Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1895-09-11


There we're two great apartment house
opposite each other, with the constant
roar and jerk of the elevated roat
lying between. Workmen had beeI
coming and going upon a third
tall white building on an opposit,
corner, with An empty lot lying sd.
jacent, and boys of his own age hac
been playing in there, playing all sort
of tantalizing games, ever since viii
bur Clint had moved into the fiftl
lat.
He used to stand at the window il
his nightgown and look at them. He
wore his nishtgown half the day some
times, because it seemed SO senseles
to dress himself when he could not &c
ont. His mama gave him his bath and
tucked him into bed at night, and
then in the morning, long before he
WAS up, she took the elevated and
went away down town to q magazine
Office where she read stories which
other people wrote, and patiently
sealed them up again and sent then
back to the writer's.
Sometimes her heart used to ach,
at the old fashioned, provincial views
of life which SO many of the stories
showed. When Wilbur's mamma, sit
ting there at her desk, in her neat
black gown, hesitsted over q page OF
spidery writing and smiled a little al
the corners of her mouth, it was a Ger.
tain sign that she had found another
love story, told in ths good old way,
where cruel fate had at last allowed
the lovers to fly into each Others
arms, and they made their exit amid 6
shower of rice to the tune of wedding
>ells, their SORROWS ended forever.
81 do wonder" she said to hersel
As her pen hung over the au-
thor's address she WAS putting
upon one of these manuscripts
one day, chow Mrs ever came
to write such q story as that. Well !
we'll! May be her husband died oil
their honeymoon, poor thing"
One day the editor of the magazine
who was a very busy man indeed,
came into the tiny little room where
his reader sat, and fumbled over some
al about.
Mrs Clint," he said, "are all thu
story writer's getting cynical? What
is the matter? 1t seems to me we
haven't had really cheerful tale TO,
.ix months"
Mrs Clint used to think a great deal
about leI little boy as she went up
and down E n the elevated, and as she
sat by ths lamp and dsrned his little
stocking a, night, or lay with his
curly itti, head upon her arm. She
looked 8. him snriously to see if he
were ge' tipS pale with the confne-
ment. Sho knew that it Was all wrong,
but she knew no other way. A little
lad of five could not be allowed out or
he street by himself.
Sometimes she too saw the bow
playing on the vacant lot where the
builders piled their waste. They used
to take an old tin pail and build fire
in it, and swing it in blazing circle
about them, and then Mrs. Clint would
shudder all over, and make Wilbur
promise that he would never go out
lone.
The flat was little more expensive
than LII Clint could rightly afford,
but sh.s bud taken it because the
janitor's wife was an old acquaintance,
An old servant i'll the boarding house
where Mrs. Clint had lived when she
had frs; come to New York, fresh
country ,-i-l with an ambition to write
for the magazines. She had had a
number II rtories accepted, had done
all sorts II work for syndicates and
newspapers, and had gone to the
theatre with nice, ambitious young
newsp sp>r men, who threw work in
her w., and told her stories of
prominent people and their humble
beginnings. And then finally she had
married one of the most ambitious Of
them, and had gone to Paris with hiu
for year, and had been delightfully."-
happy.
They had gone to all the place,
Ehere artists and writers had dis.
covered the unusual and the pictur-
ssque. They had had little apart
ment up under the roof with a wide,
wide window looking out over all
Paris; and there had been azaleas in
pots on the sill, and gay cushions on
the couch beneath, and young Mrs.
Clint had wondered if there were ever
two people in all this world SO happy
It was here that Wilbur had been
born, and two months later they were
called back to America by the paper
Clint worked for. A Presidential
campaign WAS Just coming on, and .
Worner Ike Clint was needed. It Wa
summer, hot, close summer, and Clin
took his wife and baby down to Lon
island to little town "swept by ocean
breezes," as the pulsing electric
letters at Madison Square announced.
He came down every night when he
could, but there were a great many
things to keep him in town, and he
had to make great many journeys
about the country to hear what party
'eaders had to say about it.
After the close companionship o
this last year, Mrs. Clint missed her
husband terribly. She was little
nervous and impatient, and sometimes
she said so. The hot weather and the
constant strain had worn Clint's own
nerves to rags. And he had never
known how to be soothing. He only
sat by the open window, in his shirt
sleeves, and smoked cigar and looked
at the sea, until Mrs. Clint told him
that cigar smoke would kill the baby.
Then he went down stairs and looked
at the sea from the bow of beached
dory. His wife began to ask why she
couldn't 60 about with him as she used
70 do.
Two people can go anywhere. {"
Clint said, 'but two people and baby
san 90 about nowhere.
And then she told him that she al
ways knew no was staying away be-
cause the BABY bored him. Oh, it
bad al bean . midsummer madness