Idaho news. (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1887-1891, 1891-01-31

&LA olu 'IleiluS wiz VINO hoFe
Smet after long separa-
w ton. The hour was late,
nearly midnight, but no sign of
WEAKNESS was on either face. The
room was a library with we'll filed
bookcases on all sides, large bust
ness like table in the center and deeply
cushioned chairs scattered about.
One bookcase contained only medi-
cal works in substantial bindings
and with marks OF service plainly
visible.
DR.. Thornton, host and owner OF
the handsome house in which the
room was situated, was a man past
40, with iron gray hair, strongly
marked features, a tall erect figure
and an expression at once kindly
and resolute. You read prompt de-
cision in his dark blue eyes and a
sympathy in the pleasant smile that
often crossed his lips.
His compaion, heavily bearded and
hronzed by travel, WIS a far hand
somer man, but with weaker face.
"At last, he" said stretching him
selfl azily in his deep armchair, Il
find you alone and disengaged. Give
me permission to stuff a towel into
that obtrusive Office bell OF yours,
so that no whining woman orsquall-
ing brat can summon you away and
make me unhappy"
Cant be done, Tom. Make the
most of me now, for the claims oithe
whining woman and the squaIlinS
brats cannot be denied"
You know what / want to hearl
/ left hear you twelve years ago a
| poor man with struggling almost
wholly gratuitious practice, sworn
bachelor and almost n hermit outside
ofyour professional duties. find you
wealthy, with a charming wife ind a
| popular member of society, and yet
| your practice is, as before, almost
entirely among those who could not
fee you if they wonld. From what
relative, unknown to me, your own
cousin, did inherit your fortune?"
''Did it ever occur TO you, Tom,
that there are romances in real life
all about us, quite as improbable as
those found upon the shelves of the
circulating library? My experience
will convince you that | speak with
authority. Twelve years ago-we
are getting old, Toni was as you
say, a poor man, studying hard, liv-
ing in a stuffy house in n poor neigh
borhood, hoping for better times,
more profitable practice and fuller
purse. Twas bachelor because could
offer only poverty to a wife; hermit
because my studies were engrossing,
In my small house / kept one old
woman servant, who cooked for me
and kept things tidy. Having nc
carriage | needed no boy, for Martha
could write, and / had q much larger
office practice than that outside.
''It was late one bitter night in
January, when / was reused by the
office bell and the sound OF excited
voices under my window. Hasten.
ing down, found several men carry,
ing upon n shutter the unconscious
patient was to aid, if possible.
An old man, sir, knocked down
by runaway horses and run over,
said one OF the party as they depos
tied their burden gently upon a sofa
Badly hurried, Pm thinking, doctor
but not dead'
BADLY hurt, indeed, / fornd him
and my examination convinced ms
that any further motion would re
suit fatally. Keep him | must, Of
J risk his life by removal to hos
pital. With the assistance oil two o
the men undressed him and put hin
into my own bed, noticing then tina
he wore no coat.
" Somebody took it off, they told
me, and apparently somebody KEEP
it. as it never appeared again. II
the trousers pockets we're only som,
trihing articles, II bunch OF keys anC
n handkerchief, but nothing TO Civ
any clew to the identity of my pa
. tient and unlimited guest.
81 will not enter into the details O
i the injuries that excited my interes
as physician and surgeon, as mucl
, as they called for my sympathy as /,
man. There were complications ii
the case that called upon all my skill
and knowledge, and the patient en-
: duranee of great suffering made mi