An American Suffragette | Page 4

ground with only here and there a stray fibre that had sunk to any depth.
Leonora Kimball, who at this time was slightly over twenty-three years of age, possessed a most winning and gracious manner--a face that might have served as a better model for a madonna than many of those apparently used by the old masters; a lithe and graceful figure and an abundance of vivacity when doing the things that pleased her. She had so captivated John Earl from their first meeting that he had never tried nor cared to analyze her. Indeed, had he so wished, he would have found it a difficult undertaking, for he was too content with the pleasure he felt in her presence to care to question it.
Dr. Earl had taken infinite pains to search the world for the sources of disease and its prevention and cure. He had delved deeply into the mysteries of mental and spiritual therapeutics, and had closely studied the influences surrounding the origin of individual human beings. But while he had harnessed many more or less occult forces into scientific service in treating invalids, strangely enough, it never occurred to him that similar elements might have an important mission in determining the natural affinity of those attracted by the tenderest passion in the world, and might do much, if properly regarded, to render stable that one-time sacred bond of the sexes known as the marriage relation, which at this time, everywhere, was resting upon such shifting quicksands of mismating as to menace its existence.
"Love is of man's life a thing apart," applied with full force to Dr. Earl, and he accepted his relations with Leonora Kimball with the same confidence and light heart that might characterize the least thoughtful man on Manhattan Island. While he had traveled many thousands of miles and burned many a midnight lamp to ascertain if improvement could not be made in the prevailing orthodox method of treating disease, he blindly accepted, as millions of strong men before him had done, the prevailing orthodox method of selecting a wife.
In any event, after the brother and sister had been left at the Ramsey mansion on upper Fifth Avenue, he and Leonora proceeded to spend the time from eleven to three o'clock very much as other lovers similarly situated would have consumed those four hours. They motored until one o'clock, when they went to her house, not far from his sister's residence, where he had luncheon with her and her widowed mother, and at three o'clock he arrived at the Hotel Gotham, where he had engaged apartments.
When he stepped into his new sitting-room a large photograph of Leonora confronted him on the dressing-case, his valet being a man of rare sense and tact.
As he looked into the counterfeit impression of the large blue eyes and reflected back her smile he declared to himself for the twentieth time that day that she was the most fascinating creature in the world.
CHAPTER II
A MYSTICAL PARADE
When Dr. Earl arrived at his hotel he noticed crowds of people gathering on the sidewalk, and lining up along the curbstone further down the avenue, evidently expecting a parade of some sort. He had dismissed the matter from his mind and was startled about an hour later to hear the tap of a drum on the street, then a martial air by a band, followed by the clatter of horses' hoofs and the shouts of policemen clearing the way. Throwing open a window, he witnessed a sight that dazed him for a moment, and he wondered whether or not he really was in an American city.
As if by magic, the street was now filled with women, arranging themselves in marching order, with the shout of command ringing clear upon the air, and down Fifth Avenue as far as he could see, other columns of women were forming to the strains of military music and to the stirring echoes of fife and drum.
He grabbed his hat and stick, and joined the throng that packed the sidewalk. His six feet of height and his athletic training rendered him good service in ascertaining where to go and making it possible to get there. He hurried along several blocks until he reached what he thought must be the leading column of the march. Then he elbowed his way to the curbstone and took up a position to witness this, as yet, mysterious demonstration.
The air was sharp for a day late in April, but the sky was clear and the sun shed occasional rays of splendor over some of the lower buildings upon the waiting multitude.
The crowd was remarkably quiet. There seemed to be a spell over the whole performance that savored of some of the wonders he had so recently witnessed in India. There was something electric in the