Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/485

Rh "Aunt Sue," he said, as though he was communicating a capital joke, "I've got the mitten!"

"That contemptible little Jenny Brewster hasn't—"

"Yes she has. Her 'ma' says that they met a young man on their travels last Summer, and Jenny discovered she had never known what love meant before, and—"

"Jack Claës," I interrupted, "what ever made you such a precious fool as to fall in love with Jenny Brewster?"

"Aunt Sue," he answered, "I felt that I had gone pretty far with Jenny—farther than I ever meant to. And she made me believe that her very life would be the forfeit of her unrequited affections;" his eyes twinkled again. "During the week or two before she came down with that fever her mother wrote me that Jenny was going in a decline, and accused, me of having trifled with her, insinuating that my conduct would cost her child's life. I couldn't stand that. I offered myself by return mail."

"Without really caring for her?"

"I—I—" he stammered; "Aunt Sue, I declare I didn't dare analyze my own feelings at that time. I had seen one woman who"—he stopped a minute. "But I did not believe I had the slightest chance of making her love me."

—"That woman is—"

"Camilla Mason."

"And now, Jack?"—

He jumped up. "Now, Aunt Sue, I am going to her."

We went into the sitting room together. He walked straight toward Miss Mason, who stood in the window, looking out rather sadly at the gray gloom of the day. His face was all alight. He put his hands out:

"Camilla"—in his nervous, vibrant voice—"I am free!"

Her eyes turned to him, uncertain, half reproachful. Suddenly comprehending and answering the passion of his eyes, she took the hands he held toward her in her own, and bowed her face upon them. He drew her to him, held her tight and close in his arms, pressed his kisses against the pale, amber-colored hair that coiled around the lovely head which dropped contentedly upon his shoulder—

You see they didn't mind me! And, after all, our Martinmas evening was neither sullen nor dull!

P. S.—I must tell you how it turned out about Mr. Holt. He went off travelling, and three months later brought home a wife. She wears Camilla's pearls and my cashmere. I'm glad his things didn't spoil, as my cake had to! Matrimony seems to agree with him. He doesn't cough near as much like a cat.