Wired Love by Ella Cheever Thayer (13 ebook reader txt) 📕

“What is he coming at now I wonder⁠—he commenced with a great display of words,” thought Nattie curiously; and then with a little curl of her lip, “a sentence out of some book, I suppose.”

But as soon as the wire was quiet she said,

“To C Please G. A.⁠—account.”

“I could not leave, as I am about to do tonight, without saying goodbye, in remembrance of our former pleasant intercourse,” concluded C.

“You mean you are leaving permanently?” queried Nattie, surprised.

“Yes, this is my last day here. Monday I leave town; and so, with much regret that anything unpleasant should have interrupted our acquaintance⁠—although what it was I assure you I do not know, since you deign me no explanation⁠—I will say, not as I would once, au revoir, but goodbye.”

“Goodbye,” answered Nattie, forgetting for the moment everything but C, the old C, the C who had enlivened so many hours, and about whom had dwelt that romantic mystery. “Goodbye. Believe me, I shall always remember the many social talks we have enjoyed.”

“Possibly we might enjoy them again, if you desired,” C said then, as if he gave her a chance for explanation or to express such a wish.

But Nattie, recalling now the bears-grease, the musk, the cheap jewelry and their obnoxious possessor, answered only, “Goodbye.”

Pondering discontentedly over the perplexities of life, a habit she had allowed herself to indulge in quite frequently of late, one day not long after the final exit of the once interesting but now obnoxious C, Nattie suddenly became aware of a pair of merry brown eyes, belonging to a fine-looking young gentleman, observing her critically, and with apparently no intention of discontinuing their scrutiny. At which, in her present state of temper, Nattie turned very red and very angry. “I am not on exhibition,” she thought, indignantly, and rising majestically, went towards him with the curt inquiry,

“Did you wish to send a message, sir?” The young gentleman hesitated, and appeared slightly embarrassed, but did not take his eyes from her face, nevertheless.

“I merely wished to ask the tariff to Washington,” he replied, at length.

“Forty cents,” Nattie answered, shortly.

“Thank you,” he said, but without moving, and after a moment, as if desirous of opening a conversation, he continued, smiling, “I hardly think I will send a message today; I presume you will not object to being spared the trouble?”

Nattie, having been quarreling all day with intangible somethings, was rather glad than otherwise to find a real object upon which she could vent the unamiability resulting from her surplus discontent. The young man’s evident desire to talk more than circumstances warranted, was displeasing to her, and she rejoined very stiffly,

“It is a matter of perfect indifference to me,” and turned away.

With an amused smile, he looked at the back thus presented to his view, opened his lips to speak, hesitated, and finally walked away. Nattie, looking after him out of the corners of her eyes, saw him glance back as he opened the door, and had a remorseful feeling that perhaps she had been crosser to him than he really deserved, for he was certainly very fine-looking. But what was done could not be undone, and with no expectation of ever seeing him again, she dismissed the matter from her mind.

The best, perhaps the only really pleasant part of Nattie’s life now, was her evenings, passed almost invariably with Cyn. Indeed, Cyn seemed to be a magnet, around which all gathered⁠—Quimby, although, of course, Cyn herself was not his chief attraction⁠—Celeste Fishblate, who determinedly pushed herself into an intimacy, and Jo Norton, who, had it not been for the fact so loudly proclaimed by himself, of his having no sentiment in his soul, would have been suspected of being on the road to falling in love with Cyn, so strangely was he attracted to her company. But this, of course, was impossible for him!

“That will not do, dear,” Cyn remarked, when Nattie related her little adventure with the young gentleman. “Do you know you have been in a dreadful state of mind ever since C intruded his personality?”

Nattie colored a little as she replied, discontentedly, “Oh, it isn’t that, I assure you; the truth is, I am ambitious, Cyn. I suppose I forgot it, slightly, while I was so interested in C; but I cannot be content with a mere working on from day to day, in the same old routine, and nothing more.”

Cyn looked at her scrutinizingly, as she asked, “But in what particular way are you ambitious? to be rich, or what?”

“Oh! not for money!” Nattie answered, with a slight contempt for that necessary and convenient article. “I am ambitious for fame! I want to be a writer; but when I think of the obstacles in my way to an opening, even, in that direction, I am daunted. I have attacks of energy, it is true, but I fear it is fitful; it comes and goes.”

“I understand,” Cyn replied, with more than wonted seriousness. “Your ambition is great enough to render you useless and discontented, but you need something to stimulate your energy, else it will waste itself in idle dreams. Perhaps love may come to be that motive power; perhaps⁠—” and a shade crossed her sunny face⁠—“some great disappointment.”

There was a moment’s silence, Nattie pondering thoughtfully on these words; and then Cyn continued,

“But in the meantime, since you can at present accomplish nothing, why not get all the enjoyment you can out of life, as it goes? So, when the opportunity comes, and you seize it, you will not have to look back on years wasted in vain longings for the then unattainable. That is my philosophy⁠—and I, too, am ambitious.”

“Your philosophy is cheery, at least,” said Nattie, smiling. “But I am afraid it is very hard for ambitious people to take life easy: and that is not all of my troubles,” she continued, gayly, “I can’t get anything good to eat!”

“Poor child,” said Cyn,