Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1881-01-03
He has returned to his own house il


one, on account of his mortal quarrel
with Burton. and he had now been beat
ing against an arctic hurricane and
trampiug through treacherous billows of
snow for an hour, we cannot wonder
that be fell over his own threshold in a
state d extreme exhaustion.
HAPPY for him that he did not fall
bewillered on the prairie, as many ano-
ther poor wayfarer did on that fatal
might.
Is it was, his wife must needs give
upthe vain little searches she had been
making In the neighborhood of the shan
~. She had now sick husband, with
frozen hands and feet and face to care
for. Every minute the thermometer
fell lower and lower, and all the heat
the cook stove in Jones's little shanty
could give would hardly keep them from
freezing.
Burton had stayed upon that forty
acre lot all day, waiting for a chance
to shoot his old partner Jones. He had
not heard Of the arrival of Jones's wife,
and so he concluded that his enemy had
proved coward and had left him in
possession, or else that he meant to play
him some treacherous trick on his way
home.
So Burton resolved to keep sharp
lookout. But he soon found that i'm
possible, for the storm was upon him in
all its fury. He tried to follow the
path, but could not find it.
Had he been less of frontiersman
he must have perished there, within a
furlong of his own house. But in his
efforts to keep the direction of the path
he heard smothered cry, and then saw
something rise up covered with snow,
and fall down again. He raised his
gun to shoot it, when the creature utter
ed another wailing cry SO human that
he put down his gun and went cautious
ly forward.
1t was child.
He did not remember that there was
such child among all the settlers in
Newton. But he did not stop to ask
questions. He must, without delay, gel
himself, and the child, too. to place Of
safety, or both would be frozen.
So he took the little thing in his arms
and started through the drifts And
the child put its little icy fingers OIL
Burton's rough checks and muttered
"papa p And Burton held her closer
and fought the snow more courageously
than ever.
He found the shanty at last, and roll
ed the child in a buffalo robe while b,
made fire. Then, when he got tn,
room little warm, he took the littl,
thing upon his knee. dipped her aching
fingers in cold water, and asked he
what her name was.
kitty" she said.
Kitty" he said, "and what else ?"
kitty" she answered, nor could b
find out any more.
"Whose Kitty are you?'
"Your Kitty" she said. For sh
had known her father but that one da
and now she believed that Burton wa
he.
Burton sat up all night and stuffe
wood into his lmpotent little stove t
keep the baby from freezing to death
Never having had to do with children
he firmly believed that Kitty, sleepin
snugly under blankets and buffalo robe:
would freeze if he should let the fir
subdue in the least.
As the storm prevailed with unabate
fury the next day. and as he dare
neither to take Kitty out nor to leav
her alone. he stayed by her all day an
stuffed the stove with wood, and laugh
ed at her droll baby talk, and fed he
on biscuit and dried bacon and coffee.
On the morning of the second day th
storm had abated. 1t was 40 degree
cold, but, knowing somebody must
mourning for Kitty for dead. he wral
ped her in skins, and with much diff
Guilty reached the nearest neighbor
house, suffering only frost bite on b
nose by the way.
"That child" said the woman
whose house he had come, sis Jones
seed EN- take her outen the wag'
day before yesterday"
Burton looked at Kitty moment
perplexity, then he rolled her up aga
and started out. Travelling like mad
the woman said as the watched him.
When he reached Jones's he foul
Jones and his wife sitting in utt
wretchedness by the fire. They we
both sick from grief, and unable
move out of the house. Kitty they h
given up for buried alive under t
, snow mound. They would find b
when spring should come and melt t
, snow cover off.
, When the exhausted Burton came
: with his bundle of buffalo skins th
t looked at him with amazement. Z
$ when he opened it and let out the lit
L \