The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1886-08-21
IN RHETTA'S GARDEN.
Why She and Ralph Would Dig
by Moonlight

1t was only little spot south of the
house, but violets blossome d sooner
there than any where else, and great
bursting pinks made the air spicy while
other peoples were only in bud. There
were daffodils in the grassy border, and
blue-bells, and blue spider-lilies. There
We're two rose-bushes, one cinnamon
and one damask, while double sweet
gillyfowers sowed themselves and came
up every year along with mignonette
and chrysanthemums. 1t was sweet,
fragant, old-fashioned little garden,
which Rhetta's mother had tended and
taken pleasure in, and now it was Rhet-
ta's. There she worked all her spare
half-hours, sowing and watering, weed
ing and transplantlng, till her little
hands were brown, and her checks like
her own cinnamon roses. Aunt Dor
cas-, in the kitchen, used to wonder
show on airth that child could be so
content all alone out in her posy bed"
But Rhetta was not so often alone of
late, since they had taken a boarder,
Ralph Calender found that the pleas
ATTEST path to the house lay through
the little flower-garden, and when his
Jobs of copying failed to occupy his
time, what could be more natural than
to use his leisure helping the blushing
gardener? 1t was he who carried away
all the weeds, divided the white peony
roots and reset them, and dug more
thoroughly than Rhetta ever could
around the dear old rose-bushes. Over
their work they fell talking, as young
people will, and already Rhetta' father
began to watch them little anXiously
above his spectacles as he sat on the
porch, while one of the neighbors had
remarked privately to Aunt Dorcas that
it was pity young Calender was not
a man of fortune as well as of family.
In truth, riches had taken unto them
selves wings and flown away from the
Callenders year before, so that Ralph,
instead of becoming junior partner in
an old and prosperous business, saw
nothing before him but what his two
hands could earn, and being totally
unprepared for such prospect, he had
to take little time to getused to it, and
to find out which way to turn. Mean
while he had drifted to this suburban
town, and while waiting to find situa-
ton as clerk or accountant, did copying
to support himself, and boarded at
Rhetta's.
1t was the day they had been trans
planting touch-me-nots, and Ralph had
thrown himself down under the plum
tree for respite, while Rhetta pulled
the faded blossoms from primrose.
He might have been misanthropic
enough at that moment if he had
chosen, for the last line of copying lay
upon his table finished, with not so
much as hint of an order for any
more. Worse than that, a clerks
place he had been hoping for had that
very morning been give to another. If
he had got it, he could have spoke to
Rhetta at once. His glance followed
her as she bent over her plants, her
garden bonnet dropping back from her
bright brown hair, and his fingers
sought instinctively a little ring that
hid in his vest pocket. The old Callen-
der pride had come to this, that he only
waited for the barest chance of being
able to earn living before he offered
heart and hand to pretty little Rhetta
Wood, whose bonny face was all her
dowry.
But he could not help letting love
color his words a little when he said,
presently, to, Rhetta, as he watched
her: when | make my fortune, you
shall have greenhouses and hot-beds,
and gardens laid out on terraces"
Like Colonel Porter s?' laughed
Rhetta, blushing over her trowel. "Oh!
have you ever seen his place, Mr.. Cal
lenderP It's over on the west side.
II think / have passed it, answered
the young man, indifferently. big
trees, three terraces, ribbon beds. and
peacock on the lawn; is that the
placer"
Eyes; isn't its plendid?" exclaimed
Rhetta. 81 always 90 that way when
take a walk by myself; and oh! how |
do long sometimes for things | see the
gardener throwing away-slips and
cuttings and roots that he Trims out!
Perfectly lovely thingsr'
"Why don't you ask him for them?"
''Ask him?" and Rhetta caught her
breath at the very idea of her doing so
audacious thing. "Why, wouldn't
dare"
Don't you know them the family,
/ mean"
mo; how could IP Rose Porter and
went to the same school, and when
she rides by and sees me she bows and
smiles; but that isn't being acquainted.
She is as beautiful as princess. 1t is
time for her to be at home now; she has
been in Washington all the spring"
Ralph Calender made no answer.
He was busy weaving true-love knot
of grass blades, and when it was done
he gave it to Rhetta. She blushed again
over it, and went on talking about
flowers.
II wish could get some slips OF
Colonel Porter's geraniums. she said
she has so many kinds, and have only
this little pink one. And | want a root
OF day-lilY gerry much, and some teal