Jasper County Democrat, Volume 9, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 July 1906 — WOMAN PROPOSES [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WOMAN PROPOSES

By BEATRICE STURGES

For the first two years after she entered Stuart Lee’s office as stenographer Miss Atherton’s desk was placed so that every time she glanced up she saw the back of his head. This oft recurring Incident, coupled with the fact that it was a very good looking head, well set on a pair of stalwart shoulders, probably bad much to do with the state of affairs at the end of ■lx months. Even in that time she had learned to distinguish bis step from the dozens of others that traversed the same hall, to watch for his smile of greeting and to listen to his cheery “Good morning” as he took off his hat and rolled up the cover of his desk. Then she would take a good look at the smoothly brushed yellow hair and turn again to her work, which conslsted of copying out long contracts and other tiresome legal forms. Stuart Lee was a lawyer and had bent all his young efforts so hard toward success that it was beginning to come his way. At the end of two years he took larger offices, allowing himself the luxurious necessity of n private room. Miss Atherton then had charge of the large outside room, the second stenographer and the office boy. She saw more people and received more salary, but she missed the closer comradeship of the old days and the familiar sight of a blond head rising firmly above blue serge shoulders. 1 She kept on loving him, though, for I the simple feminine reason that she couldn’t help it. Sometimes Lee gave her dictations that Would take up an hour or more, and then he would make her rest a bit and chat with him before she started

to work again. At other times be would ask her advice in the matter of an office boy or as to the choice of two samples for a summer suit or whether he looked fit to make a call without getting his hair cut, and he would sometimes lay a case before her to get another point of view. To all of these friendly manifestations she responded gladly, with an inward thrill at the pleasingly intimate basis on which it seemed to place their relations. Then this friendly glow would be suddenly chilled by a sweeping realization of the fact that she was only his stenographer and that he probably talked to her during the day because there was no one else at hand. Still there had been times when he impulsively called her into his room to watch a thunderstorm or an unusually beautiful sunset across the Hudson, and, standing close beside him at the window, she wondered if he had not felt some of the emotion that throbbed In her own pulses. If he did, however, he never spoke, and so the most gorgeous sunset was veiled in a gray mist for her, and it was a long time before a gold lined cloud appeared on her own horizon. That was when she overheard a fragmentary conversation between Lee and one of his friends. In reply to some remark Lee had said. “I don’t know what I would do without her.” The other laughed and responded: , “Well, she’s too pretty a girl to spend hes llfe in an office. Somebody will be carrying her off some day.” Lee’s reply ended indistinctly In “stop it some way” as be closed his desk with a bang, and as they passed out the door she heard the friend laugh again and say, “Do It yourself, eh?” From that day she was a changed girl. She moved as one with a purpose, and yet there was a dreamy softness *in her face and manner that seemed to envelop her as an atmosphere. Lee. looking at her closely, wondered that he had not realized how creamy was her skin, how deep her da r k eyes and how fascinating the gold and copper lights In her brown hair. Gradually she told him about herself; that it was her grandfather who had won a certain gallant fight for the Confederacy, her father who had held an honorable

office In a southern state and her brother who had won recognition for bravery In the Philippines; how she had been suddenly obliged to work after her father's death and stenography was the most immediate thing, but that she had no intention of being a stenographer all her life. When he asked her what she would do or what she wanted to do she first looked at him and then blushed deeply, looking out of his window toward the Palisades, and he felt strangely disturbed. He had accepted her in bls office as a matter of course. Companionship with her on that basis seemed natural and easy, but he was a man of reserve, and a departure’from the conservative routine disquieted his phlegmatic nature. Their conversation kept the old friendly tone of everyday badinage and comprehension, but there was a subtle difference, and he began to feel her presence more and more. Finally one spring afternoon when the sun was flooding bis office with a primrose yellow glow she looked in and asked If she might talk with blm. “Why, certainly,” he responded, wltb a smile, “and I wish you would sit in that yellow light. It just suits you in that brown dress.” She sat down, but did not speak at first. Her lips trembled, and she seemed to Tie seeking courage from the yellow sky. Suddenly she turned to him. “Mr. Lee,” she said, “I have been with you four years.” “Is it as long as that?” he questioned. “Four years this day.” “They have been busy years,” be said, "and, I hope, happy ones.” “Yes, they were happy.” she answered slowly as a pink flush spread over her face. “But now I must go away.” “Go away? Leave me? Why, Helen, you mustn’t. I can’t spare you. Where would you go?” In his surprise he had called her Helen for the first time, and her heart leaped. She turned to him tremulously and said, almost timidly, “I am going to get married.” “Married!” He brought out the word incredulously.. “Why, I thought”— Here be broke off and walked to the window, where he stood, his hands in his pockets, gazing moodily across the river. She sat silent until he turned to her again. “Why do you do this?” he questioned. Womanlike, she began with the reasons she felt least. “Because I want a home. I am all by myself, and I am tired of living In a boarding bouse. It la nothing but a travesty on life for a domestic woman to divide her time between an office and a boarding house. Besides, I have worked for four years, and I want to stop for awhile.” “Just for awhile?” “Yes, for I mean to study law and keep my other work In practice bo I can help.” “Help? Whom?” “Help—him.” “He is a lawyer, then?” Lee almost choked over the question. “Yes.” “What Is he like? Is he all right? Is he worthy of you?” She looked at him, he thought, a little sadly. “Like? He is the finest man in the whole world.” He walked swiftly to her. “But, Helen, Helen!” he exclaimed, “I don’t understand It at all. I thought you were happy here, and I supposed, of course, you understood things. I’m lonely too. I haven't had a home for b!x years, and I thought that some day —Helen, don’t you mind leaving me? Won't you miss me at all? Haven’t you seen, girl, what you are to me?” He took her hands and drew her up beside him. “Didn’t you know, Helen?” “Know what?” She lifted her brown eyes to bls. “That 1 love you and want you to be mine?” “You never said so,” she answered. “That’s because I thought you knew and because I always blunder. I need somebody with me all the time. I need you, Helen. You're the biggdpt part of my life. Come and make tv home for me.” He folded her suddenly In his arms, and his heart thrilled as he felt her lean on him. “Sweetheart,” he whispered, “I love you! I love you!” She lifted her face to his. “Dear,” she breathed so softly that he had to bend to catch it, “I have loved ybu for four years.” He held her close I* the gathering dusk for one ecstatic moment. Then she drew away. He came back to earth slowly. Not letting her go. he looked away and out of the window, where the golden light had been merged into a dull purple streaked with red and where the evening star gleamed radiant In the upper blue. “This other chap,” he began. “What other chap?” she asked. “The one you were—were going to marry.” She raised on her tiptoes and kissed him. “There's only one,” she whispered. “and it’s you.” Then she fled Into the other office. • •••••• Everybody says that Lee’s wife Is the better lawyer of the two.

"MARRIED!” HE BROUGHT OUT THE WORD INCREDULOUSLY.