Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1888-01-13
JUST LIKE 4 STORY


@Ohi DEAR" and Bertha Manning
threw down the paper she had been
reading. "Why cannot people write
things as they are, not
as they ought to be. or as they
would like to have them Nothing
ever happens in the real world as it is
pictured out in the Paper-and-ink
world. In that there are no lasting
disaPpointments and no failures. The
hard-hearted parents relent, the rich
uncle dies, the lost letter. or ring, or
bracelet, is always found; the needy
hero begins life a poor clerk, without
experience, and in less than a year is
rich and independent, with an offer of
a junior partnership and the hand of
the daughter of the house in the near
future. The raw country heroine,
either makes her appearance in the so
ciety Of the eity's elite. which she takes
by storm, or she becomes literary, writes
some poem, or song, or story, without
preparation, education, or training
mind you, and becomes famous in a
night If heroine's lines are cast in
unpleasant places, there is always a
recompense, sure, swift, curtain. We
have not found it so in the real world,
Mabel"
Perhaps because We were not hero
ines, BERTHE, replied her sister.
"Then let US become heroines as
soon as possible" exclaimed BERTHE.
81 do wish that once, just once, some
thing could happen TO us just like a
story. All want is justice, a little OF
the poetic justice that is pictured out
IN the literature of the day. But there
isn't any of it in the real world about
as Take your own case" she added.
CHANGING over ut her sister; "see how
you have worked and struggled to keep
She home for us both-that noisy,
stuffy school by day and your writing
by night Do 1 not know why your
light burns so late? but poems are a
drug in the market Five years
since we were left orphans; you have
done this, and TO what end You have
supported US both. but your health aud
strength are broken; the mortgage
which We have no means Of paying falls
due next week, and the fossilized old
humbug who holds it thinks to force
you into a marriage with his very un-
desirable self by taking away our
home"
II have done some good work in
those five years, BERTHE.
1t would have been just as good,
Queen Nab, if you had received
better pay for it. No, Nal, there
is little Of the recompense we
read Of comes into real life The real
stories are the ones that do not end
well. and editors viii not take them.
"Think of Aunt Max now. Was there
ever a sweeter, purer, better, or more
loyabIe woman in the world than Aunt
Max? And just see what her
life has been. She loved Gerald
Harding, but because Of n lost
letter, or some such tride, they
parted, and he out of revenge, L sup
pose, married that brainless Ayaway,
Bess Halton, and a sweet time he had
of It, too. What a life she led him.
through her jealousy on account Of his
former attachment, until she took his
two children and rim away, for no
other reason that could ever see but
that she might follow us out West and
annoy Aunt Max by her presence"
"Hush, BERTHE. she is deadl"
And small loss, too, Nab. There,
don't look so Mortified, Mabel 1 never
.or,TF ga. III So. 1-. -
has gone cover beyond, they must be
eulogized and praised, and counted
faultlesss when all their lives they had
made people as miserable and unhappy
as they could, and when, too, the best
thing they ever did was to die, and
they wouldn't have done that if they
could have avoided It.
'Then Gerald's death with that
party of exeursionists almost the
same day that she was killed in
the railway collision, leaving three
child en- psnniless orphans in the place
where No one know even the names Of
the little wai5s.
"Gerald's death was what We might
call poetic justice, in one sense, Bertha.
~ GlAD-o4 aunt MAX 20 take the Ci4L-
dren. with no fear that any one would
think she did it to bring him back to
her. She is poor. and is obliged 90
work hard for their support, but caring
for them has been such a comfort to
her"
poor mamma told me once that
aunt had never been the same since
abe read his name among the killed
in that terrible disaster.
"How she must have loved him! she
is not quite forty, and her hair is white
as snow Dear Aunt Max I wonder if
she knows how near a saint she is.
What a pathetic story her life would
make"
why don't You write it, Bertie2 I
am sure you could"
@Not L I'd do anything to help, or
please you, Nab. but I can't do that I
couldn't write the unreal romanoes of
the day, besides, I think it is downright
wicked. I should write the bare facts,
the naked truth; my stories would be
Just as it is in real life, ana they
wouldnt end wen No editor would
accept them "A bird in the hand Is