Reporter and farmer. [volume] (Webster, Day County, Dakota [S.D.]) 188?-1946, 1886-04-29
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quietness.
Indeed. no; was thinking of no
such point"
''But we really should not; and now,
after so many years of colonial open
air life, must have space The cos
termongers will not trouble us in the
winter-now, the windows are ali
open"
1t was summer, and one could hear
every sound-shouts of selling; SQUAD
bling of cross, tired children; the rat
Ting of the chains OF barges; aye, and
the rustling of the leaves of the trees
in the garden, and in the hull of other
sounds, even the soft swish of the in
coming tide against the old stone
foundations of the Shore House.
Here Maud came in with handful
oil ruddy carnations for her aunt. The
their growing hali-wild in the old gar
den. Maud was going off that evening
for few days visit TO Gypsy Hill, and
she meant to show that the Shore
House garden could do as well as any
on the score of carnations. She was
q fair, yellow-haired girl, not by any
means vulgarized by the Shore House
locality, but as sweet and refined as
any girl could be.
Bessie and Nan were the other two
dark girls both OF them, and in that
| like their father. Bessie was home on
| ly that very day from q weeks stay
in London. Nan was the stay-at-
home daughter.
The August evening drew on. Aunt
Mary had driven off in cab with
Maud, and the usual course of things
| drifted on The river-breezes, soften
ing the blaze of daytime, came now to
be chilly, and the windows were closed.
Then Nan sat down to the piano-the
girl played unusually well-and the
| two others each took a book. Pre-
tence for both OF them! Mrs. Lane
never even found her place, but open
ing the volume, and fixing it on her
| knee, with her hand on its open page,
she began to say: si'Had Bess seen
such person? heard how such anoth-
er was getting on?
| And Bessie answered-answered
quite distinctly, but nevertheless in
such a way as her mother detected to
l Il
OF something outside her words, and
as she answered she carried her book
to the window, seemingly SO interested
in its contents as TO be unable to spare
a moment for what her mother want
ed-a nice chat. She had by mistake
taken up dictionary which Maud had
chosen to consult for some bubble of
spelling.
Mrs. Lane had seen this, and smiled
to herself.
When the cleaning had gathered a
bit more, and Mans fingers were wan
dering amongst the dreamy, sad fan
cies of Chopin, Mrs. Lane said.
"Come here, Bess dear" she was on
n sofa, and she made the girl sit at her
feet on furry rug. at was o stupid
visit then, after ssll?"
Stupid? 1t was heavenly"
Bessie was given to impulses.
Heavenly! with Mrs. Clay laid up,
and all the boys off for their holi-
day."
"Just so, mumsie dear I'd better
make a clean breast of it at once
hadn't |? Invent on Wednesday, and
| the boys were of on Saturday three
clear evenings, you see, for me to enjoy
the charms OF their society, and
shestopped for a second, land the So
ciety OF their frieads." Here bit of
lace trimming on her muslin dress
gave little scratching noise-her
| fingers had torn it. "Bother!"
"My dear Bess?" her mother cried
in her calm way.
| ''The bother belongs to the torn
lace, my dearest, not to-to-the other
thing. Shall | tell your" The girl
| turned her face round to her mother.
"You had better dear, Ishould say"
Mrs. Lane did not feel calm III her
innermost heart. Mothers get pre-
sentiments.
"You knew that Clint boy?'
"Clint boy?"
"Well, scarcely a hoy, / suppose,
seeing he is OF the ripe age of 81. He
| has actually asked me to marry him
Presumption, isn't it?"
"If you think so. l suppose you
| told him so?"
"Mumsie dear, could | be so rude!"
and Bess linked her hands upon her
mothers knee. "But | mean it Sc
riously-quite truew she nodded. 81
mean it's quite true that he wishes
wishes-what / said Just now"
"Dear, dear, and you only nineteen"
81 feel fifty, dear, really, ever since L
came home, and have had time to think
it over"
We need not give any more Of this
conversation; fact, looming in the
future, grew out of it, and became a
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 q
clerkship-a first rate clerkship-in q
merchants house at Valparaiso.
"And," said Aunt Mary, "if thegirls
had had more suitable home-society
they would not become so fond Of
gadding 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
lower voice than usual:
"Ishall be content, Mary with other
sons-in-law if they equal Michael
Clint"
Christmas was over, and the Shore
house bad much business going on in
| it. 1t was only natural that Mrs.
Lane should shrink from the idea of
| losing Bess-perhaps her favorite 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 Barbadian home paradise for
her? He had not left her rich, but he
had left competence; surely for Bess,
she could be content if her life were
only as good az her own had beenl
| But she cried 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 ofpiled
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"
"Oh, wait-ce, tainly watt" what
did the mother want with tea or any
such creature comfort when her girls
were all away2
She stitched on, and thoughts we're
plenty. Had she really done wrong
by fixing herself in the Shore House?
Would thegirls really have had bright