The record-union., 1891-11-28

whlstled the latest popular air.
II tell you what it is" said Mrs. Mill
4 Ter, who grew impatient at last. 81
! couldn't let you do it for less than a hum
dred dollars year, She thought that
she should probably frighten the young
man away by her bold demand, but she
said to herself that it must be that or
nothing.
"Yon couldn't?" said Boomer looking
up with surprise-surprise that she
should let him off so easily. well,
| We'll call it a hundred dollars then, Mrs.
Miller, an even hundred year TO be
paid in monthly installments. And if
you're tired Of your bargain at the end of
the first year We'll paint it all out for you
as sober as Quaker, and any color you
like. Now, suppose, l can have this
| little job begun at once. I'll send the
painters over this very afternoon. / run
up and down the road every few days,
and the next time / pass in the train |
want to see Millennium Pellets as large
as life when / look this way. I'm going
TO leave you handful Of circulars and
this little bottle of the pills. Send you
up dozen by-and-by. You'd better try
'em. It's no joke; they're splendid
thing. Perhaps you think you're well,
but what's the harm in being better-or
even best? Let me see; I owe you for
the milk. Now, Mrs. Miller, good-by.
But l shall be in in the afternoon with
|
met you"
Mrs. Miller followed him to the gate.
She seemed to be struggling with an idea
| which she found difficult to express. He
had thought he was off, when she de-
tanned him by plucking his coat-sleeve to
say: Il couldn't IA done it once, but [
guess / can STAN it now. I don't know
what the rest of 'em I'll say to it, but as
longs L own the house, l d. know IS it
makes any great difference" Boomer
had buoyant and reassuring reply for
her, and he reminded her that she was
about to enroll herself among the bene-
factors of the age. He even referred to
the old house as q Temple OF Hygeia
| These little flights of fancy were anus
ing to himself, and he believed that they
were none the less effective because they
were imperfectly understood by the peo-
pie upon whom he tried them. In the
present instance the face of the woman to
whom he spoke caught no reflected light
from his radiant, impertinent ViSage, and
he perceived that if he had succeeded this
time, he might have done so at a siighter
cost of enthusiasm. This woman was
evidently influenced from within, rather
than from without, in following his sug-
gestions.
When he turned away with florid sa-
Lutte, and descended the road with the
springing step of success, Mrs. Miller
low, lusterless eyes-with eyes that were
looking through and beyond him into
the consequences of her decision-in
whose gaze Boomer was only q small and
unimportant speck upon broad field of
| vision. After few moments her fixed
look changed. There was short
ening of the focus that brought her
back to her immediate foreground, and
| she drew a sigh in acknowledgment of
her return to herself. She walked around
TO the front of the house. 1t was hot
summer day, and while the backyard
| was cool, almost damp, with closely set
| locust trees in front the sun beat upon
the face of the dwelling, peeled Off the
white paint and warped the timber. The
very atmosphere seemed to hum with the
radiation of heat. The river, broad and
smooth, that lay below the cliff beyond
the railway, was shimmering, white
sheet of water, on which the sunlight
danced in myriad points of fire. Mrs.
Miller threw her apron over her head
and looked up at the face of the house
with blinking, watering eyes.
1t had been rather pretentious house
once, with a great classic pediment sup
ported by wooden pilasters which were
now all warped out of plumb. Mrs.
Miller had owned the place for twenty
years; it had been her only inheritance
from her father who had purchased it in
the days of its sdoWnfall-in the early DAYS
| of the railway-and who had mortgaged
it within an inch of its tenure. It was
not cheerful home, but Mrs. Miller had
! never been embarrassed by a choice be-
tween this and another. 1t was her
home, such as it was. She wondered as
she looked at it how the advertisement
would appear across the front in ''five-
| foot white lettering on deep azure back
ground" She fetched two or three sighs
| that were almost groans. "Temple of
| a hot1 ,hof
that high falutin' chap called it." She
| was vaguely conscious that he had been
amused, that he had made Joke; and
she knew that the Stebbinsvillians would
not hesitate to make other jokes-iokes
which she would understand more per-
| fectly. Adeline had remnant of fierce
pride-pride will lurk in the queerest
places and survive the rudest shocks |!
! Her face grew hot with shame as she
stood there looking up at the house.
Then Granny's voice, rasping, whining,
tamiliarly peevish, came from within.
"A-a-de-li-ine."
| "Well, guess can STAN it" muttered
Mrs. Miller in conclusion as she went in
Boomer lost no time in completing his
arrangements, and in day or two Try
Millennium Pellets,'' in huge letters of
dazzling whiteness, shone upon Mrs
Miller's house. People pointed at it as
| they passed Stebbinsville in the trains
and said, There's enterprise for you.h
The advocate of "Rejuvenum," rival
pill, grew green with envy This was
just what Boomer wanted. The Steb-
! binsyillians came en- masse to take near
| look at the advertisement although
many of them could see il from their
homes, below the cliff where the principal
part of the village nestled from the wind.
1t was regarded as a magnificent joke--it
was the best thing that had happened in
! Stebbinsville since old Uncle Rastus
Bates had put overalls on his pet horse to
keep the flies from bothering him.
! Nothing else was talked of in the post
! Office. waggish story became current
in the village to the effect that Miller,
who had been absent at the time when
| the advertisement first appeared, had re-
turned home afterward a good deal the
worse for liquor, in the company of a
Souter John, whom he loved like "a
! vera brlther," and that the two men,
appalled, at the unexpected appearance
upon the front of the Miller residence,
and unable TO make out the legend with
| any degree of accuracy, had construed the
words of Boomers "ad" into a dreadful
warning-an out-of-doors version of the
| writing on the wall-a mystifying and
unfamiliar form of the terrors.
Small boys, and some who were no
| longer small enough to be excused on the
score of youth, hailed the Millers with
/ derisive epithets when they appeared in
! the town, and especially Susie, when she
went on daily quest for mail. Pills were
bitterly sore subject to Susie, but
! strange to say it was the Millennium
Pellet which turned balance favorably
| for her In the most important matter in
her life. Susie had been for years daily
and hourly meditating escape from her
gloomy home-two dashing young men
of Stebbinsville. struck with her charms,
and not over-particular in regard to fam
lily connections, having urged her to take
up her abode in more desirable duarters