The Wheel of Life

who sat in a big armchair holding a flute in his wrinkled and trembling hand. He had a simple, moonlike face, to which his baldness lent a deceptive appea

there in order to keep his features from entirely slipping away. He was the oldest member of the Wilde family

Laura, raising her voice a little that

hat sounded like a cracked silver bell. "Your Aunt Angela has a headache, so she couldn't stand the noise. I went out to get her some flowers and offered to sit with her, but this is one of her ba

l was overflowing with humanity, and he spent sleepless nights evolving innocent pleasures for those about him, but his excess of goodness invariably resulted in producing petty annoyances if not serious inconveniences. So his virtues h

of artistic impulses, and her enclosed life in the sombre old house had not succeeded in cultivating in her the slightest resemblance to an artificial variety. She was obviously, inevitably, impulsively the or

and move uptown. It is so far for her to come from Seventieth Street, she says, but as for me I'd positively hate the change and Aunt Angela can't even stand th

runken little hands still caressed it. "Do? why I'd d

og. "Well, the Park is very pleasant, you know," she returned, "a

Why, I've seen these pavements laid and relaid for seventy years and I remember all the men who walked over them. Did I ever tell

a. "We'll keep to our own roots. We are a

t," pursued Uncle Percival, "and in he

efore she made her spring. "There's nothing in the world th

rd when the full scandal had burst upon her head, though she had not then reached the fulfilment of a singularly charming beauty, she had condemned herself to the life of a solitary prisoner within four walls. She had never since the day of her awakening mentioned the name of her faithless or unfortunate lover, but her silent magnanimity had become the expression of a reproach too

see that by encouraging her as you did in her foolish attitude, you have given her past power over her for life and death. It i

knees. "Ah, Laura, would you have

erson in it. She was forgotten forty years ago, only she has

s generation have had the dew brushed off them," he lame

old story when my

ow old, my dear, and

and turned the conversation at once into another channel. "Am

question in silence, his little red

oice," he replied; "but for the rest you a

as beautiful

nate. I can see her now when she would fly into one of her spasms be

adly then-I me

-she was all one fluttering impulse, and to live peaceably in this world one must have at least a grain of leaven in the lump of one's emotion." He chuckled as he ended and fixed his m

ave never been told and yet I have always known that she d

as a little white moth who drifted to another sphere-because she had wanted so much,

" demanded Laura,

uriosity which belongs to age. "At the moment you remind me of her,

? What did she wan

have lived to a great age, and I have known great people, and I have never seen the man yet who could give a woman all the love she wanted. Women seem to be bo

ested Laura; "he brok

ver had from him living," he returned. "When she was gone everything-even the man's life for which he had sacrificed h

eemed to weigh gravely the meaning of his words. Then, rising hurriedly, she ma

e said, "so I must glance at the table. I can't r

id disappointment. "So you haven't tim

be seen to. If Mr. Bleeker comes with Aun

He doesn't listen-and besides he snor

nything else. I wouldn't let that worry me

o the large square room in the left wing where Angela remained a wilful prisoner. As she opened the door she entere

nly by a chill white matting, all emphasised the singular impression of an expiation that had become as pitiless as an obsession of insanity. On a small table by a couch, which was drawn up before a window overlooking the park, there was a row of little devotional books, all bound neatly in black leather, but beyond this the room was empty of any consolation for mind or body. Only the woman herself, with her accusing face and her carelessly arranged snow

ight have entered a death chamber. "You will

room she made a quick, feverish gesture, raising her hands to push back her beauti

that, Aunt Angela,

ords-as if any speech, in fact-were wrung from the

ther, enclosed her in a warm and earnest embrace. "My dear, my dear," she said, "Uncle Percival te

r icy remoteness. "They were tuberoses," she respond

you can't even stand the scent of lilies. N

kind of resigned despair, "but their awful perfume seemed to p

he charitably concluded, "for he couldn't have chosen any other flower if he had had the whole Garde

remarked Angela wearily, "and then he apologi

her as a step was heard on the

utside, returned with a short, flushed, and richly gowned li

nt light, but to the surprise of everybody, after the single venture by which she had proved the mettle of her dreams, she had sunk back into a prosperous and comfortable mediocrity. She had made her flight-like the queen bee she had soared once into the farthest, bluest reaches of her heaven, and henceforth she was quite content to relapse into the utter commonplace

om. Her unwieldy figure reminded Laura of a broad, low wall that has been freshly papered in a large flowered pattern. On her hands and bosom

or dear, how are

g away, sat down at the foot of the long couch. "I am the sa

r fresh air t

osa who has just come in?" As she paused a knock came at the door, and Laura opened

to France in the time of the gay Eugénie, and again as one of the diplomatic circle in Cairo and in Constantinople, she had stored her mind with precious anecdotes much as a squirrel stores a hollow in his tree with nuts. Life had taught her that the one infallible method for impressing your generation is to impress it by a difference, and, beginning as a variation from type, she had ended by commanding attention as a preserved specimen of an extinct species. Long, wiry, animated, and habitually perturbed, sh

d your strength yesterday. Mrs. Francis Barnes-you never knew her of course, but she was a distant cousin of Horace's-died quite suddenly, without an

umstances," returned Angela, indifferently. "You'

Mrs. Bleeker, whose heart

painted fan. "Of course-if you were to die we should be too heart-broken to care what you left-but, since we ar

sure I hope Angela will outlive me many years, but if

the subject for anything on earth, Angela, but, since you've spoken of it, I only mention what is in my mind. And now don't say

" bluntly enquired

upon her a glance

her condition, but for my part I am perfectly assured that it needs only some violent shock, suc

ubborn common sense which was the react

don't see why the mere sight of a man should. I've looked

nife, "is because you have only encountered the sex in domestic shackles. As for me, I haven't the least

nd feeling that her illustration did not wholly prove

in Angela, with sudden energy. "I never-never-neve

llowed it with an emphatic head shake, which said

ieve Robert would shock he

he walked restlessly up and down again until a servant appeared to inf