The Arkansaw traveler., 1885-09-12


 birds to take note of her smiles and her bluShes?
 She could not eat her bread-and- but ter, but kept drinking the hos coffee with gulps, as though with il she would sWal- iov down her sorrows.
 Tom looked at the unopened letter.
 How can you keep your fingers off it? Here's,a girl devoid of inquisitive. ness for once in a way." hs cried sar- castically.
 The mo,hes looked .. the letter.
 Business letters should always re- ceive immediate attention, she said sem cautiously
 And the father looked at the letter.
 " The post goes out at II, K lthleen better open it at once, it may SAnt an an swer,' he suggested mildly
 So k kAthleen broke the seal and for one moment let her eyes wander careiessly, lndlfferentlY down the clo sely-wTiuen page.
 Only for one moment, however the next, with a cry that in itself wa; as good IS peal of wedding bells, she had let 1t fall to the ground, had overthrown her chair. and shaken all the eggs on the NaOAG O0A CA thSiA AuPS ACA CdSCl udSkC to get out of the room.
 Tom, father, mother, all rose tumultu- ously to their feet.
 What is it-whst is Ii :? Are you mad, kathleen?' cried Mrs. Derwent in her sStonlshment, altogether forgetting her own weak nerves.
 Mad oh. mo-" cried K athleen, half up the s,airs on her way io her room ; ' only happy! I'm not an heiress after all, and I'm going to write and tell Bruce this very miuute."
 Tom, father, and mother, all looked blankly in each others faces.
 Tom was the first to get his senses to- gether. He picked up the lawyers letter from the floor, and then read aloud in the bland, legal language, which seemed to insinu ite apologies for the disagreeable truth 1t had to convey, how that the ex ecutors nominated by the late Miss 0 Brien in her will, had declined to take upon themselves the responsibility of ad- ministering to the deceased lady's estate, mained to administer to. At the period when the will had been drawn up, Kath- leen's legacy. no doubt, with other moneys, was invested in three per cent consols. Since then Miss O'Brien had not received one penny from her landed property in Ireland, and had conse- quently been compelled, in order to keep up her house and staff of servants, little by little to draw upon her capital, till of the large sum at one time invested only few hundreds remained-an amount, indeed, barely sufficient to cover the ex- penses of her costly funeral and dis charge outstanding debts in the neigh borhood. The lawyers concluded their letter with polite expressions of regret for the untowardness of the circumstances.
 Tom dropped the letter with groan as he finished reading it. Those fellows ought 10 have thought twice before they wrote in such hurry to offer their pro fessional services" he growled, and then went down on his knees rummaging in the waste.paper basket for the letter con- taining his nomination to the post office billet, which he had so carelessly jerked into 1t.
 Mrs. Derwent burst into G flood of tea-s. C. It was wicked wicked They ought to be prosecuted" she sobbed. Then she put her hand to her forehead, adding plaintively, "l'll go up to bed, l think 1 can't keep my head up." But there was real tragedy in her tone when. as she left the room and met the Phyllis coming in, she turned and said to her {: Don't give away those stockings spoke to you about this morning. They'll stand little more mending and wearing"
 And Mir. Derwent went slowly into his study to re-write his letter te the Eccles- iastical Commissioners asking for grant for the much needed repairs.
 :" It is a bitter disappointment, of course" he said to himself with a sigh, as he got out his pans aud paper bu, still it is nice to see the old bright look in Kathleen's face"
 As for Kathleen herself, it was only her tears of joy, falling thick and fast and half blinding her, which made her take more than sixty seconds over her brief letter to her lover:
 DEAR, DEAR BRUCE: Isn't it delightful ! Pm not an heiress after all. Come over at once-this very minute. Your own,
 KATHLEEN.
 That was all she wrote. But 1t was evidently enough, for it brought Bruce to the parsonage the very next day, an be- fore he went back to Carlisle the day was fixed for their wedding.
 - wish could fancy it was nothing more than a bad dream" said the girl. as she said good-by to her lover over the garden gate; "but, somehow, can't. When think over it all feel exactly as I did when ate that Seville orange, and had bitter taste in my mouth for days afterward
 Poor child This was her first taste of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, of which most of us have to eat little more than we relish through life.-AX Ms Te1y Round.
 Nervous Debilitated Men