Waterbury evening Democrat., 1891-07-09
THE wArEEasf5RY EVENING DEMOCRAT, THURSDAY, JULY
fitness as she always did, it vanished in

fitness as she always did, 1t vanished i1i moment.
 II need some rinsing water, Paul." she caia, straightening up with difficult ty in the steam of the tub, and stripping the glirt;ng bubbles from her thin, tired ;.tm3 If Jimmy or Carl would only -Atcy round I'd have them do it, but it secms like they're most always of when needed"
 ''Oh, I'll do it, mother; I'll do it!'' said the boy with a half pathetic smile. "I'm stronger than they are, only my legs ain't so good!' And taking up wood en yoke with q bucket attached to either end, he placed it across his neck and shoulders, and went limping down the hillside, whistling little that his weary mother might hear.
 The woman stood a moment, leaning with her soap-eaten hands upon the tubs edge, and looked after him with tender eyes. Then she glanced at little Gabc, six years old, and three-year-old Lannie, who were playing under the trees, and began washing again. He's the best of them all" she murmured as she rubbed. His hearts as soft as girls; he'd help mo more than he does if he could. Oh, if his father had only never done that awful thing to him!" And tears slipped down her cheeks and fell into the suds.
 The boy stopped at spring half way down the bluff, and, filling the pails, looked a moment at the mills back of the bay. Red-shirted lognen were working with their cant-hooks among the brown ricks, their sing-song cry of "He-o-he-e-e!'' as they lifted, coming in mellow waves across the water with the long-drawn, never ceasing whine of the feeding saws.
 Presently he labored back up the hill with the water, and when the tubs were filled and his mother had thanked him gratefully, he sat down on a bench near by and watched her dreamily.
 Mother" he said at last, do you 'spose we will always live here?"
 ''I hope not, dear"
 "Do you think ken ever go to work in the mills, mother?"
 "I hope so, Paul; or maybe at some thing better. The doctor said, you know, when he looked at your knees, that if some parts that were growed to- gether could be parted you would not be bothered much. But you would have to go away to big city where they do such things, and 1t would cost good deal" She could not bear to look up, and kept on washing, feeling the cloud that always hung over them grow thicker with thought of all their help lessness
 "Yes," said the boy, after a little silence, "it would cost lots; but mebbe something'u happen sometime, an it ken be done."
 "Yes, something may happen" said the mother, soothingly; ''it don't cost l much to live here in this old house that nobody owns, and as long as I have strength to wash we won't starve. May be sometime your father'n quit-will be himself again"
 Her voice broke, and the boy got up with an angry tumult in his breast and | went down to watch Lannie and Gabe, who now were playing near the preci- pice. When he had sent them into the yard he stood looking gloomily out to sea. The sun had fallen into the water far on its western rim, with a flat 1 mass of clouds lying over it like a dull l red bed of coals. Above this a vast I cloud hung in greenish folds, slit here | and there with sharp, bright blades of | light, while half the great vault above him was covered with troubled, pur- plish scud.
 ! But he took no note of the seeming prophecy of storm in the sky; he was 1 revolving in blind kind of way the l thought that If his father were not in 1 the world his mother and they would go l hack n her 1,aOD1r in the east. and all