Lexington weekly intelligencer. (Lexington, Mo.) 1871-1887, 1879-07-19
THE FIRST MRS. PETERSHAM.

THE FIRST MRS. PETERSHAM.
When Mr.. Petersham's sister had, ac-
corting to popular estimation. made
away with his young wife, she establish
ed herself at the head OF his house, and
began to have things to her mind. Not
that Mrs. Mynshyn was positive mur-
dcress, gnllty of assault with intent 10
kill or of the administration of either hot
or cold poison. But she had come into
the peaceful little household before the
first year OF marriage had expired, and
had set up her Ebenezer, and introduced
discord there, and had at last fairly wor-
ried the child into hatred of her, under
which her tender conscience writhed as
under a deadly SIN, and, between fear
and horror and the dread of losing her
husbands love, all things put on gloom
that rapt her unto melancholy, and pres
entity unto death For when the great
flood swept down the valley rs it some
| times did in spring, she, sitting ignorantly
on Il lallen tree whose branches hung DER
the brooks bed,w seized by the sudden
torrent, swirled under, and swept away,
and seen no more; nor was her body re-
covered. although little block of gran
ite stood to her memory in the dreary
family battle-ground. For all that, the
neighborly mind, drawing nourishment
from the under-current OF servants, had
but one opinion in the matter: nobody
accused Mrs. MynshYn OF taking Gerarda
Petersham by the neck and holding her
under water, for she couldn't have done
it; but it was generally conceded that
Gerarda would not have been sitting out
there, hidden among the boughs, if she
had been happy at home, and that she
would have had strength enough to save
her if she had not been weakened by her
sorrow and care, and that maybe
who knew?-life was so poisoned by her
tyrant that she did not care to preserve
it, even if she did not throw it away un-
der cover OF her chance. But while there
was more than one worthy person who
had serious thoughts of dealing with Mr..
Petersham concerning his blindness and
his absorption IN his studies while the
issues of lite and death were under his
hands, yet Mrs. Mynshyn's own peculiar
| gossips, Mrs. Grey and Miss Overton,
the wealthy widow and spinster of the
scattered hill town, held up her hands
through the ordeal, till all talk died
away, as all talk will.
AS for Mr.. Petersham, he only knew
that he had lost his young wife, nor
guessed that she had withered like one
under the shadow of the upas. He hat
been half buried in his great work or
Law. Alter his first rapture of grief hi
tried to bury himself in it again. but il
valn, and one year followed another ant
found him only beginning to pay thu
debt. In the second year he had pro
cured an amanuensis to help him in hi
work, that he might forget himself;
bent old woman, as it happened, who's
gray hair and pallid face seemed some
how perpetua! reproach to him, as i
it were Gerarda herself, through hi
lault grown old, and sad, and labOring
But one day the poor creature took her
sell out of the way. us if unable, in he
turn, to bear the strain of the dreary lit
tie family, and then he relapsed into hi
desultory reading and his morbid mem
cries, with only now and then a fit OF th
old studying.
Yet, after all, to say that Mrs. A1yn
shyn had made away with the prett
creature, her half brothers. wife.ls stron
language. Mrs Mynshyn do such
thing? Why, she was the very best c
women; she had known her catechlsn
from birth had been on the anxious sea
before she could toddle, as one NIGH
say. and had met with change so lon
agolhat she could not tell whether it wa
in Il twinkllng or otherwise-the onl
thing about it was that almost every
body who knew her wished she wOul
meet with another. To-day she wa
president or vice OF every society in til
region OF which Mrs. Grey or Mis-
; Overton was not president or vice, rel
gious and irreligious. sending sicds
the equator and parasols to Nova Zen
bla, and procuring wives for missions
ries although it is but just to Mrs. N.Y.
shyn to say that she pandered as litt
rs possible TO the tastes of the Gambia
in providing sweet and succulent spec
mems. Well, well, all this is neitht
here nor there; Mrs. Mynshyn. for a
-, her arrogance. temper, and tyranny. HI
/, innuendoes, llings, and jeers, had
high standard OF duty, and never il
dulged an idea that she did not reach 1
the poor young wife never had al
standard at all, and was washed dow
with the flood like the weed that Mr.
Mynshyn felt she was.
ht And with that Mrs. Mynshyn had r
newed her youth and begun her caree
saving where there had been waste. pu
ting prim array in place of charming di
order, bringing down the bills. keepir
down the servants, having things set
rights before Mr.. Petcrsham was out
bed, so that the machinery of the hous
s. hold seemed to go on by c!ock-wor
making him excessively comfortable
all bodily things, and never ceasing d
paraging remarks concerning the wort
lessness of the preceding regime and tt
pitiable condition OF Mr.. Petersham u
- der it. till, the poison working, he gra
ually and unconsciously found himst
looking favorably on the view that
had been misused, and was like ma
yr in still cherishing the memory of Il
misuser.
Poor Mr.. Petersham; he was young
that tlme-a fault which he liy,
long enough to remedy. He was t
possessor of a comfortable patrim
ny, and not being obliged to labor,
consequently had labored from dav
till dusk IN his recondite studies in tt
ancient law, SO absorbed in them til
,g pale cheek and lustreless eye and flute
ing heart passed unnoticed; and no.
. had he not had the studies s-result
whose ponderous volumes was still i
complete-the lonely house among Il
c, hills, with its memories, might qui
have driven him wild. All around hi
lay the dun backs of the hills shr
ting in the horizon, and on the side
one just below his study window hun
the inclosed square of the family grav
yard, where half-dozen graves, un
cn dorned and drcary, Knocked the sunshl
and dilused gloom over the whole Ian
scape. Nor within was any cheer
cr view; Mrs. Mynshyn was sitting uprig
- in her char and swapping her eyes as
the uncanny things saw through eve
door and told her all that was going
beyond them-a strange, slim. soleu
women, whose yellow face locke acre
the forehead and down the cheek, Ii
that thin. old-lashioned sugar gingt
bread which is marked with long ro,
of straight Iines-the hieroglyphics
the face of greed, thrift, temper, ,shrcw
ness and virtue. But there the resel
b:nce ceased; there was no sweetn,