The Douglas independent. [volume] (Roseburg, Or.) 187?-1885, 1883-09-29
PIERRE BRANTOME'S GRANDDAUGH.
TER.

OF OnaTlObG0 DFhuGOuo, usually e4uaI w
the exigencies of the occasion, was ex-
hausted. The twins, as a matter of
course, were the culprits. They, how
ever, with the complacency natural to
boys Of 6 or thereabouts, were indiffer-
ent to the tempest of despair which
ragged in their sisters breast. They had
considerably refrained from adding de-
ceit to their guilt, but had confessed
fully and unreservedly to rifling the
canary's nest, to tearing a jacket and
dropping q hat down the we'll, to eating
the strawberries that were saved for sup
per, and to catching theii most faithful
hen with fishhook. The fishhook rep
resented the straw; Charlotte the camel.
She could have borne anything better
than downright cruelty developed in one
80 early in one OF her own blood. She
never was boy.
''And o man was here" went on Pop
sey; "a big man." volunteered Wopsey,
the other twin. ''And he asked us about
everything, and we said our mother
wasn't very we'll and our sister was an
old maid schoola'am."
Charlotte WINGED. Where had he
picked up that expression? And had it
come to that?
"You must not talk to strange men
about mother or me. What did he
want2'
HE wanted to see you."
"Me?" Visions of tramps, of spying
burglars. only they had nothing to
"burgle," as Popsey had said one day,
came into her mind.
"How did he look?"
"He was beautiful" "He was dread
full" said the twins in duet.
Further questioning elected these
facts: He was young; he was old; he was
short; he was tall; he wore spectacles; he
had mustache, and was a bug man. In
the last and crowning fact the boys
agreed.
Practice had made Miss Brantome q
tolersble clairvoyant, so far as reading
those two small minds was concerned.
She jumped at the conclusion that some
wandering naturalist chasing on elusive
bug, had chanced that way, and gave the
subject no more attention. She had
other things to think of than "bug-men"
or any men, and the problems of how to
provide new hat for Wopsey and how
to instil remorse into the hearts of her
charges drove other thoughts away.
Sitting down on the low doorstep of
the house that had been home to her for
six and twenty years she tried to reason
it out. The sun was yet high; the days
were at their longest. Behind her flowed
the tireless river; in front of Der, across
the prairie, the hills were green. In the
field of rye over the way CLEANED large
white wooden cross. Her grandfather,
in whose veins flowed some of the blue
blood of France, had bought home in
this western conntry when the remnant
of an Indian tribe had still property to
sell. The deed of sale provided for the
preservation of their little burying-
ground. Here among the sinking graves
Pierre Brantome had built the cross. It
had been renewed several times since
then, but had always seemed the same,
and was ever the patent protector, SOL
emnly holding its white arms out as if to
defend the mouldering sleepers. The
grain grew thick around, but the tiny
village of the dead was never disturbed
by spade or plow.
Old Pierre, however, had never pros
pered. Neither did Pierre the younger; !;
and one night when riding home his
horse shied at the white cross in the
moonlight and threw him with his head
against stone. He left no legacy but
the homestead and debt to his wife and
years between Charlotte and the twin
babies, and she really had third infant
on her hands, for the mother was nothing
more useful than that after her husbands g
death. She was not feeble minded ex-
actly, but painfully gentle, strange and
unaccountable.
Charlotte shouldered her burdens with
q brave heart. Her French accent for
Grandfather Brantome's blood had never
filtered through Canada-brought her
employment in school in the town near
by. The long walks back and forth
kept the roses in her cheeks, the boys
were od-sometimes-and she, being
good, was happy. It requires leisure to
be successfully miserable.
The cross typifed to her the "daily
martyrdom of private life." And now
looking at it, her heart grew light. The
new hat would cost but trihe. Surely
there were more strawberries ripe In the
garden, the canary would lay more eggs
the jacket could be mended, and old
Speckle had proved superior to the fish
hook.
But what could the boys be screaming
about?
''The bug-man! The bug-manr' they
were shouting, trotting toward her with
all their might on their sandy little feet
It was certainly strange. Why should a
stranger call twice? That he should
come once was not surprising
twice.
''We showed him your photograph, ,
said Popsey, ''and he said you didn'i
look like an old maid bit"
''And he said." went on the other ter.
rible infant, without pause, 'wasn't
we glad to have such q nice sister-he
wished he had, and he had such lot oi
bugs. He puts them to sleep with med
icine and sticks pins through 'em, and he
has gold watch and he let us wind il
up: and we told him to come again some
more, and here he is.
Charlotte was speechless, but in some
way she found herself rising to her fee
to greet gentleman who was taking of
his hat to her and bowling with grace
which even Grandfather Brantome would
have approved.
"Miss Brantome, believe"
She acquiesced in silence.
'tI am gathering material for histori
cal work, and was directed to you for in
formation concerning the antiquities o
this region. And might as well say