Daily Yellowstone journal., 1886-03-21

lntuiuon rOOted out tine uark side OF the state
ment.
you haint had words with him, Eliasf
she said, quick alarm in her pleasant face.
"Now you didn't have no trouble with him
yesterday about them hens!n
Il told him." said Mr.. Long, reaching for
the coffee-pot, his hens had been making
tolable free in my garden, and the fence bet
ter lie fixed up II he's mind to flare up
up like fool, don't know as its any of my
concern
He took swallow from his cup His wife
watched him wiSfully She looked dazed
She went about the house that day with an
uneasy apprehension in her face.
Il don't know what TO make Of it, she
kept thinking, in troubled way.
She knew by the next night. The new line
fence was done It was seven feet high.
There was nothing to be seen across it except
the upper half of Mr.. Talcott's house, the
tops of the trees and the barn roof. 1t rose
tall and stern and forbiding And there was
no gate. It was hostile, uncompromising
barrier. II was an effective monument to
Mr.. Talcott's wrath and resentment.
The summer passed on into the fall, and
the fall became raw and windy, and eventu-
ally snowy. Mr. Longs tomatoes had not
suffered agnin from Mr.. Talcott's hens. They
had ripened finely. They had been eaten raw
and stewed; they had been made upin catsup,
and they Lad been pulled while green to be
sliced and picked.
Mr. Talcott's fence had accomplished this,
and great deal more. Il had stood there
like an evil monster, and had never been
crossed. II had come down like curse from
the skies, and shut off all the old communion
ton, and turned the old friendship into a
hard enmity, and the old trust into fixed
rancor.
1t became rapidly known that the two old
neighbors were mot on speaking terms" and
the causes and circumstances of the rupture
were not a mystery. 1t was known, too, that
Mrs. Long and Mrs. Talcott were not active
participants in the quarrel. Their old pleas
AT companonship seemed virtually ended
lecaue, in their timid womanly submissive
hess they obeyed the unspoken commands Of
their husbands rather than face the displeas-
ure which would have followed a defiance Of
them. But they smiled when they met each
other; they fingered in the church vestibule to
exchange good morning.
The autumn days filled the air with the
dim-blue vapor and not unpleasant odor Of
bonfire smoke Mr. Talcott was late with
his. He had put it off till his fall clearing
was done-the garden freed Of the dried and
empty bean-vines, and raked of; the weeds
pulled up which had hourished powerless for
harm during the last month or two; and
which now stood black and frozen; few
dead bushes cut down, and the fruit-trees
&,s.. ,,al ha-a ,,.I L., "a la. NJ
vember when the pile lay ready, low down in
q corner of the plundered tato-patch. In
some of its rough hollows lay the remains of a
thin snow.
Mr.. Talcott lighted it directly after supper.
Now and then he replenished it, at 8 o'clock
it was still burning He sat down on an old
stump to look at it as it leaped and fickered
itself out, lighting up broad space around
il and shining on the high fence.
Mr.. Talcott sat with his elbows on his knees
and his chin in his hands There was sort
Of peace in the clear night, and in the early
quiet which had settled down uponit. He
looked around at the still, bare scene and the
pale-gray sky, and felt something Of the
tranquility.
A spark from the subsiding fire snapped
nto little pile of dry stalks half rod dis
tant and they famed up. A twig took fire
from them and burned to its end, and loose
splinter blazed in its turn. He watched the
curious line of light as it ate its Pickering way
along. There was a deep deposit Of dead
leaves drifted up against the tall fence;
they took the alarm, and glowed
and cracked smartly. And then the flames
mounted up, and grew broader and redder-
the fence had caught fire.
Mr.. Talcott got up and walked over to il.
Then he returned, with scarcely the haste that
might be looked for, and started for the
pump. He seemed rather to linger on the
way: when he reached il, he stood moment
without doing anything in particular before
he filed a wooden pail, which lay near, and
went back with it, The fence was flaming
brightly; but he stopped TO pick out a chip
which had got stuck in the sole Of his boot,
and tied the old wooden muller he wore
around his neck with hands which were not
quite steady. Then he peered all about him,
in an oddly guilty way, emptied his pail Of
water or the ground and went and sat down
on the stump again. He looked cold and cross
and uneasy, and anything but heroic; but
there was a new-found warmth within him
There was quite crowd about the place
halr an hour later, looking at the blackened
remains of the line fence--seyeral men, at
tracted by the flames, and few women
hastily wrapped up. Mr.. Long had
come out and watched the conHagration
from a discreet distance. But he had
drawn gradually closer, till he finally
stood poking over the warm cinders with one
foot Mr. Talcott stood near by. They did
not look at each other for moment Then
the latter spoke, in voice made high and
sharp by the greatness Of the effort.
~Went down jest like paper" he said. II
guess there couldn't anybody astopped it.
couldn't do nothing against it-nothing at
ALI" He felt that he regained by this some
of the dignity he had lost in his own concep-
lion; he looked relieved.
His neighbor did not reply directly. The
darkness hid his softened, perturbed express
sion, and he was not the person to make it
manifest. His tone, when he spoke, was COM
posed and even condescending.
According to law" be said, II suppose I'm
called on to put up the next one, seeing as
you put up this here one. s'pose might do
it any time; l amt so terrible busy just at
present."
aWell,n said Mr. Calcott, looking down the
garden, II rather guess you better build q
picket. I guess q picketd do full as well.
You hain't heard how old Lem Pearson is,
have your-Adapted from Emma A. Opper,
in Frank Leslie's.
A Recipe for Winter Use. 4
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