A SWEET WILD ROSE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1440, 5 October 1899, Page 9

A SWEET WILD ROSE.

Unconscious of the picture she made, she stood in the doorway of a little reception room that led into the draw-ing-room, her eyes fixed thoughtfully on a man's face in the crowded room ~be-, yond. .' Melane had- been . watching her for some time* in the'past two years, he had heard much of her social triumphs and charms - .' : '"Give me a welcome home," he plead- :. ed, crossing the room to where she stood. "Of course I will." She lifted her eyes to his. They were very beautiful eyes—a fresh, unsullied, ,nobility pf character shone in them. •: "It is a surprise to see you to-night.. I thought you were on the other side." "So it seems the home folk think,".. ha answered ruefully. "I've had a beastly cold welcome. Got, home an hour ago to find every soul gone.- Not a handshake rbut.. from one old Negro left to keep the place. from walking off, I suppose. ..The lights and the music were so cheery over . here, I ventured without an invite, and in this garb," looking down on his travelling suit; "but Mrs Brown is an old friend." , "I see," the girl laughed; "your mother doesn't expect you home until next week.". ' ■ , • >; ,'. - ~-_ ■ "You were perfectly- oblivious to -the fact that I have - been watching you , for ten minutes, , and wondering why you were alone and so quiet.",; ~ ,;.. "I was indulging in a little introspection. I'm hardly responsible," with. a shrug of the fan- shoulders; "it's a fault of the age—this picking.to pieces of emotions, laying one's heart on the dissecting table and analysing the why<* and wherefore of eaoh beat." . <■- "And was the tall young fellow in there," glancing towards the drawingroom, "responsible for it all?" She laughed outright.. "Isn't it delicious to-have you for- a Mentor again! I might as well confess. „Al winter he has paid me marked attention. -Flowers candies and. all the. rest, you know,' a"d. I have liked him. . Two weeks ago the tall, dark girl in there with him- came here to visit Lena Wells and, I have been ooolly dropped. ,I was trying to .find out if I cared, or if it was only wounded,, pride.' '• ; •---; ••. : -„i v 6 ; - ;>c "What is' it?" he questioned, the eagerness, in his. voice unmistakable. . "I am not sure, yet," she answered thoughtfully, "and I could have made such an admission to no other man- in \ the room. Nowtell me what you have been doing .with yourself: these three - years." \ , * • ■ "I can't; I am thinking of the fellow in there. Why don't you be perfectly indifferent with him and flirt with someone; (else?"- ; - - '-'''-,-:' "I don't. flirt," indignantly. . --- "I do, outrageously, -sometimes. - You see,", apologetically, "a fellow can't help it; in Italy. It is as natural as breathing. I'm dying for a flirtation now. I have-not made love to a girl since I left tne dark-eyed senoritas."

"If it would make you feel more at "frorafs youc may make love; to me," she said, with sweet graciousness. "May I?" eagerly. "But I don't promise to respond. "That's all right. Til do it all." He drew her into a little; curtained cosy corner.beyond the door. "Now brace yourself. I'in. going to begin." ;,. • .■" She sank among, the cushions and kited her laughing eyes. ."It feels like childhood and playing hide and seek," she said. "It is better tkan childhood." He gave her a look that splashed her cheeks with colour.' - : "Once upon a time," he began, 'there was a lover who brought his sweetheart the biggest plums and ripest peaches. and always carried home her books and slate. Did you ever bear of him, Oaro?" He leaned toward her. But she was turning the rings on her slim fingers; ■ the faintest suggestion of a smile at the corners of her lips. "One day in class he missed a word, not that it was so unusual, and she refused to go above, because she lisped "I love you." Then he gave her a pansy with some boyish words of affection, and she flushed and asked, 'Am I your little heartease?' . Oaro, don't you remember?" "I don't remember to have given you any right to ask me such questions." "But you remember," he persisted. She laughed softly. ' "How they hated me, those other little girls. How they called me a mean, stuck-up, snub-nosed thing." A little gleam of triumph shone in bis eyes. She remembered. "Then the mountain party years afterward. You were sixteen. I was leading your horse, the saddle turned and you fell right into my arms, Oaro, and I kissed you." The long lashes had curtained her eyes. "Have you forgotten," he whispered. "However did you,make such love to the senoritas ," she. asked demurely. "You had no reminiscences and ■ youthful follies in common P" "Don't interrupt please. I.promised to do it all. Then the night lueft. I can feel yotu? : little fingers soft and warm in mino yet, and see the, wistfulness in your eyes. 'You cared then. You can't deny it. Your trembling lips and sweet wet eyes kept me straight over there among so many wild fellows. You told me to make a man of myself, and I have worked .three hard, honest years for you dear. I have never loved any other woman." '". • She sat still, the colour coming and going in her cheeks. He leaned towards her, his heart in his face. .They were quite hidden by the drapery. A voice cut softly across the low humming that filled the rooms. A woman's voice as she passed with her attendant to the refreshment room. "The pretty blonde who stood against these curtains—she was looking at you with her heart in.her eyes," the voice said. "She is young, ,1a petite, she will learn to shrug her shoulders and laugh as the years go on." The girl leaned forward to catch the reply. Her blue eyes black, her cheeks white, the little teeth set relentlessly in the soft redness of her under lip. The answer came lightly after a mosme'nt. _ ! "A man will pass a sweet wild rose if a lily glows and dazzles just beyond." The voices were lost in the hum. She leaned back, the small hands clinched. He watched her anxiously. Then sensuous, softly swelling waltz melody throbbed in his brain. Would she "never speak ? He dared not. Then with a long breath of relief she moved toward him. The delicate l>eauty of her face, shone like a flower in the shadowed nook. "Rob," she said, softly, "Fm so glad I know." "Know wkat, "dear?" He covered the little fingers as if ske had been a child. She lifted her eyes in astonishment. "Know that it was wounded pride, of course. What,did you think I meant? I would have got over it. No woman with any spirit would have cared for a man after that. But it is such a relief not to care." And she laughed a little light-hearted, childish. laugh. "Caro, are you sure?" His voice was full of entreaty. "Will you let me teach !you to care for me?" "It would be useless 7 ' —the words had no sting; the voice was soft and low —"perfectly useless, for I have discovered new and unsuspected territory in my being to-night. Rob, you dear, stupid, don't you understand?" She slipped her fingers into His, just as in the old childish days. 'Tve loved you straight through, but—you were gone so long." There was an ecstatic movement of the curtain, then silence; because undemanding is ; people are ■fan love.—" Chicago News."