Page:"A modern Hercules", the tale of a sculptress (IA amodernherculest00wins).pdf/21

Rh never was a thief but once, and had spent some years of devotion in paying his victim for the theft.

One day Paul was passing a great brown stone palace. A man was carrying in huge blocks of marble. He called on the boy to help him. Paul readily assented.

In one of the rooms stood a majestic woman. When Paul's eyes fell upon the vision he dropped his burden, and as it crashed upon the floor he stood like one transfixed. To his starving, neglected, hungry soul it seemed as though some goddess had dropped to the earth from the stars, and the woman looked at him with uncommon interest.

In a voice that thrilled him with unknown, undefinable, undreamed-of longings, she said, "I want you."

"Yes," he said, as in a dream.

Thenceforth Paul Strogoff entered the household of Ouida Angelo, the sculptress, as a model. For the first time in his life, he felt that he was human.

Monday's papers were full of Dr. Nugent's sermon, and its sensational termination. Tongues wagged fierce concerning the artistic creation, its creator, and the fearless, the eloquent divine.

"The sensation of the season has arisen out of 'A Grecian Temptress,' by Ouida Angelo. Only crude,