Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1880-08-26

| and pity of it. I have had my dreams.
I will not call them foolish dreams; it
was only the rose bush reaching toward
the trellis. Every girl has dreams, and
| it is right that she should have. 1t
makes no difference whether she be fill
| ing the position of man or that of a
woman-her heart is not changed by the
| work that her mind and body are en-
gagged in. !, ,,, -, .,,;., -, ,,,,,,,. ,,o+
have allowed me to serve him as have
served him. To think of the nights that
have sat up over those books! saved
him from bankruptcy. and in his graft
tude, he promoted me to be his coniden-
tial clerk! He was very grateful, and
am I to blame for having thought that
my life might grow fresh and beautiful
with love like the lives we read of in
books? What hours have spent, which
should have been passed in sleep, in
reading and study that might keep
abreast with him in mental culture. He
must remember me as one who has been
a help to him. 1t is impossible that he
should forget me. There is a modicum
of comfort in that thought and in the
fact that a young man is to take my
place. could not bear to think of him
smiling over the top of his desk into the
eyes of some other woman. If he mar
ries, hope shall never know it,
At that very hour the object of this
poor souls conflict with self was swing
ing in hammock suspended from the
spreading branches of giant oak, on
the Highlands, above the Hudson.
There were four of these swaying GRIM
son and yellow cradles hanging in the
balmy air from the huge limbs of this
massive tree; and it was characteristic
of these luxury-loving Bronsons that
they had lounged here, looking up into
its vast emerald dome, through the shin
ing leaves of which filtered an occa-
sional arrow of sunshine, while the
clear-voiced church bell, only few rods
away, was summoning other people in
carriages and on foot for miles from
farm and hill and meadow.
The mother and three sisters, four
stylish society women, were all beaming
now upon this black-whiskered Adonis
who was their idol.
"What should you have said," he
asked, indifferently, after lying for a
long time with his eyes closed and his
white hands clasped beneath his shapely
head, "if had married my accountant;
the woman who has been for so long in
our office, you know?"
There was little rustic of drapery
and futter of fans, then Marie, the
youngest sister, began an indignant pro-
test, which her brother checked by say
ing:
"Don't excite yourself, Marie; the
ideamerely occurred to me asI was about
to announce to you that she has been
called away"
"Is it possible!' exclaimed his moth
err, settling her gray frizzes and finger
puffs which the fresh breeze had slight
1y disarranged. What was her name?
l never saw her, but remember of hear
ing her spoken of in the matter of set
thing your poor fathers estate as faith
full creature"
s'I should think so,'' interrupted the
young man; IS she saved the estate from
bankruptcy, and your daughters from
going out into the world in some ca
pacity to earn their own living, as she
did when her father died insolvent, leav-
ing her without relatives"
Mrs. Bronson ignored the point and
went on in exactly the same key as be-
fore. cit is very unfortunate. What
will you do, my son?'
II have already hired a young man
to fill the vacancy"
"Ten years?" said Adelaide the old
est sister, "she has fairly grown gray
in our service"
edo you mean that white-faced girl
in No. 81" asked Sarah, and Marie, who
was swinging in the same airy couch as
noticed anything about her."
said his mother, ''and l heard you up in
When did it happen?
Yesterday"
Suddenly?''
every" And the young man dis
missed the subject. They exchanged
chances and smiles and let him alone
while he was thinking, g didn't say
what had called her away, or where she
had gone. Am l to blame that they
think she is deadp"'
Mr. Bronson took it upon himself all
autumn to open the mail. AS usual,
there were plenty of business letters
from Sturtevant & Co., but none "Per
c." After time he ventured an in
quiry, in a postscript, and received in
l.
After that the morning mail was left
for the new clerk, who, happily, was all
that had been represented. Yet Mr..
Bronson found an unwonted wearisome-
ness about the business that seemed to
him would wear his very life out. Night
after night he lay in his luxurious rooms
at the St. Nicholas, for he had entirely
given up going up the Hudson now, and
dreamed that he climbed the long, hard
stairs up to No. 6 with light, hopeful
step, and sitting down by his desk look
ed up over the bisected back to meet |
the soft, blue, faithful eyes that had |
never failed him; and then the fair face
and smooth brown hair turned into a
white lily, or rose, or frost flower, or
snow wreath, and faded away.
"Always into some emblem of purity, |
and fifty, too" he cried one night, when
these dream pictures continually haunt
ed and deluded him, leaving him in an
agony of remorseful sorrow. "What |
am to do? The old times can never
return.'