New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1886-04-28

ri feel fifty, dear, really, ever since
came home, and have had time to think
it over"
We need not give any more of this
conversation; a fact, looming in the
future, grew out of it, and became
very present reality. Bess was en-
gagged, and would, early in the coming
year, be married to Michael Clint.
1t was certainly not brilliant out
look. Young Clint had no prospects
in England, but had the promise OF
clerkship-a first rate clerkship-in a
merchants house at Valparaiso.
"And, = said Aunt Mary, s:if thegirls
had had more suitable home-society
they would not become so fond OF
gaddlng about, and would not have
known so much of their friends
brothers friends. You'll see [ am
right, Elizabeth, when they all have
done the same thing"
Whereat Mrs. Lane drew up her
pretty fair head, and answered in a
lover voice than usual:
"Ishall be content, Mary with other
sons-in-law if they equal Michael
Clint"
Christmas was over, and the Shore
house had much business going on in
it. It was only natural that Mrs.
Lane should shrink from the idea OF
losing Bess-perhaps her tav orite child,
because SO much the opposite OF her
self but she looked upon the starting
in life abroad as no unreasonable mat
ter Had she not done the same her
self, and had not her husband made
the Barpadian home a paradise for
her? lie had not left her rich, but he
had left a competence; surely for Bess,
she could be content if her life were
only as good as her own had been!
But she cried a bit over the making OF
the girls wedding clothes.
The Shore House looked somewhat
desolate. The gay flowers had
gone from the garden, the trees were
leafless, snow lay grimy on the barges
outside the high wall; beyond was the
slow, heavy black river, and again be-
yond it was sharper blackness on the
farther bank, where mountains Of piled
Goals were waiting to be towed down
the stream. Mrs. Lane sat sewing by
herself. All the girls were out that
afternoon, Bess making rounds in her
district for the last time, the other
two shopping in town.
A young maid opened the door and
asked if her mistress "would have
some tea or wait for the young ladies. /"
ooh, wait-certainly watt" what
did the mother want with tea or any
such creature comfort when her girls
were all away?
She stitched on, and thoughts were
plenty. Had she really done wrong
by fixing herself in the Shore House?
Would thegirls really have had bright
er chances, if she had carried them to
q more fashionable locality? Her sis
ter Mary was wise-worldly wise. And
she looked round on the spacious,
dear old room. How the old furni-
ture looked just the thing in it, how
the very shabbiness of the deep GRIM
son draparies looked venerable and
respectable in such a spacious dignity
of room! No, she could not have
been wrong.
So she unused, comforting and wor.
ry1ng her soul by turns.
Then the girls came in, and very
soon Michael Clint came too, and
there was no more dreaming over
good or i'll, but in it's place glad, hope
full planning.
Clint had been from the Saturday
to the Monday down at his godfa-
theirs, in Northamptonshire. This
was only Monday evening, and hewas
full of all he had seen and done. He
had bright way with him; he could
tell a story we'll, and he could make
amusing pictures out OF very small
suggestions.
One thing we have to pick out of all
OF his telling, because it fits into what
we are trying to give as the story of
the Shore House.
"A very goblin chamber he had
said.
"Why goblin chamber? Did you
see anything?" Nan asked.
"No; but beard
"Oh!"
"Rats-nothing more. Do Iseem to
you the sort OF man who would be-
lieve in ghosts?" and he drew up his
Uetil llSuLey lHdhlHS Cue mOSI VI MS
broad chest, and taking a step or two
across the hearthrug.
"Do presume to know the hidden
beliefs of-ot-your inner self" laughed
Nan.
"Nobly expressed, my dear.''
Don't squabble, you two" Bess
commanded gaily. "Just describe the
goblin chamber Was it like this?
with the gas turned down, and the
barges on the river creaking as they
do on q windy night, this is asghostly
as you please"
'Hum! l never, saw is in that light.
But you may be right" and the young
man began critically to look at the
antique curiosities Of the room-at
the black old mantel, and the high
wainscot; at the. piedmont over the
door, at the deep recesses of each side
OF the fireplace.
"Waddon Croft may be older-I
can't say. But there's more than one
room wonderfully like this.''
"And we may have CHEST! How
highly respectable?"