The Secret of Lonesome Cove
rom the life of Francis Sedgwick, with ed
le Road, so as to get that clump of pine against the sky. There I sat working away with a will, when I heard the drumming of hoofs, and a horse with a girl in the saddle came whizzing round the turn almost upon me. Just
t, and was cursing over the job when I heard the hoo
a voice, very full and low.
oking up. "Small thanks
eling that she was amused more than abashed at my resentment. An
artist, a
rplate. "I'm an archeologist, engaged in exhum
y!" she said. "I know I shouldn't come plunging around turns
not," I
he asked. "If I have done damage,
that you think a picture that can be bought for a hundre
e. Her face-(Elision and Comment by Kent: I know her face from the sketches. Why could he
ou're cross. And I'm truly
ve a hermit," I said, "who doesn't see enough peop
isn't a daub!" she protested. "I-I know a little about pictures. I
plai
should so like to
aid I. "My shack is
" her eyes suggested
ectable Chinaman to play propriety. But in the case of a studio, les con
. "No, I'll have to wait until-" A shadow passed o
had turned with her. I had barely time to twist her foot from the stirrup when the brute of a horse bolted. As it wa
," she said. "I shall have a time catchi
on't do!" sai
him-though, perhaps,
s. "Your horse is headed that way. You'd better come along
and unconsciously cement an acquaintance; but not one word upon the vital point of
d to temptation. On my return I found my visitor in the studio. She had said that she knew a little about pictures. She knew more than a little, a good deal, in fact,
ours aren't the work of an am
a good bit of bargaining; particularly when I suspect
said earnestly. "I want th
y then, and come back w
. "But I have enjoyed talking again with some one who knows and loves the best in art. After all," she
ook for you a
f you'll promise to sell me any print I may choo
ter as her face. (Comment by C. K.: Bosh!) Afterward I remembered that never again in our fri
have the advantage of me, you see. I
ify as an evidence of amusement, said, "Daw is a nice name, don't you think?" (Comment by C. K.:
to five,
or dinner. Good-by." (Comment by C. K.: Good! The place where she is staying is a
yet that is what it was for me almost from the first. Not openly, though. There was that about her which held me at arms' length: the mystery of her, her quickly-given trust in me, a certain strained look that came into her face, like the
too, and had an individual habit of thought. Combined with all her cosmopolitanism was a quaint and profound purity of standards. I remember her saying once-it was one of her rare flashes of self-revelation-"I am an anomaly and an anachronism, a Puritan in modern socie
in pastel, and, if I missed something of her tender and changeful coloring, I at least caught the ineffable wistfulness of her expression, the look of one hoping against hope for an unconfessed happiness. Probably
reamed against
the line. I saw the color die fr
on me with a strange expression. (Comment by C. K.: Rossetti aga
something in you which I have tried to
tly, making pure music of
with her eyes on the pictured face. But when I said to her, "You, who have all my heart, and whose name, even,
mently. "Nothing-except good
appeared in the thicket at the top of the hill I thought she half turned to look. That was five interminable days ago. I have n
She came the next time with a string of the most beautiful rose-topazes I have ever seen, set in a most curious old go
t three A. M.-the messenger boy brought me a telegram. It
for my sake. It tells
. I have destroyed the p