creams. Honor me by accepting them!”
Not even this overture could mollify Miss Clibborn, and presently she departed again with a sad glance at her lukewarm ally and frivolous secretary.
Ah, how divine Kate looked as she consumed those bonbons and our talk turned back to Plato! So divine, indeed, that I felt suddenly impelled to ask a question, to solve a little lingering doubt that sometimes would persist in coming to poison my faith in my friend. ”

“ I am even more ignorant of your virtuous country than I imagined. Forgive me, I implore you! I shall endow your mission with fifty pounds; I shall walk home barefoot; you have but to name my penance and I shall undergo it!”
Whether it was that my contrition was so complete or for some more flattering reason that I may not hint at, I cannot tell you to this day, but certainly Miss Kerry proved more lenient than I had any right to expect. Not that she did not give me as unpleasant a quarter of an hour as I have ever tingled through. I, indeed, got “what for,” as the English say. ”

“ We get pains inside and little nourishment.”
“I like her awfully,” said poor Teddy.
“Who would not?” I replied. “If a girl is beautiful, charming, not too chary of her favors, and yet not inartistically lavish; if she knows how to let a smile spring gently from an artless dimple, how to aim a bright eye and shake a light curl; and if she is not too fully occupied with others to spare one an hour or two of these charms, who would not like her? ”

“ At this there is a pause, nobody volunteering to run with this message to the bedside of Miss Fisher, though I glance pointedly at Holmes, and even make the money in my pocket jingle. At last comes a sound of stifled air trying to force a passage through something dense. It proceeds, I notice, from my friend Fisher. Then it becomes a more articulate though scarcely less disagreeable noise.
“I do not believe a word you say, sir!” he booms.
“My friend, you are an agnostic,” I reply, with a smile.
Fisher only breathes with more apparent difficulty than ever. ”

“ To me, meeting her dark eyes for an instant, and then seeing the fair, full face turn to a fair profile as she looks away in some confusion, she seems beyond doubt very beautiful. A simple straw hat covers her dark coil of hair and slopes arrogantly forward over a luminous and brilliant eye; her nose is straight, her mouth small, suggesting decision and a little petulance, her chin deep and finely moulded, her complexion delicate as a rare piece of alabaster, while her figure matches these distracting charms. ”