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approached. Some - and among them were the best women I knew - grew cool in their demeanor. I received fewer invitations.

"The mere spectacle of her had hitherto so moved me, so preoccupied my thoughts, that I had never questioned the accuracy of my first guess as to her motive in so showing herself to me. But in the third month little by little came doubt. In all that troubled period, I had given myself courage by saying to myself that she would see that this last appeal was, like all the others, quite vain and would pursue me no longer. But she had never let me see her eyes, which might have revealed to me something of her thoughts. Now, I had certainly proved my firmness, yet she showed not the slightest sign of discouragement. Perhaps, I said to myself, passion has so wrought in her that she must see me, and that sight of me is her sole object. Then, once or twice, it came into my unwilling mind that her motive might be revenge, that she sought to cause me misery rather than to allay her own. That thought I dismissed. It was unworthy.

"As another slow month went by, other questions began to form themselves in my mind. How long did she intend to continue this strange appeal, if it were one; this senseless persecution, if it were that? And whence did she obtain so close a knowledge of my movements? As to that, I began to test her powers, or, rather, it was with a blind wish to avoid her that I began to change my hour of arriving at my office, to dine at unusual hours at clubs I did not ordinarily frequent, or at obscure restaurants. But this I soon found out: change my ways as I would, I could not long avoid her. Before the day was over, somewhere, early or late, I saw her. The nervous dread of seeing that pale face was every moment with me. I found myself asking, Will it be on the steps of my office? On the curbstone by this restaurant? Will I meet her as I turn

this corner?' Dread of her became an acute mental torture impossible to describe.

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I became wretchedly nervous, unfit for work, unfit for pleasure. Once I stayed for two days in my rooms without stirring from them; but on the second, chancing to look from my window, I saw her there in the street before my door. There was no escape for me even in cowardly retreat. I hope you can understand why, as the months passed, I found this strange, silent battle wearing me out, slowly killing me. I hope you will understand how the idea of retreat, escape, hiding, no matter how cowardly, grew more and more attractive. Pride struggled hard, self-respect said no; all my manhood revolted; nevertheless, one day it was now early June - I threw some things into a bag and left for Bar Harbor. There, for one blessed day and night, I was a free man, walking the earth without dread. On leaving my hotel on the second day, there by the door, doubly conspicuous in that little town, was the silent, black-robed figure I had so learned to dread.

"I took the next train back to New York. I said to myself, I will stay in the city the entire summer; she cannot endure the heat. But she did. Then for I was utterly unnerved and not my

self I did an unmanly thing: I went to the police. I asked to be protected from the persecution of a woman.

"What does she do?' asked the high official to whom I had applied.

"Nothing,' I was forced to answer, feeling how like an imbecile it was to say so. I tried to explain, and I saw by his look that he thought me demented. That a woman stood on the sidewalk, without so much as looking at me as I went by, did not seem to him serious persecution. The man had no imagination! He did not see, and I could not make him understand, the exquisite cruelty.

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Finally he said, I am sorry, Mr.

Barrington, but I can do nothing. She has the same right to the use of the streets that you have. If she should accost you, or make herself disagreeable in any way, of course But until she commits some overt act I cannot interfere. Or, hold on; I could instruct policemen to tell her to move on if she stays too long in one place; but you say she's a respectable woman? - and has means? There might be a difficulty. I think we'd better not move in the matter. Come, sir, you're worked up over nothing. Go along quietly, pay no attention to her; she'll soon tire of that amusement. What can she get by it, after all?'

some

"Accost you,' ' commits overt act, you can guess how these stale bits of the police vocabulary jarred on me. You can see how significant they were of a vulgar police interpretation of the facts. And then the question, 'What can she get by it?' It measured the comprehension of human nature which is given to the police. The man had no conception of anything more subtle than blackmail. I went away utterly disheartened.

"I went to my rooms and thought. I tried to divine her plan, her object. I could make nothing of the mystery. Broken as I was, I thought again of flight, of Europe. But I had yielded to cowardice once - and again; I would yield no more. I had unquestionably done the woman an irreparable wrong, and I would stay and face the punishment like a man. And, besides, flight to Europe, or anywhere, was vain. She had followed me to Bar Harbor; she could follow me anywhere. She had money enough, and I well knew she did not lack determination.

"Until winter returned, I kept my resolve to suffer in silence. Then again I felt the temptation to escapeby any means. With I hardly know what hope, I employed a private detective to find out what he could. Little

enough he told me, only that certain associates of his in the trade were hired by her to shadow me, and were well paid, and that they knew nothing of her motives. Thus I found out how she knew so well where to place herself where I must pass. Thus I was enabled to see with terrible clearness the lengths to which she was willing to go!

"Next, I consulted a lawyer. But all that he could suggest was an inquiry into her sanity. He thought that such an inquiry might result in her confinement in an asylum. But, much as I desired to escape, I had at least strength enough not to resort to that cruel expedient. If she was insane, and I for one did not believe she was, had made her so.

"Probably her

SO

clearly it was I who My hands were tied. detectives reported to her these proceedings. At any rate, when I next saw her, I detected for the first time a difference in her expression, slight, indeed, that I am not sure to this day that it did not exist solely in my imagination, morbidly active after a year of mental suffering. I had been making a call, — for, in spite of everything, I forced myself to lead my usual life, — and came down the steps of my friend's house late in the afternoon of a winter day. She stood under a gaslight, and as I passed her, I thought I detected in her face I know I detected in her face the subtlest look, a mere shadow of irony. You may guess I knew this face well. How could the minutest change escape me?

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"The new expression dwelt in my memory, and seemed to suggest an explanation. Of course I inferred at once that she knew I had had recourse to detectives and to lawyers, but there seemed to be more in her look than that. I racked my mind with that intense effort which is common to us all when we are trying to recall anything which we greatly wish to remember, and which is, as we say, on the tip of our tongue. I seemed as near to the meaning of her expression as that.

But I could not catch the whole of its ficulty would daunt her, no discourage

deep significance.

"That night I awoke in a cold sweat, starting up in bed as if with nightmare, my heart beating as if with uncontrollable terror. The scales had dropped from my eyes I knew! "She was not like the police; she did have imagination! And what an imagination it was that could conceive the plan which I had at last divined! She knew the danger of the 'overt act,' and indeed she would despise anything so clumsy. She had the courage and the will power to do anything, even murder, —of the long-planned, deliberate kind, which shows will. No sudden assault, nothing which might cause my death, such as might content a weak-willed woman, could be adequate to her ideal of revenge as it was now suddenly revealed to me. She wanted no scene, no physical attack which the police could stop, and which could terminate only in the vulgarity of the police court. She She wished to subject me to a torture that was insidious and slow, against which I could make no protest, that would increase rather than diminish as time went on, that would be unending. Such torture as that must transcend the physical, it must be mental. Seeking such an end, she had imagination enough to conceive this plan of becoming my shadow, she had the strength of will and a prodigious strength was required to carry it out. But the horror lay in this, her plan, to be perfect, must include the intention of being my shadow as long as I lived!

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"If I well knew her unconquerable will, I knew, also, her devouring pride. Do what I would, she would rule my life in spite of me. Her love I might reject; but her pride, at least, I should be made to gratify. And to this passion, and to that of revenge, and to her distorted love, she would subordinate her whole life,

all her strength, all her fortune, all her prospects of happiness. No dif

ment reach her, no ill health weaken her. I quailed before the vision.

- but believe me

one

"For a moment, only for a moment, - as I gazed ahead into the years and saw this life, the most stolid could not endure unmoved, I thought of suicide. Then I said no : I will stay and fight. She shall never know so far as I can help it - that I suffer from her persecution, nor will I again attempt to interfere. Her only punishment shall be to think her revenge a failure. I will try to make her think, hereafter, that I mind her no more than I do any casual passer-by, than a lamppost, or a hydrant.

"This resolution calmed me, and I slept again. I awoke in the morning not so much fatigued. For in a way the full revelation of her purpose had freed me of one source of weakness. Pity for the woman vanished; intense aversion took its place. For a while thereafter I think I actually enjoyed the sight of her miserable face.

Of course

"Another year went by. My moods during this time alternated between abject dread and a certain savage joy as I met her. For I believed that to her I showed no sign of suffering. my history gradually became known to my friends, and as it did so I observed a certain shifting of sympathy from her to me. I had had none while the affair remained a mystery. Now, people began to think I was being excessively punished. She became known as 'Barrington's ghost,' and the slur in the name was for her, not for me. All this gave me courage. I thought with joy that I should really, in time, become wholly indifferent. I might, perhaps, even enjoy a certain happiness.

"Now, if a man is in misery, there is always some woman who will love him, and her love will be measured not by his deserts, but by his suffering. I met such a woman, -a girl whose pure beauty, whose exquisite goodness, whose

I

great courage seemed to make a bright ness round about her. I loved her, and I dared to tell her so. She knew, I said, what shadow haunted me: could she, in spite of that, dare to marry me? When this unhappy woman,' she answered, 'sees you married, happy, indifferent, surely she will know she is defeated and will cease to trouble you.' Although I knew I should see my shadow when I left the house that night, I allowed myself to believe her. Why not? knew my recent indifference had been manifest; I knew she knew her revenge was failing. Would not such a new proof as my marriage show her that I was secure against her? As a matter of fact, I had put a new weapon into her hands. "But, full of these hopes, I married. The Shadow was present when we left the church; the Shadow, in her black gown and with her white face, stood a little apart from the crowd in the railway station when we returned from our wedding trip. I afterwards learned that illness alone had prevented her following where we went. She never left us after our return. At first my wife never seemed to notice, she never complained, she never even mentioned the Shadow; she lived her life with a gay courage; but when the Shadow stood with us by the grave of our baby, born only to die Well, I think I said my wife has gone South for the winter? The reason? She is a complete nervous wreck, health, beauty, youth, all gone! "Did I never make any appeal to that woman? Once. When, after the death of our child, I saw that my wife grew afraid, when I saw that her health began to fail, I did try. I went to her house, but I could not gain admission. I wrote, but without result. Then, much as I dreaded a scene in the streets, I determined to speak to her. That evening I went to a political dinner. At its close I saw her, and, for the first time in six years, I spoke to her. I begged her to let me say a few words. She turned,

and by a gesture permitted me to walk up the street at her side. For a block, while men who knew the story stared in wonder, I poured forth remonstrance, denunciation, entreaty. Through it all, her even pace never changed, her cold face never altered, she spoke no word, made no gesture of assent or of dissent. At the end of the block was her carriage. Into this she stepped, and left me without a word. She must enjoy the memory of that hour!

"Come," added Barrington, breaking off abruptly. "I've finished my story. It's late. We must go. For fourteen years I've endured this misery. Don't say anything— I know," and then, half under his breath, he added, "Poor Eleanor! her beauty is quite gone, too."

Out of doors, a drizzling rain was fall

ing. The reflected light of the street lamps shimmered on the damp pavements. It was two o'clock in the morning; the strange odor of streets on a warm wet night filled the air; it was very still. Then, suddenly, the roar of an elevated train on Sixth Avenue, a block away, broke the silence. We turned down the street, and there, standing on the edge of the sidewalk, was an apparition at which I stared with instinctive, certain recognition. The woman was in black; she was very pale; her eyes were feverish and had deep shadows under them; her cheeks were hollow. As Barrington had said, her beauty had gone in these fourteen years, but her unconquerable will had not gone. A glance satisfied me of that. She was his fate, and could not leave him. She did not speak or move, but, as we passed, the expression of her eyes as she regarded Barrington for she raised her eyes the second he had passed was one I shall never forget. Then, turning, I saw her beckon to a waiting carriage. This she entered, and was driven rapidly away, the wet top of the vehicle flashing as it passed under successive electric lights.

Charles Miner Thompson.

PART OF A MAN'S LIFE.

"The uttered part of a man's life, let us always repeat, bears to the unuttered, unconscious part a small unknown proportion. He himself never knows it, much less do others." - Carlyle's Essay on Scott.

ENGLISH AND AMERICAN COUSINS.

I HEARD on board ship, a few years ago, a discussion as to the comparative number of Americans visiting England and of Englishmen visiting America. None rated the proportion of the former class as less than ten to one; but the most experienced traveler among us laughed at this low estimate, and declared that five hundred to one would be much nearer. Be the difference less or more, it shows the utterly unequal ground on which the two national bodies meet, as to mutual acquaintance. Traveling on the Continent of Europe, soon after, with a party of young Americans, I was witness of their dismay at being assailed from time to time by friendly English fellow travelers with such questions as these: "Is it not very lonely in America? Are there any singing birds there? Any wild flowers? Any bishops? Are there booths in the streets of New York? Do people read English books there? Have they heard of Ruskin; and how?" These were from the rank and file of questioners, while a very cultivated clergyman lost caste somewhat with our young people by asking confidently, "Are Harvard and Yale both in Boston?" a question which seemed to them as hopelessly benighted as the remark of a lady, just returned from the wonders of the New World, who had been impressed, like all visitors, with the novelties offered in the way of food at the Baltimore dinnertables, but still sighed with regret at having been obliged to come away without eating "a canvas-backed clam."

One needs to know but little of large families of collateral kindred to recognize that the nearer the cousinship, the

closer the criticism. Theodore Hook profanely declares the phrase "a friend that sticketh closer than a brother" to designate a cousin, and Lord Bacon comes near enough to the same thought to point out that we are bidden by the highest authority to forgive our enemies, but are nowhere bidden to forgive our friends. It may be wise, therefore, for Americans to draw their compliments, not from their own newspapers, but from the verdicts of such English critics as Lord Lyons, who, as recorded in the delightful Letters from a Diplomat's Diary, declared on his return from a long residence in Washington that he "had never yet met a stupid American woman," or Mr. Froude, who, during his voyage around the world, records, “Let me say that nowhere in America have I met with vulgarity in its proper sense." These two compliments are undoubtedly so sweeping that perhaps no American citizen would think it quite safe to apply them to the people who live in the adjoining street; but they are at least worth a thousand vague newspaper libels. Even Matthew Arnold, who certainly cannot be said to have loved America much, or to have known much about it, — for what can a man be said to know about America who describes a Virginia mob as fortifying its courage with fish. balls and ice water?1was led, while making a comparison with those whom he had left at home, to say, "Our [English] countrymen, with a thousand good qualities, are really, perhaps, a good deal wanting in lucidity and flexibility.”

In the same way, Americans might 1 The Nineteenth Century, May, 1887, p. 317.

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