The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1895-08-28

back to her old life uncomplainingly.
1t never occurred to her to neglect
her duties, or to be 'saucy with her
meals" as a protest against the
hardness of her lot; there was no
shadow on her broad and kindly face
to touch her fathers compassion.
Once, about month after She had
parted from her lover, there came a
sore trial to her obedience.
She was stamping and sorting the
morning letters, when she found one
among them addressed to hersf. 1t
bore Binghampton postmark, and
Mary thrust it into her pocket, with a
guilty look towards her father. All
through the day it lay there unopened,
a heavy load upon her conscience, 1t
is true, but a JOY deep and thrilling
as well, the like of which she had
never known before.
When evening came, and she could
leave the house an hour or two un-
noticed, it was towards the sea she
went to read her letter on the same
spot where she and Jack had parted.
Ii was then that Mary felt her father
had laid tax upon her, harder than
she could bear. If she might have
letters such as this now and then, LIE
would be very easy, she thought, but
there was no need to ask her father S
consent to that; she knew too well
what his answer would be, and to get
them unknown TO him would be well
nigh impossible.
Mary was simple and truthful by
nature, and deception of any kind
would have been painful to her; yet
perhaps. if it could have been done
without her fathers knowledge, she
might have consented to this CORE,
spondence, for the gleam OF hope that
it held was very sweet to her. But
when she thought of the inevitable
discovery, and the tempest Of wrath
she would have to face, she could moi
hesitate. That night, in her room:
she wrote her answer to Jack, repeat
ing that she could not go agin
father, and begging him to write no
more
After this, the monotony of her life
went on unbroken. She formed a
habit of walking out towards the sea
on fine evenings, and sitting on the
pile of stones where she and Jack sal
together for their last talk. Some
times she brought her knitting with
her, but more often she sat watching
the changing color Of the sea, and the
white-wineed vessels passing to and
fro.
It would have surprised her very
much to be told that she was romantic,
yet it is true that when she was not
thinking of her school days with Jack,
or of their shy courtship and brief
spell of happiness, she was weaving
impossible day dreams of how her
father might relent, or how Jack, be,
coming suddenly wealthy and famous,
should come to claim her, with Gre
dentials that even landed proprietor
and a poor-law guardian could not
deny.
It gave the girl curious pang now
and then to be shaken out of her
dreaming by the passing of pair OF
lovers in their evening stroll. She
could not have told why the sight of
this made her own trouble more pres
ent to her, nor why it was so impos-
sible to take up the broken thread of
her reverie. She knew nothing about
self analysis, and could only dry her
eyes and hasten back to the village to
get her fathers supper, hoping the
while he would not notice how the
even red of her cheek had spread over
nose and eyebrow.
Micklethwaite, for his part, was
pleased with his daughters obedience
in his own hard way, and was at no
trouble to consider moods and feel
ings.
Ten years had passed since Jack
Saunders had gone to work at Bing-
hampton, and many changes had come
about. Jack was good workman,
and, after being foreman for three
years, had been taken into partner
Ship by his master. The firm was at
work on some cottages they had built
outside the town as speculation, and
one of these Jack was finishing, for he
was about to be married. He had
only been home once in the ten years,
on FIVE days trip in Whitsun-week,
and then he had not seen Mary, who
was away visiting some cousins. Since
then his parents had died and his con-
nection with Daignton had ceased.
Jack hardly knew himself how his
marriage had come about; it was not
altogether through his own volition.
He had been lodging for some three
years with a widow about ten years
older than himself. She had been
from the first almost embarrassingly
kind to him, and Jack had resented
many of her ways with the impatience
OF man who likes to be independent.
Fate had at last given him helpless
into her hands with an attack of ty-
phoid, and only her unremitting care
had pulled him through.
The doctor was very emphatic to tell
ing him that he owed his life to his
his nurse, and somehow it came to be
understoodthat when he was well again
they should be married. The new
house was nearly ready, and if Jack
fingered little over the final details
it was not from any real reluctance to
fulfil his promise, but because his i'll
ness had left him disinclined to exert
himself more than he could help.
At length, however, the house was
furnished, and Jack awoke one morn
ing, to realize that it was his wedding
day. There was flower in the glass
on the table which he was to wear in
his coat, and his new clothes were
ready on chair, laid there by the
careful hands of the widow. 4 loud,
cheerful voice hailed him from below;
it was the foreman of the works. who
was to be the best man, calling him to
get up.
Downstairs, the parlor was already
being set out with the wedding break
fast and Jack had the kitchen to him