The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1883-10-25
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attachment was ripening into womanly
love.
81 know it is hard" he once said to
her, ito think how different Wills lot
would have been if he had had the mill !;
but don't fix your mind on that, my
child. You have got brave fellow,
and he is sure to do well for you.
"But / never wanted him to go to sea,
You know, father. And now it is COM
ing like fate. He's going away like
all the other boys"
"Pshawl" said Mr.. Barlow, who had
served many years on the whale ships
and rather despised land employment
In my time the girls would not have n
lover at all who had not toughened his
hands on the ropes for one voyage, at
least. Don't pout over that"
Nelly agreed to try being Drawer; but
her pensiveness did not diminish, and
her father began to suspect that there
was some cause for it which she had not
revealed.
And then came the terrible day when
he was murdered by the poor, crazed
miller.
After that, no one wasted any wonder
over that melancholy expression which
was gradually becoming indelible upon
| Nelly's face Her future husbands
father had fallen prey to disaster and
died in madness, while her own father
had been cut off in his hale vigor by
that very hand which should have
welcomed her rs daughter. Were not
these events enough to have wrought a
revolution in her character?
She was terribly overwhelmed when
! her fail er was brought home. after the
shooting.
Those who saw her related that her
grief was almost too awful even to
| speak of atterward. She seemed to
consider herself the cause of the ca
! lamity.
con, l wish / had never been born :"
she cried. But for me these griefs
would never have come to us all. My
poor, poor father-he wondered so
what made me sad, and l never told
him; and | felt something dreadful
coming-but how could L tell it was to
be this?'
"Hush!' said one of her friends. 1T
is wrong to talk so, as if you could
make or prevent what Providence has
appointed
"But l am doomed, l am doomed"
moaned Nelly. And all who are near
est to me are being visited with my
! doom.
How do YOU mean?" asked her
friend, bewildered.
Then Nelly became quiet at once.
! She set herself TO care for her mother
and never again gave any outward sign
of her own dreadful suffering; and she
showed such dread when any reference
was made to that one outbreak of wild
grief, that her friends learned not to
speak of it again.
She was so devoted to her stricken
mother, that every one pointed her out
as pattern to their children, and poor
Mrs. Barlow often said to her that
without her she should not have been
able to live q week.
How different You are, Nelly" she
would say, from the thoughtless, fun
loving little thing you used to be. I
never thought you would be such a
comfort and stay to me-"
ooh, mother" begged Nelly, don't
praise me for that 1 don't deserve to
have you think so much of me- l ought
to have been better than l am. / can't
bear to have you call me good!"
When she spoke thus it only made
her seem all the better for her modesty.
But in spite of her tender care, the
widow gradually fell into decline, and
at length she, too, passed away.
This was while Will was absent on
his first cruise.
At first, when Mr.. Barlow was killed,
the gossips had decided that it would
be unnatural for Nelly Barlow and
Will Gurton to become man and wife.
But the two young people in question
decided otherwise. Their love was the
one bright thing left to them in the
midst of the gloom that was gathering
over their lives, and they chung to it
faithfully. SO when Will came home
and found Nelly left alone in the world,
they were married at once.
They lived in the old mill by the
grassy hollow, that now occupied the
place of the pond. Around it some
shabby poplars grew, from behind
which the queer, antique houses, stand
ing at various angles, peered out in a
daZed kind of way, as if they had
never got over the joke, or the surprise,
of having the little stretch of water
suddenly vanish from before them.
Nelly, also, had never gotten over the
shock of that event and all the changes
which followed it. But she tried to be
cheerful, for Wills sake, and he was
proud OF his wife. Yet Nelly's mis-
fortunes were not over for, on his second
cruise, Wills ship was wrecked and he
was lost with number of the crew.
She never would marry again, and so
she was left to live, without children,
utterly alone in the Cd mill. She
Stunned all companionship, for she had
secret in her heart which was very
e9acting companion and drove out
everything else.
By-and-by, as she grew old, she was
so peculiar that few persons attempted
to have anything to do with her.
She became very poor, but when
charitable towns-people went and offered
her help she repulsed them, saying, al
most fiercely:
what have 1 to do with you? You
are not witches, and don't you know L
am an old witch and have brought sor-
row and suffering on all who have had