d she a cat.
She is a cat. A sleek, soft, purring cat, and with claws. I could eat
out my own heart when I think how she played with it. I was fair game
for this experienced coquette, and now I suppose she is boasting of
another conquest, telling of her victory over the simple country lad.
Well, let her enjoy her conquest while she may. The country boy will one
day come back with money enough to buy her and her purse-proud heart.
Yes, I will go back to England and I'll humble her at my feet. What rot
I'm writing. Mother, if you ever see these pages, read these words with
sympathy, as the idle ravings of a man well-nigh gone mad over a woman's
false beauty. I never told the story, even to you, my dear mother. I
dare say you guessed much of it. You know how Helen Rankine came down
from London to our quiet country home. You know how beautiful and
gracious she was. How kind and loving to you; how apparently frank and
friendly with me. She was the first woman I ever saw to whom I gave a
second thought, save you, dear mother. We rode and drove and chatted
together. She drew my very heart from me. I told her all my plans and
hopes and aspirations; of my love of the art to which I had devoted my
life; that I hoped to go to London and study, and then to Rome; that I
wanted to become a great painter. She was so full of hearty sympathy, so
kind, so womanly, that before I knew it she had me enslaved. For all the
graciousness and frankness and sympathy were but the means she used in
her heartlessness to enslave me. Then came a day, a day to be
remembered; a day like that when, beguiled by another beautiful fiend in
woman form, our first father, poor, foolish man, ate of the fruit of the
tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and so lost his paradise. I told
Helen of my love; and how I did love that woman! And she put on an
appearance of surprise, and squeezed a cold tear or two from her
beautiful eyes, and said that she thought I knew and understood. And
when half dazed I asked her what she meant, what it was that I was
thought to have known, she had to blush, and said that she had long been
engaged to her cousin, John Bruce, who was now with his regiment in
India, and that when he came home they were to be married. And then she
said something about my being so young and having a great career before
me, and that she should always be my friend and pray for my success. And
she stretched out her hand toward me. I think she must have see