Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1885-10-10

4
just the well for trysting.place."
sIf | remember rightly. it has
been an unluckky well enough for
the Doren women said the widow
"Tell me the story, MOTHER cried
Kathrine.
mo; idle tales like that are best
untold" said the widow. ssNo
doubt it is very good cold water
but when you meet your sweetheart,
hope it won't be at the well, but
under yonr mothers eyes, in the
house here.n
Kathrine laughed.
"The sweetheart must come first y
| she said aud began tn help her
mother to do the homework.
But she kept thinking of the we'll;
and that evening, at dark, she took
from the shelf in the kitchen pitch
er, quaint as the house itself. and
without saying anything to her moth
er, ran down the garden path. 1t
was two hundred years from the
day on which her ancestress, the
first lost Kathrine, had thus gone to
the old stone well-two hundred
years to the day and the hour, if
this, the eighth Kathrine, had but
known it. But she did not.
She tripped along to the well,
swinging the old blue pitcher in her
hand. She reached it, and bent
over the curb. A dim reflection of
her own face greeted her.
GLOW high the water p she
said. 81 can reach it with the pitch
er," and bent lower still.
But, failing to reach the water.
she set the pitcher on the curb, and
canght the chain which held the
bucket.
On the instant it seemed to her
that the stone satyr behind the
fountain darted his head forward,
and rolled his great hands, seized
her arms and dragged her down
wards.
The poor girl struggled and tried
to scream. The water was in her
eyes, her ears, and her mouth; the
blood rushed to her head. Still the
great hands held hes, until suddenly
she found herself leaving the water.
She stood in great cave Of white
stone, with stalactites hanging from
tire roof; and the thing that held
her she could not see, for it was be-
hind her.
The stalactites glittered like dia.
monds-thcy draped the entrance
to another cave. This. however, as
she was still pushed forward, she
saw to be gorgeous with pearls and
opals and sea gems of all sorts. In
its midst, under sparkling canopy,
lay beautiful young being like a
man, but more radiant, more splen-
did-a man whose eyes were jewels,
whose teeth were pearl, whose lips
were coral. He looked at her and
smiled. And now for the first time
the strange being who held her
spoke.
"My prince" he said, II bring you
an eighth Kathrine."
And the girl, looking round, saw
the stone features of the sculptared
satyr behind the well.
"Kathrine!" repeated the being
he addressed. ga pretty Kathrlne,
too-yonng, fresh, lovely, Katie
mine, welcome to my palace. All
that you can ask for shall be yours,
and you my queen"
There was subtle power in his
eyes. A strange mesmeric influence
seemed to draw her towards him.
1t was like that with which the
snake charms the bird.
But at the moment she heard a
strange fiuttering chorus of signs,
and, looking about her, saw the fig
ures of seven women, all old and
beut, sitting at seven spinning
wheels. They seemed to be of stone
bat as she looked they sighed again,
and each turned into white dove,
that came fiuttering towards her.
The breeze they made with their
wings seemed to dispel the enchant-
ment the man with the jewel-like
eyes had cast about her.
''Let me go!n she cried. ain the
name OF Heaven, let me 60 home to
my mother ~
She forced herself into the cold
water of the well, calling ON all the
holy names she knew meanwhile.
Again her breath deserted her,
the water rushed into her eyes and
ears; but blindly feeling about, she
caught the bucket that had dropped
into the water after her. Above
her, at the top of the well, the bless
ed blue sky was visible.
At that instant a head blotted it
out. A man, a laborcr, going home
from his work, had paused tbene to
drink and.the next moment she lay