The Storyteller.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2586, 21 August 1909, Page 1 (Supplement)

The Storyteller.

TEMPORARY AFFECTION.

(By ..Elizabeth Dutton.) <sYoung woman, you'll have to toko . a long . vacation.” */ Sherman listened to the doctor ■with philosophic calm. It was her policy to bo calm, even when, as in the present case, she was angry. Miss Sherman did not like vacations. “Very well,” she said, “1 will go to a quiet place. I will finish my treatise on 'Comparative Antliropoligy !’ ” The doctor put a fatherly hand on Miss Sherman’s' arm. “Don’t go to a quiet place,” he caid. “Sail, swim, dance, flirt.” Under Miss Sherman’s spectacled,, expressionless gaze he paused, with a faint feeling that his advice was ill-judged. “Dance,” he finished vaguely. Miss Sherman fingered her glasses, nml furnished the doctor with a fresh inspiration. “Get. those things ofF,” he said. “It’s only for reading that you need them, and you’re not to do" any reading for the next three months.” “But I’ve worn them five years,” . said Miss Sherman. “Then it’s time you gave them a rest,” said the. doctor. “Your eyes will show the strain at first by a slight involuntary motion in the l:d of the weaker eye, the left one. The affection will be intermittent, infrequent, and, I would say, temporary. Consult your oculist, of course, but do as I say.” “Tho treatise—” began Miss Sherman.

“Young woman,” said the doctor, “do you want to have nervous prostration.”

A “ ‘Comparative Anthropology! 7 ” he snorted at Miss Sherman’s trim, res treating bath; “that girl’s not a day over twenty-eight.” Miss Sherman was not often referred to' as a girl. She was dean of a woman’s college, the youngest dean in America. Her youth was generally lost sight of in the fact that she was a dean, or concealed by her impersonal manner, which diverted the confidences and violets of the girls under, her -charge to older, less beautiful, but more sympathetically inclined members of the faculty. Miss Sherman was probably the only woman at Huntley who moved no young heart to tears in the general good-byes at the end of the year. Undisturbed by the lack of emotional excitement, she. finished her unhurried packing, and, early in June, stepped on board the Bar Harbor Express, cool, carefully tailored, and, in tardy but literal obedience to the doctor's orders, without her glasses. “Pullman cheque, please,” said the porter, barring her way. ‘ j. have no cheque,” said Miss Sherman, who regarded railway employees -.as natural enemies of the human race, and treated them accordingly. What seats can you let me have?” “Pullman chairs all sold,” explained the porter;’ without interest. “Day coach, five cars in the rear.” At this point he stopped rjhort in natural surprise. The station was hot, crowded and glaring. The light would ' ' have been a strain on normal eyes. Her level, intense gaze did not waver, but the corner of her left eyelid twitched faintly, revealing a knowing flash of brown. Miss Slierman bad winked. A slow grin spread over tbe porter’s countenance. His eyes widened with delighted understanding. “All right, lady,” he cried. “Oh, all right. I’ll fix you up some way. You just step in here, and you give me that,” He reached for Miss Sherman’s neat dressing bag. “It’s too heavy for you to carry!” Without comprehending the situation, Miss Sherman followed the obsequious porter into the car, accepted the chair he procured, and let him lower the shades, bring cushions and open windows unregarded. She felt ■tired, bored, and rather frightened. She had ’left her notes on “Comparative Anthropology” locked in her study desk, because she knew their power to tempt her into disobeying tile doctor; and she missed the closely written, • accurately indexed pages, and folt gloomily distrustful of the Maine coast colony she had chosen at random from a stray circular. “Malden by the sea,” it had read. “Best of facilities for boating, bathing and deep-sea fishing; wooded walks and drives into the interior./ 'Weekly hops at the Casino a feature of the social life.” If she must go somewhere, what did it matter where she went ? “What does it matter?” she asked herself that evening, arrived at Mal- . den and sitting in the dining-room of the little hotel. Supper instead of dinner was barbarous, of course, but she meant to prolong this supper as much as possible, because she did not know what to do next. It was a good supper. Miss Sherman liad forgotten the existence of Johnny cake and fresh ’ flounders. A pleasant smell of coffee filled the low-ceiled room. The room would have been charming in its wellkept bareness, except for the curiously. trving light made by the blending of tbe candle rays with the glare of the sunset that was reflected from the -water through the uncurtained win-. - ’flows. Miss Sherman glanced inclifferentlj out at the water, and back into the room at- the people there. They u ere all niklp;;. nearly all laughing and. : nciv ' v ali young; girls in delicate dres-

.ees, and boys for them to make eyes at. Across the room Miss Sherman saw a boy with blue eyes and a deep sea tan. She looked for a minute at the contrast between his eves and his brown cheeks, classed him as older than the rest, a man, not a. boy, and caught up her bread and began to crumble it, fixing her eyes upon it with embarassed attention. For, with.a puzzled, pleased expression, the man had smiled and bowed to Miss Sherman.' And the hot twitching'of her eyelid failed to convey to her unsuspecting mind the fact that the man had smiled because he had seen Miss Sherman draw down the corner of her left eye.

Leaving the room, she caught sight of her face in a mirror. The cheeks were tinted with faint pink; the mouth was smiling; the eyes, freed from the glasses, showed - brown, and sweet. But the charm of the effect was forgotten by Miss Sherman in the painful fact that, as she looked, the left eye of the reflection winked at her.

A faint, polite ghost of a wink it was. The man across the room did not call it a- wink at all. He had seen a glinfc of brown under a fluttering lid, a quaint, mocking light, that died away from the classic beauty of Miss Sherman’s features with a promptness that left him piqued and charmed. But Miss Sherman did not 'know this. She- knew she had winked, that the conduct of the stranger and the porter woe explained, and any future misfortune* with it, and that she, Helena Sherman, had disgraced herself. She gathered up her crisp skirts, fled in terror to 'the furthest corner of the piazza, pushed a chair into the shelter cf the vines and crouched there, breathless. She had no intention of hiding in her room. She was safe here. She was comfortable, too. lllie vino blew against her cheek; she sniblt flowers she did not know, and heard music that was equally unfamiliar to ears long attuned to the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s conscientious rendering oi newly discovered masterpieces for the first and last time on any stage. In. the hotel parlor one piano and one violin, their machine-like action softened by distance, were playing a light, steady, throbbing waltz. “They’ve got the ‘Merry AYidow’ music down here,” said a man s voice close to her. “I’ve seen that show sixteen times. I am not ashamed cf it, but I pretend to be.” Miss Sherman turned to meet the eyes of the gentleman with the deep sea tan. “It is Miss Andrews, isn’t it?” he said. Miss Sherman shook her head in speechless wrath. The man sat down on the railing in front of her. “Then if you aren’t Miss Andrews,” he said, “suppose you tell me who you are.” ■ Miss Sherman wondered what one said to a rude man like this. With a range of thought whose novelty did not strike her at the time, she reflected that, under any circumstances, she did not know' what to say to a man. “You’d better tell me your name, ho said. “It will savo time. Because I am going to find out anyway.” With a sudden inspiration Miss Sherman realised that revealing her identity would put an end to this interview and the acquaintance. She realised also, that it is very easy to put an end to things.

“My name,” she said, “is Sherman— Helena Sherman.” “Helena,” said the. man: “That’s a

pretty name.” “You may have hoard my name before,” suggested Miss Sherman. “I urn the dean—the dean of Huntley.” “You’re what?” said the man blankly-

“I am the dean of Huntley University,” she began impressively; “and you—” She stopped aghast, astonished, as the man’s laugh rang, out suddenly. “My name is Dovereux,’’ ho said — “Joseph Devcroux. 1 beg your pardon, but for half a minute I believed what you said. 1 haven’t mot a girl down here who doesn’t speak the truth, the whole •truth, and so forth, even when she’s dancing. I’m glad you’ve come.. The dean wouldn’t bice you. to take her name in vain, though. The deafi is a very exacting person.” “.How do., you know?” demanded Miss Sherman.

“I’ve got -,V little cousin up at Huntley,” said the man. “The girls up there Are afraid of your friend, tho dean.” '

“And you’re not afraid of me?” Raid Miss Sherman, curiously. The man looked at her. His eyes were steady and very deep. They were like Jane Dovereux’s, only Jane’s were not so blue. Jane was Miss Sherman’s prettiest senior.

“Is Jane your cousin?” said Miss Sherman, “Jane Dovereux?” “That settles' it,” said the man. “1 wondered why you were coming over with me to dance in the Casino, why you were going to meet my mother there, and why wo were going to give you the very best time we can, as long as you are kind enough to stay in this haunt Of bridge and the barn dance. Now I know why; we’vo got to he nice t q you because you’re Jane’s friend.” “j don’t dance,” said Miss Sherman promptly. Again her companion greeted her statement with a laugh that was almost a shout of amusement. * “The Casino’s just over there,” said the man. . The waltz sounded faintly in her ears. The man held the vine aside for her to pass, rand led the way into the

dark of the wood path. And Miss Sherman rose and followed him. It was not until a long time later that she realised the part her affliction had played in her annexation.

She would let circumstances reduce, this niactcrful youth to humble apology by showing him more forcefully than any words of hers could do the absurdity of his wilful mistake. Perhaps Iris mother would see how little Miss Sherman resembled Jane Devereux’s friends. Perhaps the lines on Miss Sherman’s fare' and the dignity of her manner w-qii d- bring the man himself to a slow, ashamed' belief that she was the dean of Huntley.

In the meantime Mrs. Devcroux was gracious and motherly, the Casino floor was good, Joe Devcroux danced as only tall men could dance, and, though this was her first effort since her eighteenth .year, Mass Sherman could dance too. Sho found herself, at the close of the evening, with all her d'ances promised for the next week, with a moonlight sail, and a game of tennis in the near future, still known to a new and appreciative world as Jane Devereux’s friend.

In the course of the next few weeks it was to Jane Dovereux that she began to look for the escape from the growing awkwardness of her situation. A word or* two in one of Jane’s letters would reveal Mis 6 Sherman’s identity, and savo her the explanations that were every day becoming more impossible. Jane’s expected visit to her aunt would force Miss Sherman to leave the place. She ought to go away. There was no reason why she should not go away, but with every hour full of the unknown, belated pleasures, sho became more conscious that sho did not want to go away.

She was glad nobody thought her old. She was glad the girls were jealous of her. She was glad when Jane Devereux’s sudden trip to Egypt put off the discovery indefinitely. She began to enjoy her experiences, soothing her conscience, with tho thought that they were not her fault. She refused to hi amo herself because people deceived themselves about her. If the hoys chose to crowd round her, filling her dance card and begging her to split her dances, she could not prevent them. If tall lads beguiled her into dark piazzas, and limited their conversation to--, the dicussion. of their business prospects, it was not her duty to find safer subjects of discourse. Besides, she liked piazza corners, just as she liked long walks through the- woods witli broad-should-ered boys breaking tho branches out of her path, and motor drives inland on windy clays, with the pleasant consciousness of a boy in a boat waiting her to keep a tentative engagement. It was too late to explain.. She had tried at first.

. “Billy,” she had said warningly to the boy who was walking beside her on the shore path, “I am very much older than you.” A stray % sunbeam flashed into her eye, her eye twitched, and Billy exploded with joy at her subtle jest, and tried to give her his fraternity pin.

After all, she was not, in actual years, so much very older than Billy and liis like. And there was always Joe to comfort her with the knowledge that, though he was not the fatherly protector he believed himself, he was, at least, as old as sho.

She did not often talk to him seriously. There was a gay freemasonry between them. But in a few curtly ptit political views she heard him give another man, in his exact answers to her questions about his boat, in the firm, light pressure of his hand over hers on the tiller, she read his infinite, careless knowledge of things she did not know, and guessed he was not entirely ignorant of tho things she did know.

One day,lie found her alone on a little knoll, breaking her promise to the doctor, and straining her eyes over a volume of Browning/ Ho took the book out of her hand and* read it to her, filling her ears with tire music of the verse, and making her forget to speculate about the meaning, of the lines and sit quietly beside him, looking out to

sea.. They were on tho same knoll one day in late summer. Miss Sherman’s hair was damp from swimming; Joo Devereux’s coat was tied round her shoulders, and Joe stretched at. full length on the pine needles beside her. He looked up at her after a silence, and put out a hand toward her flying hair. “I like it that way,” he announced. > “How?” said Miss Sherman, absently. - “That way,“ he* 1 said; “loose and soft.” “It’s not neat,” said Miss Sherman. “I. never saw it look so well,” said Joe. “Joe,” said Miss Sherman, • “are you • trying to tell me that you do not like the way I. arrange my hair?” The coat had loosened on Miss Sherman’s shoulders. Joo leaned over her and pulled it tight. “Don’t you know what I’m trying to tell you-?” he said. Jane Dovereux would have been warned hv his voice. Miss Sherman’s youngest freshman would have run away, or pretended to run away. But Miss Sncrman, who lacked tho enlightening experiences"' of her youngest freshman, sat .still and -said pleasantly: " “No, I don’t know. AVliy don’t you tell me?” And Joe,, with his hands .on her shoulders, bent close arid kissed her. Miss Sherman sprang up, hot and blind with rage that needed polished and forceful English to express it. Sho said: “I will never forgive you!” The sun was hot on. the beacli, and' the glare from the .water was strong, and, confronting Joo, and looking in-

to his hurt blue eyes, Miss Sherman winked.

“Helena!” cried Joe, ardently, and. without trying to pursue h:n, stood watching her vanish.

For the sun was hot, and the glare upon the water was strong, and" her previous athletic achievements wore confined to her remote past, but the dean of Huntley ran very well. t ■ You cannot, however, always escape a situation by running away from it. Lying safe on her own bed, lVnss Sherman wished she had stayed on the beach long enough to leave Joe utterly crushed. Sho did not like feeling excited when she wanted to think. She did not like her face to be hot and flushed. She had ’not the least desire to cry for two hours about nothing, and when sho finally, arose, with supper a tiling of the past, to dross for an engagement she was ashamed not to keep, she discovered that powder puff, chamois and toilet water Have no effect on a nose that is red with weeping.

She dreaded seeing even the ‘boy she was to meet, but when she reached the piazza she wished for him eagerly. For the man who took her wrap and guided her in silence towards the- wood path was not the harmless Lilly; it was Joe.

“Have you. forgiven me?” said Joe. “No,” said Miss Sherman. “I am sorry,” he said, “because I mean to do it again.” The warning in his voice was apparent even to Miss Sherman’s inexperience, an inexperience that she. felt very much aware of to-night. Did all men make love like this one, she wondered, with everything implied, and nothing said? How little she knew about it! How little she knew about anything real or human! How unfit she was to be walking beside Joe, taking the place of ’some girl who had not sold her birthright in acquiring unimportant information—some girl who wnSu_really young! She turned to Joe with a quick longing to make sure of her own before she gave it lip. “Say you love mo,” she ordered. Joe reached for her hands. “I’m thirty years old,” said Miss Sherman hastily.

You were twenty-nine last May,” said Joe. “AA’hat do you mean?” she said. “Do you think Jane never writes to mo?” returned Joe. “Do you think she lias no pictures of you? For two months I have known who you are.” “My eyes,” said Miss Sherman, in a small voice. “It’s merely a temporary affection.” 1 Joe laughed. “I’m /dean.” said Miss Sherman, I’m clean of Huntley.” “That is merely a temporary affection,” said Joe. “I must .tell you something,” she whispered a little later, “something very bad. I wanted to, last time on the beach, I wanted to do it.” “To do what?” laid Joe. “I couldn't help doing it, and I was glad. After I said I didn’t like you to kiss me, I wanted to.” “AVanted to what?” said Joe. “I wanted to wink at you,” said the youngest dean.