The Vehement Flame

he summer night. Yet even the passing shadow of the cloud kept both the woman and the boy repentant and a little frightened; he, because he tho

cloud-black with Maurice's dullness, and livid with the zigzag flash of Eleanor's irritation-and then the little shower of te

o be with an eleven-year-old child!" Their talk, however, confessed no wonderings! It was the happy commonplace of companionship: Mrs. Newbolt and her departure for Europe; would Mrs. O'Brien be good to Bingo? what Maurice's business should be. Then Maurice yawned, and s

" she said, with sweet reproach-"didn't know we were married!-she wasn

tree, standing all alone in the field

to change the subject-then she had a flash of ins

" The annoyance in his voice was

I don't care. Wh

, it was only funny. I

d looked out

or clasping hands, and seemed to read for a while. Then he said, ab

as si

don't be

l hurt to have you dance three times, with a g

ing her talk of other things-the heat, or the landscape-he was a little preoccupied; he was trying to explain this tiny, ridiculous, lovely unreasonableness, by tracking it back to some failure of sensitiveness on hi

sed not to be married! But that Maurice, knowing of the mistake, had not mentioned its absurdity, woke an uneasy consciousness that he had thought it might annoy her! Why should it annoy her?-unless the reason of the mistake was as obvious to him as t

married-of course!" What a brute he was not to have recognized the subtle loveliness of a sensitiveness like that! He wanted to tell her so, but he could only push the newspaper toward her and slip his hand under it to feel for hers-which he clutched and gripped so hard that her rings cut into the f

one minute more, and I'll kiss

er the newspaper, and were perfectly happy-until the moment came of meeting the Ho

in a great state of excitement about them! Then she condoled with Eleanor about the heat, and told Maurice there were cinders on his hat. But not even her careful matter-of-courseness could make the moment anything but awkward. In the

d to his Mary, washing his hands before going down to supper, "

e, are you deciding a woman

the rebuke. "Tell her that when it comes to wives, ever

f?" she said: then she si

dea that she was hungry for happiness-so it was champagne on an empty stomach. Think of the starvation dul

a shrug; "well; if you can explain El

a man (we are the idealizing sex) to hang his heart on. Then

head: "It is Maurice who is

before them-sitting on the top step, her arms around her knees, her worshiping eyes fixed on the Bride. Edith had nothing to say; it was enough to look at the "bridal

supper and talk! Maurice, did she bring her harp? I want to see her p

n the piano. Did you twig her hair?" Mauri

eigh! "for she is a Queen!" Edith thought: then Maurice pulled one of her pigtails and she kicked him-and after that she was forgotten, for the g

to return the wink. She just stared at Eleanor. She only dared to speak to her once; then, breathlessly: "I-I'm going to go to your school, when I'm sixteen." It was as if she looked forward to a pilgrimage to a shrine! It was impossible not to see the worship in her face; Eleanor saw her smile made Edith almost choke with bliss. But, like herself, the Bride had nothing to say. Eleanor just sat in sweet, empty silence, and watched Maur

gh, because after supper, with an air of complete self-justifi

rotested, "Oh,

g in the twilight, with Maurice playing her accompaniment, she sang, very simply, a

O sweet

s. Houghton said, and

l that child!" Late that night he told his wife she really must do something about Edith: "Fortunately, Eleanor is as ignorant of Dickens as of 'most every

ll her 't

Kit, what do y

e is really and truly good. But, oh, Henry, she's

or! Better warn her that a short cut to matrimonial unhappiness is not

d Mary Hough

rcastically; but she took the sting o

I tr

aurice: rescuing a forlorn damsel. Well, I was perfectly direct with him; I said, 'My dear fellow, Mrs. Newbolt is not a hell-cat; and the elopement was in bad taste. Elopements are always in bad taste. But the elopement is the least important part of it. The difference in age is the serious thing.' I got it out of him just what it is-almost twenty years. She might be his mother!-he admitted that he had had to lie about himself to get the license. I said, 'Your age is the dangerous thing, Maurice, not hers; and it's up to you to keep steady!' Of course he didn't believe me," said Mr. Houghton, sighing. "He

enry, you mustn't say things before Edith!

anything; and she

" she encouraged him. "Su

ad, and a talkative woman is bad;

dith's in bed. Well,