The pioneer express. [volume] (Pembina, Dakota [N.D.]) 1883-1928, 1883-05-04
THE COLONEL.


were, and in few could the fact have been taken
with more diversity Of opiulon. There was
Mamma Dilloway, q stately, gray-haired matron,
who felt 80 wrorged by circumstances as to be
on the edge Of a quarrel with the universe
There was Margaret, the beauty, who was in
too miserable health to care about money
matters, and passed the day on the sofa in
languor and Indifference. There was
Kate, whose situation as q teacher was
the mainstay of the house. There were the
younger ones. Ethel and Fred and Harry, on
whom the world was just beginning to cast q
shadow, whose appetites and whose legs grew
with every day beyond the bounds Of provis-
ions and trousers. And there was BROOKS, the
proud and suffering eldest son, whose begin
ming had all come to naught-who cursed pow
erty as 1t had cursed him; and there was
beauty, but who, nevertheless, had that quail
lty Of abs rbing and reaecing sunshine which
brings sunshine into shadow, and who rather
relished the tussle with their wants, and al
ways expected victory.
It seemed to Mamma Dilloway, on the morn
ing that Brooks was summoned to Colorado to
take tho books of an old friend who had fallen
i'll. that now the wrist had como and she should
never see her son again.
ION the contrary, mamma" said Maria, who
was performing pos senl, sthe universe, you
must think, is not such a very ill.managed
affair after all Perhaps we couldn't do better
ourselves. King David was quite right" she
said, pausmg in her waltz ssThe dance is the
expro sion Of jov, and just now. I'm sure, of
religious joy; for if ever anybody was thank
full"
''Maria!" exclaimed her mother.
."You know, mamma. you're as glad as +"
81 don't know anv such shorts .ghte.i thing. -
said Mrs. Dilloway Colorado is long way
on and mining life is very rough. and mines
are worry UNCERTAIN, and If Brooks falls ill
while alone there with nobody
'.Just the way Clever Alice reasoned I'll
toll you what, mamma, I'll go with him. Mrs.
Byrnt offered me enough for grandma's CASH
mere shawl to pay my way, and need an out
ing, and may find Something to do myself" .,
And before Mrs Dilloway fairly knew what
westward way, having left the whole family
aghast at the vision of loneliness, oppressed
with anxiety, and wretched VI th something like
grief. They could scarcely have told ynu how
they dragged on an exis ence through the first
dreary weeks. Tho weather fitted with their
feelings, and nothing broke the monotony of
their trouble.
s'You'll have to come back, Maria" wrote
Hate .'The house is getting so damp with
mammals tears that the wallis will mldew
presently. Margaret, too, turns her face to
the back Of the sofa, and the t.ars roll down.
one by one; for dreariness. The. gloom has
even infected Ethel, whose coils are ALWAYS
going to funerals. There seems TO be nothing
to d.. nothing to expect, nowhere to go. NY
quarter hasn'tyet been paid. and we have short
sizes our low spirits three times day; hut
mamma will have it set if. there is only rota.
toes aud milk. You were all the life and com.
fort we had, and now you are gone. But you
have hni your outing now, and unless you
war me to go to an insane asylum you wi i
have to come home and leave Brooks to his
fatn"
The answer to this letter was OF a fortnight's
Later date. eCnme home, indeed" said Maria,
..when I'm having the first good time in my
lifai Snch new and strange life, too! Such
an atmosphere, and such scenery world Of
pictures. suppose you think OF us in desert;
but can you muster dozen superb Young Sauls,
Engishmen and 9th rs. every morning with
gallopiug across country, every ev,ning
with music and dancingG Yon know,
over to hunt the bufftlo and some to take up
land for ranches. There is a Mr.. Cholmonde-
ley, aud Captain Arundel and his sister, aud
Mr.. and Mrs. Cecil, and l don't know how many
others, first and last-a new one always turning
up. So you see the time passes quite different
50 seldom see marrying man that.
ionss 70 another speoies nk OH he . md
Unjust not forget the colonell Now. what do
you think Of o real British noLltman, of a
foodf Colonel Sir Guy Temple! Perfectly
charming, and rich beyond calculation-tin
mines in Cornwall think we sba name the
mine for him. By the way, didn't Brooks
write you that he has little NINE himself |!
He has given me half Of it!''
And so the letter ran on, and great cheer it
brought in o that dull place whore it was read.
"The COLONEL" said Mrs. Dilloway reaec-
lively. - Maria knew che would: 'Col Sir
Guy Temple. Those old titles think more of
themselves than half the ducal houses in the
al YHvyk I~,~k -
prince Of Wales owned tin mines in Cornwall,
though. wonder if Maria's dresses"
ooh. they don't need dresses, mamma, in
':Not need dresses, Margaret" cried
mean, mamma, her riding dress, that che
mado FROM the waterproof, you remember, is
as good as velvet court-train would be in
London"
.s.Poor Maria isn't really pretty" soliloquized
Mrs. Dillawsy; .bu. that's #, the way thing, go.
s.Oh, Maria's brightness is inst as good for
her ss beauty" said Kate.
.1f she only could be comfortably estab
lished! That would help all the rest, too.
re too good to hope for. though, in this fam
"Well perhaps she will be. She certainly
has chance"
And somehow the gray weather was not quite
so gray to Mrs. Dil'oway and her daughters; it
half seemed 10 them as II the cloud might be
abut to lift, and in the vague sense OF uncon-
.jectured possibilities, Mrs. Dilloway felt rich
enough to call 10 ragged urchin and make
him neat with an outfit Of Fred's aud Harry's
east-off garments that had already been patoied
and ola med into another color.
"We are just IN from long gallop," another
letter of Msria's ram 1.-THE wind is giving me
quit, color. shall turn out pretty before
you know it. There are rome folks who seem
% think I am, already. The air is 90 clear Won
ahink you are on wings. wish Margaret were
here Ireally think it would do her good. It
would do her good, TOO, to have .
little Of this gay life It really
enlarHes and opens your horizon. Mrs. Cecil
now has yatched up under the Midnight Sun.
Whom she tells me about it feel as il had,
too. She has told me all about the Temple
Gardens in Cornwall Sir GUYS plsce-you
were so interested in my mention Of him that
VII tell you-runn,ng down to the shore and
silver wash of the sea there. Afine old Eliza
lbethan place, the mansion is, she says, ivy-
covered. with all it's quadrangles and
courts aud wings and stacked chilnneys and
stables. On the walls OF the long hall every
Lady Temple, ono after the other, for bow
many hundred years can't say, makes room
sSor the next one Think of hanging MP your
picture there, to look ont on the world long
after your eyes are dust in their sooketsl
There arc some haunted diamonds In the fam
dy. too Did you ever hear Of such thingl
r.. Il,