The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1895-12-11
A TiIQid~
WOnlan'S Trial.
Surprising Interruption in a
Life of Monotony.
BY OCTAVE THANET.
CHAPTER I.

like. that IN all tne auCuInQS Oh JuQltn
Crest's life. The last day she went
out to o little knoll edged by sycamore
trees, only to gaze about the farm for
the sheer Joy OF possession. Yet she
was not used to love the farm; born a
timid and gregarious soul, she was op-
pressed by solitude. For twenty-five
years that long hedge Of poplars had
looked to her as she fancied prison
stockade might look to convict. Her
eyes wearied Of the billowy levels,
tossing like an ocean ABOUT the trim
four-roomed house and huge, unpainted
barns; they wearied Of the dusty cur
rant bushes and the unfruitful orchard.
Most Of all they wearied OF the one
everlasting, relentless face Of nature.
Therefore she spent hours daily nurs-
ing pitiful little show Of flowers such
as had grown in the moist seashore gar
dens of her youth, and wilted under
the fierce Iowa summers. Indoors,
she cut out pictures from the Illus
trated journals that at rare intervals
came into her hands, and pasted them
on her upholstered walls. She learned
to make paper flowers. She hankered
after the dazzling but unattainable love-
liness Of wax flowers in oval glass cases.
She subscribed to q weekly household
magazine named the Homestead, read
ing, in her hunger for ccMpanionship,
the Correspondence column" wherein
subscribers exchanged impartially their
domestic trials, their, spiritual, wrest-
Ings, the puzzles Of rural etiquette, and
the best fashions of washing blankets or
raising sponge"
Occasionally, In that oft-studied COL
umn, would appear paragraph like
this: Il would like to ask the sister
from Marr il she makes her chocolate
frosting with the whites Of eggs or boils
st, and please send receipt for pre-
venting rabbits gnawing the rosebushes.
1 1922 "LUcETTA.
Or: Il dearly love to get the Home
stead. enjoy all the sisters say. En-
mimic writes most beautifully! Please
write again, Erminie, and let US know
how to bear our crosses in the right
spirit. would be obliged, also, for
remedy how to prevent hair falling. out.
-LUcETTA.
When she read these Mrs. Crest would
blush with pleasure and feel the intoxi-
eating delights Of fame, for she was
Lucetta.
But for most OF the time there was
only work to break the loneliness. To
be sure, there was plenty Of work and
had been all through the twenty-five
years. Joshua, her husband, was a good
farmer, but for long while "unmerciful
disaster followed fast and followed
faster;" once, he had been swept clean
of all save hope b. O cyclone; once, he
had escaped only by a hairsbreadth los
Ing his farm through the fraud Of
friend. ,s t.
Twenty-Five years ago he had said:
''Never mind, Judy, just let me make
few thousand dollars and you shan't
have TO work on the farm. I'll sell out
and buy store in town and be post
master
All his life Joshua had cravel the leis-
urely honors of Office. de, too, was
social; he liked to talk, and he had a
gift for. telling stories. How many
times in the years those two simple
creatures had stocked that store will
not try to count. At first every Sunday
night. They bought book Oh book
keeping and an arithmetic, and 1t was
(but principle would not allow anything
30 like a game on Sunday an exciting
diversion to practice making change
with the numbered counters Of paste
board left by tramping farm hand.
They did not dream that the dingy red
and blue and white disks were no less
than wicked poker chips. Judith hacked
them into the proper sizes and num-
bered them neatly, so that they repre-
sented all the subsidiary coin. By con-
sequence, Mrs. Crest's extraordinary
swiftness and accuracy in changing q
dollar for, say, three dozen eggs at 173
cents q dozen, or three pounds Of butter
at 20 cents pound, were the marvel OF
the Delmar shopkeepers. From coin to
bank notes the transition is easy-in
theory; scarcity Of notes made it less
easy in practice, but by dint Of years
study the pair came to know the look
and feel OF a bank note we'll enough to
enable Joshua to detect a very poor
counterfeit So bill at a county fair.
From that day dated a reputation for
shrewdness that he no more deserved
than he did the gallows.
But the years slowly had dragged
hope and dreams away together. The
little children came; they died, one
after another, and the desolate mother
felt, deep down in her heart, that doc
tor near enough to come daily might
have saved them. Then, when the
keeness of their grief was blunted and
they went for comfort to their old
fancies, time and again their savings
had been wrenched from them. The
man would have given up the fight in
despair, but the woman clung to her
shadowy hopes the more tenaciously.
Finally, their patience and industry
conquered. The great crop Of 1891 had
Increased their savings beyond the
amount necessary to pay of the last in
stallment Of the mortgage; they would
Rctually have some hundreds in money.
Six thousand dollars and over stood to
Joshua Crest's credit at the bank.
@Only," said Judith to Myrou Dwight,
I cayn't help telling kinder scary till
the Sd of October is past and gone.
Myron was considered the cleverest
young man in Delmar or in the county.
He had been to Iowa City to the uni
tersity; he went every year to Chi
cago to buy mis- goods, which added to
his knowledge Of the world and improved
his toilets; he was talked about for the
Legislature. He was to be Joshuas
partner. Myron was almost like son
to Judith. She had loved him, petted
him. prayed for MIN, and no one except
his mother knew so well what things he
liked best 10 eat. Myron's mother was
Judith's best friend-why should Imake
D secret of it?-she was the admired
Erminie Of the Homestead. She was a
widow With this one child, whom she
had educated out Of the proceeds of a
tiny bake shop and an infinite ingenuity.
They lived in Delmar. 70 live in Del