The Roanoke times. [volume] (Roanoke, Va.) 1890-1895, 1895-04-24
MY CHARMING LODGER.

MY CHARMING LODGER. +;
TO young curatc not long from col
lcGe, and accustomed to home, that
remote Fellside parsonage ut Brigend
was essentially exile, hard enough to
bear if not quito as bad as Siberia.
had no one to whom could fall back
as Il companion. My sister was bound
to remain at home with my mother;
and she and ! composed the family.
For her own part, my mother was too
delicate to undertake the long journey
from London to the north, or to en-
dure the roughness inscparablc from
such place as Brigcnd when she got
there. We were eight miles from n
station, and the road we had to travel
over was more like the dry bed of n
river than civilized highway which
had once been macadamized, and was
presumably still kept in repair by the
ratcpayers and occupiers.
Things being so, and the long au-
tumn evenings daily deepening and
frightening, with the prospect of that
dreary, lonely winter before me, de-
tcrmincd to advertise for some young
man to whom plain living and high
thinking, with plenty of leisure and
little to pay, would be powerful in
duccments to comc-thus sharing while
tightening my solitude, as we'll as
halving, the very moderate expenses of
my housekeeping. Moderate, how
ever, as they were, my exiguous
stipend could barely meet them; and
company in the weekly bills would be
gain.
therefore put into the paper an adj
vcrtisement for paying coInpn Mon,
and in due course received n reply. AS
it was the only one I did receive had
no difficulty in making choice, and
was thus spared both trouble and re-
sponsibility. After the interchange of
Il few letters, setting times and terms,
the die was cast and things were ar
ranged and Montgomery Somerset was
booked to come on October 21-which
day, pace the Thirteen club, 1 we'll re-
member fell on Friday Meanwhile
I undertook to meet him ut the station
with some difficulty securing a fly
for his transit to the parsonage. The
roads were SO bad that few jobmnstcrs
cared to send their cattle along them
Which fact added to the dcsolation of
the place.
Unpunctual as usual, and good half
hour late, the train drew up at the lit
tie Fellside station which served this
desolate tract of country. The one
solitary first-class passenger alightcd,
was pleasantly impressed by his APP
pearance. Tall. good-looling, we'll
dressed, he was also we'll nlanncrcd-in
n way-not wholly SO, but quite passa-
bly,. lie was n tribe nervous, for 1
noticed how sharply he looked about
him, and how rapid but eager the
chances which scanned the car
riages behind his own and the few
loitcrers on the platform. Even Bob
Liant, the stolid old constable of the
district, came in for look which
seemed 10 take him in from his helmet
to his boots. OF the two 1 thought at
the time that Montgomery Somerset
was moro OF detective than our own
local Sherlock Holmes, and more like
~ to track criminal and hunt him
down. BE Shat. however, rs it may, in
n short time we were both seated in
the ratt.c-t.ap old shandrydan, which
was all that Fellside had to offer, and
jolting over tho dry watcrcourse to the
isolation of Brigend.
As tho days passed by had cause to
congratulate myself on my good for
tune; though. indeed, it was so good as
to make me wonder how it ever came
about. My lodger was simply charm
ing, always good-bumorcd, complaisant,
contcntcd. lie was not, perhaps, so
we'll educated as might have been ex-
pectcd, and knew less thnn an ordinary
gentleman of classics, ma the MATES and
the rest of the subjects known as of
course to educated mon. In fact, he
knew nothing at all of these things.
and his reading was not above the
average ot schoolboy's laundering
pronounciat:cn. lie explained this by
saying that nc had never been sent to
any good schoolat least not for long
together. Ills fnthcr had been In the
army: he vas the only child, and pa
rental love had got the better of pa
rental foresight. fo- neither father nor
mother would part with him. Hence
his education hnd been dcsultory-and
he had learned nothing from the root
upward. having forgotten, indeed, all
that nc had ever acquired. AS he was
anxious to know moro than he did, his
ignorance was not SO much Il bar ricr as
spur, ard we passed the long even
ings i'll study, which l strovc to make
rs interesting and little irksomc as
could.
Meanwhile, was glad to see how,
Under the regular regime and brisk
Fe..side air, my lodger's nervousness
gradually subsidized, and he became less