Litchfield enquirer., 1877-01-18
CFrom Harper's Magazinel MISS TRUEPEMNY'S FORTETH CHRISTMAS.

home. Her gown of lustreless silk rat tied on the old oaken boards. it's stiff folds changing like pasteboard, and the high heels of her shapely boots stumped along with a measured precision. The still irrepressible brightness and warmth of her hair were hidden by severe bit o1 three cornered lace that fell over her high white brow, and heightened the dead, cold, passionless contour of her face. Her her eyes bent to the floor. As she walked there, the figure was not an ,unin- teresting one in grim, ascetic point o1 v1ew, but not readily connected with aught that concerned the tender passion
 Yet many 8 brave soldier, and perhaps arrant rogue, carries a bit of lead with him to his grave. The bullet goes in and never comes out, but makes comfortable bag and bed for itself, and has peripa. tetic home for many g year. It may be that in that time long ago the rosy god took aim for another target, or hit this one in sportive jest, for she was, when quite young woman, red-haired, high nosed, and superior. This last the worst of all. She had mastered every thing at the village school. and it was the general belief that while she was away for 8 twelvemonth or two, Elizabeth had learn ed more than was wholesome for any one young woman to know; and when, upon her return, she actually took the place of her college-bred cousin Matthew Gorse, as book -keeper and cashier in her father store, and was perched upon the high stool, with pen behind her delicate ear, her slim little hands fumbling among bills and papers in the worm-eaten draw CT, the villagers shook their heads and hoped 10 harm might come of all this wisdom that Deacon Truepenny had bought for that ''hoighty-toighty da'ter O fis'n.''
 But Obadiah 1nnkad euor .-setf1e rickety throne of bis daughter, and not for the first time in his life thanked God she was not Q son. In another part of the store lounged idly his nephew, young Matthew Gorse; and as the sharp ferrety eyes of the old man fell upon his comedy head, they took an expression of scorn and dis gust that told very plainly in what esti- nation he was held by his forehanded uncle.
 "A clerk, indeed P groaned Obadiah, who remembered his own bitter appren- ticeship in that line -''trapesin' about with the girls at night, yawnin' and loun-; gin through the day, stickin' up his inn pudent nose at his betters, and fndin, fault with his bread and butter-a clerk, indeed !" Obadiah was about sick of it. eff he couldn't help out with the mack erel and ile, and was too dainty to pick out the rotten apples, why, he might go to thunder" would conclude Obadiah, who, although deacon, was driven to the verge of profanity by this reprobate nephew of his
 'And as to maxim head or tail O them 0,b ;s'v -nl.1 for Obadiah, "There was screw lose somewhere. Squire Bronson hadn't paid that bill. nor Lawyer Bates nuther; least ways if they had, it was all mixed up somehow. He didn't want to be rash, but if he found out any thing wrong And here the old mans greedy eyes would fasten themselves upon his daughtersss face. She was his anchor, his hope ''What with the tarna1 fashion C. feE10ls@ in nowadays, the old ledger was q sealed book to him. Matthew would push 1t over to his uncle, smile contemptuously, and lounge away, secure, as the old man well knew, that the contents were like Chinese puzzle in his hands. But now he could look away from that scornful face and mocking smile, and gaze upon the calm, serious one of his daughter. It might uot be so lovely to some folks, but to him it was the one face in the world
 Her keen gray eyes, her high nose, her sharp-set mouth, were more alluring in the eyes of her father than any soft dimpled Ieveliness There was that in Elizabeth's face that lent comfort to his fretted soul, and clean quiver about the girls nostrils brought back his dog Bess to him, and often he fell to calling her by that name, as the only venture to caress he knew how to give.
 When young Matthew caught to this pet title, for he had always hated the grim one of Elizabeth, the old man grin ned maliciously.
 "Bess it is, young man," he said, 'ssure's you're born, and Bess was the best point CT the world ever saw. If you've been at any capers, she'll nose you out, mark my words for it. '''
 And Matthew would turn upon his heel and walk contemptuously away; but sur- reptitiously he would watch his cousin from distance, and as he saw the head of the young girl bent over the battered old ledger, her keen eyes probing that miserable tell-tale of a book, his soul be- gan to be vaguely troubled. His con- temptuous indifference for this young school-miss, with her shallow knack of deceiving her father into the belief she was so wise, yielded to sense of mastery he found in that face, so pale, so proud, so severely cold. He did see that clean quiver of the nostrils; it was perfect; it was fatal. She knew it all; it was but a question of time. She held in tE ose pretty slim hands of hers hls life or his death, his future manhood or ms eternal shame.
 He found something tigerish in her toying with the futteripg pages of that wretched old book, and began to long for the time when she would swoop down upon her prey and end thls agony of yearning and suspense.
 For there had dawned within him of late, since, instead of the repulsiye power of his uncle, he had found higher, pur- CT, nobler force to combat and fear there had broken on his troubled spirit keenerg sense of suffering, but with it the neces- sity for equation, which amounted at times to an agony of yearning. He re- solved one night to feed this desire, let it cost what it would.a14 a8sA8s He got up and sat by the window. For the first time he could look upon that bit of water shimmering wonder in the moon- light without shudder. His hot eyes suddenly became wet; a sob escaped him. Hour after hour he sat there, motion less. absorbed. the prey to that thought that in the ghastly gray of the morning took so dubious a shape it tore the heart within him. All at once he saw the blue cambric gown of his cousin fitting down the garden path. He crept stealthily down the stairs. holding his breath as he passed his uncle's door, and went out into the garden. a9.z eh
 The fresh, fragrant air made him dizzy. He felt the pulses of his temples beat and E t< ~k ok n | IL es through winch he trod. Nature had scarcely awakened from her sleep, and the moon was still in the sky The gar den seemed without pulse, and the blue robe of his cousin. that was now but step from him. took the shape, to his dazed senses, of cloud that had hoated down from heaven. He stepped onward. and clasplng the blue of that cloud, fell on his knees at her feet.
 The heart of this young girl, already touched by the tender grace of the sum mil @bz, x,f f fbor