IT was in the year that Dick Martindale spent out West in the service of the Electrographic Company that his wife became acquainted with Sarah Latimer. Although the latter was by birth a Western girl she had lived long enough in the East to seem like a compatriot to Bertha Martindale, who had come from the dear gregarious suburban life with its commingling of family interests and sympathy, to a land peopled thinly with her husband’s friends, mostly men. Dick laughingly asserted that she had never forgiven him for his few years of Western life previous to their marriage, ascribing all his faults of habit and expression to that demoralizing influence, and he wondered at her courage in exposing little Rich and Mary to the chance of acquiring the wide ease and carelessness she objected to in him. He had been a little uneasy, in view of her previous opinions, as to the manner in which she would dispense hospitality in the little furnished house that they hired, but he need not have feared. Bertha had always been used to popularity.

“Don’t you think I get on well with people?” she asked.

“Like a bird,” said her husband.

“No, but really. Don’t you think I adapt myself?”

“You do so much adapting that I’m getting afraid of you.”

“Don’t.” She put his newspaper one side and kissed him, and he submitted to the caress patiently, his eyes still following the paragraph on which they had been fixed.

“The two women I really feel at home with,” she continued musingly, “are the clergyman’s wife, who is just a dear, poor soul! and a living reproach to everyone, and Sarah Latimer. I wonder that you never told me about her, Richard.”

“Sarah Latimer! I always thought she was a stick,” said Richard, glancing up from the newspaper.

“Well, she is not, at all; at any rate, she’s only the least little bit stick-y. Oh! I suppose if I were at home I mightn’t have taken such a fancy to her, but out here—! and I do think it’s pathetic about her.”

“How on earth you can discover anything pathetic about Sarah Latimer, Bertha, beats me. That long, sandy-haired wisp of a girl! Let me alone; I want to read my paper.”

“No,” she held the paper down with one hand. “It’s really important; do listen to me, Dick! I want to do something for her.”

“You are doing something for her; you have her here morning, noon, and night. She’s forever going about with little Rich and Mary; people will be taking her for my wife some day, you just see if they don’t. I nearly kissed her by mistake for you yesterday; she was right in the way as I came in the door. Now don’t feel jealous!”

“No, I won’t,” said Bertha with indignation. “But look here, Dick! I know she is with us a good deal, but I do want to give her a chance.”

“A chance of what?”

“A chance to enjoy herself, and to see people, and to feel that she’s young, and—oh, a chance to get married, if you will have me say it.”

“I thought so,” said Dick. “You may as well let her go back to private life, Bertha; she’ll never be a success on any stage of that kind. I don’t believe any man ever wanted to marry her, or ever will.”

“You can’t tell,” said Bertha musingly. “So many fellows come here! I should think some of them might fancy her.”

“No, they will not,” said Richard deliberately. “You mark my words; that girl will never get married. Yes, I know she’s good, and she’s clever, and really not bad looking, either, when you take her to pieces. But she’s not interesting—that’s the gist of the whole matter, and nothing you can say or do will alter that.”

“She may not be interesting to you, but she is to me,” returned Bertha. “And that argument goes for nothing, Dick. Scores of uninteresting girls get married every year. Here is Sarah Latimer at thirty, or near it, with nothing in this world to occupy her, or take up her attention. Her uncle and aunt are very good to her, but they don’t need her—she is rather in the way, if anything. That big house is all solemnly comfortable and well arranged, and oppressively neat. The servants have been there for years. The furniture was bought in the age when it was made to last, and it has lasted. The curtains are always drawn in the parlor, and if a chink of light comes in, Mrs. Latimer draws them closer; everything is dim and well preserved, and smells stuffy when it doesn’t smell of oilcloth. It gives me the creeps!”

“You are eloquent,” said Richard.

“There is only one place that looks as if it were ever used,” continued Bertha, unheeding, “and that’s the sitting-room off the parlor. It has a faded green lounge in it, and discolored family photographs in oval walnut frames, and two big haircloth rockers, with tidies on them, on either side of the table, which holds a lamp, a newspaper—not a pile of them, they are always cleared away neatly—and a piece of knitting work. Here Mr. and Mrs. Latimer doze all the evening.”

“What on earth has all this to do with Sarah’s marriage?” asked Richard.

“Everything! Don’t you see that the poor girl is just being choked by degrees; it’s a case of slow suffocation. She lived East after she left school until five years ago, and came back to find her girl friends married and moved away. People, of course, sent her invitations, and were polite to her, but there seemed no particular place for her, anywhere. She’s too clever for most of the men here, and her standard is above them. She’s what I call a very highly educated girl.”

“You seem to suit them,” said Richard, laughing.

“I’m naturally frivolous,” said Bertha with a sigh, “but Sarah isn’t. If she only had to work for a living she would be a great success, but she has enough of a little income to support her. She reads to Rich and Mary, and she is giving music lessons to some little girls just for occupation. Besides, she practices Beethoven three hours a day—she’s making a specialty of the sonatas. She reads Herbert Spencer a great deal, and has theories of education, and on governing children. I’m afraid that neither Mr. Allenton nor your friend Dick Quimby care about sonatas or Herbert Spencer.”

“Not a hang!” said Richard. “If she could play the banjo, or give them a dance—by Jove, I’d like to see Sarah Latimer dance a—”

“Richard!” cried Bertha, indignantly. “If you’re going to be horrid I’ll go away, I won’t say another word.”

“Then I’ll be horrid, for I don’t want you to say another word! I’m dead sick of Sarah with her pale, moony eyes and her straw-colored smile—send her to Jericho, and let me read my newspaper, and don’t embrace me any more, you’ll muss my hair.” He turned and kissed his wife as an offset to the words.

Bertha could not help owning to herself that week that Sarah was a little heavy. She was a tall, thin girl, with a long nose, light gray eyes, and a quantity of sandy red hair. She had no color in her cheeks, and she had a peculiar look of withered youth, like a bud that the frost has touched. Beneath that outer crust of primness and shyness there was, as Bertha had divined, an absolutely virginal heart, as untried in the ways of love or love’s pretense as that of a child of six. She had not had any real girlhood yet at all, while she was apparently long past it. Bertha wondered at that slow development, which occurs much oftener than she dreamed of.

She asked Sarah indefatigably to spend the evenings with her. On these occasions Sarah sat completely, appallingly silent amid the jokes and laughter of the others. Bertha had long consultations with her dear friend, the clergyman’s wife, about her.

“She will never like anyone who is not on the highest intellectual plane,” said Bertha with a sigh; “but there’s a sort of wistful sentimentality through it all that makes me so sorry!”

It was some days after this that Bertha sat one morning cutting out garments for little Rich and Mary, when Sarah Latimer came in. The children greeted her, but not effusively. They were always instructed to be on their best behavior in her presence, and regarded her more as an awe-inspiring companion, who read to them, took them walking, and picked up blocks for them, than as a friend to be loved; she was always oppressively quiet while they chattered.

“Sit down, Sarah,” said Bertha cordially, sweeping a pile of cambrics from a chair. “Here’s a fan, if you want it, but you don’t look a bit hot; you never do. I think you’re pale this morning. Aren’t you well?”

“Why, yes,” said Sarah slowly. Her eyes had a dazed look in them, and there was an uncertain note in her voice.

Bertha observed her critically. Sarah’s drab gown, made with severe plainness, took all the life out of her hair and complexion, and made her tall figure gaunt. Bertha cast her brown eyes down at her own lilac muslin, overflowing with little rippling frills and furbelows, and sighed, a genuine sigh of pity, for another woman’s misuse of her opportunities.

“What have you been doing lately, Sarah? I haven’t seen you for some days.”

“Nothing much,” said Sarah.

“I expected you yesterday; Dick Quimby asked why you were not here. He’s asked after you twice lately, Sarah. I think he’s beginning to be fond of you.”

“Because he asked after me twice?” said Sarah. “Perhaps he’ll propose to me to-morrow.” She gave a spasmodic laugh, and the color came and went in her face. Bertha gazed at her in genuine surprise.

“I don’t know what’s the matter with you, Sarah,” she said. “I’m glad you came in, for I wanted to ask you to join us in a little trip to the Lakes. Dick has to go Thursday, and we have concluded to make up a party. We’ll be gone a couple of weeks, and Mr. Quimby is to join us there. I think we’ll have a lovely time.”

“You’re very kind,” said Sarah, pulling nervously at her fan, “but I don’t think I can go.”

“Why not? You won’t have to dress.”

“It’s not that. The fact is—Did I ever speak to you of Will Bronson?”

“No, who is he?”

“I had almost forgotten that myself,” said Sarah, “until he came to call yesterday. I knew him years ago when I was a young girl; we went to school together. He was a nice boy, but I never had much to do with him; boys never cared for me as they did for other girls. At any rate, he came to see us yesterday. He lives in Idaho; he’s been out there for a dozen years, and he says he’s pretty well off.”

“Well,” said Bertha expectantly, as the other stopped, “what does he look like?”

“Oh, he’s pretty tall, and he has a big brown beard.”

“I suppose that he is intellectual?”

“Not a bit! He’s very—very—Western. You think we are Western here, Bertha, but we’re not.”

“And is this gentleman stopping with you?” pursued Bertha.

“No, he left for New York to-day.”

“Then why can’t you join our party for the Lakes?”

“Because—” The fan dropped from Sarah’s fingers. “The truth is, Bertha, he asked me to marry him; that’s what he came for.”

“What!” cried Bertha.

“He brought some letters to uncle,” went on Sarah, “recommendations, and all that, and afterwards he spoke to me. He says he’s always thought he’d marry me when he had time, but he has never been able to leave the mines before. He has an aunt who lives here, and she has written to him about me, sometimes. He has gone on to New York for a week, and wants to stop back here over one day to get married and then go straight out to Idaho. He wanted me to answer him yesterday, but I asked him to give me until this morning to make up my mind.”

“And what did you say then?” asked Bertha breathlessly.

“I said yes,” said Sarah.

Bertha rose up, heedless of all her sewing materials, which dropped on the floor, and walking over to Sarah, solemnly embraced her.

“You are a dear girl,” she said. Then she took Sarah’s hand in hers, solicitously. “Hadn’t you better lie down, Sarah, and let me bathe your forehead and get you a glass of lemonade?”

“I’m not ill,” said the girl with a convulsive laugh.

“You are just shaking all over,” said Bertha, “and no wonder! Do you think you love him, Sarah?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, you are sure he loves you?”

“He says he does.”

“And does he seem perfectly splendid to you, dear?”

“I guess so,” said Sarah.

“And you are to be married—when? A week from to-day? Oh, what a time you will have getting your clothes! And to think I’ll not be here at the wedding—it’s too, too bad. Sarah, I’m just delighted with you. I always knew you weren’t like other people; most girls wouldn’t have dared.”

“Maybe I’ll wish that I hadn’t,” said Sarah, and the dazed, vacant expression came back with the words.

Richard and his friends were at first incredulous when Bertha narrated the news to them; then, to quote Dick’s expression, Sarah’s stock, in the general estimation, went up fifty per cent.

“The old girl must have had something jolly about her, after all,” he said. “You were right this time, Bertha. I met this Bronson once, and he’s a good fellow. What a lot of courage he must have!”

Bertha only met Sarah once after this before she left for the Lakes. She saw the bridegroom’s picture, which represented him as a tall, stalwart fellow, with a big beard and merry, honest eyes. Bertha liked the face, and felt that it was one that inspired confidence.

“To think that after all my planning she should have done it just by herself,” said Bertha to her husband, “and it was such an unlikely thing.”

“It is singular that the world can move without your pushing it,” replied her husband with a quizzical smile.

Within a few months the Martindales’ plans were broken up; their stay West was no longer necessary, and they went back home again. Bertha received one letter from Sarah after her marriage, a singularly flat and colorless epistle, which told nothing. Bertha had periodical times of wonderment as to Sarah’s present life and chances of happiness. Her own short experience of Western life resolved itself mainly into a recollection of the girl with whom, after all, she had been most intimately associated, and who had disappeared from her horizon so suddenly and romantically.

It was not until three years later that she heard of Sarah again. Then she received a note from Mrs. Bronson, who, it appeared, had come East for a few days and was stopping at a large hotel in town.

Bertha was delighted. With a whimsical remembrance of her long, tedious days with Sarah was a real affection for her. She left the children at home, although they clamored to be taken to see their old friend.

She felt that there was so much to talk about that she must be absolutely untrammeled. How she would astonish Dick when he came home!

As she ascended in the gorgeous elevator, her mind mechanically reverted to Sarah’s former surroundings; she was glad to be able to infer that the silver mines had proved fortunate. She was shown into a private parlor, equally gorgeous in its appointments. She heard the sound of a laughing voice in the adjoining room, and the next moment a porti—re was pushed aside and Sarah appeared. She was dressed in a trailing silken tea-gown of a deep crimson tint—her hair shone like a coronal of gold, there was a rosy flush on her cheeks, and her eyes gleamed with merriment. In her arms she held a handsome baby boy of about a year old, who suddenly turned and ducked his head into his mother’s neck as he saw the stranger, taking hold of her hair with both hands and giving it a pull that loosened its fastenings and sent it tumbling around them both.

“You little rogue,” she said. “His nurse has gone out for a few moments, and I don’t know what to do with him. Keep still, Wilfred.”

Two small, fat, black-stockinged feet, like little puddings, were kicking wildly in a vain attempt to get up on her shoulder, and, presumably, over on the other side, where his head and hands already were, as far as possible from the strange lady.

Sarah sat down on the sofa, clasping the boy in one arm; with the other she swept the tumbled hair back from her face.

“Now I can at least look at you, Bertha,” she said.

Bertha made a movement forward to kiss her, but the infant, who had turned his head for furtive observation, ducked back again with renewed scramblings and kicking at the first indication of her approach.

“I think he will kill me soon,” said his mother resignedly.

“Where is your Herbert Spencer?” Bertha couldn’t help asking; but at that moment the truant nurse arrived; the boy, still in his attitude of clutching, was detached from his mamma’s gown, one hand and foot at a time, as one separates a cat from a cushion. As soon as this was accomplished, he turned and fell upon his nurse in like manner, and the sight of a round little body, entirely headless, with two waving black feet, was Bertha’s last view of the heir of the Bronsons.

The two women clasped hands impulsively and looked at each other; then they both burst into a fit of laughter, deliciously inconsequent.

“It is so perfectly ridiculous!” said Sarah at last.

“What?” asked Bertha.

“Why, that it is I, at all. It’s so absurd to think that that’s my baby! I haven’t the least idea what to do with him.”

They both laughed again, helplessly.

“You are very happy?” asked Bertha, trying to be serious.

“I suppose I am. Sometimes I think everything is topsy-turvy, and I don’t see straight; it’s all so different from the life I used to live, but—it’s nice.”

“Do you keep up your music?” asked Bertha again, after a pause.

“I don’t keep up anything. I play dance music, and read the newspapers. I’ve been traveling nearly all the time since I was married. Will’s business keeps us flying, for one reason or another, there are so many companies that he has to see. I’m always packing or unpacking, or in a Pullman car, and I think always that when I get through traveling I will find myself back at uncle’s once more, and begin to dust everything neatly. You know that we go off again to-night. I’m so sorry you won’t see my husband; he’ll not be back here until train time.”

“I’m sorry, too,” said Bertha.

“I want to thank you for all you did for me in the old days,” pursued her hostess. Their positions were reversed; it was she who led the conversation, while Bertha replied.

“If it hadn’t been for you I should never have been married at all.”

“My dear, I had absolutely nothing to do with the matrimonial cyclone which swept you off,” said Bertha, laughing again.

“Yes, you did, you were so happy, it made me very envious to see you and your husband together. If it hadn’t been for that, I don’t think I’d ever have had the courage to say yes when Will asked me. And you were so kind and good to me, and I know I’m only a stupid thing at best.”

“You’re just a dear,” said Bertha very warmly. Then the two women had a long and exhaustive conversation, before they finally parted.

“She’s very handsome,” said Bertha to her husband that night. He was quite interested and curious about it all. “She’s rich, and she’s happy. Isn’t she the last woman on earth you would have imagined such a romance happening to!”

“Yes, indeed,” said Richard.

“What do you suppose there is in married life to improve a girl so? She’s not in the least uninteresting now.”

“Judge from your own experience,” said Richard. “Association with a superior being cannot fail—”

“You need not say any more,” said Bertha with the scorn expected of her. Then, with a sudden change of tone, “If she had married you, darling, instead of that Bronson man, I could have understood it—no woman could help being nicer for loving you!”