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Senator North

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standing on the sidewalk, her head thrown back. Betty nodded, put on her things and ran downstairs. Miss Carter was wrapped in an old cape, and her turban was on one side, but she looked rosier than usual. "I've been half-way out to Chevy Chase," she said, "and I was just thinking of paying poor old General Lathom a visit. He does look so well in bronze, poor old dear, and all that ice round him will make him seem like an ogre in fairy-land. He wasn't a bit of an ogre, he was downright afraid of me." "I suppose a man really feels as great a fool as he looks when he is proposing to a woman he is not sure of. I wonder why they ever do. After I gave up coquetting, came to the conclusion that it wasn't honest, they proposed just the same." "Some women unconsciously establish a habit of being proposed to. I've had very few proposals, and I know several really beautiful women who have had practically none. As I said, it's a habit, and you can't account for it." "I went yesterday to Virginia to call on a relative who has just lost her last adopted parent," said Betty, abruptly, "and she looked so forlorn that I asked her to visit us for a while. I hope you'll like her." "Ah? She must be some relation of mine, too. You and I are third cousins." "Don't ask me to straighten it out. The ramifications of Southern kinships are beyond me. She is a beauty--very dark and tragic." "That is kind of you--to run the risk of Senator Burleigh going off at a tangent," said Miss Carter, sharply. "By the way, you cannot deny that you have given him encouragement; you have neither eyes nor ears for any one else when he is round." "He is usually the most interesting person 'round;' and I have a concentrative mind. But I never intend to marry, and Senator Burleigh has never even looked as if he wanted to propose. By the way, Molly has actually asked him to come to the Adirondacks for a few days. Can't you and your father come for a month or two? Jack has promised to stay with us the whole summer, and we'll be quite a family party." "Yes, I will," said Miss Carter, promptly. "I haven't been in the Adirondacks for six years and I should love it." "Harriet Walker--that's our new cousin--will be with us too, most likely. She looks delicate, and I shall try to persuade her that she needs the pines." "Ah! Look out for the Senator--in the dark pine forests on the mountain." "I don't know why you should be so concerned for me. I usually have kept an admirer as long as I wanted him." "Oh, no offence, dear. The dark and tragic lady merely filled my eye at the moment. By the way, Mrs. North thinks of going to the Lake Hotel this summer. Isn't that close by your place?" "It is just across the lake. There is your old General. He does look like an ogre, and he's got a patch of green mould on his nose. You ought to take better care of him." "He looks so much better than he did in life that I have no fault to find. The doctor has told Mrs. North that the pine forests may do her all the good in the world, prolong her life, and Mr. North has written to see if he can get an entire wing for her. I hope he can go too, but he always seems to have so much to do at home in summer. I do like him. He's the only man I know who, I feel positive, never could make a fool of himself." "I am half starved. Come home and have your breakfast with me." "I should like to. Senator North--" "There is Mr. Burleigh on horseback--with Mr. Montgomery. He _will_ look well in bronze--but they only put Generals on horseback, don't they? There--he sees me. I am going to ask them to come in to breakfast." "I believe you like him better than you think, my dear. Your eyes shine like two suns, and I never saw you look so happy." "The morning is so beautiful and I am so glad that I am alive. I know exactly how much I like Mr. Burleigh." XIV "Do all Southerners make such delicious coffee?" asked Senator Burleigh, as the four sat about the attractive table in the breakfast- room. "The Southerners are the only cooks in the United States," announced Miss Carter. "The real difference between the South and the North is that one enjoys itself getting dyspepsia and the other does not." "There are just six kinds of hot bread on this table," said Burleigh, meditatively. "And no pie and no doughnuts. Mr. Montgomery, you are really a Southerner--ar'n't you glad to get back to darky cooks?" "I was until we began on this tariff bill, and now there is not an object you can mention, edible or otherwise, that I don't loathe." "The details of such a bill must be maddening," said Betty, sympathetically, "but, after all, it is an honour to be on the Ways and Means Committee. There is compensation in everything." "I don't know. When a man lobbyist tries to find out your weak spot and play on it, you can kick him out of the house, but when they set a woman at you, all you can do is to bow and say: 'My dear madam, it is with the greatest regret I am obliged to inform you that I have sat up every night until three o'clock studying this subject, and that I have made up my mind.' Whereupon she talks straight ahead and hints at trouble with certain constituents next year who want free coal and an exorbitant duty on Zante currants, raisins, wine, and wool. The whole army of lobbyists have camped on my doorstep ever since we began to draw up this bill. How they find time to camp on any one's else would make an interesting study in ubiquity." "I am afraid some of your ideals have been shattered, and I am afraid you are shattering some of Miss Madison's," said Burleigh, smiling into Betty's disgusted face. "I hate the dirty work of politics," said Montgomery, gloomily. "Of course it doesn't demoralize you so long as you keep your own hands clean, but it is sickening to suspect that you are sitting cheek by jowl in the Committee Room with a man whose pocket is stuffed with some Trust Company's shares." "I used to hate it, but I don't see any remedy until we have an educated generation of high-class politicians, and I think that millennium is not far off. As matters stand, there is bound to be a certain percentage of scoundrels and of men too weak to resist a bribe in a great and shifting body like the House. Any scoundrel feels that he can slink among the rest unseen. The old members who have been

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