Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1881-11-30

wait no longer. Pushing her way
through the ruins and the smoke with
those that had been summoned into what
had been Miss Payne's little parlor. she
pressed her lips tightly together, and
the color fled from her face as she saw
the motionless form of her old enemy
stretched on couch there, and standing
by the side of it the rector, blood
streaming from a wound on his head. his
coat torn, and one arm hanging listless
by his side, Some falling bricks and
timber had struck him and had disa-
bled the arm, and lest his appearance
should excite alarm he had sent Bob
Howard with the message for help and a
strict injunction to say nothing beyond
what he had been told.
In few seconds Miss Payne, more
frightened than hurt, was moved beyond
the reach OF peril, and was conveyed to
Aunt Agatha's cottage, accompanied by
the wounded rector. Aunt Agatha's
foresight had already summoned good
DIR. Holmes to the place, and hurrying
as fast as his lame foot would permit. he
reached the cottage almost at the same
time as the cavalcade. Miss Triple, in
d1gnant that her cousin should have de-
serted her for that woman had not
awaited the issue of the Investigations
DR.. Holmes pronounced Miss Payne
to have sustained very severe shock
from fright, but tc be free from bodily
damage. The rector's arm was broken.
but the wound on the head was only skin
deep, and not much more serious than
the torn coat.
From that time, for many months,
Aunt Agathas house became Miss
Payne's home, and her hostess tended
her with ali the solicitude of a daughter.
great poet has told us that ssthe
learned eye is still the loving one," and
it SO happened that in this unwearied
tendance and ministration Aunt Agatha
discovered not few unsupported virtues
in the fat, wheezy, puffy old soul, and
something like genuine attachment
sprung up between them.
A very constant attendant was the
Rev. Frank Jordan. Even when his arm
was still very painful, and he might we'll
have been excused had he abstained from
visiting parishioner who was in no i'm
minent danger, his solicitude about Miss
Payne was remarkable. In spite of the
severity of winter SHOWS and frosts, his
arm secured by splints and bandages, he
would come, and sit for q whole ten
minutes with Miss Payne, and for whole
hours talking with Aunt Agatha-prob-
ably about the patients symptoms.
But the SHOWS melted on the high
hills, and the brooks, swollen with their
muddy tribute, chartered noisily down
the slopes, and snowdrops and crocuses,
daffodils and violets bloomed again. and
In due course the breath of the blush
roses in the garden was waited into the
cottage.
And then people in the village said,
and laughed at each other as they said
it, that Miss TippIe was going to give up
Barham House and to leave Hilderstock.
She had indiscreetly spoken to some
bosom friends of her approaching mar
riage with the rector, and before the
chrysanthemums had opened out their
ragged beauties to the next autumn sun
it became known that Mr.. Jordan's con-
sent had never been asked for this ar
rangement, and that the parson had,
with good success, asked that {" remark
ably disagreeable woman" to be his
bride.
Miss Triple reflected, however, with
some complacency that the living was a
very poor one, and that Miss Gayfer's
fortune, for all her ridiculous pride, was
barely enough for her to live on in de-
cency. But even in this she fell into her
besetting sin of premature talk; for
when poor old Miss Payne died year
or so later, it was found that she had
left the whole of her not inconsiderable
fortune to Frank Jordan, in recognition
of the great kindnesses and services that
she had received from her dear friend
Agatha, his wife.