Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-04-07

IdG
miles, she might be sure of comfort; at all
events, she would be sure of safety.
When it was announced, in family coun-
Gil, that Sarah had letter by mail, the ex-
citement was equal to that which would
have been felt in any we'll established
household in Salem to-day if large square
box had been sent from the English steamer
in Boston marked "By Order of the Queen"
and left by the American express at the
door. Probably Sarah Paris had never
had five letters by mail in her life, and
probably, indeed, the women of the house
hold would not receive five in the next two
years. She had expected the excitement
which the letter would cause, and when it
was at last brought up to her from her
uncle's store on the wharf, from which It'd
ings of its arrival had already been re-
ceived, she called the family around her,
before she opened it, and explained to them
the subject. Every one of them grew pale
with surprise; dear Aunt Huldah threw her
arms around the girl and broke into tears.
The scene was just such as she had antici-
pated; but she had now had days
upon days in which to forecast
what it would be and what she
should say, and she bore herself bravely
Tie WuOl6s one IOlQ Qer Q6dr Au0b
'Ruldah that she must not think that she
was going away forever. What had hap
pened was this: that she was determined to
see more of the world; they had often
laughed about it, and in their laughing
about it she had been more serious than
they had thought. She was determined to
go now, aud they would see how she was
going. Thus she broke the letter open, and
revealed to them its contents. .
OF course it was not long before the whole
of Salem knew her secret. There was no
reason why it should be secret, and the girl
had faced this possibility as she had faced
all the rest of the adventure. The passage
in it which had the one thrill for her of
keen excitement was the inevitable visit
from Harry Curwen.
That visit came at s o'clock in the even
ing of the day of the arrival of the letter.
Harry came into the room playing with his
little cane, and affecting to be in light
spirits, but Aunt Huldah knew, and Sarah
knew, that this was but atfectation. He
did not so much as take off his coat He
said at once:
II thought, perhaps, Sarah, you would
walk with ME. The roadway is dry, the
night is lovely, and 1 have something 1
want to say to you"
He was too intimate in the house to be
afraid to be frank, and in two minutes the
girl was with him in the street. Then he
was eager; then be was passionate. Why
had she done such thing as this, without
letting him have a word? Had he not some
rights that nobody else had? And the girl,
with dignity, said that she did not know
that he had, and did not know why he
should claim any; to. which Harry replied
in an eager protestation of his affection.
He supposed that she understood that he
could not live without her, and did not pre-
tend he could live without her. He had not
supposed that she was like girl in book,
who wanted to see him on his knees, or to
hear any protestations in words. But he
had tried to show in a thousand ways that
her pleasure was his pleasure, and that he
did nothing in life which he did not associ-
ate with her. But nowhe came, on the first
instant that he heard this folly, to say that
if he had done wrong he was sorry. He was
hers, and he was only hers, as she perfectly
we'll knew. Would she take him, bear with
him, love him, and let him show, as life
went by, that if he had not offered himself
to her in the right way at first the offer was
none the less sincere?
1t would not be fair to say that Sarah
Paris was not affected by the dignity
which, after all, this spoiled child managed
to throw into his protestations of attach
ment. 1t would not be fair to say that she
was not proud, that at last he had made the
protest which he had been so sluggish in
making, and which he had been willing to
leave unmade. But if she was proud, or If
in any way she were pleased, she did not let
him know that She simply said he had no
right to presume upon any good naEVre of
hers. She said that they all lived in q sim
pie life, as he had said, and that he. had no
right to charge her with showing him any
more regard than she would have shown to
anyone else with whom she was on friendly
terms of daily intimacy.
The poor boy interrupted her to say that
he made no charge at all. -..,-s.,
Then she went on to say that she was hon.
ored, as any woman might be honored, by
what he was pleased to say TO her; but with
a good deal of dignity, and with words
which he never forgot, she said that he had
no right, and she thought he had no
right, to ask any woman to be his wife She
told him that he was a spoiled child; she
told him that he lived merely to amuse him.
self; she told him that if in amusing himself
he played with other people, he did not seem
to care great deal; she told him, in short,
that he had no right to ask any woman to
marry him while he was butterfly playing
around the life of the world, which he
seemed to her to be. "I cannot SCI" said
she, ''that you are of any use to ANYBODY; 1
do not see that this world is better that you
live in it. do not choose that my husband
shall be a man who cannot stand before God
and men and say. I am doing some service
to the country to which belong"
Such was, condensed only too severely for
the purpose of this little tale, the subject of
the sharp dismissal which, in that nights
walk, Master Harry Curwen received from
Miss Sarah Paris.