icture
of Eve--

MY Eve--

I FLED from the house.

THE purpose of my visit claimed not an instant of my thoughts. Nor did
Eve.

NOR the past.

ROSE petals only filled my mind.

I LEARNED from a friend that Eve had been drowned years before in the
St. Lawrence River--

SHE had left her husband and baby girl for another love.

ROSE petals--

ROSE petals everywhere.

IN A FIELD

A CHILD of three or four was playing in the tall grass among the nodding
buttercups and daisies. I watched her as she played. She seemed a fit
companion of the flowers, this sweet babe. I longed to feel the touch of
her little fingers on my face.

But as I advanced to where she was playing I stopped abruptly
with the sense of sudden chill. My heart even grew cold.

Was I having a vision, was it an intuition of the future--or was
this a meaningless phantom!

I had been reading of late a modern philosopher whose translator
had made much use of that somewhat ghostly word. Perhaps that was what
had given rise to this inexplicable thing. For as I stood there watching
the child there flashed across my consciousness a changing vision of her
destiny.

It was terrible.

It struck me that it might be better if she could be taken now
while innocent and sweet.

I caught myself back from the act of judging life and death.

I had been the momentary victim of a freakish fancy.

I gazed at the child again, and I saw a strange thing, as clearly
as I see you now.

She, a young woman, was standing amidst scattered wilted flowers,
with parted lips and wide horrified eyes. It seemed a land far off, some
land under the burning sun.

She cried out, a cry of anguish. She was there to hide from
herself and tortured by the memory of what she once had been.

I saw her again, this time on the sea, still trying to escape
from herself, from the tyranny of her lost innocence.

And then I saw her in a rapid succession of scenes, again and
again--gambling places, drinking,--sometimes listless and
distraught--sometimes forced and eager--with wonderful, costly jewels.
But they were too heavy. The price of them was weighing upon her soul.

THEN a grave, alone under leaden skies of some Northern country. No
flowers now, only the moaning wind--the cold rain.

I LIFTED the child in my arms and kissed her.

INCALCULABLE

IT was one of those gray days so frequent in Paris in the late fall. A
drizzling rain was