The west shore., August 01, 1889, Page 445, Image 38

THE WEST SHORE.
4 Ul
with straight, tapering fingers, tipped with dainty, pearl-tinted
nails. Her feet are small and the walks erect with a queenly
liearing. Her voice, which is soft but not modulatiHl with the
refinements of cultivation, issues betwean teeth of pearl, and
Hi through whose delicate outlines the blood seems ever to
buret. Everything about her bespeaks a more than ordinary
person.
This, my dear cousin, is a very long and labored portrait of
the Olive that I have found blooming in this wild, neglected
npot. Well, Indeed, the poet says
Fall muj a flowtr U born to bluih niuma,
And WMt it iwmUims on th dnoit air.
I have always hulf doubted the existence of such female
characters except in fiction ; I have never believed that love
or such an infatuation was born in a single glance; and to have
Iwth these doubts negatived, and the truth brought home to
me in my own personal experience in so utterly unexiecUd a
manner and in so unpromising a place, bailies me with wonder
and surprise. I could not credit it if it were not true ; but alas !
my heart has been in such a tempest this whole week, that
whether I would or not I must acknowledge the wonderful va
riety of the world and of our experiences in it.
Faithfully yours, W. K.
Winthrop Fairfax and I, though he wu several
years my junior, were old friends, united not only by
the ties of blood, but by the stronger affinity of con
genial comradeship. I had known him and his fam
ily from boyhood. He wu born to a rioh inheritance,
but the death of his father, and an unfortunate dis
aster soon afterward, swept away all their property
except a small patrimony whioh was in his mother's
name and had thus been preserved from the general
ruin. Winthrop had passed through his university
career before this calamity had befallen the family,
bnt he now found himself thrown upon the world to
make his way as an artist, in which respect be was
regarded by those who knew him best as a genius.
Of this character I will not speak further hore, si it
will be better disolosed by the event which I as the
biographer of a strange tragedy shall now proceed to
narrate.
I immediately resolved on the facts disclosed by
his letter, whethbr wisely or not, to attempt to save
him from what I believed to be a dangerous infatua
tion, and one which, if indulged, would be fraught
with domestio sorrow, if not doath, for his widowed
mother idolized her gifted son and watched over him
with that solioitude whioh only those can fool whose
pride strengthens as their penury increases. W ith
out divulging his secret, I arranged my business as
soon as I could, and in about a wk I left, ostensibly
for Colorado; in reality, however, taking a route which
in due time landed me in the town of K . I im
mediately went to the hotel and inquired for Win
throp. He wu gone, but had secured liaising at a
private houe. I went thither and found him in a
humble spartment already bestrewn with artist' ma
terials, while an easol, wholly envelopod with drapery,
which had evidently been hastily dung over it on my
approach, occupied the most favorable corner of the
room. My cousin received me with constrained cour
tesy, and perused my face with a surprised look,
whilo my own feelings at that moment misgave me,
and an embarrassing pause ensued, whioh noither of
us broke for several second. Dut we had been too
faithful to each other in tranquil friendship to seek
to dissemble now when the first reefs of life were ap
pearing in our pathway.
" I supposed my totter," exclaimed Winthrop ab
ruptly, would find you in the Devil' canyon; other
wise I should not have sent it so soon, although it
contained no invitation for you to intrude upon my
idyllic life in K .M
" Frovldflnoe or destiny," I replied, Ignoring his
uncivil thrust, " seems to have chosen me u the in
strument to step between you and ruin."
I did not know how far evont would justify my
assertion, but I had taken a bold step, and concluded
to act as if the worst had happened. To my surprise,
Winthrop did not demur to the Implied accusation.
Arising from the camp chair In front of the easel, he
began, as he strode to and fro across the room, to jus
tify what he had done and purposed doing.
" I am not a ohild," he said, "to be dlotatod to
and my actions scanned. Suppose I should choose to
marry this girl, whose affair 1 it but mine and hen?"
" It Is a suflloiont answer to that to say that your
mother, Winthrop, who scaroely live but by you and
in your future, will be made wretched by it"
" My mother ha not een Olive; she doe not
know how beautiful she la. If she knew my happl
noss depended upon my marrying her"
" Dut Alioe War field? Do you forget that your
relations to her are almost tantamount to a betrothal V
" Arthur, love is an affinity; t goo wher It la
sent How silly for our parent to think they can
mix the seies lik a pack of card and cause Mary to
mate with John, and Alioe and Winthrop to suddenly
love each other because thry are placed In jmUpoal.
tion in the social shollle. Alio la a fair girl, and
worthy of the best love of a lover, and for a Urn I
confess I mistook the desire of our parent to nnlU
us to I lore; bnt now that I know what real lov U,
I shudder to think what a wretched fat we bar es
caped." M I!ut bow do you know," I lualated, " that thl I
not a mere infatuation, which will leav you m fin
morning as suddenly at it came? A man' lov U
like a halcyon, which it aver diving aftor new prey,
and reappearing t the most uueipocted plaor. Even
if this girl loves you, of which you have, I venture,
no positive assurance, you run a terrlbl risk la a.