Alpena weekly argus. [volume] (Alpena, Mich.) 1871-1893, 1878-03-20
A LIFE FOR A LIFE.

Bertrode Dodge was blue. L
was August weather-there was NJ
air stirring from one arid noon un
til TIE next, and the insects hisseC
maliciously all day long in tho
parched grasses. Perhaps that wa
the reason that Bertrode was blue.
Perhaps it was that as she walk,
ed Growers Tract, day by day, and
saw the summers limited compile.
ton in the red apples burning
among the gray-green boughs, the
hay-felds at aftermath, the pur-
pie tasselled corn, and yellow wheat,
that she felt her life to be aimless.
She had let the summer come and
wane across her passive existence.
In the winter she had been gay,
looking at the sunset across the
snow, watching the chic-a-dees, and
searching the woods for purple
mererion. In the spring the long
walks to the post-office had been
full of joyful fancies.
But in August something seemed
to Cypress her. The sky burned
too blue, the woods were too calm
ly content in their greenness, the
days closed too beautifully in their
ripe splendor, as she walked the
Tract at sunset, coming from the
notwithstanding always empty
handed. Yes, something was wrong,
and when she realized it fully, she
said:
Ell am idle-I am stepped in idle
ness. have been doing nothing
for a year. Now l will have some
work, and Dick may 60 to the post
office. / care too much for those |
letters"
Whatever those letters mi ht be,
there came no more of them. A
certain gay tourist drifting about
the world, forgot to write them at
last; perhaps Bertrode was pretty,
but one travelling everywhere meets
many pretty faces.
Bertrode's cheek grew thin and
white. Her mother saw that she
struggled to repress a growing ir-
ritableness. But she worked on
increasingly at her employment of
teaching the district school of Gro
ver's Tract. She devoted herself
to the children. Their parents said
they had never before learned so
fast. Bertrode smiled only family
at their praise. One day, coming
home from school through the
woods, she flung herself down
among the ferns and dry grasses.
at is dust and ashes,' she cried.
The sky cleaned blue through
the green boughs overhead, and a
little bird sang cheerily in neigh
boring bush. She lay there until
she felt the dew falling. AS she
rose up, something rustled at her
side. She looked down; a great
rattlesnake was slipping through
the grass, going from her, appa-
rently unaware of her presence.
Fascinated, immovable, yet full of
horror, she stood and watched the
creature. For a moment it glided
steadily on, its course so direct, its
appearance so subtitle and deadly,
that she felt spellbound as she re-
garded it. Suddenly, with thrill
of horror, she saw the reptiles aim
it was making directly for a shady
spot, where a man lay asleep be-
meath the trees. One moment more
would be too late to prevent the
threatened attack. Starting from
her passivity, she seized stone at
her feet and hurled it full at the
creature. He had just paused and
raised his crest to view his position,
when the stone struck him upon
the head, and with q vengeful hiss ,
he leaped into the air, then fell at
full length upon the ground and |
slowly expired.
Bertrode stood looking at the
dusty length and bloody head Of
he dead snake, her mind in sort 1
IF wonder that anything could be
70 loathsome and vile, when she 9
,eard her name spoken. She rails (
d her eyes and saw Fennel Gould I
before her. The young c
nan looked at the snake with a {
ort of shudder, and said: :
"Bertrode, you must have saved 4
ny life." q
81 suppose 7 did," she answered.
The creature was coming directly Il