Waterbury evening Democrat., 1889-10-10

Q raking and burning till the numerous columns of white, gray and blue smoke might we'll have been that of the first offering to Ceres, the spring-time sac rifice of the goddess of the fields and or the harvests to come.
 Climbing over the rail fence, I walked on to the crest of the little hill, catching confused rattle of girl voices, as approached the source of the blue smoke, which I, at length, saw proceeded from no windrows of dry leaves and grass, but from cracking fire of dry, dead beech limbs and strips of hickory bark. The first glance was a disappointment to me. There were three girls instead of two the third, the odd, the unwclcome one to me, a stout, strong, practical, ugly, matter-of-fact young woman of about my age, and for whom I had never had any liking, chiefly, and, perhaps solely, because it was notori- ously known that she was wrapped up in an inordinate liking for me. All the winter before at the Sandtown school she had persecuted mo with her lavish misunderstanding par ticularly fine apples in my desk, so that should be surprised by them on raising the lid to take out my arith- metic and slate; sending languishing " kiss-verses always with the candy duly 1nclosed; putting rather pretty book-marks, with appropriate notices upon them at the next lesson in gram mar or geography; and very often adding little dishes of candied honey (of which I am particularly fond to this day) to my school dinner, if the weather was such as to make the mile walk at noon sufficiently objectionable to overcome the temptation of 8 warm dinner at home.
 Then she was perpetually near me, and always ready to fetch any thing l wanted, or to help at any thing I might be trying to do. And she was not to be swervcd from her self-im- posed servitude by any amount of jeer- ing remarks of cur schoolmates, and naughty neglect at my hands.
 Here she was, and as usual, making herself laboriously busy in the prepar- ation of woodland dinner, to which she had brought, all and singular, the tid-bits that were my special weak nesses. including a plentiful supply of "candied' honey.
 "Where's Buck? I thought you were to bring Buck with you?" were the joint exclamations of our two girls.
 And didn't know you was to have that Fan Go-uns h-yur." I retorted, with a look of cool disgust directed to where that sturdy tlax-haired maiden was serenely, nay joyfuly, tripping about the fire and looking up from her work at me whenever her eyes could be spared two seconds at time from the exacting duties of skilled cooking.
 ''We brought her to do the cook ing," whispered my sister Liz, mis- chievously. ''She's a splendid cook. you know. And such dinner she s getting"
 ''And then we know she is such an admirer of yours, Jim,' said Polly, de- lightedly. ''She's perfectly happy at this blessed minute" A serene smile on Fans good-natured, strong face perfectly attested this observation.
 ''Now don't be too cross to her." said my sister Liz, who always was a kind-hearted thing. ''Treat her lit tie bit friendly, won't you?" and she laughed in my face.
 '.At least till the dinners over," said Polly, laughing too. "Then you can be as ugly to her as you want to be. Look at her carrying those two buckets of water: Ain't she strong? But you haven't told us why you didn't wait for Buck!' And she turned upon me with her large brown eyes having some sort of an expres- sion in them new to me, and not pleas ant to mo either.
 ''Buck went away some'rs this mornun," I answered, thinking about the ambuscade and the judges exor- dium.
 "Yes, I know he did," Polly replied, quickly, and then looking into my face as if this interruption were only de- signed to draw me on to further expla- nation. We had sat down upon the long, dry wildhorse-grass of these woods, here quite thick enough to make soft and dry seat without reinforcement of the natural growth. had nodded and even smiled faintly at Fan, who almost fell over the fire in joyful surprise.
 "How did you find it out?" said. in quick suspicion that dated back to some time before. Perhaps to the supper table at Bogusses! She laughed little bit confusedly and turned tc Liz in a momentary pcrplexity. 'You knowed he went away with Martin" l said, fixing my eyes upon hers in the steady threatening way in which teachers extort confessions from rccalcitrant pupils. She blushed a lit tie, and laughed great deal-a great deal too much, in fact.
 Then two schemes formed themselves in my mind, very bright and original, as l t1attered myself at the time. Very old and dull and hackneyed and com. monp1ace as know them now. Not intellectual because old and hackneyed | &N