For the pretty waitress, becomingly pale, was gathered in Kemper's arms,
her cheek against his shoulder. Neither seemed to be aware of me.
"Darling," he said, in the imbecile voice of a man in love, "why do you
tremble so when I am here to protect you? Don't you love and trust me?"
"Oo--h--yes," she sighed, pressing her cheek closer to his shoulder.
I shoved my hands into my pockets, passed them without noticing them, and
stepped ashore.
And there I sat down under a tree, with my back toward them, all alone
and face to face with the greatest grief of my life.
But which it was--the loss of her or the loss of Grue, I had not yet made
up my mind.
THE IMMORTAL
I
As everybody knows, the great majority of Americans, upon reaching the
age of natural selection, are elected to the American Institute of Arts
and Ethics, which is, so to speak, the Ellis Island of the Academy.
Occasionally a general mobilization of the Academy is ordered and, from
the teeming population of the Institute, a new Immortal is selected for
the American Academy of Moral Endeavor by the simple process of
blindfolded selection from _Who's Which_.
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