Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1896-10-17

and we were unable to give her the cue
Poor, good Christian soul. She played
the piano as she did everything else, as
her conscience babe her, just the best
she knew how. So after Miss Matilda
had given us the Turkish Retreat"
the wellington Boots Quickstep," and
other carefully rendered selections,
Helen and could do 70 less. We thun-
dered at Bach and trilled at Chopin in
the best conservatory style we had been
taught and snickered in our sleeves
(they were wide then, too, my dears,
but at the bottoy and not the top).
How Cousin Ynn gaped. l actually
thought the mans eyes would pop out
of his head.
Then we made him play. He had to
be almost dragged to the piano this
time, but we were eager and curious to
see him 60 through with his little jigs
and reels again after our old masters.
So Cousin Linn took his seat at the
instrument. Somehow, as he sat there
idly lingering the keys for moment,
the stoop went out of his back and the
dull look faded from his eyes, and he
seemed almost handsome
Suddenly he threw his head back like
a warhorse and struck chord. never
heard q like sound come from Miss
Craig's old piano or any other. Grand
and full and sweet, it sounded in the
ears of our guilty consciences like the
trump of doom. Again he struck the
keys, and we felt that if it had not been
for the expense and trouble to poor Miss
Craig we would have liked then and
there to sink through her best parlor
carpet.
Then our cousin flung back his long
hair and started off in earnest. What it
was he played have never known, but
if it be possible to crowd more runs,
cadenzas, shakes, arpeggios and other
tests of technique into one piece of mu-
sic have never heard that piece. The
music seemed to flow from him like a
river, and it was pleasure to watch the
swift and easy movements of his fingers
With hardly pause and never look
from the player at his two shamefaced
auditors, the tones of tho piano drifted
from the grand to the light and airy,
from the classic to the modern, and
finally into soft and dreamy adagio
that brought tears to the eyes that had
just now before beamed with the laugh
ter of mischief.
And all the while poor little Miss
never dreamed what tempest of re-
morse she had stirred up in two hearts.
Well, remorse meant repentance, and
repentance meant reparation.
'We must take him back everywhere
and show what he can really do" said
Sister Helen as she fingered behind
with me at Craig's gate, pretending to
fasten my sash.
So back we went. Our faces, long
as the shadows of the falling even
ing, told every girl friend that
something was wrong, and when we
had played and they had played and
Cousin Linn had played they knew
what it was. And when we had closed
the last gate and turned homeward we
were two sad and conscience stricken
girls and one silent and solemn man.
But as we neared the house Cousin
Linn's downcast eyes began slowly to
tu1n toward us, and as they fell upon
our woebegone countenances the pre-
ternaturally grave lines went out of his
face like dissolving view in stereop-
ticon, and he fell down-the man actu-
ally fell fiat down in a fit.
And we solemnly picked up our skirts
and left him there groveling in a con-
vulsion of laughter that scared the birds
from every tree i'll the block.
Cousin Linn came again to the house
many times afterward. He often played
for us. but the painful subject was
never referred to. We did not con-
slider him awkward any more. In
fact, was beginning to think him
quite handsome when one day l came
unobserved into the garden, where he
and Helen sat, and heard her ask for
the first time his forgiveness for the
trick that had recoiled so shamefuIly
upon us.
1 thought the man would fall into
one Of his hateful fits and turned to go,
lut he only bent over her and whis-
pered his reply, while 1 stole back
through the trees to the house.
So the end of it all was that had a
new cousin, and though she is three or
four times removed, to this day love
her well, for she is my sister Helen. -
Cincinnati Pest.