The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1896-01-28
nrrIoN $3.50 pEn yGAR.
A POSTPONED PILGRIMAGE.
px 4 e. HAMILTON.

DIR. Rutledge hitched his horse I'm
front OF his gate and looked out over
the roofs OF the village with an ex-
Jpression that 10 one in Ell Campo had
ever 9 him wear before. His eyes
were bright, his figure erect, the very
brim OF his soft felt hat, which usually
dropped 80 despOndently, had straight
tened itself out. He looked ten years
younger than before, and he felt like
q boy. As he walked up the gravelly
path to the house he stopped, as he
would have done years ago, to pick q
rosebud for his b~uttonhole before he
entered the house where his Mary
for forty years but she was still his
sweetheart, and this morning he
thought the rose especially appro-
PIRATE.
"MaryW he said, as he thrust his
head in at the sitting room door. But
Mary was in the kitchen, intending q
muchworn coat and making the most
OF the yellow March sunshine which,
In her provident eyes, ought to serve
for frewood in California. She was a
woman of the New England type,
spare and sallow, with gray eyes and
thin, soft hair, brushed carefully back
from q broad forehead. Years ago she
had been pretty, but time and care
anu many disappointments had long
since withered her girlish grace, and
had left in its stead the marks of
patient strength, sweet and gentle, yet
almost stern. She had lived for her
husband and, through him, for her
children; but, with the se%lf-suppres-
sion of which New England women
are often capable, she had hidden from
them the depths OF her tenderness
for TOP much loving Is a weakness
which Puritanism puts akin to sin.
AS h looked up now from the gar
ment on which she was putting the last
patient stitches, she caught the glow
OF the crimson rose on her husbands
faded coat, saw the new light in his
face, and dropped her hands instinc-
lively into her lap.
Henry J" she cred, wonderingly.
Henry walked straight up to her,
took her face in his hands, and, look
ing down into the clear gray eyes, he
said: We're going on iii wedding
journey"
Their wedding journey |! Too poor
to take n whom they were married,
i1had been the will-o-the-wisp delight
to which they had looked forward ever
since.
SuddenlySturning from his wife, the
doctor stretched out his long, thin
arms and began slowly cavorting
around the table with a queer, grotes-
: que sort OF prance which was the
nearest approach to a dance step Of
which his early education had made
him capable, humming all the while
q curious medley of We're going
be joyful, joyful" in want of anything
more secular to express his feelings.
sob, what o song" cried his wife.
Have you forgotten you were sixty
eight years old last December ?"
81 know it," answered Henry, still
continuing his evolutions. "And l
should be as well satisfied if it had
been @ hundred and sixty-eight-
provided we could have spent all those
years together !" and he gave her d
bow of %schoolboy aw~kwardness.
"Henry Those are sacred hymns
that you are singing (; and you look like
q windmill Sit kown and tell me what
you mean"
The withered cheek had flushed and
the gray eyes looked expectantly
happy. Slowly Henry drew In his
sails, doubled up his long legs anu
dropped himself on the carpeted box
which served as an ottoman at her
feet.
Nothing to tell" he answered,
with a provoking GOODNESS that he had
not shown for years. nothing, only
athat we are going. Where shah it
be Z"
cit will be nowhere, unless you tell
me what you mean" she said, putting
her hands on his shoulders and look
Ing at him sternly.
why, haven't you guessed? Where
are your feminie intuition's The
Duarte estate is settled up, and / have
. their check for two hundred dollars
right here" and he tapped his breast
pooKet with an important air. "Now,
whore shall it bep To the beach-a
few days at the Coronado, say-or up
to San FranciscO-or where 2"
We couldn't go home ?" whispered
Mary, with q wistful look.
TIL doctor sobered instantly.
"Home" had never been in California
to Mary, although during the twenty
years of life there she had uttered no
word of complaint. Often, as she sat
In the doorway, looking out through
the twilight toward the East, her
husband had caught the longing look
In her eyes and had known, with a
bitter and helpless pain, that his
health was being bought at a high
price.
go home?p he repeated, relapsing
into his usual grave manner and old
fashioned phraseology. eve GER
tainly could return to Massachusetts,
wife, and 1 have no doubt that it is
the best and most e~xpedient thing to
do. Tourist tickets can be had for
ninety eight dollars, ! believe, and we
can save up money to take us around
when we get there"
"Oh yes, we u save" she MUIR
INJURED.
And so it happened that the "wed-
ding trip" was decided upon, and that
the weeks OF preparation and of
simple, happy anticipation commenced.
There were many long and serious dis
cussions as to the route they should take
and the places and people they should
visit. Each familiar name brought
up scores of recollections, aud the two
old people talked and laughed over
their early days with bright faces and
light hearts. Sometimes their happi-
ness seemed too great to be spoken,
and they would sit and look into each
others faded eyes with o smile that |
was glad and yet weighted with a
pitiful memory of the sorrows they
had shared together sometimes they |
would break into quiet laughter with
out having any visible reason for such
q demonstration and altogether, as
Mary said, they " acted very child
1sh." Aud yoC, to stand once more In
che old, familiar places, to lift their
eyes again to the well-known hills, to
talk with the friends of other days
old family friends whom their fathers
had known and h~onored-to worship