The Eaton Democrat. (Eaton, Ohio) 1875-1903, 1886-09-23
ALMOST A BREACH.

ALMOST A BREACH.
The Trouble Caused Two Lovers
By Their Oats.
"You dearest, sweetest little duck,
SO it was! Manny's pessus pet"
1t sounded much like ''mammy's
pessus pet, but the voice was SO young,
SO fresh, so cooling, that Joe Parker
could not believe his ears.
There was something magnetic"
about it, to use the slang of the day;
at least it attracted Joe to the ROY of
raspberries that flung their green arms
all abroad on the old picket-fence be-
tween his garden and the next neigh
boris, and irresistibly bent his head 10
and see what he could see.
And this is what he saw: Such a
lovely girl! Her hair was red, to. be
sure, but it was that bronze red that
looks brown in the depth of its ripples
and gold on their crests. Just now, in
the blazing sunshine, it was all a rich
deep red, with gilt threads among it;
but then she. had such eyes!-large,
clear, red-hazel eyes, as beautiful as a
robins OF q squirrels, fringed with
dark lashes, and overbrowed with deli
cate dark arches. a little lifted with a
look of surprise that was the result of
shape and outline. Iregret to say that
her fair soft brow and cheeks were
slightly freckled, but in such a fresh red
and white the smallest spot will show,
and nobody is perfectly beautiful, not
even Mary Ann May, commonly called
NANNY May" For instance, her
mouth was large, but then it was so
full. SC red. and parted over such firm
white teeth, that it seemed just to match
the saucy little nose above and the
round dimpled chin below it. Her
waist was large, too, Just as large as the
waist of any s%culptured goddess wrought
by Phidias or Praxiteles, for Nanny had
never been pinched in mind or body,
or given over to that awful tyrant
They" who puts our girls to the tor
ture of rack and boot from their infancy,
that they may be and do as s'They" do
and are. But she had a tall, strong,
shapely figure, and its movements were
all instinct with the untrammeled grace
of nature. As she stood in her mothers
garden, with both hands clasping her
pet to her bosom, a basket of dandelion
greens and an old case-knife at her feet,
she was q perfect picture; and she had
not an idea of it.
Joe's theories fled as he gazed. The
voice had not misled him, it was not a
mothers voice; the darling on whom
Nanny lavished her sweet words, her
tender embrace, sven her kisses, was
a cat. But such a cat! Peter was as
great a beauty as his mistress. His coat
of deep blue-gray was striped and
dashed with shining black; a ring OF
black encircled his massive neck; his
tail was ringed also with sable, and five
wide black stripes ran from between his
ears down to the very tip of the tail,
merging as they went into one broad
band; then there was a snow-white spot
upon his breast, and his powerful paws
were as black as jet.
..Manny's dumb silly about that there
cat" was her fathers chronic growl
but, since Nanny was all the child lefr
to him, and in his secret heart its living
idol, he only growled. He would no
have uttered a derogatory word abou1
Peter for any thing; he even remem.
bered to get a bit of meat for him when
W. he wen to the village, and hac
once been known to turn back half
mile for that very purpose.
As for mother May, she spoiled tn,
cat just as she had spoiled Mary Ann
She was a dear, kindly, tender-heartec
old woman, with an utter inability t.
rule or order or mold anybody or an,
thing. She took life as she found it
and neither fretted nor tried to ament
tia sort of a moral feather-bed, soft t.
evaporation, but, after all, restful tt
eager. hard-worked, exasperated, an,
wiry people of her race.
"A proper nice woman" Semanth,
Carrier said; ..als0ays an eternall,
good-natured. No faculty in her, an,
N that rifles you consider'ble when yor
want to have things gee; but whel
you're sick o sorry, sort of comfortin,
like a poultice."
Peter knew his power and his position
Pett.-d from his early kittenhood. b
soon learned, like the young of tn
human species, that he could tyranniz
over his bettcrs, and then the warmesl
softest seat was given up to him, tn
door opened at his first appeal, tn
giblets of the rarely used fowls wer
saved for him, his tastes gratified, an
his notions respected. One is some
times tempted to half accept the mascu
line theory that women like tyrants
when one sees how they manufactur
them for themselves.
Now Joseph Parker had lust come t