Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1883-03-21

Once away from the spot, she tool
herself severely to task for an unwar.
ranted and groundless indignation.
OF course, the poor fellow admires
Charlottesville could help it? Adorel
her even as the humblest believer may
worship saint. But further than thai
or closer-bah I'm growing childish
This weak, intellectual atmosphere
vitiates my Judgment" She told her
self that the caress she had witnessed
was involuntary but impersonal homage
to beauty-that homage of dark race
for blonde beauty that might trace its
origin back to Montezuma's days, when
Guatemozin and his fellows looked
eagerly and longingly out across the
eastern ocean for the promised coming
of the fair god. But try how she would
to lull her fear by chronological conclu.
sions, she could not dispel her conviction
that Ramon's feeling for Charlotte was
not the reverence of devotee nor the
gratitude of beneficiary, but the in
fatuation of an ardent, undisciplined ma
ture, undominated by any restraining ia
tiuence of education or of expediency.
He made no further alarming manifesto
tions, but Miss Harrod could not help
observing that as the days sped on he
grew thin and pale, as one who is wasted
by acute illness or by great grief. His
sunken cheek, his feverish, shining eyes,
his thin, tremulous hands, moved the
girl 8 compassion. Yet she made it her
earnest aim that she and Charlotte
should go to the workroom as little as
possible. In the dearth of diversion
consequent upon the social chaos of Sill
yer, it had become favorite resource to
frequent Ramon's dark and dingy abode,
and Miss Harrod found it no difficult
task to be there only accompanied by
some of her acquaintance. But in the
difficulty of inventing plausible pretexts
for avoiding the place, she developed an
Impotence and irritability that amazed
Charlotte Plevel.
IL don't see why you want to keep
tagging at one whim forever" she said,
GROSSLY, one day. "No, dom t want to
60 to the pottery. For my own part,
I like variety. And it hurts my lungs.
don't care to ruin my health for few
paltry bits of clay that would not cover
my grave. I mean to walk to the top
Of Chilinhua Hill-I've never been there.
OF course, you will do as you please"
As they passed one of score or so of
saloons Ramon. sitting on the pavement,
looked up at them with piteous eyes that
touched Miss Harrod sorely. They had
not seen him for fortnight.
lit can do no harm to greet him, he
looks SO ill.,"
These few days had wrought sad raw
ages in his face and form. He was
wasted and shrunken, his face haggard
and hollow. Miss Harrod had long sus-
pected some organic trouble of the sort,
but Notwithstanding she knew it was
the cause his race invariably assign for
such ailments, che heard with angry i'm
patience Ramon's meek explanation of
his malady.
"Sickness Of the heart; yes, by that I
suffer much: Something of palpitations,
much of pain. No, no doctor can cure,
/ think. It comes from suffering-fron
sorrow-p0r la t9'istezu.
Nonsense p said Miss Harrod, in
vigorous Spanish idiom. "Ni que
tristeza dare say you've had heart
disease all your life long"
Half way up the bill Miss Harrod
brought her companion to standstill.
How uncommonly careless to have no
glass! With one we might zee as far
almost as the Mongollons. Wait you
here, Charlotte. and I will just scamper
down and borrow one from LIE Cher"
She bad not gone dozen rods toward
the jewelers. when the sound of voices
in the steep, stony street behind her ar
rested her steps, and sent her fastening
back with flying feet. A score of squalid
natives thrust frowsy heads and ungain-
ly, half-naked bodies out of their mar
row, burrow -like novels; tho commotlon
of speech, pitched to accents OF petu-
lance or of pain, had stirred their slug
gish sense to something like curiosity.
Charlotte Pleyel, alarmed, amazed, with
lips that quivered and eyes that COM.
manded release, stood there in tragic at.
titude clasped in the arms of Ramon
Gutierrez. His dark olive skin was livid
with excitement; great, strained veins
stood out on his brow and bare throat,
thick and purple; his eyes were dilated
and extended.
Ramonw cried Miss Harrod, in the
vernacular, rude and rapid, chow dare
you! Let go that lady at once! Do you
hear?-or l shall strike you down like a
dog! What do you mean, you hound?"
She had lifted her light umbrella club
wise, all her cold and cynical indiffer-
ence gone, fierce as tigress in defence
of the woman she loved. Ramon
opened his enfolding arms with a sudden
pulsing motion that thrust Charlotte to.
ward her friend with force that almost
felled her. His voice, normally gentle
as a woman's, was hoarse and hard when
he spoke.
"She would have entered yonder," he
cried, pointing to the but before them;
"and I could only hold her-she would
not understand. One lies there ill-ah,
black and putrd! I would not let her
go; how could I? Think, lady, of that
perfect face, all scanned and unsightly
with the disease of scars. What, then!
do I not say it is Viruel0se" Then
Miss Harrod, not staying to explain,
with only word to Ramon, seized Char
lotte and hurried her away to safety, far
from the infected house.
For weeks avague rumor had terrified
the timid of smallpox here in Silver,
unquarantined and uuopposed by COM
mon precaution; but the authorities,
fearful of Diet rring immigration, had
hushed the whisper down.
All the profuse praise and earnest
gratitude bestowed upon him availed not
to Tighten Ramon's dependency. In
lieu Of the olden gentle brightness dull
and stolid gloom had fallen upon him
q despalring and hopeless apathy.
"My work has for me nov nothing of
interest, he said to Miss Harrod's kind
" effort to awaken his attention. "Con-
I am done with the
church. She succors not her children
in the day of need; she opens no road to
my dQnbt and nAin A1l that I am