The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1878-02-14

WISo VIC JUL IOP1y. O"A se'Ae.o h1J
ancestors if you are incapable Of doing
so. I hope your ideal husband may ap-
pear. In the meantime I think you are
but one remove from an idiot to refuse
Walter, a perfect gentleman, and my
probable heir |"
"Perhaps! ] will come tomorrow
and finish your dress.
And SO saying Edna wrapped her
shawl about her and departed. For
this girl, sharing with her mother an ex-
ceedingly slender income, the legacy of
her long-dead father, utilized ready
needle and exquisite taste by sewing for
her relatives. Her mother would have
tainted in horror had any one suggested
to her that her daughter was dress
maker. But dear Edna, she admitted,
helped her more.prosperous relatives
with their sewing, emitting to add that
said relatives put sufficiently small
pecuniary acknowledgment into Edna's
purse.
The girl herself, a superbly-handsome
brunette, rebelled mentally every hour
of her life against all this pretense.
Proud to her hearts core, she had no
mean shrinking from facing the truth
that she was poor and obliged to work
for money; but the prejudices of her rich
aunt, the affectations of her helpless, fine
lady mother must be respected, and she
worked for half pay and secrecy when
she might have won an honest living as
an acknowledged dressmaker.
When Walter Templeton asked her to
be his wife some of this long pent-up
irritation of the false life forced upon
her found vent in her refusal of his suit.
She half regretted the sarcasms she had
poured upon his position when she saw
the detected face and the expression of
hurt amazement there.
CATER ALL" she thought, when he
left her, "the poor fellow is not much
to blame He has been under Aunt Lu-
Giles thumb ever since he was a mere
boy, brought up upon small doses of
common sense and vast ones of Pilgrim
Fathers, blue blood. and the degradation
of honest labor. But I won't marry
him I get enough of the family fail
ing without going to live with Aunt
Lucille, one more hanger-on. I earn all
she gives me, that's one comfort. Any
dressmaker would charge twice as much
as she will pay me to make that black
velvet"
Yet when she came day after day,
working busily at the fall sewing OF her
aunt, she missed the courteous atten-
tions of her cousin. Truly Aunt Lucille
had spoken truly when she said Walter
Templeton was perfect gentleman. His
manner was the perfection of good
breeding, with deferential courtesy for
all womankind, and most fascinating
Difference for the one woman he loved.
Stung by the bitter emphasis of Edna's
refusal, the contenptuous sarcasm of
her reasons, he withdrew from her pres
ence, seldom coming to the room, where
he read to his aunt while she sewed.
Truly Edna had defined his position
in that mental retrospect she had taken.
He had been his aunt's plaything in his
boyhood, handsome lad, full of talent
and promise. When he attained ripper
years he was sent to school, to college,
graduated there, was put into the po-
sition of outieul nephew to an aunt
who openly proclaimed him her heir.
Courted in society, his aunt's favorite,
with ample means at his ready COM
mand, his own idea of his course of life
was that it was far superior to that of
common men. Thoroughly imbued
with his aunt's pride, he rather scorned
the idea Of labor of any kind until he
loved Edna.
By the light of that love ne felt un-
easily that she scorned the money he
took freely, unless he earned it first.
More than once he had known of her
proud refusal of any gift for which her
nimble fingers had not given full
equivalent. He loved her first for her
beauty, then for the noble attributes of
mind and heart she certainly possessed,
| though she screened them well with her
sarcastic pride.
Gradually, indeed unconsciously,
she had sheathed the weapons she had
kept at command, her pungent wit, her
keen satire, when her cousin Walter was
by. She let herself be interested when
he read, and spoke freely when they dis
oussed literature or art.
Mrs. Montgomery looked well pleased.
1t was one OF her pet schemes to leave
her wealth divided between Walter and
Edna, as man and wife, and she encour-
aged intimacy with all her heart, hiding
her satisfaction under her usual curt
manner.
Partly from her hints, partially, it must
be confessed, from his own sense of SUI
periority, Walter had settled convic-
ton that he was comforting an honor
when he offered his hand to Edna. a
hand that would lift her to his side in
the afauence of his aunt's favor.
So the first spur that drove him from
her presence was certainly mortified.
vanity. More reasonable motives came
later.
Tho fall sewing was completed, when,
with that unreasonable perversity that
falls often to the lot of the most favored
mortals, Mrs. Montgomery was obliged
to have it all renewed in mourning for
her only sister, Edna's mother.
1t was "dreadfully provoking" of
course, the more SO as Edna, really low
ing the peevish invalid who had been her
cara for x5ooro ao,,1J 1oo% a44o.oJ