The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1879-05-23

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cried when he had hidden her good-by.
He did not think tina. any one else had
shed tears for his sake since. Poor lit
tie lilly! Pretty little lilly! He had
. great notion to 60 to Greenbrier and
look her up. He wanted to find out
whether she would be glad to see him.
He went to Greenbrier. He found the
decent, tidy little brick house where the
Eatons lived. He was shown into
dark little parlor. The woman who ad-
mitted him went up stairs to tell Miss
lilly 80 noiselessly that John thought
she must be in her stocking-feet And
when lilly came down to him she ap-
peared to have on list shoes. Every
thing about the house was muffled.
Mother has q dreadful headache"
lilly explained; "she suffers terribly
with neuralgia
It was impossible not to see that lilly
was extremely agitated. The hand
she gave to John was like ice, and trem.
bled to his touch. He almost seated
her, still holding her hand, and she
looking up at him with the old wistful
look in her eyes. John was touched.
He always had liked lilly. And, poor
little soul, how thin she was! Was it
possible that she had only exchanged
one kind of bondage for another?
She went out to the front door with
him when he left, and he saw then in
the daylight how pale she had grown.
The little wild rose had lost her bloom.
He asked her to take drive with him
for the sake of old times. "You look as
though you needed the fresh air."
eyes. do not get out often; mother
is SO ailing."
On the evening of his last day in
Greenbrier he made up his mind that
he would ask her to marry him. He
had very little doubt of her answer, poor
foolish child; for his own part, he fan
cied he was in love with her. At all
events he ought to be in love with some
one by this time. lilly was almost the
only girl he had ever known well.
But fate interfered with his intention.
Mrs. Eaton was 50 i'll that lilly could
not be spared from her side for more
than five minutes. She ran down Just
to say good-by. John resolved that he
would write instead. He told lilly he
would write. "And take care of your
SELF" he added. She did not cry this
time. Persons who take an extreme
view of human maladies would perhaps
have said said that she looked simply
broken-hearted.
When John did write, it was a diff
ferent sort of letter from the one he had
planned. On his return to camp he was
confronted by crisis in his life. Agay
party from Washington came down to
dance and flirt in the tented field in lieu
of the conventional ballroom. OF its
number was Maud Gale, who, if expe-
rience goes for any thing, should have
been an adept in both dancing and flirt-
ing. A society girl par excellence, but
the first of the type who had crossed
John Leonard's path. She had Guilt
waited fascination to the full extent of
her powers, and John fell an easy VIC
tim to her practiced wiles. He was be.
witched. What if her hair were blon-
dined, and her skin were whitened and
Redeemed, and her eyebrows darkened?
John was innocent as babe about these
matters. To him Maud was radiant in
all the fresh beauty of young woman
hood. lilly? She faded in his thought
by contrast into such q mere dull little
country girl.
Still bewitched, he became engaged
to Maud. She reasoned that she might
do worse. She had weathered good
many Washington campaigns now,
young as she looked. Still bewitched,
he would have married her had not fate
interviewed. Had he done 80, he would
infallibly have rudely awakened from
his golden dream; but he would doubt
as other men and women have done be-
fore him. He might have found COM
fort in the reflection that he was no
more wretched than other men who like
him had married-for love.
He was still madly infatuated, how
ever, when his regiment was ordered
into battle-a battle which ended in VIC
tory for his side, but which left him in
q condition lowering between life and
death. He was desperately wounded;
and-poor fellow!-when they first told
him that the amputation of his right
arm was unavoidable, it seemed to him
that he would rather die outright. A
cripplei MANNED! He thought Of Maud
and her strong, bright beauty with q
sickening sensation of unftness.
He lay at deaths door for weeks.
Part of the time he was too Ill to recog-
nize any one. Only the tenderest nurs-
ing, the most assiduous care, saved him.
And when he finally opened his eyes to
consciousness, upon what assiduous and
tender nurse do you suppose they rested?
It was incredible. Upon whom but
gentle, care worn, gazelle-eyed little
lilly! Chow on earth" began John,
then dropped off to sleep again.
1t had been almost q year now since
he had seen this dewy woodland rose.
He had only written her one letter
meanwhile, but that letter had been her
hearts sustenance ever since. She had
laid it away among certain other men,
cries of hers-mem0ries which retained
their sweetness like withered sprigs of
As the months sped by she
made up her mind that she would never
see John again-that he had forgotten
her. This was her presentiment. But
she did not blame John because he had
not proved all that she had once hoped
he would; that had been her mistake,
but mistake which had been also her
one Joy and romance. She called him
her good angel. In the dear Hebrew
phrase, he had come to her-as in truth
every good friend comes to us--as an
angel Of God.
During this weary while her mother
died. lilly found herself without a tie |
in life. She might come and 60 as she |
pleased. There was distinct desire in |
her lOvinU heart tn do the 0na work for