The Purple Heights

ece, of course, would be companionable. He would only have to put upon her the finishing touches, so to speak, embellish her natural graces with a finer social polish. At the

tment store in town," he

must be furnished with everything she needed, and as quickly as possible. She needed, i

Smith to proffer aid and adv

st with terror against Nan

st you have; and make Miss Smith the

nough clothes of her own, and yet she hadn't been allowed to choose what she really wanted. Gently but inexorably they had rejected the garments Nancy selected, smoothly insisting that these weren't "just the thing" for her. They sl

een allowed to pick them out for herself, instead of having been hypnotized-"bulldozed" is what she calle

ect breathed dissatisfaction, her bearing was ungraciousness itself; nor did the two women clerks, trained to patience, tact, and politeness as they were, altogether manage to conceal

hungry, and had their first meal together. Nancy hadn't been trained to linger over meals: one ate as much as one could get, in as short a spa

te aside, sighed, stretched luxuriously, and y

here, along with the travelin'-bags, in a coupla hours. I got a swell suit-case, didn'

the train they were to take did

you like to

o to the

girl's mental processes; the psychology of the proletariat, he tho

hrieked with laughter, the loud, delighted laughter of a pleased child. Her enthusiasm for the slapstick artist provoked him, but at the same time that gay laughter tickled his ears pleasantly. There's plenty of good in a girl who can laugh like th

it mo

else could I expect? She's not a whit worse than the vast majority! She's got the herd-taste. That

' for sad things," she ruminated, as they left the

go over these new possessions, to gloat over her new toilet articles, to sniff at the leather of her traveling-kit. The

dy with the na?ve greed of one who had been heretofore stinted. She had seldom had what she really craved, and at best she had never had enough of it. To be allowed to order wh

le and female, should be driven to bed by lordly colored men in white jackets, and there left in cramped misery with nothing but an uncertain, rustling curtain between them and the world; this, too,

th her hand against every man and every man's hand against her. She had been bullied and beaten, she had eaten leavings, and worn cast-offs. Since her mother's death she had known the life of an uncared-f

st real of all was the feel of the money in it. Nancy fingered the money, thoughtfully smoothing out the bills. "As soon as we are settled, you will have your allowance, and I shall of course provide you with a check-book," Mr. Champneys had told her. "In the meanwhile you will naturally want money for such little things as you may need." And he had given her twenty five-dollar bills. She had received the money dumbly. This

leepless even than Nancy, was tabulating his estimate of t

ad; may

ust improve. Part

n-year locust. Must be restrai

l: suspend judgment

ry herself; has a villainous fashion of slouching, with her hands on her hips. Plenty of hair, but of terrifying redness; sullen expression of

done for he

leep. Sufficient to the day was the red hair thereof; h

e house he had recently purchased, in the West Seventies. It was a fine old house with a glimpse of near-by Central Park for an outlook, and what he had paid for it would have purchased half Riverton. He wanted its large, high-ceilinged rooms to be furnishe

ts shifting, splendidly dressed patrons, its light and glitter, filled Nancy with the same wonder that had fallen upon A

their hand-made faces, their smart shoes, the way they wore their hair, the way they wore their clothes; the men's air of being well dressed, of having money to spend, of appearing importantly busy at

of folks back home, but there's

ome town were to these magnificent beings as daubs to Titians, as pigmies to Titans. If in those first days the girl had been called upon to do the seven bendings and the nine knockings bef

useum of Natural History failed to win any applause from her; the Metropolitan Museum bored her interminably, there was so much of it. Most of the antiquities she thought so much junk,

ng and abetting the education he had in view for her, to arou

eshless hands, and the mark of the embalmer's stone knife still visible upon his poor old empty stomach. And she didn't like him at all. There

glass cases; but I never dreamed in all my born life that anybody'd want to keep dried people," she commented disgustedly. "I don't see no

tain famous shop filled at that hour with fashionable women wonderfully groomed and gowned. Here, seated at a small table, lingering over her ice-cre

ull his mustache, thoughtfully. He had discovered how appallingly ignorant she was, how untrained, how undisciplined. To-day h

or to screw up her mouth, she was almost attractive, despite her freckles! Her eyes, of an agaty gray-green, were transparently honest. She had brushed the untidy mop of red hair, parted it in the middl

stood out bright and golden in her memory. There had been a steam-piano hoo-hooing "Wait till the clouds roll by, Jenny." Wasn't a steam-piano perfectly grand? She liked it better than anything she'd ever heard. She'd long ag

any different animals as she wanted to see, until now. She admitted that she sort of loved wild things-she even

and at a word from him a keeper unlocked a cage door, to allow a young chimpanzee to leap into his arms. It hugged him, exhibiting extr

other baby," said th

e," said Nancy, so na?vely that the man with

," he suggested; and he added,

sturdily; and she added, reflectively: "I'd any day rather have me a

took his charge back to their hotel that evening, it was w

joined her at lunc

nephew this morning. He w

hand that held her

she asked, alm

oom, say at noon on Wednesday. Don't be seared," he added, kindly. "All yo

an' t

pier. You and I go to our apartment, until our own hous

anic-stricken. "Because I won't! I can't! There's some things I just can't stummick,

il the very last minute. Though he's a mighty n

e pair, ain't we? Him goin' one way an' me

es not suit you?" h

an' I'll do it-I ain't the sort backs down. But I ain't none too anxious to get any bet

xteen, my dear,"

n they're sixty," said she, coldly. "There ain't but one thing to

u have no just cause to disbelieve m

ou aim to marry to that nephew of yours. If I was just me myself without bein' any kin to her, you wouldn't wipe your old shoes on me." She gave him a clear, lev

er next question sur

?" she demanded. "I got noth

a plain, tailore

ick out my dress. I want a weddin'-dress. I want one I want myself. I want it should be white satin' an' real bride-like. I've saw pictures of brides, an' I know what's due 'em. I ain

lessly. "White satin,

"I got to insist on the shower bokay. If I got to

d he, hastily. "Only-under the circumstances, I can't help thinking that so

ain, but I won't get married in it. Ain't it hard enough as it is, without me havin' to feel more horrid than what I do alrea

capitulated, h

and you shall choose your own wedding-dress," he prom

in a taxi. Then came the even more marvelous world of the department store, which, "by reason of the multitude of all kind of riches, in all sorts of things, in blue clothes, and

forth for her inspection. Getting married began to assume a rosier aspect, due probably to the reflection of the filmy and lacy miracles

wasn't deepened the mystery but didn't destroy the romance. Americans are all but hysterically sentimental. Sentimentality is a national disease, which rages nowhere more virulently than among women clerks. Would they rush through the necessary alterations, set a

ss as a great store can turn out; its lines had been designed by a justly famous designer. There was a slip, with as much lace as could be put upon one garment; such white satin slippers as she had nev

could hardly get used to the delight and the luxury of all the hot water and scented soap and clean towels she wanted, in a bath-room all to herself. Think of not having to wait one's turn, a very limited turn at that, in a spotted tin tub set in a five-by-seven hole in

hair hanging down her back, sat down on the floor, and drew on those silk s

ix it so's folks could walk on their hands for a c

touched the satin frock. All these glories for her, Nancy Simms,

ious and almost impossible, glistening there on her bed! Carefully she smoothed a fold, slightly awry. Reverently she placed the thin tulle

th a last passionate glance at the splendors of her wedding-frock, and never a thought for the unknown groom because of whom she