1
All's Fair
by Gelett Burgess
TAKEN FROM "METROPOLITAN MAGAZINE," APRIL 1906
"You must have been a romantic youngster," she said, her eyes fixed on the distant landscape.
"I was, decidedly," he answered, his eyes fixed on her. Then he added, "And I am yet."
"Indeed?" She raised her eyebrows, smiling.
"I spent my childhood here and I feel now, somehow, as if I owned the place."
"It's very good of you to let me stay here--" she began.
"I'm so glad you came--at last! I missed you when I was a boy. I knew you would come, sometime."
"Indeed? How dear of you! How long ago was that?"
"Let's see--I was ten years old--eighteen years ago. Just think of it!"
"And I was eight. I'm afraid I wasn't very romantic myself. I was a matter-of-fact little thing, though I did have some queer fancies now I remember it." Her eyes had come back from the hills, fluttered about him and alighted on his face. "Tell me what you did here when you were a boy," she said, impulsively, almost warmly.
"I was alone most of the time and so I had to make up games that only one could play."
"But I thought you were expecting me."
His eyes fell from hers. "I used to pretend you were here. You did not keep me awake then as you do now."
She laughed, with a note of pleased incredulity.
"You don't believe me?" he said. "I believe you do stay up later than is good for you," she replied. "You were out late last night. Am I to believe that was my fault?"
"I was thinking about you all the time," he said.
"I suppose I ought to be sorry that I came down here to trouble you, but really I didn't know