THE AMATEUR LOVER
snatcher, or a general all-round robber of widows and orphans, why, here I am, all dressed and trained and labeled for the part. But a Mother" The smile went zigzagging again across his face just as a big, wet, scalding tear came trickling down the girl's cheek into his fingers. The feeling of that tear made his heart cramp unpleasantly. "Oh, hang it all," he finished abruptly, " what does a Mother do, anyway ?"
The little white face in his hands flooded instantly with a great desolation ."I don't know," she moaned wearily. "I never knew."
For some inexplainable reason Aleck Reese's dev- ilish, insolent beauty flaunted itself suddenly before Drew's vision, and he gave a bitter gasp, and turned away fiercely, and brushed his arm potently across his forehead as though Sex, after all, were nothing but a trivial mask that fastened loosely to the ears.
When he turned round again, his conquered face had that strange, soft, shining, translucent wonder- look in it which no woman all her life long may reap twice from a man's face. Tenderly, serenely, un- caressingly, without passion and without playful ness, he picked up his sad little bride and carried her back to the big, roomy, restful chair, and snuggled her down in his long arms, with her smoke-scented hair across his cheek, and told her funny, giggly
little stories, and crooned her funny, sleepy
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