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THE COURIER
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A IoATTBR DAY GALATEA.
SHE was tall and statuesque, with a figure that was a marvel
of indolent grace and a face that might have beoc modeled
from that of tlio fubled queen of beauty. Masses of gold
brown hair curling softly over a low Grecian brow, features that
were faultless in their chiseled regularity; a white transparent skin,
veined delicately like the petal of a rose, and great gray eyes under
straight dark brows, and long sweeping lashes. Absolute perfection,
nothing less; and yet and yet it was a perfection that chilled and
saddened you. She was so serene, and white, and still. She was
like a snowniaiden, or a marble sculpture lovely to the eye, but
icy cold to the touch. She bad no warmth, no glow, no tenderoessj
She looked as Galatea might have looked before Pygmalion's .ardent
kisses awoke her to passionate life and the knowledge or a woman's
soul.
Men raved about her beauty, but her immobility froze them, and
they dared not approach her. When she was twenty-five she had
never had a lover. No man had ever told her she was beautiful. No
man had ever kissed her, or even touched her hand, save in the ordi
nary friendly greeting.
Then when she was twenty-iivo she met Dick Vandeleur. Fate
threw him across her path, just by the merest accident, and forgot
to take him away again. So ho stayed.
Dick was twenty-five, too; a man in years, but a boy in everything
else: Ardent, impetuous, careless, sanguine; with all a boy's happy
hopeful belief in himself and tho unknown future, a boy's trnsting
heart and a boy's sunny smile.
It was a wonderful thing, that smile of his. No one could resist
it Men invariably thawed before its genial warmth, while women
well, no woman ever said "no" to Dick Vandeleur. He was not
the sort of a man tho women 6aid "no" to. He always put one in
mind of those lines of Owen Meredith's:
Some happy souls there are that wear their nature lightly; these
rejoice
The world by living, and receive from all men more than what they
give.
One handful of their buoyant chaff excels our hoards of careful
grain.
Justly; for one man's joyous laugh augments earth's joy is all
men's gain.
Scorn not the gift of gladness given to those bright souls. It is from
Heaven.
Dick wore his nature lightly. He was by inclination and profes
sion an artist. As yet he only stood on the lowest rung of the ladder
of success, but he had a keen desire to climb to the very top, and he
saw no reason why he should not. His vocabulary held no such
word as fail. He believed in himself, he believed in his art, and he
believed in the future. Happy Dick!
. Well; as I said before, fate threw him across Patricia Campbell's
path, and left him there. It suited him very well to be left there,
and he had no wish for fate to remember him and tako him away;
for he found Patricia the most interesting and facinating woman
from certain points of view that he had ever met. Tho very quali
ties in her that repelled other men attiacted him. Perhaps it was
the force of contrast, perhaps it was an undercurrent of sympathy,
perhaps but what is the use of speculating? In this tangled skein
of life there are so many cross threads that, to all appearance, start
nowhere and go nowhere; so many effects to which we can assign no
cause.
Patricia's beautiful, iji passive face set him thinking, and the
second time he saw her he said in his casual way:
"I say, Miss Campbell, I want you to do something for me. I've
got a bright idea will you help me carry it out?"
Patricia looked at him doubtfully. In all her life no man had
come to her for help before, and the novelty of the situation im
pressed. her. She did not quite know what to say.
HeIp you?" she repeated, in a dubious tone; and then she added,
"Can I?"
"Rather!" cried Dic't; "I should just think you can it you only
will."
She was still looking at him in that wondering way. "Tell me
how,' she said. ' '
He went a step nearer, and looked down at her with his winning
smile.
"You can sit for me," he answered; "and you will, won't you?
You don't mind my asking you, do you?"
Patricia shook her head, and the mystified expression deepened in
her unconscious eyes.
"No, I don't mind. But why why?"
Dick hesitated. If he had been talking to any other woman in
the world he would have said. "Because you are the most perfectly
beautiful woman I have ever seen. Because you have a figure to
send a sculptor mad and a face like a painter's day dream; and 1
must paint you or die."
But some subtile instinct warned him that it would wiser not to
talk like that to Patricia, so be thought for a moment.
"Well." he said at last, "the fact is, I've got a good thing in my
mind's eye, but I'm hard up for a model. That's often the way, you
know. Ideals and realities are such awfully different tilings. But
your face is just what I want, and and well, you would be doing
me the greatest possible service if you would sit for me."
Patricia was silent, and Dick waited for her answer with breath
less impatience. He felt as if his whole future fate was trembling
in the balance. Presently she sighed a long drawn, quivering
sigh.
"Are you sure," she asked; a little wistful, "quite sure, that I can
help you? I am not used to helping people. No one ever asks me
to."
"Quite, quite sure," Dick returned, with eager emphasis "and
you are the only person who can."
"Then I will," said Patricia.
So the bargain was struck, and the oddly assorted pair proceeded
to carry it out.
He painted her asGalatea,and the work took a long time, and nee
essitated a great number of sittings. .Dick spoiled a good many can
vases, but that was his way through life. He was always throwing
aside his old canvases, and starting on new ones. It was a habit he
had.
Patricia displayed a patience that seemed inexhaustible. She
never fidgeted, never complained. When once Dick had posed her
she would remain in the same position for any length of time, and if
she grew tired, or cold, or cramped, she kept her secret, and he was
none the wiser.
At last the great wore began to progress, and Dick spoiled no
more canvases. He got fairly under way, and the successful realiz
ation of his ideal was only a question of time.
"I've never come anything near this before,"hesaidto Patricia one
morning. "I always hoped that some day I should paint a picture
that would make me famous, and now I am doing it. This will
make me famous and I shall owe my fame to you."
He looked at her and smiled, and the smile was. reflected on her
face. She had taken to smiling more often of late.
After that everything went with remarkable Bmoothness, and be
fore very long the last touches were put. Dick looked at his com
pbtod work and saw that it was good, and his delight and enthus
iasm knew no bounds. He was like a child with a new toy.
Patricia stood by his side and looked, too, but his high spirits did
Highest of all in Leavening Power.-Latest U. S. Gov't Report
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