Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1889-02-14
SEVEN OFFERS.
What Happened While Waiting
for the Next.

''well, good night, Elizabeth" said Ton
Barbury, and opened the front door anC
went out.
Miss Elizabeth Lawton stood few min
utes in the hall where he had left her
There was a half smile on her face.
'Poor Tom," she said, ''poOr, dear Ole
Tomp' Then she sighed a little and went
back into the parlor. where the chairs were
drawn up suggestively near together il
front of the bright CRATE fire.
"This is the seventh time, 'she said, softly
'Yes, the seventh time, poor, dear old
Tomr'
She looked around the beautiful luxurious
room, and wondered how it would seem il
she had given different answer TO the
seventh asking of the same question. Would
he be here still! Would she be sitting be-
side him on the sofa, his arm, perhaps-but
Miss Elizabeth blushed slightly, and
changed the subject in her own mind. Such
thoughts seemed hardly decorous in a
maiden lady past thirty.
She rose and walked across the room to
ring the bell, but paused as she noticed a
letter on one of the little tables. 1t had
come in the evening post, and been brought
in while Tom was there, and so she had not
read it. She opened itnOw, and her face grew
surprised and little hard as she read. And
yet it certainly contained only pleasant
news. Her old friend Helen Armstrong
wrote to say that she was going TO be mar
ried, and wanted her to come and be a
bridesmaid at her wedding. Surely there
was nothing distressing in this, nothing
that should make Elizabeth feel suddenly
betraye ed and deserted, and yet she did. She
had curious feeling of having locked the
front door in the face of an enemy while her
~r""o weakly intellectually admitted him
at the back
''Well, WELL" she calculated as she read,
"a widower with two childrenr' and she
II ought with the rapidity of lightning that
Tom Barbury at least was a bachelor, in
good and regular standing"
Il am ashamed at my age" the letter ran,
''to be so much in love and to feel so happy
over it, but if you only knew him, Eliza
BETH He is the dearest man, so good and
honorable, and so fond of me. Every one
respects him, and am so anxious for you
TO know him. He is of the firm of Cochran
d Brown, merchants, quite well off and
with q lovely home"
Miss Elizabeth instantly stripped the
sugar coating from the pill, and examined it.
''In trade. is he-a dry-gcods merchant!
Well, certainly shouldn't have expected it
of Helenr' And then the disagreeable
thought rose in her mind and confronted
her. that the reason, the real reason, why
she had said ''no' several times to Tom
Barbury was because he owned shoe store
She had never acknowledged this to herself
before, it was such horrid, snobbish rea-
son.
She was ashamed of it; she had covered
1t up with finer, more dignifed explanations
and hidden it away, even from herself But
tonight it shook them all of, and appeared
before her in all its unveiled ugliness.
Yes, she would have married Tom Bar
bury years ago. except for her silly, false,
unwomanly pride. She was ashamed, lit
tie bit ashamed of him.
And what was there to be ashamed of!
He was as honest and good a man, as ever
walked the earth, and as true a gentleman,
too.
But the Lawton blood had never run in
channels of trade. Elizabeth's father, old
Judge Lawton. during all the years that he
had sat on the bench, had never known Tom
Barbury's father. who was sitting on
bench of different kind, and making shoes.
Tom had partly washed away the stain
the cleansing waters of n wholesale trade
He did not sit on a bent h as his father had
done; he did not button customers shoes.
He sat in little Office, with a pen behind
his ear, and wrote most Of the time. but
still to sensitive Elizabeth Lawton, the
trail Of the serpent was over it all. She
used to look at the Lawton crest on her
note paper occasionally, and say sorrow
fully to herself: 20, could never quarter
it with button hookp'
She and Tom had grown up together but
their family backgrounds were different.
In Elizabeth's home every thing was
stately, elegant and refined. She had never
been inside Tom Barbury's house, but she
had reason to think it was otherwise there
he had mother and a Shadowy sister or
two, but they were nebulous and uncertain
persons in Elizabeth's fancy, for she had
never seen them at close social range
With Tom it was different. He was all
that was delightful and satisfactory. o
why is it that We can not pick man off
from his family tree, as we would q ripe
pear or peach, and serve him separately.
1t was ten years since Tom had first
asked her to marry him, and she had been
ashamed to say yes; bu. she had been
ASHAMED OF her shame ever since. Poor,
dear old Toml Her heart warmed toward
him tonight, as she read her friends letter
There is very strong esprit de corps among
unmarried women, who are no longer young.
Friendships between them are unusually
deep and strong, partly perhaps because
the sentiment generally called out by mar
rage is by them unexpended, and finds its
outlet upon their friends. They band to-
gether and stand by and uphold one
another. They watch each other anxiousIy,
and honestly mourn wheu one of their
number defects from the course, and Joins
the great majority Of the married. They
are always little disappointed in the alb
sconding member, and have a peculiar
grieyed lonely feeling for her desertion.
They do not grudge her her happiness but
they wonder at her choice of il.
Miss Elizabeth experienced all these feel
ings after she had read Helen Armstrong;
letter.
She shivered a little and drew her chair
closer to the fire. She felt uureasonablv
angry with Helen. Presently she rang the
bell. and sac - the maid who answered it: