Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1892-12-02

4 have him2 Didn't Ruby Oskes try to
drown himself because mittened him7
Didn't refuse Jerry Vail only last Sun
day, lust for your And after I've waited
between hope aud despair all these years,
/ you ask me thatl"
And Polly covered her face with her
hands as ifto conceal either her bushes
or her tears, but shortly she uncovered
her face-and pretty, pale, though
somewhat care-worn face it was--and
continued:
! 'sYou're very kind and thoughtful,
| Ebenezer, to ask Inc about fixing up
your house. Where you've lived so
many years can't help being happy
home for me; but might suggest one
or two little improvements, seeing you
asked me. You might just cart the rub
Dish out of the front. yard-the swill-
barrel, aud ash-heap, and grindstonc,
aud such-and make up some posy beds.
I've got lots of seeds, aud you eau have
some of 'em-hollyhocks, and china
asters, and marigolds, and double pop
pies, aud sweet-williams, and four. o.
clocks, and morning glories. They'll
want to go by the window, and you'll
have to move tie pigtrough. Then your
I square room would be more like some
thing if it had carpet, and n sofa, and
q picture OF two, and a center table
and, above all, curtains for the win
dows.
"You haven't got many dishes, 1
s'pose, but I'll bring host. I've got
two whole sets of blue stoneware, all
except the slop-bowls, besides the best
part of gilt china set. You've seen
EN-, guess. The house wants paint
| ing, too; never saw so brown a house
for white one. Then we'll want an
extension table, SO when Betsy and her
children visit us they can sit down.
! Don't be offended, dear Ebenezer; l
shouldn't have said all this, for the
world, but you know you asked me-"
Ehenezer didn't know whether he
ought to be offended or not. He was
fiattered and yet mortified.
Polly put her hand in her pocket and
brought out her handkerchief, and with
it came her tatting shuttle and thread.
The sight of these brought her mind
back to the sober realities of life 1t
was stitch, stitch, stitch, with poo- Polly
from morning to night, with no one to
love her or care for her us she mcrited
So she sat down with her back to the
bushes, and when Ebenezer knew by the
low sobs that reached him that she was
crying, he let go tue bushes carefully.
so as not to disturb her, and walked off
home.
He 10y awake until long after midnight
that night. His thumb panied him
little, but his sleeplessness was not
caused wholly by that.
He was thinking of the time, many
years back, when Polly Virgins, then a
rosy girl of eighteen, was very dear to
him. He remembered how she had gone
to Dame Chadwick's "applc- cut" one
night with Jim Winters, and that she
firted with him all the evening. He re-
membered, too, how angry and jealous
he was about it, and that he treated her
coldly and never sought to WOO her after
that.
He made resolve at last, and then he
closed his eyes and went to sleep--to
dream of tables of all kinds, with sofas
and pictures, and blue dishes, and rolls
of carpeting, and poppy and marigold
seed by the bushel being piled pro-
miscuously in his front yard and that
he was giving to the house \ coat Of
white paint.
Then he was stretching and lacking
down carpet in the garnet, and
He awoke with groan. He must
have been hammering away at his sore
thumb, for it was throbbing and aciling
terribly. Sleep was out of the question
now, so Ebenezer got up and lighted
candle and walked the bare floor till
daylight, wondering why he had never
felt so lonely before, and thinking, as
he had never thought before. that a
bachelors life was wretched one.
A few days after her walk on the
beach Polly sat knitting in her sisters
best room, when that lady came in from
the store, whittier she had gone for q roll
of butter.
"Sakes alive, Polly, you will never
believe i'll Ebcnczer Stickncy is turning
everything inside out aud upside down
at his house. They're painting the house
outside, and papering and whitewashing
inside, and he's got Jim Black there
clearing out the yard. I didn't think
much about oil that, for the Lord knows
the place needed it; but just as 1 left
the store what should stop in front of
the miller's gate but two loads of brand
new furniture. Then said l to myself,
that means something. spoke to Sally
Brown about it, and we both say there's
a wedding ahead"
Mrs. Betsy Carverwas so excited over
this piece OF news that she did not notice
how pale Polly had grown, nor her hand
tremble so that she dropped half the
stitches off her knitting needle. Size
ratified away:
81 reckon 1 know who he'll marry
That brazsn faced Murray girl that sits.
right in front of him every time he goes
to Vittoria to church. She's had her
cap set for him these two years, Sally
says, and at last she's trapped him."
Polly's face was flushed to crimson
now. She made no reply, but bent over
her work, ncrvonsly taking up the
stitches she had dropped.
If she loved Ebenezer stickney, her
oicfar did MT oponoot - Tot