The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1893-05-02
IN LATER YEARS.

veranda, idly looking out on a typical
Southern California landscape in early
spring. The Cuyamaca was still white
with the lately fallen snow, and rugged
Ell Cajon showed to advantage in the
foreground. The lower slopes and the
valleys were green, occasional patches
OF yellow showing where the violet,
now past its prime, or the poppy, in all
It's richness, found a congenial home.
Miss Harcourt listened to the wind
songs of the birds, and underneath the
gay melody there ran a minor strain,
like some half forgotten song which is
recalled by al old association.
Her mind glanced swiftly 9 the
last ten years in her California home,
Her mothers illness and death, her
fathers loss, not only of life, but of
fortune. Their retirement to this lonely
ranch among the hills. Yes" she
said to herself, ''the gay, u~nrefecting
girlhoQd in New England seemed like
something in another age. Not a feel
ing, not a hope, not a desire in common
with that young creature. She thought
with a smile, as one might think of an
other, that in those years she was fair
to look upon. The clear, bright eyes,
the softly rounded cheeks, the mass of
rebelliou3 hair which tangled and
curled in spite of her plats. Why did
those years, especially those spent at
the Atlantic View, come back with
such ~vividness? Suddenly she was
seized with an overpowering desire to
write. Not the beauty of the landscape,
not the nameless productions of the
soil, not the present, but the past made
her pen fly swiftly. She felt as if i'm
PEELED by a power from without, and
described the first romance, with it's
sad little ending, which she experienced
that summer at Atlantic View.
The years rolled back OF either side
and she saw clearly as a woman what
she failed to understand as a child-like
girl. AS she wrote, she found herself
making Arthur Lindley one of the main
figures, and herself the other, The
tall, impetuous young fellow, free,
rich, handsome. He was courted by
many, and admired by all. How, then, |
did it happen that he should have
shown such eager delight in her society,
flushing with pleasure when she ap
peared and attending her like her
shadow? The young Ethel vas ready
to believe in the sincerity of the lad,
when he told her frankly that there
was nc girl to be compared with her,
not One NoOne was so true, sohOnest,
so unaffected. What a series of scrapes
the boy did get into, to be sure, and
how he confided them all to her and
asked her advice, for he had no mother
and no sisters. "But I don't want you
for my sister," he had said with a
twinkle in his blue eyes.
Those long mornings on the beach, |
when the bathers made merry and the
locker on lined the sands; those after
moons Of idle swinging in a hammock
till the long shadows made a game of
tennis a possibility those soft evenings,
when the cottages looked like fairy
palaces and the band played dreamy
music in the park; they all foated
through the halls of memory.
Ethel Harcourt wrote spontaneously.
She saw, with the perception of ma
ture years, the tangled web in which
her girlish feet were caught. She re-
membered the days when there crept
into and between the c~omradeship an
alien note. How or when it began she
could not tell, but her instinct warned
her of the approaching danger. Arthur
LindIey no longer came with his out
bursts and condolences. He seemed to
be watching her, to be weighing and
comparing her words, holding her at
a hostile distance. There was nothing
which could have been told, no one
word or sentence which separated
them, only a growing atmosphere of
distrust on one side, and maiden shy
ness and reserve on the other. Atlast
there came an outbreak from him bit
ter, unkind words and mysterious allu-
sions. Ethel tried to have him explain
himself, but it had no effect. She had
treated him shabbily, he, who had
been her best friend. No one could
bear such things, and he would not
bear them any longer. There could be
no explanation; no, he would not hear
one word, but would bid her good
morning" After this they would meet
as strangers.
Ethel was a girl who held her head
very high, and she would not for a
moment have young Lindley think
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