Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1894-02-16

t'other tack. | went into his place one
day back in the spring to git some
steak-notice what good steaks he's
givin' Of We tnis season? he gifts 'em
wsv from Pori lanG, and he does seem
TO Oil hold O. better beef n Otis did
and [ sez to Lin, sez ], Iin, they do
say Lyddy AIMS goin' up to Boston to
run an eatin' house; hearn anything
bout it? Feler up there's offered her
half the business and himself thrown
n. if she'll come mp and run it. You
want to wake up pooty quick ef you
don / want to lose her. Thought I'll
kind O. give him a scare, you know.
Lin. he didn't say nothin' right of,
but went and drawed some karryseen
lie into his molasses measure. Then
he sez, sez he, Don't s'poee l could
sell 'em the meat for their place, do
ve?' sez he. Well, there, said Cap'n
jim. 81 don't know to this day
whether he knowed was only foolin'
oi whether he really did think he could
make deal to sell n Boston eatin
house meat from Portland by way OF
the Hsrbor. But he's all right. He's
Lyddy AIMS stiddy company; and !
don't b'lieve she'd let any other feller
fool round her-ef there was any fell
Ter TO fool. Lyddy Ann comes O.
mighty forehanded stock, and she
hsin't agoin' to let no forty thousand
dollars slip out of her hands, motif she
knows herself. She'll git it, sure as
eggs is eggs, onless some girl we don't
know on hereabouts cuts in under her.
Hain't no marrying girls among your
folks up to the Outlook that's tryin' to
cut her out, be there?" and Cap'n jim
went into such commissions over his
ponderous joke that the gold rings in
his weather beaten ears fairly shiyered
with the shock.
No, there were no marrying girls
among the Outlook boarders who
would cut Lyddy Ann out; but, IN
some respects, Lin Burnham was a
match worth trying for He was r
good deal Of chestnut burr, after all,
rough on the outside but something
sweet within.
"After Otis Burnham died, 50 Silas
Evans told me, "Lin, he up and shin
gled the old fish house on the dock
cause his father hoped he woul Init let
it 90 to wrack And you and me know,
added Silas, "that them big old fish
houses on Burnham's dock is about as
onproftable piece of property as you
can find b'tween Duck Rock Ledge
and the Pint. When them two boys
of Widder Parkins was missin' IN last
winters big gale, Lin, he KEEP the old
woman Jest plum full of vittles and
fuel and wouldn't take a red cent for
'em nuther when the Parkins boys
showed up-and there wasn't never
nobody that hez plagued him as them
Parkins boys uset to fore they growed
ND. Lots Of good about Lin Burn
ham. even il he don't quite come up to
his father"
But the best of folks are sometimes
fesrfully slow, and even Lyddy Ann
must have begun to weary of hope de-
ferred; for she said to me one morn
ING. when 1 went into the kitchen TO
drink my "before-breakfast' cup OF
coffee with her: "Does seem as if I
should fly, there now! when things 60
so slow" said "What things, Lyddy
Ann?" and she answered, indefinitely
"Ob. most everything, and then adj
ded, Gins goin' up to Portland to-
day. Anything he can do for you?'
Lin going to Portland 1t was a
happening that might well become a
very seven-days' wonder. For Linz
whose travelled road barely reached
bevond the Point, the Townhouse or
the outlook, to 60 to Portland, and in
midsummer, was something worth a
"seare head" in the Globe, if an en-
terprising reporter had but got hold
Of rhe news. But the sequence in
Lyddy AIMS remark struck me yet
more forcibly than the tidings she
conveyed, and l said to myself
'Lyddy AIMS getting tired Some
things going to happen pretty soon,
or l haven't studied Lyddy Ann all
these years correctly
Tie impression found currency
'Up-along' that this trip to Portland
meant business. On the postoftice
bench, where it was openly discussed
at noon. the decision seemed to be
that Lin had gone up for ring, while
down at the Hawkins fish house under
the hill opinion wayered between
suit of ready-msde wedding clothes
and a change Of butchers for the sup
ply Of beef But Cap'n jim, batting
his travis on Burnham's dock aloRe
with his son Sam, hazardedy yt5e sug-
gestion that Lin hadn't goSe to Port
land at all, but had just gone of ''fol
a train. ride as fur as thu Orchard tC
git alone spell and thiik it over
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