The Lake County star. [volume] (Chase, Mich.) 1873-current, 1875-10-07

forms of danger, viewed through his
misty spectacles, and he was just remark.
ing, "Ain't / glad / fetched my gun
along" when voice, that seemed to rise
almost from under him, shouted: EVAN
home-g0 home! while still another,
at little distance, responded with
"ChOke him-choke him-better drown
better drOwn!"
And again the shrill whistle assailed
the ears Of the perplexed and shuidering
old beau.
Then, from rising ground, at no great
distance, that looked like bank of fog
halfpeOpled with armed men, there came
the sharp report of a gun, and the job was
done for old Sol Potter. Not waving
"cat-taiP' that rose among the rushes OF
the swamp butseemed to be aiming some
sort of shOoting-iron at him. Not a
frog that lurked among the sedge and
swamp-cabbage but had some direful
threat in the crOak with which he saluted
the mule and his rider, and Sol dolefully
exclaimed:
Pm Just surrounded! What's one
double-barreled gun ag'in sech crowd as
this ERE? There's nOthin' left for me to
do but jist to surrender. Takes white
flag to do that, l s'pose. Wonder if hand
kerchief won't do?"
No sooner said than done, and in an
other m oment Sol Potter was vigorously
waving the one really white piece of
linen about him, in the direction of the
awful shapes on the foggy bank.
As he did so, however, the patient and
sorely-tired brute beneath him came to
his masters assistance, with long-drawn
bray whose mournful pathOs rendered
any verbal declaration Of old Sol's inten-
tions utterly unnecessary. 1t was clear
case of surrender, and again a piercing,
threatening whistle rang across the
swamp, while Sol was sure he could dis
cover long arm reached out in way
that seemed to point homeward. Not
another sound, nor word or token,
and Sol settled back on his mule in hope
less dependency, exclaiming, "Sur-
rounded surroundedp and again the
frogs-only this time he knew it was
the frogs-seemed to croak around the
submerged legs of the shivering mule.
"Van Lennep-Lennep-V Lennep
better 90 home-go home!"
1t was a good halfhour, however, be-
fore Sol could muster courage to move
in any direction, and when he did, it was
to follow the advice of the frogs with a
dazed, puzzled, doubtful state of mind,
as if there yet remained some degree of
uncertainty whether he had been really
robbed and murdered or not.
And that night there was no one to in
terfere with Mat Granger at the fireside
in Sally Van Lennep's sitting room, nor
the next, nor the next; and when, a
round week afterward, old Sol Potter
saddled his mule and started in the mid
die of the afternoon over the hills toward
Ben's, the first acquaintance he stopped
to exchange gossip with asked him
bluntly:
Herd the news bout Mat Granger
and Sal Van LennepT'
"Well, l can't say as how / hev," fall
tered Sol, dreadful suspicious racking
his brain.
"Married Yesterday, and gone off to
town, and won't be back till Thanks
givin'. Amt that sudden?'
Powerful sudden!" calculated Sol;
and then he added, "There, now, if l
amt glad met ye. I'd "a forgot suthin'
if l hadn't. I've got to 60 right back
home arter it,"
And back home he went, but if the
was the thing he was looking
for when he got there, the crops and the
market, not to speak of Mat Granger,
were as much ahead of him then as Mat |
and the frogs and the shadows had been
the night he was surrounded" in the |
swamp.
Women are bad speculation"
Sol that Thanksgiving-day |
81 never knowed one on 'em
to pay, and marryin' ID be an awful ex-
for keerful man like me-"