The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1869-04-08

lapowerful and attractive person with the
young of both sexes. Clint thought they
were intimate friends, whereas the rela
ton he bore to Phil was that of faith.
full spaniel to kind and indulgent mas
ter. Phil liked HIM, of course, as good
masters like their dogs. The one walked
gravely complacent, his own road, while
the other folltwed and played about him
Clint opened his heart and confded every
thing to Phil, but Phil kept his own
counsel. Clint had even on one or two
occasions whispered to HIM his secret
hopes with regard Emma Wexford, con-
fession which Phil had received with a
very curious smile.
While they were waiting for Emma to
return to the room, Clint longed to walk
up to his friend and give him hint of
his present matrimonial purpose; but
something in Phils face or manner, pre-
vented him This evening, in fact, the
hound happened to be in the masters way
and so received cold looks instead of en-
enlargement. Emma staid out of the
room os long as she decently could, dread
ing to return to it for reasons which may
lust as well be told. She was afraid of Phil
Kermer-afraid, because he was at once
the dearest man to her in all the world,
and the most dangerous He had won
her hea almost before she knew it; and
only when he came to speak to her of
marriage, had she awakened to the peril
of the position. Her father had died a
drunkard, and her mother; on her dying
bed, had made her promise that she
would never marry drinking man."
After the ruin she had seen wrought in
her own family by that one fatal habit of
acknowledgement it seemed hardly necessary
that such promise should be exacted
from her; and now she was glad she had
given it, for it seemed her only safety
She might, in some joy.intoxicated mo-
ment, forget the two untimely graves in
the church yard, and their silent warning;
but that sacred pledge she could never
forget-it would prove berrier against
temptation when everything else had
failed For Phil Kermer, as has been in
timated already, was what might be call
ed drinking man." He did not merely
take little wine for the stomach's sake,
nor was he, on the other hand, a drunkard
any more than her father had been at his
age; but that he took, now and then,
something stronger than wine, and took
a trifie too much, could not be denied.
He had at first laughed at Emma for ask
ing him to forego the practice; and when
he found how serious she was in requir-
ing it of him, he was vexed. He thought
it was absured and imperious for any per-
son to suppose that he, Phil Kermer, was
capable of ever becoming a sot, and for
l, l.
They had quarrelled ON that theme when
last they parted, and he had kept away
from her as long as he could She had
been made very miserable by his absence,
and now she was at once overjoyed and
alarmed to see him again.
With nervous hands she smoothed her
hair and arranged her collar, after hug
ging the little ones in bed,a land finally went
down stairs. Lucy and Uncle Jim soon
retired, and left her alone with the visi-
tors. There was an awkward sileuce of
some moments, during which she read in
Phil's face two things-that he had come
full of passion, and persuasion, to con-
vince her that she, not he, was wrong;
and that he was quietly Warrington Clint
to go. She at once determined that Clint
should not go, little thinking what he
himself came for don
A damp had fallen upon the boys
spirits, which he vainly endeavored to
shake off At length, he went to the
door, and looked out at the snow storm
On his return, Emma made room for him
on the sofa beside her.
"Snewing fast, isn't it," said she, care
lessly, while she was almost shivVering
with her own nervousness.
"Fast, and great flakes" said Clint.
II tell you, this will make lively work
for US tomorrow; wont it, Phtl?"
Phil merely wagged his head with a
slow, lazy nod, and neither smiled nor
spoke. This reserve was killing to poor
Clint, But Emma came to his rescue.
"What have you to do with the SNOWY
she asked, to call him out, although she
had heard him brag that he was Sin the
ice" this year, along with Phil, That set
him going again. They had the CONVEX
satlon all to themselves, however, Mr..
Kermer only now and then, giving a word
or nod when appealed to, as he sat pla-
cidly pulling his beard, and waiting for
Clint to go.
At last confused glimmer of the
truth broke upon the young mans mind.
1t was when she reproved them for what
they had been doing that afternoon
namely, boring the ice
"You shouldn't bore on Sundays" she
said. 81
"Nor on Sunday evenings, either" Phil
replied, SO dryly, that nobody could tell
lust what he meant by the Joke.
/ Clint. however, took the application
to himself and felt terribly cut up by it.
He began to explain to her that boring
on Sunday wrs sometimes deed of ne
cesslty, but quite broke down before he
ended, and wound up with: aamat ooH
"Well, guess had better be going."d
T. "No, don't 90, vet" said Emma an s,nil.