Seventeen | Page 6

May Parcher said that Joe Bullitt was ``awfully sarcastic.'' William had spent the ensuing hour in an object-lesson intended to make Miss Parcher see that William Sylvanus Baxter was twice as sarcastic as Joe Bullitt ever thought of being, but this great effort had been unsuccessful, because William, failed to understand that Miss Parcher had only been sending a sort of message to Mr. Bullitt. It was a device not unique among her sex; her hope was that William would repeat her remark in such a manner that Joe Bullitt would hear it and call to inquire what she meant.
`` `SO indifferink'!'' murmured William, leaning dreamily upon the gate-post. ``Indifferink!'' He tried to get the exact cooing quality of the unknown's voice. ``Indifferink!'' And, repeating the honeyed word, so entrancingly distorted, he fell into a kind of stupor; vague, beautiful pictures rising before him, the one least blurred being of himself, on horseback, sweeping between Flopit and a racing automobile. And then, having restored the little animal to its mistress, William sat carelessly in the saddle (he had the Guardsman's seat) while the perfectly trained steed wheeled about, forelegs in the air, preparing to go. ``But shall I not see you again, to thank you more properly?'' she cried, pleading. ``Some other day--perhaps,'' he answered.
And left her in a cloud of dust.

III
THE PAINFUL AGE
``OH WILL--EE!''
Thus a shrill voice, to his ears hideously different from that other, interrupted and dispersed his visions. Little Jane, his ten-year- old sister, stood upon the front porch, the door open behind her, and in her hand she held a large slab of bread-and-butter covered with apple sauce and powdered sugar. Evidence that she had sampled this compound was upon her cheeks, and to her brother she was a repulsive sight;.
``Will-ee!'' she shrilled. ``Look! GOOD!'' And to emphasize the adjective she indelicately patted the region of her body in which she believed her stomach to be located. ``There's a slice for you on the dining-room table,'' she informed him, joyously.
Outraged, he entered the house without a word to her, and, proceeding to the dining-room, laid hands upon the slice she had mentioned, but declined to eat it in Jane's company. He was in an exalted mood, and though in no condition of mind or body would he refuse food of almost any kind, Jane was an intrusion he could not suffer at this time.
He carried the refection to his own room and, locking the door, sat down to eat, while, even as he ate, the spell that was upon him deepened in intensity.
``Oh, eyes!'' he whispered, softly, in that cool privacy and shelter from the world. ``Oh, eyes of blue!''
The mirror of a dressing-table sent him the reflection of his own eyes, which also were blue; and he gazed upon them and upon the rest of his image the while he ate his bread-and-butter and apple sauce and sugar. Thus, watching himself eat, he continued to stare dreamily at the mirror until the bread-and-butter and apple sauce and sugar had disappeared, whereupon he rose and approached the dressing-table to study himself at greater advantage.
He assumed as repulsive an expression as he could command, at the same time making the kingly gesture of one who repels unwelcome attentions; and it is beyond doubt that he was thus acting a little scene of indifference. Other symbolic dramas followed, though an invisible observer might have been puzzled for a key to some of them. One, however, would have proved easily intelligible: his expression having altered to a look of pity and contrition, he turned from the mirror, and, walking slowly to a chair across the room, used his right hand in a peculiar manner, seeming to stroke the air at a point about ten inches above the back of the chair. ``There, there, little girl,'' he said in a low, gentle voice. ``I didn't know you cared!''
Then, with a rather abrupt dismissal of this theme, he returned to the mirror and, after a questioning scrutiny, nodded solemnly, forming with his lips the words, ``The real thing--the real thing at last!'' He meant that, after many imitations had imposed upon him, Love--the real thing--had come to him in the end. And as he turned away he murmured, ``And even her name --unknown!''
This evidently was a thought that continued to occupy him, for he walked up and down the room, frowning; but suddenly his brow cleared and his eye lit with purpose. Seating himself at a small writing-table by the window, he proceeded to express his personality--though with considerable labor--in something which he did not doubt to be a poem.
Three-quarters of an hour having sufficed for its completion, including ``rewriting and polish,'' he solemnly signed it, and then read it several times in a state of hushed astonishment. He had never