Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1875-07-01

1
my hands trembling, my knees shaking,
tears streaming from my burning eyeballs
He dropped the accused instruments and
| held out his hands to me.
| "Thou art after my own heart" he
said thou lowest the music, Us do, to
alteration
| Yes" | faltered, "but cannot stand
too much of it. The ecstacy is too divine;
it Overpowers me-"
Then he fell to talking of Therese, tell
| ing me for the hundredth time that his be-
| loved child had promised him never to
marry; that while he lived she would be
! happy with him, Of course, and at his
| death he had made arrangements for her
| entrance into a religious house, there to
spend the rest of her days with the good
| Sisters.
"We have put by the necessary money,
| Mr.. Van Tassel; with it we have nothing
| to do it is as if we knew not of its exist
| ence. cannot tell you what joy it makes
! me to think of it; it is Il weight off my
| heart
And placing his pudgy hands upon his
breast he raised his eyes to heaven, while
my own heart beat to desperation.
Was, then, this present dull secusion of
hers only to be changed for the gray desc
lation of convent?
When | dared cast my eyes upon the
dropping form of Therese it seemed tome
that her lips quivered and her long eye
lashes shone with tears.
This was the price l paid for breathing
the same air with Therese. We seldom
spoke to each other, for when even the
great head of Monsieur Rigaud nodded in
slumber it seemed to her and to me that
the shining nav of the monster at his side
yawned vindictively for every word that
might fall from our lips.
One wild March night had lain awake
thinking of all these things, wondering if
indeed it could be that Mons. Rigaud
could always have his way; that the days
should creep into months, and the months
into years; that should live for the tor
ture of the trombone and the simple Joy
of sleeping under the same roof with
| Therese; and that at last it should all
come to an end, that Therese should go to
the good Sisters and L" | should 90 to
the deuce" repeated to myself sayagely,
because the thought panied me so.
| 1t was then | first felt a sense of suffo-
cation, and raising myself in bed found
the room suddenly filling with smoke
from the little window that led into the
hall.
| sprang to my feet, hurried on my
clothes, and rushed to the door to find the
hall filled with dense hot vapor, to hear
peculiar cracking sound mingled with
| the rush of hurried feet and stitled voices
, below
All at once the house, the street, that
quarter of the city, became pandemo-
mum of noise, of terror, Of madness and
confusion. Even as | flew to the door of
| Therese and burst in with the strength of
despair, a terrible tongue of flame shot
before my sight through the corridor be-
low. My breath came in stinted stabs,
cut as it was with fear for Therese, and
the suffocating smoke.
| caught Therese from her little couch
in the closet, which had so often iancied
but never seen, and tied her we'll up in
shawls despite her cries and circumstances.
| The poor child's one thought was for her
father, who, naked and trembling, par
| alyzed with terror, stood in the middle of
the floor with one hand in the legs of his
| wide pantaloons, the other waving wildly
| in the air.
Mother of God"' cried poor Monsieur
| Rigaud, "we are LOST"
my father save my fathcr," cried
Therese, struggling to reach him.
How could she think, with my soul in
as big blaze of love for her as the one
burning in the building below-how could
she think / would risk one hair of her
beautiful head for the craven body of her
| father?
fled with her to the front room, from
whence alone we could escape to the
street A ladder was already At the win
| dow.
MY father! oh, my fathern' still cried
the foolish child; and putting my face
close TO hers, said:
My sweet Therese, | will save him if
| it costs me my life.'
Then the frightened girl put her lips to
mine, and chung sObbing there, accepting
| the sacrifice Of my life, and even her own,
| for the poor, fat Frenchman in the back
chamber.
But pang rent my heart when | put
her into the arms of the man upon the
ladder yonder with the iron cap and the
eager eyes.
How should | save Monsieur Rigaud
when the corridor below was like the
yawning pit of hell itself and the immense
body of the musician like milestone
about my neck?
| But life was swceter to me since had
felt upon my lips the warm rapture Of the
first kiss of Therese, and showed Monsieur
Rigaud before me with lusty velocity
| We reached the room, the window; the
ladder was still there, another iron cap
two more eager eyes.
"Shove him over cried the brave fire
man. thought we were saved, when
suddenly Monsieur Rigaud refused to go
without his trombone. His two hundred
pounds were immovable. Throw him
out'' cried the man from the ladder.
But I could not murder Monsieur Ri
gaud. He planted his foot firmly upon
| the floor - will not leave il to perish -