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The Travelling Thirds
I
The California cousin of theLyman T. Moultons—aname too famous to be shorn——stoodapart from the perturbedgroup, her feet boyishly asunder, her headthrown back. Above her hung the thickwhite clusters of the acacia,[1] drooping abundantly,opaque and luminous in the softmasses of green, heavy with perfume. AllLyons seemed to have yielded itself to theintoxicating fragrance of its favorite tree.
1. The acacia of Europe is identical with the Americanlocust.
In the Place Carnot, at least, there was nota murmur. The Moultons had hushed inthought their four variations on the aggressive2American key, although perhaps insensibleto the voluptuous offering of thegrove. Mrs. Moulton, had her senses respondedto the sweet and drowsy afternoon,would have resented the experience as immoral;and as it was her pale-blue gaze resteddisapprovingly on the rapt figure of her husband’ssecond cousin. The short skirt andthe covert coat of ungraceful length, its lowpockets always inviting the hands of itsowner, had roused more than once her futileprotest, and to-day they seemed to hanglimp with a sense of incongruity beneaththe half-closed eyes and expanded nostrils ofthe young Californian.
It was not possible for nature to struggletriumphant through the disguise this beneficiarychos