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A Pair of Patient Lovers By: William Dean Howells (1837-1920) |
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A PAIR OF PATIENT LOVERS by W. D. Howells Author of "The Landlord at Lion's Head" "Ragged Lady" etc. New York and London
Harper & Brothers Publishers
1901
CONTENTS
A Pair of Patient Lovers The Pursuit of the Piano A Difficult Case The Magic of a Voice A Circle in the Water
A PAIR OF PATIENT LOVERS
I. We first met Glendenning on the Canadian boat which carries you down the
rapids of the St. Lawrence from Kingston and leaves you at Montreal.
When we saw a handsome young clergyman across the promenade deck looking
up from his guide book toward us, now and again, as if in default of
knowing any one else he would be very willing to know us, we decided
that I must make his acquaintance. He was instantly and cordially
responsive to my question whether he had ever made the trip before, and
he was amiably grateful when in my quality of old habitué of the route I
pointed out some characteristic features of the scenery. I showed him
just where we were on the long map of the river hanging over his knee,
and I added, with no great relevancy, that my wife and I were renewing
the fond emotion of our first trip down the St. Lawrence in the
character of bridal pair which we had spurned when it was really ours. I
explained that we had left the children with my wife's aunt, so as to
render the travesty more lifelike; and when he said, "I suppose you miss
them, though," I gave him my card. He tried to find one of his own to
give me in return, but he could only find a lot of other people's cards.
He wrote his name on the back of one, and handed it to me with a smile.
"It won't do for me to put 'reverend' before it, in my own chirography,
but that's the way I have it engraved." "Oh," I said, "the cut of your coat bewrayed you," and we had some
laughing talk. But I felt the eye of Mrs. March dwelling upon me with
growing impatience, till I suggested, "I should like to make you
acquainted with my wife, Mr. Glendenning." He said, Oh, he should be so happy; and he gathered his dangling map
into the book and came over with me to where Mrs. March sat; and, like
the good young American husband I was in those days, I stood aside and
left the whole talk to her. She interested him so much more than I could
that I presently wandered away and amused myself elsewhere. When I came
back, she clutched my arm and bade me not speak a word; it was the most
romantic thing in the world, and she would tell me about it when we were
alone, but now I must go off again; he had just gone to get a book for
her which he had been speaking of, and would be back the next instant,
and it would not do to let him suppose we had been discussing him.
II. I was sometimes disappointed in Mrs. March's mysteries when I came up
close to them; but I was always willing to take them on trust; and I
submitted to the postponement of a solution in this case with more than
my usual faith. She found time, before Mr. Glendenning reappeared, to
ask me if I had noticed a mother and daughter on the boat, the mother
evidently an invalid, and the daughter very devoted, and both decidedly
ladies; and when I said, "No. Why?" she answered, "Oh, nothing," and
that she would tell me. Then she drove me away, and we did not meet till
I found her in our state room just before the terrible mid day meal they
used to give you on the Corinthian , and called dinner. She began at once, while she did something to her hair before the morsel
of mirror: "Why I wanted to know if you had noticed those people was
because they are the reason of his being here." "Did he tell you that?" "Of course not. But I knew it, for he asked if I had seen them, or could
tell him who they were." "It seems to me that he made pretty good time to get so far as that." "I don't say he got so far himself, but you men never know how to take
steps for any one else... Continue reading book >>
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Short stories |
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