HIS SECOND WIFE

BY

ERNEST POOLE

TO M.A.



HIS SECOND WIFE

CHAPTER I

On a train speeding toward New York, in one of the parlour cars two
young women sat facing each other, talking and smiling, deeply absorbed.
They took little apparent notice of any one else in the car, but most of
the people near them kept throwing curious glances their way.

These glances differed vastly, as did the thoughts behind them. A tall,
genial Westerner, who looked as though he had come from a ranch, smiled
frankly and hungrily on the pair and told himself with emphasis, "Those
two girls are fifty-fifty. I'd like a dozen of each brand." And a slim
college boy with fresh, eager eyes kept darting quick looks from time to
time at the older of the two, the blonde. He asked himself confusedly,
"How'd I start in with a woman like her?" And exciting pictures rose in
his mind. In the meantime an elderly lady, with a sharp, inquisitive
air, had put down the ages of the girls at twenty-two and thirty.

"They're sisters," she decided, but then she nearly changed her mind.