Beach Volley

Beach Volley —_Elizabeth Oakes Smith_. Clarence and Harry, much wrapped in white about the head, but with bare little white arms and bare little brown legs, came in solemnly and placed some red lanterns on the table. Bess posed in a chair decorated for the occasion, arranged her draperies, pulled nearer the “incense lamp,” which was her father’s Turkish cigar lighter, laid out her cards, and bent over them in grave silence.,"Have you told Mr. Hinter yet?" she asked suddenly.,"Oh, Mona, if you could only know how wretched I was all last night," he says; "I never put in such a bad time in my life.",“What’d you sneak off for like that?” he said sneeringly. “Going back to tell the boss you caught me gambling?”,The music, soft and almost mournful, echoes through the room; the feet keep time upon the oaken floor; weird-like the two forms move through the settled gloom.，"You are indeed," he says, in a tone so grateful that it ought to have betrayed to her his meaning. But grief and disappointment have seized upon her.，"It doesn't seem worth while," she began, but Patricia broke in impatiently:，Nell Gordon’s eyes were wet with something else than mirth when Betty entered the house later with her pet in her arms. She had heard of the assault upon the innocent Moses and Jethro and resolved to assist mightily in the smiting of the Philistines. She also held a private consultation with her purse and decided to send off at once to a popular mail-order house for a pair of trousers for Moses of a distinctly different cut from those that had been his undoing."No, crow black birds are too lazy to build nests. They take the first nest comes handy."

"I should like," said the Admiral, "to have met Nelson. In all my going a-fishing I never fell in his way.",On the wall hung a gilt-framed portrait, which rumor said represented Ebenezer Wopp, a wreath of carefully made wax flowers, a silver coffin-plate framed and bearing the name and date of demise of Mr. Wopp’s mother, and two or three colored chromos.,NEITHER boy nor dog paused till they came to the dusty road. There Bouncer stopped and ran excitedly about the spot where the big man had taken May Nell in his arms; doubled back on his track, stopped again, and looked up at Billy, perplexity written all over his face. Billy encouraged him with word and caress; but he came at last, put his nose against Billy’s knee, and whined apologetically.,Patricia lifted her brows, perplexed and inquiring, and then dropped them with a shrug that seemed to indicate that the matter no longer interested her.,You can just take any recipe for a party and it will make a good début for a girl, but it takes more time to concoct one for a widow, especially if it is for yourself. I spent all the rest of the day doing almost nothing and thinking until I felt light-headed. Finally I had just about given up any idea of a party and had decided to leak out in general society as quietly as my clothes would let me, when a real conflagration was lighted inside me.,"Oh come, come!" cried the Admiral, "don't make me feel more ashamed of myself than I am. But, Miss Lucy, is not the sea a subject about which you cannot think without being[Pg 110] inspired with thoughts high above those which visit you from other topics?",After recovering her senses a little, she picked up the key, locked the door again, and went up to her room to try and compose herself; but she found it impossible to quiet her agitation.,"Indeed, you'll do no such thing!" cried Elinor, the color rushing to her cheeks and her authority as eldest sister asserting itself promptly. "I don't intend that Bruce shall hear a word until I've had my first good criticism.",Moses’ intuition regarding St. Elmo’s retreat proved to be correct, and it was a sadly dejected countenance on which he gazed when he looked into the cave. Tears, dirt, and the juice of Saskatoon berries mingled on the fair sleeping face of the child, until he seemed to be the very Cree Indian he had so often personated in his play. His long curls were tangled and matted with small twigs. His diminutive brown velvet coat displayed a large rent in the elbow through which oozed a pathetic-looking suppuration of pink and white checked shirt.,CHAPTER IX. AFTER THE DEED.,It was not long, however, before their strong constitutions asserted themselves. Soon both boys were able to sit up and take stock of what damage had been done. Jerry was first on his feet, pale and a little shaky, but again master of himself.,"I am determined, my father," said Beauty, "that you shall not return to that castle without me; you cannot prevent me following you. Although I am young, life has no great attraction for me, and I would far rather be devoured by the monster than die of the grief which your death would cause me.".