“Well, she is.”
Mr.—(I declare, his name escapes me, so I will call him by his Christian name, Harvey)—Harvey, utterly oblivious to the pitying scrutiny of the two men, moved slowly up the road, homeward bound. He stopped in the middle of the sidewalk to light a “Sweet Cap,” threw back his unimposing shoulders, and accelerated his gait a trifle in deference to his position as the master of a celebrity.
It was his habit to take a rather roundabout way up to the little cottage on the hill. The 15 route led him past a certain drug store and a grocer’s where he was on speaking terms with the clerks. They knew him. He did the marketing, but the account was in Miss Duluth’s name. A livery stable, too, was on the line of progress. He occasionally stopped in to engage a pony phaeton for a drive in the afternoon with Phoebe.
To-day he passed these places by. Every one seemed to be busy. He could see that at a glance. So there wasn’t any use stopping. That was what he got for coming home from town in the middle of the day. He nodded to several acquaintances—passing acquaintances in both senses of the word. They turned to look after him, half-smiles on their lips.
One woman said to another, “I wonder if he’s really married to her?”
“If he wasn’t, he’d be living in the city with her,” was the complete rejoinder.
“He seems such a quiet little man, so utterly unlike what a husband of hers ought to be. He’s from the far West—near Chicago, I believe. I never can remember his name. Can you?”
“It’s not an uncommon name.”
“Why doesn’t he call himself Mr. Duluth?”