in my own far from impeccable verse, as Bettie Hamlyn heard the summing-up one evening in May. It was the year I graduated from King's College, and the exact relation of the date to the Annos Domini is trivial. But the battle of Manila had just been fought, and off Santiago Captain Sampson and Commander Schley were still hunting for Cervera's "phantom fleet." And in Fairhaven, as I remember it, although there was a highly-colored picture of Commodore Dewey in the barber-shop window, nobody was bothering in the least about the war except when Colonel Snawley and Dr. Jeal foregathered at Clarriker's Emporium to denounce the colossal errors of "imperialism"....
"Thus, then, I end my calendar Of ancient loves more light than air;-- And now Lad's Love, that led afar In April fields that were so fair, Is fled, and I no longer share Sedate unutterable days With Heart's Desire, nor ever praise Felise, or mirror forth the lures Of Stella's eyes nor Sylvia's, Yet love for each loved lass endures.
"Chloris is wedded, and Ettarre Forgets; Yolande loves otherwhere, And worms long since made bold to mar The lips of Dorothy and fare Mid Florimel's bright ruined hair; And Time obscures that roseate haze Which glorified hushed woodland ways When Phyllis came, as Time obscures That faith which once was Phyllida's,-- Yet love for each loved lass endures.
"That boy is dead as Schariar, Tiglath-pileser, or Clotaire, Who once of love got many a scar. And his loved lasses past compare?-- None is alive now anywhere. Each is transmuted nowadays Into a stranger, and displays No whit of love's investitures. I let these women go their ways, Yet love for each loved lass endures.
"Heart o' My Heart, thine be the praise If aught of good in me betrays Thy tutelage--whose love matures Unmarred in these more wistful days,-- Yet love for each loved lass endures."
For this was the year that I graduated, and Chloris--I violate no confidence in stating that her actual name was Aurelia Minns, and that she had been, for a greater number of years than it would be courteous to remember, the undisputed belle of Fairhaven,--had that very afternoon married a promising young doctor; and I was draining the cup of my misery to the last delicious drop, and was of course inspired thereby to the perpetration of such melancholy bathos as only a care-free youth of twenty is capable of evolving.
5
"Dear boy," said Bettie, when I had made an end of reading, "and are you very miserable?"
Her fingers were interlocked behind her small black head; and the sympathy with which she regarded me was tenderly flavored with amusement.
This much I noticed as I glanced upward from my manuscript, and mustered a Spartan smile. "If misery loves company, then am I the least unhappy soul alive. For I don't want anybody but just you, and I believe I never will."
"Oh--? But I don't count." The girl continued, with composure: "Or rather, I have always counted your affairs, so that I know precisely what it all amounts to."
"Sum total?"
"A lot of imitation emotions." She added hastily: "Oh, quite a good imitation, dear; you are smooth enough to see to that. Why, I remember once--when you read me that first sonnet, sitting all hunched up on the little stool, and pretending you didn't know I knew who you meant me to know it was for, and ending with a really very effective, breathless sob--and caught my hand and pressed it to your forehead for a moment--Why, that time I was thoroughly rattled and almost believed--even I--that--" She shrugged. "And if I had been younger--!" she said, half regretfully, for at this time Bettie was very nearly twenty-two.
"Yes." The effective breathless sob responded to what had virtually been an encore. "I have not forgotten."
"Only for a moment, though." Miss Hamlyn reflected, and then added, brightly: "Now, most girls would have liked it, for it sounded all wool. And they would have gone into it, as you wanted, and have been very, very happy for a while. Then, after a time--after you had got a sonnet or two out of it, and had made a sufficiency of pretty speeches,--you would have gone for an admiring walk about yourself, and would have inspected your sensations and have applauded them, quite enthusiastically, and would have said, in effect: 'Madam, I thank you for your attention. Pray regard the incident as closed.'"
"You are doing me," I observed, "an injustice. And however tiny they may be, I hate 'em."
"But, Robin, can't you see," she said, with an odd earnestness, "that to be fond of you is quite disgracefully easy, even though--" Bettie Hamlyn said, presently: "Why, your one object in life appears to be to find a girl who will allow you to moon around her and make verses about her. Oh, very well! I met to-day just the sort of pretty idiot who will let you do it. She is visiting Kathleen Eppes for the Finals. She has a great deal of money, too, I hear." And Bettie mentioned a name.
"That's rather queer," said I. "I used to know that girl. She will be at the K. A. dance to-morrow night, I suppose,"--and I put up my manuscript with a large air of tolerance. "I dare say that I have been exaggerating matters a bit, after all. Any woman who treated me in the way that Miss Aurelia did is not, really, worthy of regret. And in any event, I got a ballade out of her and six--no, seven--other poems."
For the name which Bettie had mentioned was that of Stella Musgrave, and I was, somehow, curiously desirous to come again to Stella, and nervous about it, too, even then....
3.
_He Earns a Stick-pin_
"Dear me!" said Stella, wonderingly; "I would never have known you in the world! You've grown so fa--I mean, you are so well built. I've grown? Nonsense!--and besides, what did you expect me to do in six years?--and moreover, it is abominably rude of you to presume to speak of me in that abstracted and figurative manner--quite as if I were a debt or a taste for drink. It is really only French heels and a pompadour, and, of course, you can't have this dance. It's promised, and I hop, you know, frightfully.... Why, naturally, I haven't forgotten--How could I, when you were the most disagreeable boy I ever knew?"
I ventured a suggestion that caused Stella to turn an attractive pink, and laugh. "No," said she, demurely, "I shall never never sit out another dance with you."
So she did remember!
Subsequently: "Our steps suit perfectly--Heavens! you are the fifth man who has said that to-night, and I am sure it would be very silly and very tiresome to dance through life with anybody. Men are so absurd, don't you think? Oh, yes, I tell them all--every one of them--that our steps suit, even when they have just ripped off a yard or so of flounce in an attempt to walk up the front of my dress. It makes them happy, poor things, and injures nobody. You liked it, you know; you grinned like a pleased cat. I like cats, don't you?"
Later: "That is absolute nonsense, you know," said Stella, critically. "Do you always get red in the face when you make love? I wouldn't if I were you. You really have no idea how queer it makes you look."
Still later: "No, I don't think I am going anywhere to-morrow afternoon," said Stella.
2
So that during the fleet moments of these Finals, while our army was effecting a landing in Cuba, I saw as much of Stella as was possible; and veracity compels the admission that she made no marked effort to prevent my doing so. Indeed, she was quite cross, and scornful, about the crowning glory being denied her, of going with
