Помощь по Теле2, тарифы, вопросы

Я думаю не надо представлять этого американского писателя , которого называют грустным сказочником XX века. Свои рассказы он писал для простых людей: клерков, продавщиц, бродяг, ковбоев, мелких авантюристов, фермеров. Они и были героями его произведений. Его рассказы были короткими. Именно поэтому его иногда сравнивают с Чеховым. И хотя его рассказы проникнуты грустью, они оптимистичны, а неожиданная развязка всегда радует. Провидение всегда спасает его героев, казалось, идущих к неминуемой гибели. Да, почти все рассказы О. Генри заканчиваются хорошо, ведь люди не любят плохих концов. Однако жизнь самого писателя была трагической…

Давайте познакомимся с ним поближе. Начнем с того, что О. Генри — это псевдоним писателя, а звали его Уильям Сидней Портер. Он родился в Америке (городок Гринсборо, штат Сев. Каролина) 11 сентября 1862 года. Это было около 150 лет назад. Он прожил 48 лет и умер 11 июня 1910 года в городе Нью Йорке. Вы можете познакомиться с ним поближе, если прочитаете его краткую биографию (на английском языке) или посмотрите фильм о его жизни (на русском языке). Также на нашем сайте, вы найдете а также Читайте и смотрите! И, конечно, вы сможете улучшить свои знания английского языка, так как все рассказы писателя есть как на русском, так и на английском языке. Итак, в нашей литературной гостиной сегодня американский писатель О. Генри или Уильям Сидней Портер.

О. Генри (фильм о писателе, краткая биография)

Хотите продолжить знакомство с американским писателем О. Генри, а заодно улучшить английский язык? — Читайте О. Генри (краткая биография на английском языке).

Thе real name of the writer O. Henry was William Sydney Porter. He was born in a small town Greensboro in the USA (the state of North Carolina) in the family of a doctor. He was brought up by his aunt because his mother died when he was a small boy.

After finishing school at the age of fifteen, Porter worked in his uncle’s chemist shop in Greensboro. Then he went to Texas because he wanted to see new places. For two years he worked on a farm, then he became a clerk in an office and at last got a job in a small bank. During this period he studied languages and became interested in literature.

Soon he married Athol Roach; they had a daughter. Porter was a happy husband and father, but his happiness did not last long.

One day a theft of a thousand dollars was discovered at the bank where he worked. Though it was not he who had taken the money, Porter left the town and went to Central America where he stayed for some time. But when he heard that his wife was very ill, he returned home but was immediately put into prison for three years.

His wife died and his little daughter was raised by the relatives. The little girl was told that her father had gone very far away and would not return soon. In prison William often thought about her and was very sorry that she would not receive a Christmas present from him that year. Porter decided to write a story and send it to one of the American magazines to get some money for a present. The story called «Whistling Dick’s Christmas Present» was published in 1899. Porter had signed it «O. Henry» - the first pen-name that came into his head. While still in prison, he published many other stories.

In 1901, when he was released from prison, he settled in New York, and continued writing short stories for different magazines. Very soon he became one of the most popular short-story writers in America.

O. Henry’s stories won great popularity and have been translated into many languages. Most of them have unexpected endings and the reader is always taken by surprise.

During the short period of his literary activity, O. Henry wrote 273 short stories and one novel «Cabbages and Kings» (1904).

In his stories O. Henry describes amusing incidents of everyday life in large cities, on the farms, and on the roads of America. In most of his stories he does not touch upon important social problems, but the author’s sympathy is with the common people of America, whose life he knew very well. His greatest wish was that people should be happy.

Short Biography of O. Henry (presentation)

In the presentation I have used the real photos of O. Henry. The author.

Speak about O. Henry, using the presentation:
1. Speak about O. Henry’s childhood and youth.
2. Say a few words why he was sent to prison.
3. Where and why did he write his first short story?
4. What did he describe in his short stories?
5. Why did the American people like his stories?
6. Why did O. Henry give happy endings to most of his stories?
7. Did O. Henry touch upon social problems in his short stories?

Разные школы

Разные школы

Старый Джером Уоррен жил в стотысячедолларовом доме? 35 по Восточной Пятьдесят и так далее улице. Он был маклером в деловой части города и так богат, что каждое утро мог позволить себе - для укрепления здоровья - пройти пешком несколько кварталов по направлению к своей конторе, а затем уже взять извозчика.

У него был приемный сын, сын его старого друга, по имени Гилберт - отличный типаж для Сирилла Скотта(1). Гилберт был художником и завоевывал успех с такой быстротой, с какой успевал выдавливать краски из тюбиков. Другим членом семейства старого Джерома была Барбара Росс, племянница его покойной жены. Человек рожден для забот; поскольку у старого Джерома не было своей семьи, он взвалил на свои плечи чужое бремя.

Гилберт и Барбара жили в полном согласии. Все окружающие молчаливо порешили, что недалек тот счастливый день, когда эта пара станет перед аналоем и пообещает священнику порастрясти денежки старого Джерома. Но в этом месте в ход событий следует внести некоторые осложнения.

Тридцать лет назад, когда старый Джером был молодым Джеромом, у него был брат, которого звали Диком. Дик отправился на Запад искать богатства - своего или чужого. О нем долго ничего не было слышно, но, наконец, старый Джером получил от него письмо. Написано оно было коряво, на линованной бумаге, от которой пахло солониной и кофейной гущей. Почерк страдал астмой, а орфография - пляской святого Вита.

Оказалось, что Дику не удалось подстеречь Фортуну на большой дороге и заставить ее раскошелиться, - его самого обобрали дочиста. Судя по письму, песенка его была спета: здоровье у него пришло в такое расстройство, что даже виски не помогало. Тридцать лет он искал золота, но единственным результатом его трудов была дочка девятнадцати лет, как и значилось в накладной, каковую дочку он, оплатив все дорожные издержки, отправлял теперь на Восток в адрес старого Джерома, чтобы тот кормил ее, одевал, воспитывал, утешал и холил, пока смерть или брак не разлучат их.

Старый Джером был человек-помост. Всякий знает, что мир держится на плечах Атласа, что Атлас стоит на железной решетке, а железная решетка установлена на спине черепахи. Черепахе тоже надо стоять на чем-нибудь - она и стоит на помосте, сколоченном из таких людей, как старый Джером.

Я не знаю, ожидает ли человека бессмертие. Но если нет, я хотел бы знать, когда люди, подобные старому Джерому, получают то, что им причитается?

Они встретили Неваду Уоррен на вокзале. Она была небольшого роста, сильно загоревшая и так и сияла здоровьем и красотой; она вела себя совершенно непринужденно, но даже коммивояжер сигарной фабрики подумал бы, прежде чем подмигнуть ей. Глядя на нее, вы невольно представляли ее себе в короткой юбке и кожаных гетрах, стреляющей по стеклянным шарам или укрощающей мустангов. Но она была в простой белой блузке и черной юбке, и вы не знали, что и подумать. Она без малейшего усилия несла тяжелый саквояж, который носильщики тщетно пытались вырвать у нее.

Мы будем с вами дружить, это непременно, - сказала Барбара, клюнув Неваду в крепкую загорелую щеку.

Надеюсь, - сказала Невада.

Милая племянница, малютка моя! - сказал старый Джером. - Добро пожаловать в мой дом, живи у меня, как у родного отца.

Спасибо, - сказала Невада.

Вы мне позволите называть вас кузиной? - обратился к ней Гилберт со своей очаровательной улыбкой.

Возьмите, пожалуйста, саквояж, - сказала Невада. - Он весит миллион фунтов. В нем, - пояснила она Барбаре, образцы из шести папиных рудников. По моим подсчетам, они стоят около девяти центов за тысячу тонн, но я обещала ему захватить их с собой.

Обычное осложнение между одним мужчиной и двумя женщинами, или одной женщиной и двумя мужчинами, или женщиной, мужчиной и аристократом - словом, любую из этих проблем - принято называть треугольником. Но эти треугольники следует определить точнее. Они всегда равнобедренные и никогда не бывают равносторонними. И вот, по приезде Невады Уоррен, она, Гилберт и Барбара Росс образовали такой фигуральный треугольник, причем Барбара заняла в нем место гипотенузы.

Однажды утром, перед тем как отправиться в свою мухоловку в деловой части города, старый Джером долго сидел после завтрака над скучнейшей из всех утренних газет Нью-Йорка. Он душевно полюбил Неваду, обнаружив в ней и независимость характера и доверчивую искренность, отличавшие его покойного брата.

Горничная принесла для мисс Невады Уоррен письмо.

Вот, пожалуйста, его доставил мальчик-посыльный, сказала она. - Он ждет ответа.

Невада насвистывала сквозь зубы испанский вальс и наблюдала за проезжающими по улице экипажами и автомобилями. Она взяла конверт и, еще не распечатав его, догадалась по маленькой золотой палитре в его левом верхнем углу, что письмо от Гилберта.

Разорвав конверт, она некоторое время внимательно изучала его содержимое; затем с серьезным видом подошла к дяде и стала возле него.

Дядя Джером, Гилберт хороший человек, правда?

Почему ты спрашиваешь, дитя мое? - сказал старый Джером, громко шелестя газетой. - Конечно, хороший. Я сам его воспитал.

Он ведь никому не станет писать ничего такого, что было бы не совсем... я хочу сказать, чего нельзя было бы знать и прочесть каждому?

Попробовал бы он только, - сказал дядя и оторвал от своей газеты порядочный кусок. - Но почему ты об этом...

Прочитайте, дядя, эту записку - он только что прислал мне ее - и скажите, как, по-вашему, все ли в ней в порядке и как полагается? Я ведь плохо знаю, как и что принято у вас в городе.

Старый Джером швырнул газету на пол и наступил на нее обеими ногами. Он схватил записку Гилберта, внимательно прочитал ее дважды, а потом и в третий раз.

Ах, детка, - проговорил он, - ты чуть было не расстроила меня, хоть я и был уверен в моем мальчике. Он точная копия своего отца, а его отец был чистый брильянт в золотой оправе. Он спрашивает только, можете ли вы с Барбарой сегодня в четыре часа дня поехать с ним в автомобиле на Лонг-Айленд? Я не нахожу в записке ничего предосудительного, за исключением бумаги. Терпеть не могу этот голубой оттенок.

Удобно будет, если я поеду?

Да, да, дитя мое, конечно. Почему нет? Право, мне очень приятны твоя осторожность и чистосердечие. Поезжай, непременно поезжай.

Я не знала, как мне поступить, - застенчиво проговорила Невада, - и подумала: спрошу-ка я лучше у дяди. А вы, дядя, не можете поехать с нами?

Я? Нет, нет, нет! Я разок прокатился в машине, которой правил этот мальчишка. С меня довольно! Но ты и Барбара можете ехать, это вполне прилично. Да, да. А я не поеду. Нет, нет и нет!

Невада порхнула к двери и сказала горничной:

Поедем, будьте уверены. За мисс Барбару я отвечаю. Скажите посыльному, чтобы он так и передал мистеру Уоррену: "Поедем, будьте уверены".

Невада! - позвал старый Джером. - Извини меня, моя милая, но не лучше ли ответить запиской? Черкни ему несколько слов.

Не стану я разводить эту канитель, - весело сказала Невада. - Гилберт поймет и так - он все понимает. Ни разу в жизни я не ездила в автомобиле; но я проплыла в каноэ по ущелью Пропавшей Лошади на Чертовой речке. Еще посмотрим, где больше риска!

Предполагается, что прошло два месяца.

Барбара сидела в кабинете стотысячедолларового дома. Для нее это было самое подходящее место. На свете много уготовано мест, куда мужчины и женщины могут удалиться с намерением избавить себя от разных хлопот. Для этой цели имеются монастыри, кладбища, курорты, исповедальни, кельи отшельников, конторы адвокатов, салоны красоты, дирижабли и кабинеты; лучше всего кабинеты.

Обычно проходит много времени, прежде чем гипотенуза начнет понимать, что она самая длинная сторона треугольника. Но нет того положения, которое может длиться вечно.

Барбара была одна. Дядя Джером и Невада уехали в театр. Барбара ехать отказалась. Ей хотелось остаться дома и заняться чем-нибудь в уединенной комнате для занятий. Если бы вы, мисс, были блестящей нью-йоркской барышней и каждый день видели, как смуглая, ловкая чародейка с Запада накидывает лассо на молодого человека, которого вы держали на примете для себя, вы тоже потеряли бы вкус к дешевому блеску музыкальной комедии.

Когда мы в десять часов стали прощаться, Айлин, как обычно, тепло и сердечно пожала всем нам руку, обольстительно улыбнулась и пригласила заходить. Незаметно было, чтобы она отдавала кому-нибудь предпочтение, но трое из нас знали кое-что, знали и помалкивали.

Мы знали, что искренность и прямота одержали верх и что соперников уже не четверо, а трое.

Когда мы добрались до станции, Джекс вытащил бутылку живительной влаги, и мы отпраздновали падение наглого пришельца.

Прошло четыре дня, за которые не случилось ничего, о чем стоило бы упомянуть.

На пятый день мы с Джексом вошли под навес, собираясь поужинать. Вместо божества в белоснежной блузке и синей юбке за колючей проволокой сидел, принимая доллары, молодой мексиканец.

Мы ринулись в кухню и чуть не сбили с ног папашу Хинкла, выходившего оттуда с двумя чашками горячего кофе.

Где Айлин? - спросили мы речитативом.

Папаша Хинкл был человеком добрым.

Видите ли, джентльмены, - сказал он, - эта фантазия пришла ей в голову неожиданно; но деньги у меня есть - и я отпустил ее. Она уехала в Бостон, в корс… в консерваторию, на четыре года, учиться пению. А теперь разрешите мне пройти - кофе-то горячий, а пальцы у меня нежные.

В этот вечер мы уже не втроем, а вчетвером сидели на платформе, болтая ногами. Одним из четырех был Винсент С. Вэзи. Мы беседовали, а собаки лаяли на луну, которая всходила над чапарралем, напоминая размерами не то пятицентовую монету, не то бочонок с мукой.

А беседовали мы о том, что лучше - говорить женщине правду или лгать ей?

Но мы все тогда были еще молоды, и потому не пришли ни к какому заключению.

Примечания

«Роза Южных штатов» («The Rose of Dixie»), 1908. На русском языке публикуется впервые.

Третий ингредиент (The Third Ingredient), 1908. На русском языке в книге: О. Генри. О старом негре, больших карманных часах и вопросе, который остался открытым. Л., 1924, пер. под ред. В. Азова.

Как скрывался Черный Билл (The Hiding of Black Bill), 1908. На русском языке под названием «Как скрывался Черный Билль» в книге: О. Генри. Рассказы. Пг.-М., 1923, пер. О. Поддячей.

Разные школы (Schools and Schools), 1908. На русском языке под названием «Письмо» в книге: О. Генри. Рассказы. Пг-М., 1923, пер. О. Поддячей.

О старом негре, больших карманных часах и вопросе, который остался открытым (Thimble, Thimble), 1908. На русском языке в книге: О. Генри. О старом негре, больших карманных часах и вопросе, который остался открытым. Л., 1924, пер. под ред. В. Азова.

Спрос и предложение (Supply and Demand), 1908. На русском языке в книге: О. Генри. О старом негре, больших карманных часах и вопросе, который остался открытым. Л., 1924, пер. под ред. В. Азова.

Клад (Buried Treasure), 1908. На русском языке под названием «Забытый клад» в книге: О. Генри. О старом негре, больших карманных часах и вопросе, который остался открытым. Л., 1924, пер. под ред. В. Азова.

Он долго ждал (То Him Who Waits), 1909. На русском языке под названием «Тот кто ждал» в книге: О. Генри. Черный Билль. Л., 1924, пер. З. Львовского.

Пригодился (Не Also Serves), 1908. На русском языке в книге: О. Генри. Рассказы. Пг.-М., 1923, пер. О. Поддячей.

Момент победы (The Moment of Victory), 1908. На русском языке под названием «Героизм» в книге: О. Генри. Рассказы о Западе и Юге. Л.-М., 1924, пер. под ред. В. Азова.

Охотники за головами (The Head-hunter), 1908. На русском языке в книге: О. Генри. О старом негре, больших карманных часах и вопросе, который остался открытым. Л., 1924, пер. под ред. В. Азова.

Без вымысла (No Story), 1909. На русском языке под названием «Не повесть» в книге: О. Генри. Таинственный маскарад. Л.-М., 1924, пер. З. Львовского. Рассказ написан в тюремные годы и публиковался в двух вариантах (первый - в 1903 г.). Здесь дается в позднейшей редакции.

Прагматизм чистейшей воды (The Higher Pragmatism), 1909. На русском языке под названием «Смелее» в книге: О. Генри. Рассказы. Пг.-М., 1923, пер. О. Поддячей.

Чтиво (Best-Seller), 1909. На русском языке под названием «Ходкая книга» в книге: О. Генри. Рассказы. Пг.-М., 1923, пер. О. Поддячей.

Лукавый горожанин (Rus in Urbe), 1909. На русском языке под названием «Летний отдых» в книге: О. Генри. Черный Билль. Л., 1924, пер. З. Львовского.

Негодное правило (A Poor Rule), 1909. На русском языке под названием «Неверный путь» в книге: О. Генри. О старом негре, больших карманных часах и вопросе, который остался открытым. Л., 1924, пер. под ред. В. Азова.

Old Jerome Warren lived in a hundred-thousand-dollar house at 35 East Fifty-Soforth Street. He was a down-town broker, so rich that he could afford to walk--for his health--a few blocks in the direction of his office every morning, and then call a cab.

He had an adopted son, the son of an old friend named Gilbert--Cyril Scott could play him nicely--who was becoming a successful painter as fast as he could squeeze the paint out of his tubes. Another member of the household was Barbara Ross, a stepniece. Man is born to trouble; so, as old Jerome had no family of his own, he took up the burdens of others.

Gilbert and Barbara got along swimmingly. There was a tacit and tactical understanding all round that the two would stand up under a floral bell some high noon, and promise the minister to keep old Jerome"s money in a state of high commotion. But at this point complications must be introduced.

Thirty years before, when old Jerome was young Jerome, there was a brother of his named Dick. Dick went West to seek his or somebody else"s fortune. Nothing was heard of him until one day old Jerome had a letter from his brother. It was badly written on ruled paper that smelled of salt bacon and coffee-grounds. The writing was asthmatic and the spelling St. Vitusy.

It appeared that instead of Dick having forced Fortune to stand and deliver, he had been held up himself, and made to give hostages to the enemy. That is, as his letter disclosed, he was on the point of pegging out with a complication of disorders that even whiskey had failed to check. All that his thirty years of prospecting had netted him was one daughter, nineteen years old, as per invoice, whom he was shipping East, charges prepaid, for Jerome to clothe, feed, educate, comfort, and cherish for the rest of her natural life or until matrimony should them part.

Old Jerome was a board-walk. Everybody knows that the world is supported by the shoulders of Atlas; and that Atlas stands on a rail- fence; and that the rail-fence is built on a turtle"s back. Now, the turtle has to stand on something; and that is a board-walk made of men like old Jerome.

I do not know whether immortality shall accrue to man; but if not so, I would like to know when men like old Jerome get what is due them?

They met Nevada Warren at the station. She was a little girl, deeply sunburned and wholesomely good-looking, with a manner that was frankly unsophisticated, yet one that not even a cigar-drummer would intrude upon without thinking twice. Looking at her, somehow you would expect to see her in a short skirt and leather leggings, shooting glass balls or taming mustangs. But in her plain white waist and black skirt she sent you guessing again. With an easy exhibition of strength she swung along a heavy valise, which the uniformed porters tried in vain to wrest from her.

"I am sure we shall be the best of friends," said Barbara, pecking at the firm, sunburned cheek.

"I hope so," said Nevada.

"Dear little niece," said old Jerome, "you are as welcome to my home as if it were your father"s own."

"Thanks," said Nevada.

"And I am going to call you "cousin,"" said Gilbert, with his charming smile.

"Take the valise, please," said Nevada. "It weighs a million pounds. It"s got samples from six of dad"s old mines in it," she explained to Barbara. "I calculate they"d assay about nine cents to the thousand tons, but I promised him to bring them along."

It is a common custom to refer to the usual complication between one man and two ladies, or one lady and two men, or a lady and a man and a nobleman, or--well, any of those problems--as the triangle. But they are never unqualified triangles. They are always isosceles--never equilateral. So, upon the coming of Nevada Warren, she and Gilbert and Barbara Ross lined up into such a figurative triangle; and of that triangle Barbara formed the hypotenuse.

One morning old Jerome was lingering long after breakfast over the dullest morning paper in the city before setting forth to his down- town fly-trap. He had become quite fond of Nevada, finding in her much of his dead brother"s quiet independence and unsuspicious frankness.

A maid brought in a note for Miss Nevada Warren.

"A messenger-boy delivered it at the door, please," she said. "He"s waiting for an answer."

Nevada, who was whistling a Spanish waltz between her teeth, and watching the carriages and autos roll by in the street, took the envelope. She knew it was from Gilbert, before she opened it, by the little gold palette in the upper left-hand corner.

After tearing it open she pored over the contents for a while, absorbedly. Then, with a serious face, she went and stood at her uncle"s elbow.

"Uncle Jerome, Gilbert is a nice boy, isn"t he?"

"Why, bless the child!" said old Jerome, crackling his paper loudly; "of course he is. I raised him myself."

"He wouldn"t write anything to anybody that wasn"t exactly--I mean that everybody couldn"t know and read, would he?"

"I"d just like to see him try it," said uncle, tearing a handful from his newspaper. "Why, what--"

"Read this note he just sent me, uncle, and see if you think it"s all right and proper. You see, I don"t know much about city people and their ways."

Old Jerome threw his paper down and set both his feet upon it. He took Gilbert"s note and fiercely perused it twice, and then a third time.

"Why, child," said he, "you had me almost excited, although I was sure of that boy. He"s a duplicate of his father, and he was a gilt-edged diamond. He only asks if you and Barbara will be ready at four o"clock this afternoon for an automobile drive over to Long Island. I don"t see anything to criticise in it except the stationery. I always did hate that shade of blue."

"Would it be all right to go?" asked Nevada, eagerly.

"Yes, yes, yes, child; of course. Why not? Still, it pleases me to see you so careful and candid. Go, by all means."

"I didn"t know," said Nevada, demurely. "I thought I"d ask you. Couldn"t you go with us, uncle?"

"I? No, no, no, no! I"ve ridden once in a car that boy was driving. Never again! But it"s entirely proper for you and Barbara to go. Yes, yes. But I will not. No, no, no, no!"

Nevada flew to the door, and said to the maid:

"You bet we"ll go. I"ll answer for Miss Barbara. Tell the boy to say to Mr. Warren, "You bet we"ll go.""

"Nevada," called old Jerome, "pardon me, my dear, but wouldn"t it be as well to send him a note in reply? Just a line would do."

"No, I won"t bother about that," said Nevada, gayly. "Gilbert will understand--he always does. I never rode in an automobile in my life; but I"ve paddled a canoe down Little Devil River through the Lost Horse Canon, and if it"s any livelier than that I"d like to know!"

Two months are supposed to have elapsed.

Barbara sat in the study of the hundred-thousand-dollar house. It was a good place for her. Many places are provided in the world where men and women may repair for the purpose of extricating themselves from divers difficulties. There are cloisters, wailing-places, watering- places, confessionals, hermitages, lawyer"s offices, beauty parlors, air-ships, and studies; and the greatest of these are studies.

It usually takes a hypotenuse a long time to discover that it is the longest side of a triangle. But it"s a long line that has no turning.

Barbara was alone. Uncle Jerome and Nevada had gone to the theatre. Barbara had not cared to go. She wanted to stay at home and study in the study. If you, miss, were a stunning New York girl, and saw every day that a brown, ingenuous Western witch was getting hobbles and a lasso on the young man you wanted for yourself, you, too, would lose taste for the oxidized-silver setting of a musical comedy.

Barbara sat by the quartered-oak library table. Her right arm rested upon the table, and her dextral fingers nervously manipulated a sealed letter. The letter was addressed to Nevada Warren; and in the upper left-hand corner of the envelope was Gilbert"s little gold palette. It had been delivered at nine o"clock, after Nevada had left.

Barbara would have given her pearl necklace to know what the letter contained; but she could not open and read it by the aid of steam, or a pen-handle, or a hair-pin, or any of the generally approved methods, because her position in society forbade such an act. She had tried to read some of the lines of the letter by holding the envelope up to a strong light and pressing it hard against the paper, but Gilbert had too good a taste in stationery to make that possible.

At eleven-thirty the theatre-goers returned. it was a delicious winter night. Even so far as from the cab to the door they were powdered thickly with the big flakes downpouring diagonally from the cast. Old Jerome growled good-naturedly about villanous cab service and blockaded streets. Nevada, colored like a rose, with sapphire eyes, babbled of the stormy nights in the mountains around dad"s cabin. During all these wintry apostrophes, Barbara, cold at heart, sawed wood--the only appropriate thing she could think of to do.

Old Jerome went immediately up-stairs to hot-water-bottles and quinine. Nevada fluttered into the study, the only cheerfully lighted room, subsided into an arm-chair, and, while at the interminable task of unbuttoning her elbow gloves, gave oral testimony as to the demerits of the "show."

"Yes, I think Mr. Fields is really amusing--sometimes," said Barbara. "Here is a letter for you, dear, that came by special delivery just after you had gone."

"Who is it from?" asked Nevada, tugging at a button.

"Well, really," said Barbara, with a smile, "I can only guess. The envelope has that queer little thing in one corner that Gilbert calls a palette, but which looks to me rather like a gilt heart on a school- girl"s valentine."

"I wonder what he"s writing to me about" remarked Nevada, listlessly.

"We"re all alike," said Barbara; "all women. We try to find out what is in a letter by studying the postmark. As a last resort we use scissors, and read it from the bottom upward. Here it is."

She made a motion as if to toss the letter across the table to Nevada.

"Great catamounts!" exclaimed Nevada. "These centre-fire buttons are a nuisance. I"d rather wear buckskins. Oh, Barbara, please shuck the hide off that letter and read it. It"ll be midnight before I get these gloves off!"

"Why, dear, you don"t want me to open Gilbert"s letter to you? It"s for you, and you wouldn"t wish any one else to read it, of course!"

Nevada raised her steady, calm, sapphire eyes from her gloves.

"Nobody writes me anything that everybody mightn"t read," she said. "Go on, Barbara. Maybe Gilbert wants us to go out in his car again to-morrow."

Curiosity can do more things than kill a cat; and if emotions, well recognized as feminine, are inimical to feline life, then jealousy would soon leave the whole world catless. Barbara opened the letter, with an indulgent, slightly bored air.

"Well, dear," said she, "I"ll read it if you want me to."

She slit the envelope, and read the missive with swift-travelling eyes; read it again, and cast a quick, shrewd glance at Nevada, who, for the time, seemed to consider gloves as the world of her interest, and letters from rising artists as no more than messages from Mars.

For a quarter of a minute Barbara looked at Nevada with a strange steadfastness; and then a smile so small that it widened her mouth only the sixteenth part of an inch, and narrowed her eyes no more than a twentieth, flashed like an inspired thought across her face.

Since the beginning no woman has been a mystery to another woman Swift as light travels, each penetrates the heart and mind of another, sifts her sister"s words of their cunningest disguises, reads her most hidden desires, and plucks the sophistry from her wiliest talk like hairs from a comb, twiddling them sardonically between her thumb and fingers before letting them float away on the breezes of fundamental doubt. Long ago Eve"s son rang the door-bell of the family residence in Paradise Park, bearing a strange lady on his arm, whom he introduced. Eve took her daughter-in-law aside and lifted a classic eyebrow.

"The Land of Nod," said the bride, languidly flirting the leaf of a palm. ""I suppose you"ve been there, of course?"

"Not lately," said Eve, absolutely unstaggered. "Don"t you think the apple-sauce they serve over there is execrable? I rather like that mulberry-leaf tunic effect, dear; but, of course, the real fig goods are not to be had over there. Come over behind this lilac-bush while the gentlemen split a celery tonic. I think the caterpillar-holes have made your dress open a little in the back."

So, then and there--according to the records--was the alliance formed by the only two who"s-who ladies in the world. Then it was agreed that woman should forever remain as clear as a pane of glass-though glass was yet to be discovered-to other women, and that she should palm herself off on man as a mystery.

Barbara seemed to hesitate.

"Really, Nevada," she said, with a little show of embarrassment, "you shouldn"t have insisted on my opening this. I-I"m sure it wasn"t meant for any one else to know."

Nevada forgot her gloves for a moment.

"Then read it aloud," she said. "Since you"ve already read it, what"s the difference? If Mr. Warren has written to me something that any one else oughtn"t to know, that is all the more reason why everybody should know it."

"Well," said Barbara, "this is what it says:

"Dearest Nevada--Come to my studio at twelve o"clock to-night. Do not fail."" Barbara rose and dropped the note in Nevada"s lap. "I"m awfully sorry," she said, "that I knew. It isn"t like Gilbert. There must be some mistake. Just consider that I am ignorant of it, will you, dear? I must go up-stairs now, I have such a headache. I"m sure I don"t understand the note. Perhaps Gilbert has been dining too well, and will explain. Good night!"

Nevada tiptoed to the hall, and heard Barbara"s door close upstairs. The bronze clock in the study told the hour of twelve was fifteen minutes away. She ran swiftly to the front door, and let herself out into the snow-storm. Gilbert Warren"s studio was six squares away.

By aerial ferry the white, silent forces of the storm attacked the city from beyond the sullen East River. Already the snow lay a foot deep on the pavements, the drifts heaping themselves like scaling- ladders against the walls of the besieged town. The Avenue was as quiet as a street in Pompeii. Cabs now and then skimmed past like white-winged gulls over a moonlit ocean; and less frequent motor-cars- -sustaining the comparison--hissed through the foaming waves like submarine boats on their jocund, perilous journeys.

Nevada plunged like a wind-driven storm-petrel on her way. She looked up at the ragged sierras of cloud-capped buildings that rose above the streets, shaded by the night lights and the congealed vapors to gray, drab, ashen, lavender, dun, and cerulean tints. They were so like the wintry mountains of her Western home that she felt a satisfaction such as the hundred-thousand-dollar house had seldom brought her.

A policeman caused her to waver on a corner, just by his eye and weight.

"Hello, Mabel!" said he. "Kind of late for you to be out, ain"t it?"

"I--I am just going to the drug store," said Nevada, hurrying past him.

The excuse serves as a passport for the most sophisticated. Does it prove that woman never progresses, or that she sprang from Adam"s rib, full-fledged in intellect and wiles?

Turning eastward, the direct blast cut down Nevada"s speed one-half. She made zigzag tracks in the snow; but she was as tough as a pinon sapling, and bowed to it as gracefully. Suddenly the studio-building loomed before her, a familiar landmark, like a cliff above some well- remembered canon. The haunt of business and its hostile neighbor, art, was darkened and silent. The elevator stopped at ten.

Up eight flights of Stygian stairs Nevada climbed, and rapped firmly at the door numbered "89." She had been there many times before, with Barbara and Uncle Jerome.

Gilbert opened the door. He had a crayon pencil in one hand, a green shade over his eyes, and a pipe in his mouth. The pipe dropped to the floor.

"Am I late?" asked Nevada. "I came as quick as I could. Uncle and me were at the theatre this evening. Here I am, Gilbert!"

Gilbert did a Pygmalion-and-Galatea act. He changed from a statue of stupefaction to a young man with a problem to tackle. He admitted Nevada, got a whiskbroom, and began to brush the snow from her clothes. A great lamp, with a green shade, hung over an easel, where the artist had been sketching in crayon.

"You wanted me," said Nevada simply, " and I came. You said so in your letter. What did you send for me for?"

"You read my letter?" inquired Gilbert, sparring for wind.

"Barbara read it to me. I saw it afterward. It said: "Come to my studio at twelve to-night, and do not fail." I thought you were sick, of course, but you don"t seem to be."

"Aha!" said Gilbert irrelevantly. "I"ll tell you why I asked you to come, Nevada. I want you to marry me immediately -- to-night. What"s a little snow-storm? Will you do it?"

"You might have noticed that I would, long ago," said Nevada. "And I"m rather stuck on the snow-storm idea, myself. I surely would hate one of these flowery church noon-weddings. Gilbert, I didn"t know you had grit enough to propose it this way. Let"s shock "em--it"s our funeral, ain"t it?"

"You bet!" said Gilbert. "Where did I hear that expression?" he added to himself. "Wait a minute, Nevada; I want to do a little "phoning."

He shut himself in a little dressing-room, and called upon the lightnings of tile heavens--condensed into unromantic numbers and districts.

"That you, Jack? You confounded sleepyhead! Yes, wake up; this is me--or I--oh, bother the difference in grammar! I"m going to be married right away. Yes! Wake up your sister--don"t answer me back; bring her along, too--you must!. Remind Agnes of the time I saved her from drowning in Lake Ronkonkoma--I know it"s caddish to refer to it, but she must come with you. Yes. Nevada is here, waiting. We"ve been engaged quite a while. Some opposition among the relatives, you know, and we have to pull it off this way. We"re waiting here for you. Don"t let Agnes out-talk you--bring her! You will? Good old boy! I"ll order a carriage to call for you, double-quick time. Confound you, Jack, you"re all right!"

Gilbert returned to the room where Nevada waited.

"My old friend, Jack Peyton, and his sister were to have been here at a quarter to twelve," he explained; "but Jack is so confoundedly slow. I"ve just "phoned them to hurry. They"ll be here in a few minutes. I"m the happiest man in the world, Nevada! What did you do with the letter I sent you to-day ?"

"I"ve got it cinched here," said Nevada, pulling it out from beneath her opera-cloak.

Gilbert drew the letter from the envelope and looked it over carefully. Then he looked at Nevada thoughtfully.

"Didn"t you think it rather queer that I should ask you to come to my studio at midnight?" he asked.

"Why, no," said Nevada, rounding her eyes. "Not if you needed me. Out West, when a pal sends you a hurry call--ain"t that what you say here ?--we get there first and talk about it after the row is over. And it"s usually snowing there, too, when things happen. So I didn"t mind."

Gilbert rushed into another room, and came back burdened with overcoats warranted to turn wind, rain, or snow.

"Put this raincoat on," he said, holding it for her. "We have a quarter of a mile to go. Old Jack and his sister will be here in a few minutes." He began to struggle into a heavy coat. "Oh, Nevada," he said, "just look at the head-lines on the front page of that evening paper on the table, will you? It"s about your section of the West, and I know it will interest you."

He waited a full minute, pretending to find trouble in the getting on of his overcoat, and then turned. Nevada had not moved. She was looking at him with strange and pensive directness. Her cheeks had a flush on them beyond the color that had been contributed by the wind and snow; but her eyes were steady.

"I was going to tell you," she said, "anyhow, before you--before we-- before-well, before anything. Dad never gave me a day of schooling. I never learned to read or write a darned word. Now if--" Pounding their uncertain way up-stairs, the feet of Jack, the somnolent, and Agnes, the grateful, were heard.

When Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert Warren were spinning softly homeward in a closed carriage, after the ceremony, Gilbert s said:

"Nevada, would you really like to know what I wrote you in the letter that you received to-night?"

"Fire away!" said his bride.

"Word for word," said Gilbert, "it was this: "My dear Miss Warren-You were right about the flower. It was a hydrangea, and not a lilac."

"All right," said Nevada. "But let"s forget it. The joke"s on Barbara, anyway!"

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I
Old Jerome Warren lived in a hundred-thousand-dollar house at 35 East Fifty-Soforth Street. He was a down-town broker, so rich that he could afford to walk-for his health-a few blocks in the direction of his office every morning, and then call a cab.

He had an adopted son, the son of an old friend named Gilbert-Cyril Scott could play him nicely-who was becoming a successful painter as fast as he could squeeze the paint out of his tubes. Another member of the household was Barbara Ross, a stepniece. Man is born to trouble; so, as old Jerome had no family of his own, he took up the burdens of others.

Gilbert and Barbara got along swimmingly. There was a tacit and tactical understanding all round that the two would stand up under a floral bell some high noon, and promise the minister to keep old Jerome’s money in a state of high commotion. But at this point complications must be introduced.

Thirty years before, when old Jerome was young Jerome, there was a brother of his named Dick. Dick went West to seek his or somebody else’s fortune. Nothing was heard of him until one day old Jerome had a letter from his brother. It was badly written on ruled paper that smelled of salt bacon and coffee-grounds. The writing was asthmatic and the spelling St. Vitusy.

It appeared that instead of Dick having forced Fortune to stand and deliver, he had been held up himself, and made to give hostages to the enemy. That is, as his letter disclosed, he was on the point of pegging out with a complication of disorders that even whiskey had failed to check. All that his thirty years of prospecting had netted him was one daughter, nineteen years old, as per invoice, whom he was shipping East, charges prepaid, for Jerome to clothe, feed, educate, comfort, and cherish for the rest of her natural life or until matrimony should them part.

Old Jerome was a board-walk. Everybody knows that the world is supported by the shoulders of Atlas; and that Atlas stands on a rail– fence; and that the rail-fence is built on a turtle’s back. Now, the turtle has to stand on something; and that is a board-walk made of men like old Jerome.

I do not know whether immortality shall accrue to man; but if not so, I would like to know when men like old Jerome get what is due them?

They met Nevada Warren at the station. She was a little girl, deeply sunburned and wholesomely good-looking, with a manner that was frankly unsophisticated, yet one that not even a cigar-drummer would intrude upon without thinking twice. Looking at her, somehow you would expect to see her in a short skirt and leather leggings, shooting glass balls or taming mustangs. But in her plain white waist and black skirt she sent you guessing again. With an easy exhibition of strength she swung along a heavy valise, which the uniformed porters tried in vain to wrest from her.

“I am sure we shall be the best of friends,” said Barbara, pecking at the firm, sunburned cheek.

“I hope so,” said Nevada.

“Dear little niece,” said old Jerome, “you are as welcome to my home as if it were your father’s own.”

“Thanks,” said Nevada.

“And I am going to call you ‘cousin,’” said Gilbert, with his charming smile.

“Take the valise, please,” said Nevada. “It weighs a million pounds. It’s got samples from six of dad’s old mines in it,” she explained to Barbara. “I calculate they’d assay about nine cents to the thousand tons, but I promised him to bring them along.”

It is a common custom to refer to the usual complication between one man and two ladies, or one lady and two men, or a lady and a man and a nobleman, or-well, any of those problems-as the triangle. But they are never unqualified triangles. They are always isosceles-never equilateral. So, upon the coming of Nevada Warren, she and Gilbert and Barbara Ross lined up into such a figurative triangle; and of that triangle Barbara formed the hypotenuse.

One morning old Jerome was lingering long after breakfast over the dullest morning paper in the city before setting forth to his down– town fly-trap. He had become quite fond of Nevada, finding in her much of his dead brother’s quiet independence and unsuspicious frankness.

A maid brought in a note for Miss Nevada Warren.

“A messenger-boy delivered it at the door, please,” she said. “He’s waiting for an answer.”

Nevada, who was whistling a Spanish waltz between her teeth, and watching the carriages and autos roll by in the street, took the envelope. She knew it was from Gilbert, before she opened it, by the little gold palette in the upper left-hand corner.

After tearing it open she pored over the contents for a while, absorbedly. Then, with a serious face, she went and stood at her uncle’s elbow.

“Uncle Jerome, Gilbert is a nice boy, isn’t he?”

“Why, bless the child!” said old Jerome, crackling his paper loudly; “of course he is. I raised him myself.”

“He wouldn’t write anything to anybody that wasn’t exactly-I mean that everybody couldn’t know and read, would he?”

“I’d just like to see him try it,” said uncle, tearing a handful from his newspaper. “Why, what-”

“Read this note he just sent me, uncle, and see if you think it’s all right and proper. You see, I don’t know much about city people and their ways.”

Old Jerome threw his paper down and set both his feet upon it. He took Gilbert’s note and fiercely perused it twice, and then a third time.

“Why, child,” said he, “you had me almost excited, although I was sure of that boy. He’s a duplicate of his father, and he was a gilt-edged diamond. He only asks if you and Barbara will be ready at four o’clock this afternoon for an automobile drive over to Long Island. I don’t see anything to criticise in it except the stationery. I always did hate that shade of blue.”

“Would it be all right to go?” asked Nevada, eagerly.

“Yes, yes, yes, child; of course. Why not? Still, it pleases me to see you so careful and candid. Go, by all means.”

“I didn’t know,” said Nevada, demurely. “I thought I’d ask you. Couldn’t you go with us, uncle?”

“I? No, no, no, no! I’ve ridden once in a car that boy was driving. Never again! But it’s entirely proper for you and Barbara to go. Yes, yes. But I will not. No, no, no, no!”

Nevada flew to the door, and said to the maid:

“You bet we’ll go. I’ll answer for Miss Barbara. Tell the boy to say to Mr. Warren, "You bet we’ll go."”

“Nevada,” called old Jerome, “pardon me, my dear, but wouldn’t it be as well to send him a note in reply? Just a line would do.”

“No, I won’t bother about that,” said Nevada, gayly. “Gilbert will understand-he always does. I never rode in an automobile in my life; but I’ve paddled a canoe down Little Devil River through the Lost Horse Canon, and if it’s any livelier than that I’d like to know!”

Two months are supposed to have elapsed.

Barbara sat in the study of the hundred-thousand-dollar house. It was a good place for her. Many places are provided in the world where men and women may repair for the purpose of extricating themselves from divers difficulties. There are cloisters, wailing-places, watering– places, confessionals, hermitages, lawyer’s offices, beauty parlors, air-ships, and studies; and the greatest of these are studies.

It usually takes a hypotenuse a long time to discover that it is the longest side of a triangle. But it’s a long line that has no turning.

Barbara was alone. Uncle Jerome and Nevada had gone to the theatre. Barbara had not cared to go. She wanted to stay at home and study in the study. If you, miss, were a stunning New York girl, and saw every day that a brown, ingenuous Western witch was getting hobbles and a lasso on the young man you wanted for yourself, you, too, would lose taste for the oxidized-silver setting of a musical comedy.

Barbara sat by the quartered-oak library table. Her right arm rested upon the table, and her dextral fingers nervously manipulated a sealed letter. The letter was addressed to Nevada Warren; and in the upper left-hand corner of the envelope was Gilbert’s little gold palette. It had been delivered at nine o’clock, after Nevada had left.

Barbara would have given her pearl necklace to know what the letter contained; but she could not open and read it by the aid of steam, or a pen-handle, or a hair-pin, or any of the generally approved methods, because her position in society forbade such an act. She had tried to read some of the lines of the letter by holding the envelope up to a strong light and pressing it hard against the paper, but Gilbert had too good a taste in stationery to make that possible.

At eleven-thirty the theatre-goers returned. it was a delicious winter night. Even so far as from the cab to the door they were powdered thickly with the big flakes downpouring diagonally from the cast. Old Jerome growled good-naturedly about villanous cab service and blockaded streets. Nevada, colored like a rose, with sapphire eyes, babbled of the stormy nights in the mountains around dad’s cabin. During all these wintry apostrophes, Barbara, cold at heart, sawed wood-the only appropriate thing she could think of to do.

Old Jerome went immediately up-stairs to hot-water-bottles and quinine. Nevada fluttered into the study, the only cheerfully lighted room, subsided into an arm-chair, and, while at the interminable task of unbuttoning her elbow gloves, gave oral testimony as to the demerits of the “show.”

“Yes, I think Mr. Fields is really amusing-sometimes,” said Barbara. “Here is a letter for you, dear, that came by special delivery just after you had gone.”

“Who is it from?” asked Nevada, tugging at a button.

“Well, really,” said Barbara, with a smile, “I can only guess. The envelope has that queer little thing in one corner that Gilbert calls a palette, but which looks to me rather like a gilt heart on a school– girl’s valentine.”

“I wonder what he’s writing to me about” remarked Nevada, listlessly.

“We’re all alike,” said Barbara; “all women. We try to find out what is in a letter by studying the postmark. As a last resort we use scissors, and read it from the bottom upward. Here it is.”

She made a motion as if to toss the letter across the table to Nevada.

“Great catamounts!” exclaimed Nevada. “These centre-fire buttons are a nuisance. I’d rather wear buckskins. Oh, Barbara, please shuck the hide off that letter and read it. It’ll be midnight before I get these gloves off!”

“Why, dear, you don’t want me to open Gilbert’s letter to you? It’s for you, and you wouldn’t wish any one else to read it, of course!”

Nevada raised her steady, calm, sapphire eyes from her gloves.

“Nobody writes me anything that everybody mightn’t read,” she said. “Go on, Barbara. Maybe Gilbert wants us to go out in his car again to-morrow.”

Curiosity can do more things than kill a cat; and if emotions, well recognized as feminine, are inimical to feline life, then jealousy would soon leave the whole world catless. Barbara opened the letter, with an indulgent, slightly bored air.

“Well, dear,” said she, “I’ll read it if you want me to.”

She slit the envelope, and read the missive with swift-travelling eyes; read it again, and cast a quick, shrewd glance at Nevada, who, for the time, seemed to consider gloves as the world of her interest, and letters from rising artists as no more than messages from Mars.

For a quarter of a minute Barbara looked at Nevada with a strange steadfastness; and then a smile so small that it widened her mouth only the sixteenth part of an inch, and narrowed her eyes no more than a twentieth, flashed like an inspired thought across her face.

Since the beginning no woman has been a mystery to another woman Swift as light travels, each penetrates the heart and mind of another, sifts her sister’s words of their cunningest disguises, reads her most hidden desires, and plucks the sophistry from her wiliest talk like hairs from a comb, twiddling them sardonically between her thumb and fingers before letting them float away on the breezes of fundamental doubt. Long ago Eve’s son rang the door-bell of the family residence in Paradise Park, bearing a strange lady on his arm, whom he introduced. Eve took her daughter-in-law aside and lifted a classic eyebrow.

“The Land of Nod,” said the bride, languidly flirting the leaf of a palm. "I suppose you’ve been there, of course?”

“Not lately,” said Eve, absolutely unstaggered. “Don’t you think the apple-sauce they serve over there is execrable? I rather like that mulberry-leaf tunic effect, dear; but, of course, the real fig goods are not to be had over there. Come over behind this lilac-bush while the gentlemen split a celery tonic. I think the caterpillar-holes have made your dress open a little in the back.”

So, then and there-according to the records-was the alliance formed by the only two who’s-who ladies in the world. Then it was agreed that woman should forever remain as clear as a pane of glass-though glass was yet to be discovered-to other women, and that she should palm herself off on man as a mystery.

Barbara seemed to hesitate.

“Really, Nevada,” she said, with a little show of embarrassment, “you shouldn’t have insisted on my opening this. I-I’m sure it wasn’t meant for any one else to know.”

Nevada forgot her gloves for a moment.

“Then read it aloud,” she said. “Since you’ve already read it, what’s the difference? If Mr. Warren has written to me something that any one else oughtn’t to know, that is all the more reason why everybody should know it.”

“Well,” said Barbara, “this is what it says:

‘Dearest Nevada-Come to my studio at twelve o’clock to-night. Do not fail."” Barbara rose and dropped the note in Nevada’s lap. “I’m awfully sorry,” she said, “that I knew. It isn’t like Gilbert. There must be some mistake. Just consider that I am ignorant of it, will you, dear? I must go up-stairs now, I have such a headache. I’m sure I don’t understand the note. Perhaps Gilbert has been dining too well, and will explain. Good night!”

Nevada tiptoed to the hall, and heard Barbara’s door close upstairs. The bronze clock in the study told the hour of twelve was fifteen minutes away. She ran swiftly to the front door, and let herself out into the snow-storm. Gilbert Warren’s studio was six squares away.

By aerial ferry the white, silent forces of the storm attacked the city from beyond the sullen East River. Already the snow lay a foot deep on the pavements, the drifts heaping themselves like scaling– ladders against the walls of the besieged town. The Avenue was as quiet as a street in Pompeii. Cabs now and then skimmed past like white-winged gulls over a moonlit ocean; and less frequent motor-cars– –sustaining the comparison-hissed through the foaming waves like submarine boats on their jocund, perilous journeys.

Nevada plunged like a wind-driven storm-petrel on her way. She looked up at the ragged sierras of cloud-capped buildings that rose above the streets, shaded by the night lights and the congealed vapors to gray, drab, ashen, lavender, dun, and cerulean tints. They were so like the wintry mountains of her Western home that she felt a satisfaction such as the hundred-thousand-dollar house had seldom brought her.

A policeman caused her to waver on a corner, just by his eye and weight.

“Hello, Mabel!” said he. “Kind of late for you to be out, ain’t it?”

“I-I am just going to the drug store,” said Nevada, hurrying past him.

The excuse serves as a passport for the most sophisticated. Does it prove that woman never progresses, or that she sprang from Adam’s rib, full-fledged in intellect and wiles?

Turning eastward, the direct blast cut down Nevada’s speed one-half. She made zigzag tracks in the snow; but she was as tough as a pinon sapling, and bowed to it as gracefully. Suddenly the studio-building loomed before her, a familiar landmark, like a cliff above some well– remembered canon. The haunt of business and its hostile neighbor, art, was darkened and silent. The elevator stopped at ten.

Up eight flights of Stygian stairs Nevada climbed, and rapped firmly at the door numbered "89." She had been there many times before, with Barbara and Uncle Jerome.

Gilbert opened the door. He had a crayon pencil in one hand, a green shade over his eyes, and a pipe in his mouth. The pipe dropped to the floor.

“Am I late?” asked Nevada. “I came as quick as I could. Uncle and me were at the theatre this evening. Here I am, Gilbert!”

Gilbert did a Pygmalion-and-Galatea act. He changed from a statue of stupefaction to a young man with a problem to tackle. He admitted Nevada, got a whiskbroom, and began to brush the snow from her clothes. A great lamp, with a green shade, hung over an easel, where the artist had been sketching in crayon.

“You wanted me,” said Nevada simply, “ and I came. You said so in your letter. What did you send for me for?”

“You read my letter?” inquired Gilbert, sparring for wind.

“Barbara read it to me. I saw it afterward. It said: ‘Come to my studio at twelve to-night, and do not fail.’ I thought you were sick, of course, but you don’t seem to be.”

“Aha!” said Gilbert irrelevantly. “I’ll tell you why I asked you to come, Nevada. I want you to marry me immediately-to-night. What’s a little snow-storm? Will you do it?”

“You might have noticed that I would, long ago,” said Nevada. “And I’m rather stuck on the snow-storm idea, myself. I surely would hate one of these flowery church noon-weddings. Gilbert, I didn’t know you had grit enough to propose it this way. Let’s shock "em-it’s our funeral, ain’t it?”

“You bet!” said Gilbert. “Where did I hear that expression?” he added to himself. “Wait a minute, Nevada; I want to do a little "phoning.”

He shut himself in a little dressing-room, and called upon the lightnings of tile heavens-condensed into unromantic numbers and districts.

“That you, Jack? You confounded sleepyhead! Yes, wake up; this is me-or I-oh, bother the difference in grammar! I’m going to be married right away. Yes! Wake up your sister-don’t answer me back; bring her along, too-you must!. Remind Agnes of the time I saved her from drowning in Lake Ronkonkoma-I know it’s caddish to refer to it, but she must come with you. Yes. Nevada is here, waiting. We’ve been engaged quite a while. Some opposition among the relatives, you know, and we have to pull it off this way. We’re waiting here for you. Don’t let Agnes out-talk you-bring her! You will? Good old boy! I’ll order a carriage to call for you, double-quick time. Confound you, Jack, you’re all right!”

Gilbert returned to the room where Nevada waited.

“My old friend, Jack Peyton, and his sister were to have been here at a quarter to twelve,” he explained; “but Jack is so confoundedly slow. I’ve just "phoned them to hurry. They’ll be here in a few minutes. I’m the happiest man in the world, Nevada! What did you do with the letter I sent you to-day?”

“I’ve got it cinched here,” said Nevada, pulling it out from beneath her opera-cloak.

Gilbert drew the letter from the envelope and looked it over carefully. Then he looked at Nevada thoughtfully.

“Didn’t you think it rather queer that I should ask you to come to my studio at midnight?” he asked.

“Why, no,” said Nevada, rounding her eyes. “Not if you needed me. Out West, when a pal sends you a hurry call-ain’t that what you say here?-we get there first and talk about it after the row is over. And it’s usually snowing there, too, when things happen. So I didn’t mind.”

Gilbert rushed into another room, and came back burdened with overcoats warranted to turn wind, rain, or snow.

“Put this raincoat on,” he said, holding it for her. “We have a quarter of a mile to go. Old Jack and his sister will be here in a few minutes.” He began to struggle into a heavy coat. “Oh, Nevada,” he said, “just look at the head-lines on the front page of that evening paper on the table, will you? It’s about your section of the West, and I know it will interest you.”

He waited a full minute, pretending to find trouble in the getting on of his overcoat, and then turned. Nevada had not moved. She was looking at him with strange and pensive directness. Her cheeks had a flush on them beyond the color that had been contributed by the wind and snow; but her eyes were steady.

“I was going to tell you,” she said, “anyhow, before you-before we-before-well, before anything. Dad never gave me a day of schooling. I never learned to read or write a darned word. Now if-” Pounding their uncertain way up-stairs, the feet of Jack, the somnolent, and Agnes, the grateful, were heard.

When Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert Warren were spinning softly homeward in a closed carriage, after the ceremony, Gilbert s said:

“Nevada, would you really like to know what I wrote you in the letter that you received to-night?”

“Fire away!” said his bride.

“Word for word,” said Gilbert, “it was this: ‘My dear Miss Warren-You were right about the flower. It was a hydrangea, and not a lilac.’

”All right," said Nevada. “But let’s forget it. The joke’s on Barbara, anyway!”