Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1879-01-22
ooh, father, father! You don't mean

| ooh, father, fatherl You don't mean
!, that you ever thought of doing such a
t silly thing T. cried Betty, infree disgust.
I''gAnd when hespesters me sol | never
; should have another days peace in my
life. You might just las we'll put me in
prison, with q spy and q master over
me. Oh. no, indeed! Give him any,
thing, but send him away Start him
, in business in Australia, buy HIM q farm
in the West, but don't father, pray don't
keep him here"
And Betty's voice settled it. Mr.. Will
marth told his wife's young step-cousin
that he had changed his mind, and had
no place for him in his business, but
knew of an opening, and would eetab-
llsh MIN in it, in a western city.
els it Betty's wish ?" said Will. And
he refused the prefer; and one evening,
catching Betty's hand, as he bid her
goodbye, and lifting it to his lips, with
kiss that burned in upon it, he left
the place and buried himself unknown
among the southern mountain with
some focks Of sheep.
One might suppose Betty would have
been satisfied then. Not she. She was
as restless as a bird. Perhaps she miss
, ed the pleasure of having Will behold
her conquests; perhaps she missed the
constant, tender service. A month
afterward, when Mr.. Valerno drew his
lessons to a close, and betook himself to
other fields-vexing and Notifying her
it may be, but not grieving her a parti-
cle-she certainly missed the old friends
ship anu sympathy, the kindness in
which she could confde and with which
she could advise; and little Betty Will
marth's black lashes were wet with tears
that she could not account for, and that
surely she never dreamed that she
should be shedding because Will
Maunder was away. She had reason,
presently, to miss that kindness to some
purpose. Her father was in that same
year thrown from his wagon; and he
lay but partly conscious for weeks
afterward, and for months he never left
his room nor quite recovered his intel
ligence. In those weeks and months,
unfaithful clerks and book-keepers en-
riched themselves and impoverished
Mr.. Wilmarth; and when he finally re-
covered, it was to the wreck of what
had once bid fair to become great for
tune. eff Will Maunder had been
with me-" said Mr.. Wilmarth, "strang-
ers and hounds would have had no
chance to fleece men'
1t was true Betty heard it with a
shiver. She had thought as much,
many a time, yet put the thought away;
but now her father declared it so,
seemed to make the fact sure. And
why was not Will with her father? For
no reason, but that she had in reality
driven him away. Then they owed all
their misfortunes to her headstrong
folly. If Will Maunde patient,
foreiving, honest Will Maunder-had
been in her fathers business, this dis
aster never would have overtaken it
her father would not be beginning life
over again in his old age; her mothe.
need not have relinquished her nurse
her sisters would not be dependent ona
distant relative for the charity of Their
receipted school bills; she herself wouH
not be cramped and pinched, turning
, old clothes, warming old food: doing
) the work that servants in plenty had
always done for her before; listening
) still to these tiresome lovers, that did
, not forsake her because poverty hsd
Joined her throng.
: If crying would have brought him
, back Will Maunders could have sailed
) to Betty on a flood of tears; but tears
) being useless, Betty scorned to shed
, them. She had no idea where he was,
: except for the vague rumor that spoke
of him as sheep-raising somewhere in
/ the Carolinas. If she had, having sent
him off in her prosperity, she could not
call him back in her calamity. So she
, braced herself in way Will could have
approved; and she laughed bitterly at
herself to think of the sentimental idiot
; she had been, and Of the innocent
: young Italian on whom she had poured
out the burden of her vain fancies; and
her clear, dark, cheeks Redeemed redder
: than their wont: at the thought of the
J light in which the clear-headed Will
must have held her infatuatiOn.
: Betty's cheeks, though, had never
: lost their carnation; she was no older
) than before, so far as her beauty was
concerned; only into the radiant face
there had stolen new expression, per-
haps called out by the necessity Of SO
much tenderness toward her sick father
and disconsolate mother, perhaps by
the longing for a once-neglected pre-
, sence: the hope, growing more patient
that it might yet return-the sense
growing daily more humble, and nothing
had befallen her but what she sadly de-
, served.
And then the long war broke out and
in all its course, no word of Will. She
| thought he might be in it. She was
, sure that his blood must be stirred. She
/ looked for his name in the bulletins, in
the promoted, in the dead and missing,
; in the discharged, in the forlorn hopes;
she longed to do something for him,
, now that it was impossible-to encour
age him, to help him, if she could only
, once find his name. She never did
And when at last, peace was declared,
there came through the obscure chan
, nels in which all such news runs, not
to be verified, and yet too authentic for
: disbelief, the report that he had been a
!, conscript of the confederates, had fallen
in the first battle and died in the hos