Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1878-06-01


zee him earning hi3 bread by the sweat
OF bis brow, while they Jared ike the
lilies Of the field 70 have Tom envy and
perhaps hate them, and feel bitter that
life bad been rendered 70 much easier for
them by injustice %
Perhaps they would Share with
Tom
Ah, i wouldn't be quite safe to trust
to that pleasant perhaps
You ought not 70 suspect your chill.
dren OF being less generous than your.
self
But their mother must have been
uDgenerous first, you zee.
You have Anson 10 think Of Hitty,
in this affair, az vel a. Tom. If you
don't love Tom better
DON'T don't; but the viii has
made il impossible for me u marry An,
son with a clear c0nscience-tO marry
him and be happy, If he we're sure of
earning fortune, with which We could
make amends 10 little Tom, it would be
different, But ! cannot count upon
such an improbable contingency. As
you say Tom viii have his heaI and
hands 10 push his way, but the best head
and the busiest hands 90 not always.
compel fortune; and il any harm should
come to him from want OF capital, if he
SHOULD be tempted tn -in from lack Of
money, l--l should have to answer for
1t; it would be my guilt"
Nonsense, Hitty; your conscience il
100 tender. Marry Anson aud trust to
fate, that's my advice. -upposing you
refuse and he mauies somebody else,
and-little Tom does not live 70 grow
up
shall not have Wronged him"
But you will have wrorged Au.0n" "
Not if he-if he marfies-a another" "
Many would perhaps approve Hitty
Ihome's conduct at this crisis, more
would condemn but she walked accord.
ing to her light in those cruel DAYS 1t
was no easy task she had get herself
She was 10 receive no meed for her sac
Tihce except seltapproyal-nothiDg but
reproaches Could she have seen all
that would happen, she might have
spared herself this cruelty. And how
much can happen in thi. time, how
. much to make our wisest iOrethOugbts
assume the aspect Of imprOyidenCes
Property changes hands, values shrink,
children grow up with wills of their
own, people die and make room torremotc
heirs or they outlive the sharp edge OF
sorrOw and anger, snd learn to bear the
burden Of their mistakes Miss Hitty
had faded in the meantime, while AnsOn
Ssarle wore his years like gsrlands. The
fortune OF whiCH her not impossible F"
children might have robbed little Tom
had dwindled 10 the merest pittance
through the knavery OF the man to whose
wisdom it was entrusted, while Anson
Searle had unexpectedly stepped into
possession Of the Ssarle estate, with its
old stone mansion, its orchards and OUT
lying meadow lands, and the income
that had been rolling up since the SearIes
first set tOot upon Plymouth Rock
twenty years before there had been no
shadow Of such a possibility, no dream
Ot it in Anson' mind or anOther's. Two
healthy lives bad barred the way against
him. but death had effected a breach.
Whatamistske ke Hittv Thorne made ="
people had commented these half dozen
wears, She might have been mistress at
~aarle Hill il she'd had r mind to risk
marrying poor man. Folks get their
come up oncs in this world sometime-,'
with the usual charity commentators
bestow upon the motiyesot others, No
body had kn6wn the tue cause Sf Hitty' :
refusal to marry SearIe, il had been the
town talk. 10 be sure-s riddle which no
one had solved. She had not even con-
fided her reasons 70 her lover. lie
would overrule them, she feared, would
call them absurd, and only make her
task more difficult. and perhaps grow to
hate little Tom. and some time Tom
might need his sgeod will; who could tell?
Anson Searle had not borne his dismissal
with the toItltude of an early MARTYR,
/ but he had sworn never 70 ask her twice
to marry him, and he had kept his word.
But perhaps after his anger cooled and
he watched her saddening year by year,
some surmise that her behavior had not
been dictated by caprice or any petty Ino.
tive grew upon him, and obliged him to
render her the tardy justice OF
appreciation And a pretty return
Tom had made her-speculatiug
with hs employers money, and
Threatening the family pride with
disgrace. Unless five thousand dollars
were forthcoming, there was only fort
night between him and ruin. And Tom
WAS only twenty-five, They must save
him. Miss Hitty was one to stand by
her gun; where there was \ will there was
a way, and she followed the only way she
knew. If Mr. Sesrle, iumbling about
tor the reasons of Httys conduct to
ward himself, had at length stumbled
upon the clew--hayng an intimate
knowledge o. her fathers will already
and if he had not been quite heroic
enough TO Orgive her for preterring
Toms welfare to his own, he must have
found grim satisfaction, in the tuln that
fate hsd ordered, in seeing the Thorne
property shrinking day by day, till there
was hardly enough to butter their bread
till it was plain that Hitty's sacrifice
had been toY uaught But when did ever
sacrifice prove futile? Though it fail Of
its direct purpose, dees it not enrich tho
soul not only of the one who sacrifices,
but ofall behodcrs?
1t was near twilight OF an autumn day
that Miss Htty put OH her worn bonnet
and went slowly, with certain reluc
tance, up the hill toward the Seare man,
SION she pulled the brazen knocker
timidly, and stepped into the house that
might have been her own like any be2gar.
The dead Searles looked down from the
walls OF the osken hail with cold Ques
tiOnings in their pursuing eyes; in the
great drawing room the wood fire snap-
ped with good will and glinted gayly
upon bro "a and ormolu, upon the quaint
mirrors set in garnets upon the yellow
ivory keys of the old piano, Anson
Ssarle rose to receive his guest with a
flush of surprise,
"Is it-you.- -Hitty?" he exclaimed,
" Your
" Yes. You did not expect me?'
" Expect you No. Have | had reason
to expect you"
We sometimes expect without rea.
son. have come expecting you to
grant me favor"
"A tavor?'
=" Yes. It strikes you oddly that