I forget that stupid fellow, my escort; the pale-blue dress, so often worn; the random words—­idle, thoughtless, and unkind, at least in their effect; even pretty Belle Mason fades away, and her charm and her triumph no longer remembered against her.  I go a-drifting from all unpleasant memories!  I murmur a prayer learned at mamma’s knee long years ago, and alas! for long years left unsaid.  I kneel in the firelight glow, I tenderly, fondly kiss that red rose.  True, it is withered and dead, yet how sweet it is to my lips, and how dear it is to my heart!  Something whispers that I love the man who gave it me!  It seems to quiver to life again, and tremulous with a strange, new joy, I remember the hand-touch and the smile which came with the giving of that red rose.

[Illustration:  Miss Kate Meadows (of the Inner Sisterhood)]

* * * * *

II

       A Dash of Jealousy and Hypocrisy
       Done up in Old Gold.

* * * * *

ROBERT FAIRFIELD, LOVER.

Robert Fairfield is an average man among men—­but he is something more:  He is the ideal man among women.  All women have ideals, and there is not, there can not be a more dangerous piece of heart-furniture.  An ideal is easily broken, sometimes badly damaged, always liable to injury; and the heart of woman hath not one cabinet-maker who can, with his touch and skill, bring back one departed charm, one lost beauty.

I know this man—­and yet I do not.  I love him—­and yet, again, I do not.  I suspect that, woman-like, I am more fond of his charming, delicate attentions than I am of the man himself.  I sometimes fancy that he loves me; but I am wise enough in my day and generation to be painfully aware of the fact that just about six other women entertain the same delicious fancy.  He has told me of his love, told me in a gentle, artistic manner—­and doubtless he has told the six other females the same story; for he need not trouble himself to vary the telling each time, because he has no fear of detection.

He knows that he is never the topic of conversation among women.  They seldom, if ever, discuss their ideals, and all of them, myself included, have a most evidently-conscious air whenever dear Robert’s name happens to be mentioned, no matter how trivial the mention.  But I am the least touched, and surely the more unresponsive of the entire seven, consequently he is more devoted to me than to any of the others.  He was by my side the entire evening at Mrs. Babbington Brooks’s elegant and most fashionable ball the other night; he was my escort to the musicale last Tuesday, and O, he did look so handsome!  And he never before said so many positively tender things, and he said them in such a tired, pathetic tone, that he almost won my heart; really, when I’m with the man I am sure that I love him, and most devotedly.  But I have perfect control over myself and my limited supply of feeling—­Henry Seyhmoor says I am without a heart; so I only look at him full in the face when he tells me all those tender little things, and then turn away with a light laugh—­assumed, of course—­and gently but firmly remind him that I am not Kate Meadows.