The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1894-01-02
A NEW YEAR REUNION

A NEW YEAR REUNION
what comfort is my son Jackl His
treacherous mother left no trace of her
in him. He is all minel Another year
will see Jack through his medical col
lege. Then, with my son my partner,
can look outside of business and perhaps
can love again"
DR.. Stielson's sister entered-Miss Sue.
"a man is down stairs, brother, with
box for you. He is sinister and mysteri-
GUS and will rot give his name, but must
see you"
mo subject peddler? Ihave got over
that. Let him come up. Stand, sister,
outside the door and listen"
A man like robber, with swelled fea-
lures, came in with parcel.
"Well?"
SIS that your name or initials?" asked
the man, producing a surgical instru-
ment of silver.
Undoubtedly. How did you come by
it?'
81 took it in trade from young man.
think l see his picture on that mantel."
"Slanderer! Deceiverr' exclaimed DR..
Stielson. "That is my only son."
'Take your hand from my throat,
doctor. lam afraid of you. If l should
cry 'Murderp what would become of
that young man? See herew
He opened his package. and it con-
tanned full set of costly surgical in
struments in DIR. Stielson's speciality, of
late not much used, but he recognized
every article.
"Your reputation, said the illicit deal
er, sis such that | put the clew upon my
bargain at once. Iasked the young man
for receipt when Ipaid him the money.
1 swear that l see his photograph there.
Can you swear this is not his handwrit-
ingT'
The doctor looked and groaned and
sank into his chair.
''Sue, settle with this person. o my
Godr'
The sister did as she was hidden, dis
missed the fence shopkeeper and came
back.
"Jack is thief, Sue. He has robbed
his father. What is to be done?"
Nothing 1t is bad enough already"
81 can never trust him again-never
recommend him. Our ways part from
this moment. Let him never see mer'
Brother, it is New Years eve."
''The night l married his accursed
mother. Have l toiled and spent the
hours of sleep in storm and midnight con-
sultation to gain a national fame only to
come to this pang-I have no son?'
He tainted who had a nerve of steel
and could cut to the very membrane be-
tween life and death. His sister was ex-
perienced and gave him restoratives and
heard him continue to moan and rave.
s'Be still" she said at length. ''Do you
suppose this affiicts me not? What have
/ to love but Jack? If you throw him
off, l will go with him. Now bewarer'
"Oh, if he had killed some one in an
ARRAY If he had set the city on fret If
he had been anything but a thief"
Enough. He is thief. That is all
of it. A thief was forgiven on the cross,
where you and l are now. shall for
give him"
Il never will
"Then you are bad man. Perhaps
you have stolen yourself some time.
Look below your hard heart, Pierce
Stielson, and rehectp
She heard a key in the door below and
left her brother, sick herself of the mis-
cry which had come upon that house.
New Years ever exclaimed the doc
tor, and he threw himself upon the floor,
not for the first time in his life, to know
the ache of the broken heart.
He had come to Philadelphia from
| Delaware, out of an apothecary's shop, to
study medicine. Excessive ambition from
boyhood on had annealed his real sensi-
bilities with the fire of energy till he was
like boiler full of fire, his rivets of life
ever screwed up, his leisure nothing but
cold exhaustion. His was a name of fame
now without personality.
All knew that he had separated from
his wife soon after their marriage and
was soured, but his son seemed to fill the
vacant place. His own integrity was
everywhere understood, and very few
knew that this man of Indifferent man
ners and hurry and intensity had a sec
ond nature beneath the first that was like
an undeveloped childhood.
Pure misery he felt now, the little
thing he had not watched-filial truth
taking him like an assassin upon his own
threshold.
He could not cry; he could not reason.
His absolute nature and faith had been
| r L. !
There were bottles ON his mantel
which could kill They had often oc-
Cured to him as instant reliefs from so
much living and so little resulting. He
felt like dying now by his own act. No
fear of the grisly had he. but he was de-
tered by pride.
If he could almost wish his son would
read of his fathers suicide and become
penitent, there was woman who might
think the love of her had caused it and
exultl
How honorable, he thought, had been
his life; the uniform meeting of his bills,
the apprehension of debt, the fidelity OF
his contracts, his disregard of avarice
while accommodating prosperity And
yet his sister had but now thrown it up
to him that he might once have been a
thief
He thief Now he did weep in in
dignationl
"Never, never
Oh, memory!
He faltered to say "never'' again, for
there crept into his mind the memory OF
two distinct acts of dishonesty committed
in childhood, which he had forgotten for
80 years.
He had played truant from school in
his parents absence and meanly put the
excuse for it upon his orphan cousin, a
helpless ward in his fathers house.
There also arose before him moment
when he had taken a quarter of dollar
twice from his employers till to buy hIs
way into a circus.
Could those deeds be now called vii
lainy? Pshawl They were the raw acts
of an Uniformed animal, mollusk, a
timid, wistful child. He had put temp
tation under his feet long ago and re-
solved never to lie nor evade nor to take
mean advantage, and had lived up to his
second life till frankness and courage
were as natural to the great surgeon as
to his faithful mastiff dog.
Yet he was not giving anybody else the
chance TO reform His son was the off