Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1890-05-16
the subject, however, though Hattie kept al

make Of Lois Arms Lois felt nothing but
honest distress no anger against any one
none against Hattie, nor even against
Mrs Elliot. Her mother. before she di,d.
had told her a good many times that she
had not enough spirit and would have y
hard time going through the world. aud
she would have told her that now had she
been alive.
After Hattie went she sat there listening
to the carpenters hammers and the birds,
but they no longer sounded to her as they
had done. She kept saying it over TO her
self in a discordant refrain that drowned
everything else, and took away the sweet
ness Of il, with bitter after taste
1.-Two silk dresses, a black one and a col
ored one and / ought 10 furnish the house,
and it's going 10 be a burden to John If /
don't"
She had her fathers supper oil ready for
| him when he came from his work though
in spite Of her trouble, aud they ate it
peacefully together in the great barn like
kitchen, which stretched the width of the
house behind the other rooms.
II was odd enough that her father should
broach the subject of her anxiety of his
own accord that night but he did, after
supper, in the sitting-room.
Lois" said he, don't you want some
thing TO buy some clothes with Amt you
got to make some new things before fall y
Lois choked a little before she answered.
IL guess you've got about ways enough for
| your money, father"
well, | could let you hev a leetle. |
amt got much Jest now Ef two or three
dollars would do you any good"
81 really don't need it now, father. I've
got plenty"
'Well, you know best got to tmnkn'
bout it this afternoon--I don't know what
put it into my head--when was ploughin'
Ef things were as they was once, you'd
hev enough. When | look back | wish
your mother hadn't been quite so set bout
hevin them bay winders and piazzasn
"Oh, father, don't
mo- | won't. | don't mean to find fault
Your mother was a good woman and a smart
one, and she meant all right Sometimes
can't help thinkin' it over that's all"
Lois kept thinking it all over, and over,
and over. Sunday night John Elliot came;
that was his regular counting night. He
came early, long before dusk everyth
down to his love making, was prompt aud
earnest and day-lighted with John Elliot.
He looked just as he was. His tall, stout
figure bore his i'll fitting Sunday clothes so
sturdily that it made up for their want Of
8
cheeks, and heavy but strong mouth and
chin, fronted Lois and her father aud life
squarely.
The three sat solemnly III the front room,
for little while after he came Then Mr.
Arms went out into the kitchen, and sat
down patiently IN his old arm chair, drawn
into the back doorway, and listened to the
frogs and the low hum Of voices in the
next room. Both sounds seemed to belong
to a spring he had left behind He gener-
ally went TO bed, in his little room which
opened out of the Kitchen long before John
left, though this sober young man never
kept his love up late. But to night he still
sat there in his chair, though half asleep,
when the front door closed He wondered
dreamily why John went so soon-an hour
earlier than usual Then he heard Lois go
up the front stairs to her room, and then
he locked the door and went to bed him
self
Next morning he looked curiously at Lois
a good many times when she was going
about getting break fast for him in the early
light. He thought she looked very sober
Once he asked her if she did not feel well,
and she said yes. After breakfast, howev.
er, she said more. He was Just putting on
his hat to go to his work when she stopped
him
Father" said she, 81 s'pose you ought
to know it John and amt going to get
married in the fall
You don't mean you've broke it off Z"
mo; haven't broke it off, father. hope
some time it II be all right and that's ali |
can say about it, Don't talk any more about
it, father. | tell you this, for | think you
ought to know"
1t was not so easy to stop her nervous,
distressed father in his wonderment and
conjecturing, however. He fingered and
talked and questioned, but Lois would say
no more than she had said, and he went off |
TO work in anxious bewilderment
He had been very confidential about his
daughters prospects with the farmer whom
he was helping. He had said good deal
about the new house, and how likely the
young man was Today he said nothing.
When he came home he looked very old |
and detected
Lois saw it, with an awful sinking at her
heart, but she never faltered in her pur-
pose. A corner Of her resolute mothers |
maDtle seemed to have fallen upon
her gentle, humble little daughter. She
never would marry John Elliot until she
could so to him well enough provided with
womanly gear not to be burden to him at
the outset. There was no anger in her de-
termination, and no pride deserving the |
name.
She had got it fixed in her mind that she
could not marry the young man now with
out injury TO him, and she loved him too |
well to do this that was ALL
She had asked him the night before to |
defer their marriage year. She gave him |
no reason; ; she thought she could not, with
out perhaps having his mothers remarks
traced back and trouble being made then,
too, she knew he would not consent to the |
plan.
The result was inevitable with a young |
man of John Elliots turn of mind. He broke |
the engagement squarely and went home.
Next day the carpenters stopped working on |
the new house. The silence of the hammers
smote Lois with dreadful sense of loneli
ness all day. Her father did not notice it till |
Tuesday night then he asked Lois abrupt |
ly, Have they stopped work on the house p |
eyes" said Lois, with great sob. Then |
she ran upstairs, threw herself on her bed, |
and cried bitterly. She could not help it. |
Still, strangely enough, she was very far |
from giving up all hope. She had never be-
lieved more firmly in her life that the new |
house would be finished aud she and John |
live in it some day. She was going to work |
and earn some pretty dresses and some fur |
niture then John would come back, and it |
would be all right.
She had not any doubt about it. Her |
greatest present distress was her fathers |
detection and her not seeing John Sunday |
nights, and she made the best of that.
She got the district school to teach, and |
passed the summer that way, instead of |
making edging and listening to the carPen-
ters' hammers. The school was half mile |
from her home, and she had to keep the house |
tidy and get meals for her father, besides |
teaching, so she had to work hard. Back |
and forth she went passing first the wild |
roses and then the golden rod on the country |
road morning and noon and night, never |
faltering. Her pretty face got strained,
earnest look on it. but never a hopeless one.
If John had only known but he worked on |
in the shop over in Pawlet village, and never
came near Lois. If she was in his thoughts,
he kept her there so secretly that nobody |
knew. He went to work on week days and
to meeting ON Sundays steadily and Just as
usual He never alluded to Lois, or his
broken engagement, or his unfinished house,
to anybody, and silenced his mother with,
II don't want TO hear a word about this,
mother; you may as we'll understand it first
as last
She never mentioned the matter to him
afterward, though she got a good deal of
comfort from talking it over amongst her
neighbors.
Lois used TO meet Johns mother some
times, and would return her stiff bow wist
fully. She never thought of being angry
with her. John she never met She used
to glance timidly across the church of Sun
day sometimes, and see him upright and
grave in his pew but he never turned his
head her way, and never seemed TO see her,
Lois taught all that year till the next
spring then she had two hundred dollars
in money. She had not spent one cent of
her salary, but had saved it iealously. She
had nnt anu N har fathar fbat