The Mason County journal. [volume] (Shelton, W.T.) 1886-1927, 1889-10-04

as big as twenty-five-cent piece.
For the sight of the crippled child
awakened memories in the heart and
mind of Bill the Lineman that were
more bitter than sweet, and always
very sad.
Ten years before. when Bill was
strapping young fellow in Western
Massachusetts, he had married one OF
the prettiest girls in the village. Bill:
was proud of his girl wife and loved
her very dearly. He was a happy
fellow indeed when there came to his
home baby girl and his love for the
tiny thing was second only to his al
lection for tho baby's mother. Soon
after the little one came Bill moved
to the city, where he had obtained
employment, and then all his bad luck
came to him.
His wife. who had been so neat
housewife, gradually changed into
slatternly gadabout. She read cheap
story papers and went to the matinees
at the third-rate theaters, while her
home and her child, as well as poor
Bill, we're altogether neglected. Bill
was be- ide himself with grief, and had
it not been for the baby, which he
watched. tended and played with all
through his leisure hours, possibly he
might have done something reckless
One day while Bill was at work the
careless wife and mother, engrossed
in dime novel, dropped the baby
from her lap. and the little one was
hopelessly crippled by the fall. When
Bill came home and learned the truth
he cried like a child with grief He
fretted all the night, and in the morn
ing remained away from his work
that he might hold the baby. laid upon
a pillow, in his arms. Often the tears
would roll down his cheeks, but he
never once scolded or reproached his
wife.
At last, overcome with remorse and
unable to endure the sight of her hus-
bands grief and her child's pain, the
girl (she was but twenty put on her
hat and went out, to return no more
to her home.
For six years the poor fellow tender
ly cared for his baby, but when the
little girl was seven years old she
died, and Bill was left without any
comfort at all.
The lineman had been alone for
three years when he beheld the face
of the little child at the crooked win
dow-a face that opened old scars, but
which none the less swelled Bills
tender heart with kindly sentiments
toward the little cripple.
Before he went down he nodded
cheerily to the girl, and it sent a
thrill of pleasure through the big fell
low when the wan face answered his
greeting by a faint smile. For many
days Bill nodded from the cross-arms
to his little neighbour, and he felt as
though they were really getting quite
we'll acquainted.
Soon the spring time came, and one
warm, sunny day the lower sash of
the crooked window was thrown up,
while the child leaned forward as if
to inhale and enjoy to the full the
sweet balmy air of the May morning.
Then the acquaintance of Bill and the
small, pale-faced cripple was begun in
earnest.
THAT'S good" said the lineman,
after nodding as usual. "You want
some of this fresh air to bring back
the roses to those ily-white cheeks.
How does my little neighbor feel to-
day?"
At first the child only smiled, as shy
children will, in response to her
strange friends remarks and inouir-
les. but before very long this bashful-
ness wore away and then the girl chat
ted freely to the big man on the lofty
pole.
Down in the street the people and
the teams hurried to and fro, but
forty feet above them Bill the Line
man and the tiny child conversed to-
gether with as much privacy as
though they had been in the quiet and
secluded parlor of a country house.
From the child Bill learned that her
name was Mile. and that her aunt
her good aunt, she always called her
was obliged to leave her alone all
| through the day because she worked
In big factory, where they made
mems neck-ties and such things. The
child seemed to know nothing about
father or mother; as long as she could
remember she had been with her
"good aunt, who was with her everv
evening and all thro ugh the long Sun,
days.
Bill, as may be imagined, possessed
some fine feelings, though he was but
a Ineman. Nothing could have n
duced him to intrude on the privacy
OF this good woman, who was evident
ly poor, yet who, in her poverty,
cared so we'll for the child that was.
apparently, not her own. So Bill al
ways timed his ascent of pole No. TIA
in the fore noon, about ten or eleven
o'clock, when it was tolerably certain
that the woman would be at the fac
tory, and on Sunday he never went up
at all except for moment quite early
in the day.
The child from time to time asked
Bill hundred questions about his
work and the telegraph, and she was
particularly interested in the music OF
while a knot of idIers and passere.hu
gathered about him.
''Bill the Lineman-taken a tumble
at last!" exclaimed the groceryman
from the corner, while Bills friend,