The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1873-11-27
wanderer at hand to help you down.

= river with Jolly abandon that mu'
have fascinated the strange arts
g At any rate something did; since /
was not miles away on the morrow
He was in the wood again; oddl
. enough, at about the same hour tha
. had found him there the day before
l don't know whether he expected
! meet the small man again, or why b
altered his plans: perhaps he did no
know himself. He looked over tn
village, which was to have bee
simply pausing place for refresh
ment; at the tickle sunshine, throw
ing light and shadows over the wood
which was so beautiful even in tn
winter baroness, and thought that
day might be well spent in such {
place.
Mr.. Noel Caperne sat on moss,
stone by the river, and watched ;
squirrel springing from branch t.
branch, till the brown fur began tC
turn into velvet coat, and he caught
himself wandering back to yester-
days adventure, and specializing al
what sort of areception the little chap
had met with at home All at once
he put his bearded chin into his
hands, and bent a perplexed frown
upon the river
''There's something in his face I've
seen before" said the artist to him
self Il wonder what it is. A fancy
of m.ne, perhaps. Don't believe that
though. Whatever it is, circumstan-
ces Lot pleasant have to do with it.
I am a fool"
Here he broke into laugh, which
the ''ery solitude of the wood around
him seemed to rebuke and silence.
Of course he was a fool. The day
was declining, and he had stage of
his journey before him; what was the
use of sitting on a moss-covered
stone, specializing on ghostly resem-
blances?
As he got up from the stone Mr..
Caperne heard voices, and paused.
A little below him there was a turn
in the path, over which the branches,
leafess though thye were, fell SO thick
ly that he dared to peep through
them without being seen; and there
was Tony, velvet-coated, and red
capped, and long tongued. Mr.. Ca
perne saw something else also, which
appeared to him more worthy of at
tention;-only a yonng girl, with a
bunch of violets in her hand, early
violets, and sweet, so far as he could
judge, since each one travelled to her
lips before it was arranged in its
place amongst the tiny bits of moss
which served as a foil to the BIOS
SONS.
'tIn the first place, Tony" said the
young lady, ''you had no business mp
a tree, as you call it-horrid slangl
In the next"
"But, don't I tell you I was after a
squirrel, said Tony; "and don't you
know how papa hates squirrels?
And this was the very chap that ate
our nuts in the Summer-I knew
him by the curl of his tail"
SIN the next, proceeded the young
lady, calmly, "you must have been
sho@kingly rude to strange gentle
man, by your own account"
''Aunt Lucy, I didn't say he was
gentleman" cried Tony. "He works
for his living. Girls never will un-
derstand things"
Every stupid of them, certainly"
said Aunt Lucy. ''Then you think
if I we're to soil my hands with any
thing but flowers, I shouldn't be
lady, eh? They are very sweet,
Tony"
This was about the violets, but the
girl looked up as she said it, and Mr..
Noel Caperne drew back suddenly.
and went away down the path with
noiseless footsteps. He went to his
room in the queer old inn by the riv-
er, and the knapsack, which lay ready
for him, but he did not take it up.
He threw open the easement instead,
and leaned out over the river, where
it ran, dark and sullen, under stone
arches, and the distant rush of a
mill wheel reached him. But these
things were only palpable to him
vaguely What he really saw with
his discerning minds eye was the
picture of a girish face bent over
bunch of violets; and as this rose be-
fore him, Mr.. Caperne brought his
eyebrows together, and said, impa-
tiently, "Where have I seen it be-
fore?"
The mill wheel sang on its mono
tone, and the woods began to have
suspicion of green about them; still,
the strange gentleman stayed on at
the clumsy old inn by the river.
People talked about him curiously,
which was not of the least conse-
quence; that landlord took credit to
himself that the old inn was better
worth staying at, after all, than your
modern stucco and gingerbread in
ventions, where men were treated
more like sacks of grain than human
creatures, with bones to break; and
the landlady' limited that her guest
must be in love, because he was
always incoming about the water-side,
in Corven Wood. He was doing
some bit of a painting, too. she