Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1873-05-30

corner of the hall lay the big basket that
had made so much trouble, but somehow
Lutte wanted it now. AS she lifted it up,
the cover slipped one side, and two or
three bright leaves fell out. The basket
was full
'Yes," said Tommy, who found the ST.
lence very oppressive, ''me and Freds
been away over to Bricketts woods this
afternoon to get them for you. [ should
ha' thought he'd ha' been too tired to
go off again. I'm bout used up" A
manly expression Tommy was fond of
using.
"And he was going to give them to me
when l drove him off," thought Lutte,
with sharp pang. What a
wicked thing [ am Why don't they
come? He must be" No, she couldn't
bring herself to speak the word and,
catching up Fred's geography, she turned
the leaves from sheer necessity of doing
something.
On the fly-leaf was "Freddie Randall"
in her fathers writing. She remembered
when he wrote 1t; they had all said it was
hard to tell which was prouder-Fred of
the new book, or the father that his only
son had advanced a step in learning.
Would he ever write his boys name again?
Then there was the boys scrawl, and here
the name again in old English type, and
on another leaf strange-loOking birds with
banners in their beaks, bearing that name
so precious now. And now his favorite
picture of prancing horse. How hard
he worked over that with dirty fingers,
head on one side and tongue stuck hard
into his cheek-and how Lutte had scOld-
ed because he abused his books so! She
would have been glad at that minute to
see him drawing in Tennyson's Poems,
present from Will Schcfield last birthday.
He had taken two or three of her paints to
color the illustrations in the book. Here
the Falls of Niagara were painted bright
red with dark green sky overhead. A
party of negroes in very blue shirts were
cutting yellow sugar-cane; and in a pic
ture of the arctic regions, ship was
frozen among straw-cOlored and scarlet
icebergs, while orange and vermilion
Northern Lights streamed over the scene.
Out from the leaves futtered bit of paper
upon which Tommy again vouchsafed in
formation.
"Fred writ that right in the teacher
had company-her feller, [ guess" he
added, by way Of explanation. Gle was
going to put it in the postoff1ce, but had
to get an envelope first Read it," And
Tommy glowed with pride at Fred's skill
81 give him the paper he added, swelling
with generosity.
The paper looked as if it had been cut
with dull knife from the back of an old
letter; and Lutte read:
"MR. SKOFIELD | do not want you to
think what [ sed about my sister was tru
[ tOled it to PLACE hir she get up before 1
do she is the best girl in the world and I
guess you think so two | rOte this becaWs
/ do not want what | sed to be a ly.
"FRED RANDALL"
"Teacher thought he was writin' IN his
writin' book all the time," snickered Tom
my, but Lutte didn't hear.
1t was very still now. The early twi-
light had fallen, and it was almost dark,
but nobody had thought of lamps. Aunt
Lutte, having cried herself so sick that she
could cry no more, lay on the sofa, trying
hard not to think Tommy was stretched
beside her on the floor; and Bridget, with
her apron over her head, was rocking
back and forth on the kitchen floor, moan
ing for the 'two eyes that were the light
of the house" Was that the street door?
1t shut with a slam. Gus Robbins, pro-
badly. Why couldn't people stay away
just nowl Somebody tumbled on the
stairs. How much that sounded like
Fred! If we could only hear him tumble
up stairs again
"Why, what are you all in the dark
for?" Everybody jumped. There was no
mistake this time, for this was nobody but
Fred.
In answer to Aunt Harriet's and Lute's
questions and Tommy's open-mouthed
wonder, he only said, 90, Bridget is so
stupid We went up on Thompson's hill
after beech-nuts, and Rufe Douglass did
fall out of q tree and break his arm.
When father and mother found me all
right, they thought they'd go round by
Uncle Jobs. Father told me to come and
tell you, but wanted to go round by Lin
Foye's and see if his doves had any squads
yet, so | didn't get along very quick.
Been to supper? Pm bout starved"
Supper! Who had thought of supper?
and going after squads when they were
suffering so! They didn't know whether
to give him all the preserves he could eat,
for Joy that he was safe, or send him to
bed without a mouthful, they were so
vexed at his not getting "along very
quick"
But rather think joy triumphed, for it
was reported Fred had said at school it
was ''first-rate to have folks think you
were drowned, it made 'em awful clever to
a feller"; and about a week after, as
Bridget was scolding because Fred had
left mud tracks on the clean floor, when
he had been told so nadny times to wipe
his feet, Lutte wiped up the mud herself,
and said, "You can't expect a boy to re-
member everything, Bridget" t."-Our Young
Folks.