Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1896-12-17

/ nave been better for me to have had :
! rejected than to have been limp enough
! to leave it unfinished all these weeks.
! | have been idle, l am ashamed of
myself. Let US go down to Green
witch, dad, if you are on pleasure bent;
or, rather, if you are bent on giving me
I pleasure. And let US 60 by steamer
and take me into the painted hail and
tell me about Nelson and Greenwich
| hospital as it used to be all the way
! down from poor Nell Gwynne's days
/ to now. You know how I love navel
/ history"
! Had Capt Kelly been more percep-
/ tive or more suspicious he would have
! disCerned that the girl was pratting
/ on in order to divert his attention from
| herself and her sorrow. The singing
| sensation of the first doubt of one best
! loved in the world by her had assaiIed
/ her in a vague and indefinite way. But
in the midst of the maze of bewiIder-
ment and anxiety through which she
had commenced to wander she made an
effort to spare her stepfather the pain
! of compromising and syEpathizing
with her.
/ The atmosphere of the bright May
I day helped her. The busy river scenes
and the hungry, noisy, holiday people
who crowded the steamer and seemed
TO be afflicted with an unquenchabIe
thirst diverted her mind from the
shapeless trouble that had loomed over
her spirit for awhile Nor did the
clouds gather again when they left the
/ merrymakers in the innumerable tea
houses that offer their irresistible at
fractions on the ways between the pier
and Blackheath and the park. For in
the latter the venerable hawthorn trees
were thickly laden with their white
! and pink nutty perfumed blossoms and
| the scents of the lime trees were watt
ed in upon them from the fine old
avenue which runs along outside the
park wall from the top of Cro0ms hill
to the heart of the heath. To the girl
who seldom strayed beyond the pre-
Cincts of PaddingtOn it seemed as re-
freshing q thing to explore the cock
neys rural paradise as if it had been
! the read country and in her perfect ap-
probation of that freshness, the beau
ty and the novelty Of it, all her doubt
and anxiety faded rapidly until their
proportions seemed so petty that she
was ashamed of having allowed them
to shadow her for an instant.
Then their little dinner at the Ship
was quite a stirring event in her
hitherto uneventful life. That wonder-
full dinner at which it appeared to her
that every fish that SWAN in the sea
was served in half a dozen different
guises. 1t is true that her thoughts
never f1uctuated far from ShOlto and
( REQUIRED to him constantly both while
she was inhaling the fragrance of the
lines and hawthorns and while she
was eating whitehall. But though she
wished for his presence and longed to
hear the sound of the voice that made
the sweetest music the world held for
her ears she had no sore or sad feeling
about his presence. He was doing right
she felt sure, in stayinq with the good
kind aunt who had just parted with the
oirl who had been as a daughte~ to her.
F W." Dol 2 rig and n thoughtful
',~ya fpr oilers endeared him more to
her
Eve must have another day here,
papa when Sholto comes back" she
said, when the dinner was over and
they were starting for the station.
CAY, ay, we will, and will invite his
I sister to come with u.s. It will be
! something of a treat to the young
/ Scotch lady. They have no Green
wich hospital or whitehall dinners like
this in Edinburgh Capt. Kelly said,
with calm confidence in the superiority
of the grand old naval palace that
fronts the river so proudly.
But the mention of Lady Gwenap
reused no enthusiasm in Patrice.
In little sitting-room in Chichester
street another woman was going
through a terrible torture of doubt and
anxiety during the hours of that hol1-
day which Patrice passed in Green
witch.
Ned Thorburn had got the post of
/ special correspondence at the seat of
war, and his mother had to cover the
pain of parting with him and the
/
prospect of the dangers by which he
must inevitably be surrounded before
she could possibly see him again. Her
nerves had been weakened and her
courage of heart had been cowed by
q long course of ill-health, of poverty
and enforced idleness. Ten years ago
she had BEEN the handsome hearty,
mistress of a prosperous, handsomely
appointed home. But the demon or
I speculation had tempted her husband
and he had succumbed to the tempta-
/ ton. When everything was lost he
could not face the ruin but he faced
death instead leaving the burden to
be borne on the shoulders Of his hand
some, high-spirited son.
The lad proved himself equal to the
task
How hard that task had been at
times no one but himself knew, for he
was man who only spoke Of his suc-
cesses, never of his failures. His great
object in life up to within the last few
months had been to make enough to
keep his sister at home and spare her
the necessity of doing anything be-
sides tightening their mothers days.
Now it seemed as if the sun Of success
was going to shine on him benet1cently.
The post for which he had craved was
his and he was to be richly paid for
filling it. But one Of the motives