The St. Cloud journal. [volume] (St. Cloud, Minn.) 1866-1876, 1872-03-28
Goodbye, Sweetheart !"
A TALE IN THREE PARTS.
BIZ RuoDA BouauroS, AUTHOR OF "RsD AZ ROSE 1,
SnE," ETC.
PART u.-NOON:
CHAPTER vi.
WHAT JENNA SAYS.

CHAPTER vi.
WHAT JENNA SAYS.
At the lowest calculation there
must be forty.eight hours between the
sending of any letter by post and the
receiving of the answer. In most
cases sixteen or eighteen of these
hours are siidden over IN sleep but in
a great anxiety who can sleep? In
heavy grief one may sleep-probably
one will; when Hope has stolen out Of
sight, and Despair sits by US with vel'ea
head, then one sleeps most deeply.
Sometimes, In slumber, God gives US
back our dead him that but yester-
day We coldly kissed in his strait
shroud, We see coming toward US with
lfe-colo,ed lips, and open eyes the
dead never come back to Us dead: al
ways they are alive-talkiDg, smiling,
occupied in some commonplace employ
ment, making some foolish, tender jest.
But Sleep, refuses to come to the
troubled, who have Jet an uneasy
hope she will not be made use Of
merely as bridge over obnoxious
hours she will be loved aud woced for
herself, or elxe she will stand rcleut=
Iessly apart. think that there are
very few Of the thousands of minutes
that constitute those forty y.eight hours
that do not find Lenore consciously,
broadly wakeful. She refuses all pro.
posals that tend to divert her thoughts
BY exercise or employment: she will
not walk-shc will not drive: she
she will not even come downstairs.
All day long she sits in the window
seat in her room sits there, with
dropped figure and careless dressed
hair her eyes fixed alternately on the
brown winter outside, or tho avenue b,
which all carriages and oil toot-passen
gers must approach the house, aud OF
the watch which lies on the table be.
fore her; as if By looking, looking
she could make the slow hands pas
more swiftly over the dial-plate. {
unwise Lenore! to wish to hurry th
feet of the swift minutes! They ma
seem uusweet, nay, most bitter, accord
ing to our present gauge of sweet an
sour i; but oh! are they worse-ar
they worse than the deep, timeles
grave, and the leadcn.colored shore
OF Eternity, toward which, in thei
fitting, they carry US? Once, comm
in suddenly, find her With all Paul
letters strewed around her she
reading them oil through in order
from the first sea-sick note he wrote be
from jersey on his homeward journey
to the three scrawliug gallopiug line
which were to bring him back to he
I think, poor soul !.she is trying to e,
tract more love than is in them fro,
the loving phrases that fill them. Th
short winter day treads heavily past I
his rest, and the night comes-thc win
ter night in its dull endlessness-the
the dim, late morning light. Lenor
makes no complaint, and cuts me sho,
when begin inquiries ; but l hnoD sh
has not slept. The postman comes an
without any special interest attaching
to him it is impossible that he ca,
bring any thing yet.
| Another day walks past with laggin
feet. Lenore will not move, will nc
eat all her life seems to have passc'
into the eyes which gro'o to tho face {
the watch that ticks ever before hel
She has turned Paups picture, whic
hangs opposite her bed, to the wall
when 1 asked her why she has don
; it, she answers that uoless he is here
, she has no business to look at him.
The second slow day dies : its life
20 faint and dark that there is littl'
difference between il and its deatl,
Sylvia and I dine tete.a.tete and ge
over our dinner with surprising an
feminine celebrity. 1t is astonishin
how the presence Of even one man pr
lo,gs the duration of dinner -; is it fro'
; the comparative immensity Of man
appetite, or from tie stimulus and ge'
tie fIlip that bis company gives to col
versation 7 We yawn through tt
evening, and At ten retire to such war
depths Of silky sleep rs one experience
, only IN frosty weather, = !.