Capitalists and financiers -- Fiction; Criminals -- Fiction; Wall Street (New York, N.Y.) -- Fiction
“Not at all. Call this afternoon at four and I'll try to have one of my
best nurses here. She is--well, quite young; in fact”--with what might
be called a desiccated archness--“she is a little younger than I and
quite pretty. I call her handsome!”
Some women are so sure of their own position that they do not fear
competition.
“Thank you! I'll be here at four, sharp.” And Mr. Jemingham went away
without having given his name to Mrs. Morris.
At four o'clock Mr. Jemingham called at Mrs. Charlton Morris's agency
and had an interview with Miss Kathryn Keogh. Mrs. Morris gave them the
use of her own little private office; Jemingham very impressively waited
for Miss Keogh to sit down and then did so himself.
He threw at Miss Keogh one of those inventorying looks that women find
so difficult to appear unconscious of, probably because they know their
own weak points.
Miss Keogh was beautiful--and when an Irish girl is beautiful she is
beautiful in so many ways! She had the wonderful complexion of her race
and a mouth carved out of heaven's prize strawberry. Her eyes were an
incredibly deep blue when they were not an incredibly deep pansy-purple,
and they were abysses of velvet. In the darkness, without seeing
them--just by remembering them--you loved those eyes. In the light, when
you could see them, you simply worshiped! Her throat was one of those
paradoxical affairs, soft and hard, which made you think at one and the
same time of marble and rose-leaves--Solomon's tower of ivory, crowned
by the glory of golden-brown hair, so fine that you thought of clouds of
it!
If you looked at her eyes you suspected, and if you looked at her throat
you were certain that you, a respectable married man, had in you the
makings of a criminal--the crime being bigamy. Also you would have
sworn to her only too cheerfully that she was the only girl you had ever
loved. With one look, remember!
Jemingham looked at her with a cold, impersonally appreciative eye, as
he might have scrutinized a clock that was both beautiful and costly.
Miss Keogh understood it perfectly. It piqued her, accustomed as she was
to instant adoration. Yet it was not entirely displeasing. This man knew
as a connoisseur knows--with his head. That he had not permitted the
silly heart to disturb the critical faculties was less flattering,
of course. It deferred the inevitable triumph and thus would make it
sweeter.
“Has Mrs. Morris told you what I should like you to do?” Jemingham's
voice was coldly emotionless, and his gray eyes showed frosty lights.
“She has told me what you doubtless told her. But I must confess I am
not very clear in my own mind,” answered Miss Keogh.
Her voice was what you would have expected an artistic Providence to
give her. It complemented the lips. If you closed your eyes and heard
the voice you saw her eyes and felt the heavenly strawberries on your
own lips!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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