Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1888-10-19
CHANET.
tCopyright.l
By ]. W. DE FOREST.

tCopyrightl
''What singular odorp' soliloquized
Miss Holcum, snutfing the air with a
slight tremor of disgust about her
nostrils
She said odor instead of smell, because
she was q teacher of several years stand
ing in one of the common schools of New
York, and had learned in the exercise OF
her profession to express herself with an
elegance of the Johnsonian species. She
was accustomed to remark to her scholars:
Before you speak, always consider not
only your thoughts, but also the language
In which you propose to give them utter
ance."
She was at this moment ascending the
third staircase Of the cheap, plain, and
even seedy lodging house in which she
had her parlor-bedroom- or, in
other words, her one room in which she
studied. slept and did such small cooking
as was needed for her tea and breakfast.
In this simple fashion she had lived for
years. not merely because her earnings
were small, and not at all because she
was stingy, but mainly because she was
noble, unselfsh woman, who had it at
heart to educate a youthful orphan
cousin.
at is burning charcoal" she added
after an instant. Can it be that some
poor mortal is seeking his death p
School teaching alone had not given her
the wisdom to reach this suspicion. She
was a reader of novels; she had an imagin-
alton and a native longing after the un.
usual; she was capable of conceiving a
suicide and of conceving herself as saw
ing him. Where a practical, common
sense man would merely have smelt fire,
this fanciful, impulsive woman scented
O tragedy of the heart. We shall see
which of these two characters best suited
the exigency that was now agonizing in
this bare and musty old lodging house.
The widest imagination is sometimes the
Guest common sense.
ut may be that young foreigner"
thought Janet Holcum. She ran up an
other fight Of stairs hurried along q
musty, dusty passage and stopped before
a door marked by dirty fingers. Timor-
ous and modest, she looked at it with hes
itation as well as anxiety; but the char
coal fumes were stronger here, and began
to make her sick and faint; she felt that
she could not hesitate long. After rap
ping and receiving no answer, she put
her mouth to the keyhole and called also
without effect.
"Oh dear what shall l DOR she
groaned, confident now that tragedy
was passing within, and looking about
her vainly for help. She had already
learned that this fifth story was unoccu-
pied except by the pale, slovenly, bag
gard young foreigner, whose step she had
frequently heard, pacing to and fro for
hours, over her head. AS she remem-
bered that he was a man, and that she
had never been introduced to him, she
thought of running down stail and sum-
moning some other man to save him. But
the poisonous air demanded instant
action; she tried the lock unavailingly
and then flung herself desperately against
the door; the miserable bolt catch gave
way, and she was within. Unable tC
breathe in the mephitic atmosphere OF
the room she rushed across it, opened 6
window and thrust her head out Look
ing back from this position, she saw some
thing which made her shudder.
There was a painters easel; on the
easel was picture with its face turned
from her; behind the easel, on the floor OF
one corner of the room, was a wretched
bed, and on this, the chest and head con-
cealed by the picture, lay the motionless
form of a man. The moment Janet had
drawn one long breath of the out of dool
air she FASTENED to this terrible corner
No time to look at the man. no leisure tC
query whether he were alive or dead; she
lifted him by the shoulders, dragged hin
to the window and seated him by it in
chair. Her only distinct consciousness
as to his condition was that the tempt,
which dropped against her cheek was no
entirely cold.
But the appearance of the suicide, a
she held him up in the chair, was alarm
ing. His face ash colored, his lips blu
and contracted, his head dropping help
lessly on one shoulder, he seemed to b.
already in another world. She scarcel,
noticed that he did not look to be NOR
than 25 years of age; that his long curl
ing yellow hair, although neglected, wa
beautiful; that his wasted and ghastl,
features were classic in outline. Two o
three times she cried loudly for assist
anoe: Help! Murder" But outsid
there was only a wilderness of roofs; in
side, the musty old lodging house SCENE,
another desert. She was left alone witt
her awful question of death or life.