class="smcap">Once—in the life that was only a memory—was it real—or was the biting cold—was the hunger what had always been—her mother had taken her to the house of the great lady—

Her eyes had opened in childish wonder, as the Princess took her from room to room.

On a great couch of palest blue, among cushions that were all lace and blue and pink—a muff.

It had been carelessly thrown down—she had loved it.

Her greatest desire had been to touch it—to feel the soft gray fur on her face.

A piercing wind blew from the frozen river—the muff—if it would come it would keep her warm—

She would put her hand in it and hold it to her heart.

Through half-closed lids she saw the muff—curving and swaying in the air—like a gray bird.

It was looking for her—there were so many freezing children in the streets—she was small for her age—

How warm—how kind of the Princess to send the muff.

Maybe mother will soon be home from work—we can have supper—

Boris will come from school—

But Boris lay dying—prisoner in the enemy's land.

When a pale sun struggled to shine down on the dirty streets—on the confusion and sorrow of that Russian city—an old Priest—dying with all the rest—of sorrow for his land—found the frozen body of a little girl—with hands clasped over her heart—a faint smile on her upturned face.

ROSE PETALS

Thirty years had passed.

Thirty years that I had spent in vainly trying to overcome the love and hatred which consumed me. However occupied I was with the pressing affairs of my almost over-filled life I was conscious of an undercurrent of despair—the despair that I had felt when Eve told me she no longer loved me.

We were engaged.

Whether she really loved me, or whether it was only a girlish fancy I could not tell. But the day was set for our wedding and was not far off when one Sunday afternoon I went to her house for tea.

The mahogany table in the library was covered with fallen rose petals—the roses he had sent her. Although no other detail of the room has remained in my memory, I still can see the rose petals covering the polished surface. By some inexplicable phenomenon those pink petals were fixed forever in my mind.

I left that part of the country and eventually lost all trace of Eve.

Thirty years later I had a professional engagement with a client.

The man was ill with a cold and asked me to come to his house—

I was shown into a large, stately drawing-room. Great portraits were on the walls, there was massive furniture, fine oriental rugs. A fire blazed on the hearth.

Then I perceived it—the great bowl of roses with fallen petals—scattered over the table

Like a knife they went through my soul——

Rose petals——

Eve—the ring she had returned, which lay in some dark recess of my desk——

The door opened and a tall slim girl advanced—

Eve I cried—my eyes blurred till I could hardly see.

With a strange, somewhat strained laugh, the girl replied that she had not been named for her mother, but it was often said that she was indeed her mother's living portrait.

Then she drew aside a heavy curtain—Before my dimmed eyes was a picture 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 coming down through the bare branches of the trees and a cold mist was rising from the Seine.

I felt out of tune with the universe.

The rain irritated me.

To cheer my drooping spirits