The Carbon advocate. [volume] (Lehighton, Pa.) 1872-1924, 1881-01-01
At the Eleventh Hour. 4"
BY NOEL RUTHvEN.


In the village of ITomedale, on the Hud-
son
The shades of evening had fallen, and
The hills were preparing TO wrap themselves
in hooded gray The dim m,mysterous "hush''
that night whispers to the dying day was
Upon the earth. The shadows of the noun
tains deepened, and their tops were dark.
purple in the twilight. New and wonderous
charms were awakening beneath the balmy
caresses Of the night breeze, while subtle
perfume hoated in the luscious air. Lights
twinkled on the shore, in easements up
high on the bluffs, on river-craft, and in
beacons, sending long streals ofilumination
across the CLASSY water. The river was steel.
gray, and the shadows of the banks sank
down in ghostly and fathomless darkness.
Stars came out in the dark-blue sky, SHIN
merng like rose-diamonds. Dogs bayed.
! Oh, it was the bodr of heart ease when that
throb of pain called "life' was cast aside and
forgotten
| IN the bed chamber of neatly white
washed cottage, that stood on the out skirts
of the village of Homedale, sat man be-
side bed, his rough, coarse, brown hands
clasping the thin, white, waxen fingers of a
woman, who, gasping for breath, lay upon
her back, her eyes closed, while her lips, IA
she caught at her breath, seemed to murmur
name.
The man was not aged, he might have
been but fifty, but grief had cast its terrible
shadow upon him, and his forehead was
-wrinkled, his eyes sunken and his form
bent.
He said no word, he made no sign, but,
with his hollow eyes bent upon the floor, he
clasped the worn hand, amid silence only
broken by the ticking OF noisy clock and
the gaspings of the woman.
She was young, ay, and beautiful Her
hair, dark as the blackbirds wing, lay a
cross the snowy pillow in vast silken meshes.
Her face, despite its emaciaton, was deli
cate oval,h brows were exquisitely pencil
ed, her nose and mouth were absolutely
fsultless,
She did not open her eyes, but kept them
closed.
"Water I" she gasped, at length.
Then the man, gently putting aside the
waxen hand, stepped over to bureau, and
pouring out some water from brown
earthenware-pitcher into tumbler, offered
it to the girl. She opened her eyes. They
were large, lustrous, heavy-lidded, and of
that blue which in some lights assumes the
color Of the violet.
GLOW soon am to die?" she asked, after
she had, by painful effort, swallowed few
drops of the cooling beverage which her
father had prepared for her.
"Hush, Nellie; don't talk that way"
''Father, can talk no other way. Am
to die to night?"
"Doctor Blyther gives hopes"
The girl impatiently turned her head
from side to side on the pillow.
doctor Blyther dare not triAe with me ="
she said,
At this moment the doctor entered.
The girl turned her lustrous eyes full up
on HIM. Her words now came slowly but
each wordtold.
doctor blyther, father tells me that you
give him hopes of me if you do you lie p
"My dear--"began the physician a fat,
fussy little man.
"You lie" she repeated, with horrible
emphasis.
"Let me feel your pulse, Miss Nellie"
Gifts for the purpose of telling me how
soon / am to here !" and with strength
Of which he did not deem her capable, she
stretched forth her arm.
The doctor took the wrist, and held his
fingers on the pulse for some time.
"There's no death in that pulse" he said
addressing the old man, who murmured,
"Thanks be to God !"
"Not bit of it" continued the physician;
"and, what's more, if your daughter will be
guided by me, III engage to phil her
through"
4 AS4AsS 70 INcoNcI-bou sue uuueut
almost in a shrek, "what would l recover
for"
"Revenge!" halfwhispered the old man,
and his eyes flashed, his nostrils quivered
his veins stood ont like cords upon his fore
head, and his chest heaved as he spoke.
So Revenge is mine, saith the Lord, F" said
the doctor, solemnly.
The old man turned on him.
"lf the flames Of hell were leaping up TO
lick me down into the fiery depths and that
by one-half seconds forgiveness Of Alfred
Howard | might be snatched from their en-
brace, ia say No {"
1t was terrible to see this man clinch his
hands and grind his teeth, aud so suddenly
change from being the very image of in
eonsolable grief to tie embodiment Of mad
! ferocty.
This won't do, Mr.. Allen," said Doctor
Blyther.
"What won't do2"
This terrible, insatiate carving for How
ards"
blood r. bursts in Allen, in a shrek. "By
the Lord that made me, M"
"liush, father, Tor my sake I" said the girl,
and the instant she spoke Allen became
| quoted as il by mage.
III It would not agitate Miss Nellie too
much, have news
News New 2 cried the girl, echoing his word.
"Ofhim ?"
D