Wits' End

by Amy Ella Blanchard

"I don't know anything of the kind, and if he did, you were certainly very unkind to deprive me of such a gift."

"Would you care to have one? I'll do a dozen for you, if you like." The offer was made eagerly.

"Oh, bless me, I couldn't afford to pay the price of one."

"You could pay the only price I care for."

Gwen trembled. She was not ready for declarations. At this moment she resented Ethel's high hand in carrying off Cephas Mitchell, who just now appeared more desirable than ever before. There was dead silence for a moment and then the girl turning away, said: "You ought to sacrifice your feelings in every direction for the sake of your success. You shouldn't let anything stand in the way of it. Hard cash is the only price you should want, and it is the only one I could consider. I don't believe in allowing sentimental considerations to take the place of material benefits. If you are going to offer pictures to your friends in this wholesale way, I'm afraid you'll have a poor time of it."

Kenneth turned pale and shivered, even though he was standing by the fire. "Good-night," he said, "I am wrong to be keeping you up so late."

"Good-night," returned Gwen holding out a passive hand, which was ignored by the man pretending to be busy over lighting his lantern.

She let him go without another word and did not watch the lantern star disappearing over the hill. "I shall express my opinion to Ethel Fuller," she said as she waited for the last log to fall asunder. "I'll not have anyone poaching on my preserves. Even that silly little Flossie Fay was making eyes at him. There isn't a girl among them but would give her eyes to be Mrs. Mitchell, and why should I be more fastidious than they?" Yet she dreamed that night, not of Cephas Mitchell, but of a single great wave that tossed high, enveloping Kenneth and herself in its lucent green waters. She felt herself sinking, sinking, but awoke with the start which follows the sensation of falling, and sighed as she turned on her pillow.

Meantime Kenneth, walking through the dim perfumed night watching a gibbous moon dip behind the cove, cried out against fate. "Go slow," had been Luther Williams' warning, and he had not heeded it. Now he knew—he knew that the joy had gone out of the world for him because a girl had chosen ease and luxury rather than the battle with poverty. At first he was fierce in his hate of the man who could offer her so much, and he thought only bitterly of her for caring for those things which money could buy, but by degrees his mood changed, under the quiet stars in their limitless spaces. What did it matter after all? Life was not long, and there would be a certain reward for him. He remembered Luther Williams' words: "Life is worth living when you have made the sacrifice of doing what is best for everybody." He recalled his mother, vain, selfish, eager to receive, slow to give, hysterically tearful over her own supposed privations, thinking herself a martyr because she could not live as sumptuously as her indolent pleasure-loving nature craved. He thought of his sister and her two children. "I could do more for them, I suppose," he said. "I doubt if mother would be much happier, for with each fresh supply there would be a new demand, and if it were not met that would be another ground for grievance. It is like pouring water into a sieve, and the worst of it is that she becomes so accustomed to my sacrifices that they mean nothing to her. Poor mother!" But his mind was made up. He would not look for appreciation, and the summer over he would accept the position offered him in a broker's office by an old friend of his father's, and on holidays he would follow his painting as a recreation.

For the next few days he kept himself aloof from Wits' End and the group of young people who frequented the cottage. When he met any of them he pleaded hard work as an excuse. Meantime Gwen missed him, though she would not confess this even to herself. She knew that Mrs. Fleming and the children had gone to Blue Hill for a visit, and her conscience pricked her as she thought of Kenneth in his loneliness, but as she perceived Ethel Fuller to be in dead earnest in her effort to attract Cephas Mitchell she resolutely set Kenneth and his affairs out of her mind. The weather had not been favorable for the row to Jagged Island, but that it was surely to take place Ethel daily reminded both Gwen and Mr. Mitchell. There were other things on foot, however, and each girl vied with the other in making herself as charming as possible. Ethel did not hesitate to propose all sorts of expeditions which Gwen's pride made her reject with scorn, but she accepted such suggestions as Mr. Mitchell himself made, and he began to divide his time so equally between the two that it became known as a matter of course that if he were not walking or rowing or sailing with Gwen, he was with Ethel.