Youth and the Bright Medusa

irl to know anything about pictures; here was a whole continent full of people who knew nothing about pictures and he didn’t hold it against them. What had such things to do with h

er than art, because she was the most overwh

to be at home this evening, telling her

e on the train, coming back tired from their holiday with bunches of wilted flowers and dirty daisies; to tell her that the fish-man, to whom she had often sent him for lobsters, was among the passengers, disguised in a silk

g out of the express car in order to catch the first boat. The East River, and the bridges, and the city to the we

me in his life Hedger took a hansom cab for Washington Square. Caesar sat bolt upright on th

he Square hung globes that shed a radiance not unlike the blue mists of evening, emerging softly when daylight died, as the stars emerged in the thin blue sky. Under them the sharp shadows of the trees fell on the cracked pavement and the sleep

gas burning in the top hall? He found matches and the gas bracket. He knocked, but got no answer; nobody was there. Before his own door were ex

friends from Chicago. They arrived on Friday, heralded by many telegrams. Very rich people they were said to be, though the man had refused to pay the nurse a month’s rent in lieu of notice, — which would have been only right, as the young lady had agreed to take the rooms until October. Mrs. Foley had observed, too, that he didn’t overpay her or Willy for their trouble, and

ws. When he went to put his coat in the closet, he found, hanging among his clothes, a pale, flesh-tinted dressing gown he had liked to see her wear, with a perfume — oh, a perfume that

im; she guessed he was too proud. She wanted awfully to see him again, but Fate came knocking at her door after he had left her. She believed in Fate. She would never forget him,

and knelt down before the wall; the knot hole had been plugged up with a ba

him, that such a woman had lain happy and contented in his arms. And now it was over. He turned out the light and sat down on his painter’s stool before the big w

nced the return of Eden Bower to New York after years of spectacular success in Paris. She came a

e entirely upon stocks, — Cerro de Pasco, and how much she should buy of it, — when she suddenly looked up and realized that she was skirting W

g fur coat, and short, high-heeled shoes, alight from a French car and pace slowly about the Square, holding her muff to her chin. This spot, at least, had changed very little, s

anced up and blinked against the sun. From somewhere in the crowded quarter south of the Square a flock of pigeons rose, wheeling quickly upward into the brilliant blue sky. She threw back her head, pressed her muff closer to her chin, a

. All the way down town her mind wandered from Cerro de

e wrote it into her glove. It was five o’clock when she reached the French Galleries, as they were called. On entering she gave the attendant her card, asking him to take it to M. Jule

never forget anybody who interests me.” She threw her muff on his writing table and sank into the deep chair. “I have

tainly! There are some very interesting things of hi

’ve no time to go to exhibitions

to say, among the very moderns. He is always coming up with some

hibitions. Has he had great succ

stache. “But, Madame, there are many

o say. We once quarrelled on that issue. An

and he is decidedly an influence in art. But one can’t definitely pl

? Thanks. That’s all I want to know.” She rose and began buttoning he

r out through the carpeted show-room, now closed to the public and draped in cheesecloth,

d settled, like a plaster cast; so a sail, that has been filled by a strong breeze, behaves when the wind suddenly dies. Tomorrow night the wind wo