The Wheel of Life

ra received by a special messenger a

ppeared to have been written in frantic hast

is periodical inclination to a fresh affair, his errant fancy had wandered in a particular direction, and Gerty's epicurean philosophy had failed as usual to account for the concrete fact. To Laura the amazing part was not so much Perry's fickleness, which she had brought herself to accept with tolerant aversion, as the extraordinary value Gerty placed upon an emotion which was ke

if he had aught in common with his cousin. A slight resemblance to Perry Bridewell offended her as she recalled it, and, while

from her long ago, and, as she remembered this, Laura felt a jealous impulse to snatch her friend away from the restless worldliness and the inordinate desires. The pitiable soul of Gerty showed to her suddenly as a stunted

s knocking softly at the closed door of Gerty's chamber.

he explained, pointing to the clos

oor upon her, and then crossing to the windows th

hurt you, dearest,"

on her shoulders, was sitting before her bureau making a pretence of sorting a pile of bills. In spite of this pathetic subte

brace, while she nervously tore open a bill she held and then tossed it aside without glan

ding her in her arms. "You are too beautiful. You w

r, I see that. If it's not one it's another, but it's always somebody. A year ago he promised me th

Then suddenly her brow contracted with resolution, and she went through a long list of items

think," murmured Laura wi

miliated expression grew almost violent. "Well, I think so, too. O

u couldn't g

ns a battle-all the time-every instant. I've never had one natural moment, I've never since the beginning been without a horrible suspicion-and I see now that I never shall be. He likes me best I know-in his heart he really puts me first-but there

eclared Laura; "who is there

n expression of disgust, of spiritual loathing-the

e bond-slave to my body? Why, a day labourer has rest, but I haven't. There's not a moment when I'm not doing something for my beauty, or planning effects, or undergoing a treatment. I never sleep as I want to, nor bathe as I want to, nor even eat what I like. It's all somebody's system for preserving something about me. I've lived on celery and apple

me, but I wish you wouldn't. I wish you'd try to

that one dies out all inside-the sensations I mean, and the emotions-before the husk begins to wither?" She paused a moment, but as Laura continued to regard her with a soft, compassionate look she turned away again and, touching an electric button in the wall, flooded the room with light. The change was so startling that every object seemed to leap at once from twilight vagueness into a conspicuous prominence. On a chair in the corner was carelessly flung a white chiffon dinner gown, and a pair of little satin slippers had been thrown upon the floor beside it, where they lay slightly sideways, with turned-out toes, as they had fallen from the wearer's feet. The pa

he said, "if I coul

which made her moods at once so unexpected and so irr

ad. "I was keeping it for the ball next week, but there's no call like the call of an emergency. The horrid creature he fancies will be there," she added, surveying her exquisite armful with an admiring, unhappy glance, "and it will be war to the death between us, if it costs him every cent he h

bed, she went to the mirror and rega

"Annette has my cold bath ready. I must have

out to-night?" asked Laura, remembering

a dance. Do you think that I

ing of her face, the arranging of her hair, the perfuming of her beautiful neck and arms-she chatted gayly in the same flippant yet nervous voice. When at last the maid had

nt, exultant, barbaric. To Laura she had never seemed more beautiful nor more unhappy. Then suddenly her manner underwent a curious change, and her accustomed mask-the smili

to," she said coolly,

e with insolent indifference, while his startled gaze hung up

u were downright ill and I was about to call up the d

her cooler judgment. He looked as uncomfortable as it was possible for a man of his optimistic habit of mind to f

ression was still lying somewhere beneath this superficial remorse. Considered as physical bulk he was impressive, she admitted, in a large, ruddy, highly obvious fashion; then he appeared suddenly so stupid and chi

d because he could think of nothing further to say t

njoy Ada Lawley's face when she sees my gown. She told me last night that she would never be caught wearing silver gauze again until she wanted to look every day as old as she really is. It was r

andle had flashed before them. Then, with that child-like need of having his eyes opened, of being made to see, his attention wa

xclaimed, and a

ed to keep both my colour and my reputation." She crossed to the bureau, and opening a drawer took out a green and silver fan. "I really needn't

ithout a jealous indignation, "and I dare s

rawer with a bang. "Well, I shoul

filled with a pity not unmixed with disgust, Laura put on her fur coat and went slowly down the staircase. The last sou

he house door caused him instinctively to look up, she saw that it was Roger

w," he asked, "fo

a block or two. I've been shut

at her side. "I've always had a considerable liking for M

inable that Adams should confess to an admiration for Perry Bridewell, and th

ntly; then moved by a flitting impulse, she added after

tle mystified as h

t further light broke upon him

stly that he particularly appealed to me. There's something ab

s la

judices are more than h

eard about him," rejoined

the flowing yet energetic step she had inherited from her Southern mother. On the opposit

n years ago. The last time I saw much of him, by the way, we roughed it together one autumn on the coast of Nova Scotia, and I remember he volunteered there to go out in the first heavy gale to br

reet became singularly vivid, while she moved on in an excitement which she could not explain though she felt that it was wholly pleasurable. Kemper was present to her now in a nobler, almost a glorified, aspect, and she began, though she herself was hardly aware of it, to idealise him with the

"but one is never proof against intuitive impres

den, and the delicacy of his long, slender figure appeared to her almost as a physical infirmity. It occurred to her at the instant that his bodily defects had never before showed so pla