A Dainty Trifle for my Lady Love
THE STORY OF
A PICTURE
By Douglass Sherley
1884.
By Douglass Sherley.
There was a colored crayon in a crowded shop-window. Other people passedit by, but a Youth of the Town, with Hope in his heart, leaned over theguard-rail and looked upon the beauty of that pictured face long andearnestly.
It was the head of a pretty girl with dark hair and dark eyes. She wasclad in a dainty white gown, loose-flowing and beautiful. In her lefthand, slender and uplifted, a letter; in her right a pen, and beneath ita spotless page.
She was seated within the shadow of a white marble chimney-piece richlycarved with Cupids, fluttering, kneeling, supplicating; with arrows new,broken, and mended; with quivers full, depleted, and empty. The great,broad shelf above her pretty head was laden with rare and artistictreasures. A vase from India; a costly fan from China; a dark andmottled bit of color in an ancient frame of tarnished gold, done by someFlemish master of the long-ago. Beyond all this, a ground of shadowygreen, pale, cool, and delicious. On the table, near the spotless pageand the dear pen-clasping hand, a bunch of flowers; not a mass of uglyblooms, opulent and oppressive, but a few garden roses, old-fashionedand exceeding sweet, blushing to their utmost red, having foundthemselves so unexpectedly brought into the presence of this prettygirl.
This, in outline, was the picture. The dealer had written on a slip ofpaper, in large, rude letters,
It was a frameless crayon, thrust aside and somewhat overshadowed by ahuge and garish thing in gaudy-flowered gilt, which easily caught andheld the eye of the busy throng.
The Youth passed on to his duty of the day with Hope in his heart. Lightgrew his heavy task, and the drudgery of his work was forgotten—he washaunted by the sight of that face in the Picture. The softness of theeye, the sweetness of the mouth, or something, made the Youth of thenoisy Town believe her answer would surely be—Yes.
Now the Youth and the Afternoon Shadows together came and feasted on thebeauty of that Maiden's face. The Shadows, without booty, fled away intothe night. But not so with the Youth. In triump