Waterbury evening Democrat., 1890-08-21
CHAPTER IT

beside her. She never slept quietly. In addition to the spinal disease which warped the poor girls figure she suf' fered from an affection of the throat that made her respiration in slumber a rattling snore, interrupted at regular intervals by gufgle that sounded like strangulation. So audibly distressing was 1t that her father could not sleep within two rooms of her, and the I healthy occupants of the intervening nursery complained that nothing was done to break Hester of making such a racket. If she wanted to stop it she could"
 Her young aunt and roommate knew better. Hester had shared her bed for almost nine years. Mrs. Wayt's or phaned sister was but fourteen when she came to live in the parsonage, then situate in Cincinnati. It had been a hard winter with the pastors wife. While her mother lay dying in Ithaca, N. Y., her then only daughter, the first-born of her flock, beautiful vivacious child of eight, met with the accident which crippled and dwarfed her for life. The telegram announcing Mrs. filings ill., ness was answered by one saying that Hester was at the point of death. She had just passed the first doubtful stage upon the return journey, nfeward, when Hetty, in her new black frock, insisted upon relieving the grief-worn watcher over the wreck that could never be put together again.
 Lying in strange quarters in a strange town at the dreariest hour of the twenty-four, Hetty recalled that as the date when the load of care, now an in- I kne. 70 n.-z upon her. She had before this likened 1t to needle she had once, in childish wantonness, run under tho bark of a young willow, and seen disappear grad ually from view as the riven bark grew over it, until, at the end of a year, no vestige of the steel remained, except a ridge which was never smoothed away. She was not exactly penniless. The portion left her by her mother was judiciously invested by her guardian, and yielded her exactly four hundred dollars year. It was transmitted promptly, quarterly, until she was of age, by which time she was so rooted and grounded in prudence that she con tinued to draw the like amount at equal periods.
 "It Is enough to dress her." Mrs. I ing his sanction to her offer of home to one who stood alone in the world save for her sister, and an uncle who had lived in Japan for twenty years. And she is welcome to her board-is she not Percy dear?"
 "Welcome, dear love? Can you ask the question with regard to your only sister-poor, motherless lamb! While l Hun haCa n rOnf hofrnon ,,S 4bo el- ', and a crust of bread between us and starvation, she shall share both. Let | me write the letter."
 | The epistle was almost tattered with many readings when Hetty became an inmate of her brother-in-law's homo. She had not kept it until now That was not strange, Fairhill being the latest in a succession of ':settlements'' to which the brilliant gospeller had ac- cepted calls, generally unanimous and almost invariably enthusiastic. There were three children at Hetty's coming her own and her mothers namesake, Hester, and Percy and Perry, the twin boys. Four had been born since, but two had not outlived early infancy. Mr. Wayt would not have been preacher oi the period had he not enriched some oi his most effective discourses with illus. trations drawn from these personal be. reavements.
 His celebrated apostrophe to 8 six. months-old daughter, heginning-"Dea1 little Susiel She had numbered but 9 brief half-year of mortal life, but she was loving and beloved! seem to feel the soft strain of her arms about my neck this moment"-is too familiar tc my readers through newspaper reports, to need repetition here. The sermon embodying this gem of poetic and rhetortcal emotion is known to have won him calls to three churches It was still dark when Hetty's cal caught the muffled thud of feet upon the garret stairs. Wherever provi, dence and parish preferences cast the lot of the Wayts, Homer's bedroom was nearest the heavens that were hot by summer and cold by winter.
 "I don set no store by ceilin's," he told Hetty when she wished they could lodge him better" "Seems il twas naturaller fur to seq the beams purity nigh onto my nose when I fus wake in the mornin'. I'm kind O lone. some fur 'em when I caant butt me head agln the top O me room when I'm a mindter."
 At another time he conf1ded to heI that it was ''reel sociabul-like to hear the rain onto the ruff, clus' to fellers ears O nights"
 He was on his way down to the kitch. en now to light the fire. Unless she should interfere, he would cook break. fast, and serve it upon the table she had set over night and sweep down the stairs and scrub the front door-steps while the family ate the morning meal. He called himself Tony" as did all the family except Hetty and Mrs, Wayt. Tho former had found '.Homeg Sn'tth, IT," written in sprawling hand upon the hy-leaf of a song-book which formed the waif's entire library. Hetty had notions native to her own small head. One was that the-but for her friendless lad would respect himself the more if he were not addressed by what she called "a circus-monkey's name." For this reason he was "Homer" to her, oyNI ha,. ctC R1lN |