The Everlasting Whisper

ainly she showed no signs of it to his eyes, which, though keen enough, were, after a male fashion, unsophisticated. She was a very pretty woman, petite, alert, and decide

riend, giving him a small, plump hand in a welcoming grip, establishing him in an instant, by some sleight of femininity which King did not plumb, as a hearthside

r hand, whose well-kept beauty caught and held King's e

en," thought Kin

ed of intimacy to offer each guest in accordance with the position he had come to occupy, or which she meant him to occupy, in her household. Akin to her in instinct were those distinguished ladies of t

budding youth must be perfected in flower. And if Mrs. Ben was indefatigable in keeping herself young while Ben quietly accepted the gathering years, it was with no thought of coquetting with other men, but only that she might remain an older sister to her daughter, maintain the closer contact, and see that Gloria made the most of life. Any small misstep which she herself had made in life her daughter m

t swiftly to his friend's face, seeking approbation. And he found it. King had risen as she went out, holding himself with a hi

ongratulate you, old ma

ever remembered i

his long hands togethe

er, Mark," he

Ben perhaps looked for, he did not add. Everyth

wn, look at what she has made of herself! While you and I and the likes of us have been content to stay pretty much in the rough, she hasn't. There's not a more accomplished, cultured little woman this or the other side Boston, even i

way back to a grandf

e his immaculate attire. He chuckled. "One must live

and laughter from the Gaynor gues

. And I want you to see my little girl; I've told her

s sort who would never be anything but strangers to him, accepted the inevitable without demur and followed his host. He would

me abreast of a wide stairway leading to the second storey. Down the glistening treads, making her

" called

oria, "I wanted--Oh!

ithin himself. For she had seen him coming to the house. Straight-d

his is my little girl. Gloria, you know

y, pretty little pink-nailed hands which had done little in this world beyond adorn charmingly the extremities of two soft round arms. For an i

the fine soft skin of hers. Yet there was a warm pleasurable thrill in the contact. Gloria was very much alive and warm-bodied and beautiful. She was like those flowers which King knew so well, fragrant dainty blossoms which lift their little faces from the highest of the old mountains into the rarest of skies, growths seeming to partake of some celestial perfection; hardy, though they clothed themselves in an outward seeming of fragile delicacy. Physically-he emphasized the word and barricaded

g them, how long he would have held them if she had not been so serenely mistress of the moment. "My hair was all tumbling down and I had to run upstairs to fight it b

t she retained that lustrous crown of hair just to please her papa, whereas one who had not been told might have been mistaken in his b

le drawing; he had known, had he ever paused for reflection, which he had not, that a baby would not stay such during a period of eighteen years. She had heard a thousand tales of "my good friend, Mark." Mark, thus, had been in her mind a man of her father's age, and about such a young girl's romantic ideas do not flock. But from the first glimpse of the booted figure among the trees she had sensed other things. King would have blushed had he known how pic

aint for her the high lights of an episode of Mark King making a name for himself and a fortune at the same time in the Klondike country. She danced away, singing, to her abandoned friends, who were returning to the house. "It's the Mark King, my dears!" she told them triumphantly, not unconscious of the depressing result of her disclosures upon a couple

g fellow with the pampered pompadour, his eyes show

ant to make me sorry I ever invited you here, do you?" And a brief half-hour a

n" while the others were Archie and Teddy and Georgia and Evelyn and Connie. It was to th

but extremely comforting Georgia. "He's a real man, every inch of him." ["Every inch a King!" she thought quickly, unashamed of the pun.] "

onal city-dweller's "outdoor rig." Shining puttees lying bravely about the shape of his leg; brown outing breeches, creased, laced at their abbrevi

managed to have her all to himself

at she was already watching the house for his coming. And he would have been no end amazed and bristling with defence had he glimpsed the astonishing fact that Gloria alre

ustache, bore down upon him. King did not like this suave individual; he had the habit of judging a man by first impressions and sticking stubbornly to his snap judgment until circumstance showed him to be in error. He liked neither the way Gratton wa

f ingratiatingly, "in the things I have heard of you,

ng upon King to kick him

paths along which he should come to hobnob with men like Gratton. He was sorry that he had promised to stay to lunch. His thoughts all of a sudden were restive, flying off to Swen Brodie, to L

resented King's attitude. His heavy lids had a fluttering w

ngle's 'Secret' this year, Mr

heeled

?" he said sharply. "And w

oked wise and amuse

d back their chairs; he found himself still drifting, this time physically and still with Gloria as they two strolled out through the grove at the back of the log house. There was a splendid pool there, boulder-surrounded; a thoroughly romantic sort of spot in Gloria Gaynor's fancies, a most charming background for springtime loitering. The gush and babble of the bright water tumbling in, rushing out, fi