DRAWN BY W. L. METCALF. ENGRAVED BY CHARLES STATE.
"SHE WAS HARDLY AWARE OF HIS PRESENCE BEFORE HE HAD SEATED HIMSELF BESIDE HER."
"I don' know w'at all dat mean," the old man muttered, bewildered, as he arose and walked out on the gallery.
Offdean had taken coffee in his room, and would not wait for breakfast. When he went to bid Euphrasie good-by, she sat beside the table with her head bowed upon her arm.
He took her hand and said good-by to her, but she did not look up.
"Euphrasie," he said eagerly, "I may come back? Say that I may—after a while."
She gave him no answer, and he leaned down and pressed his cheek caressingly and entreatingly against her soft, thick hair.
"May I, Euphrasie?" he begged. "So long as you do not tell me no, I shall come back, dearest one."
She still made him no reply, but she did not tell him no.
So he kissed her hand and her cheek,—what he could touch of it, that peeped out from her folded arm,—and went away.
An hour later, when Offdean passed through Natchitoches, the old town was already ringing the startling news that Placide had been dismissed by his fiancée, and the wedding was off, information which the young creole was taking the trouble to scatter broadcast as he went.
Kate Chopin.
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