Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1897-01-07
WILNlAY
By Barry Pain.
CHAPTER l.


guardian never opposed him in any
thing, but his friends-of which in
spite of his eccentricities he had many
were indignant. He was leaving
Cambridge in the middle of his career
there and the career had promised to
be brilliant He was going to Queens
land and Queensland is long way
off. | told him if he went there he
might Just as we'll die and on the whole
l should prefer the death. What made
il more irritating, was that he never
gave one solid reason for going TO
Queensland, or even for leaving Eng
hand at all. A mans friends can hard
iy allow him to make fool OF him.
self without providing themselves
some plausible explanation, and ac-
coldingly we said that there was Il
woman in the case. 1t was not a very
satisfactory explanation because We
certainly did not know who the woman
was
At first he wrote to me frequently.
At the end of six months got one
long letter from him of which the first
which he seemed to have been giving
much attention, while the remainder
Of the letter was occupied with a pro-
posal for a new reading in passage
in one of the Agamemnon choruseS
To this letter there was Il postscript;
Il have married" He did not say
whom he had married, or give any
,T,, ,i,,N
and to congratulate, and sent him
silver candleSticks.
He never answered that letter or
acknowledged the present. | had no
further news of him until little more
than a year afterward, when | hap
pened to see in the paper an announce
mept of the death of his wife. | wrote
to express my sympathy, and he never
answered that letter either. made
allowance for his erratic nature, but
my patience was considerably tried.
Years went by, and then one day |
got short note from him:
Dear Edward You never told me
what you thought of that reading in
the Agamemnon which | proposed to
YOU. I wish you would. Do you hap
pen to want to buy-or know of any
body who wants to buy-a quantity of
precious opals?
Try and answer this at once,
Yours ever,
Philip Amory.
To this | replied:
Dear Phil:-Since you first wrote on
the Agamemnon, ! have forgotten my
Greek but without acquiring in its
place any desire to buy opalS or any
knowledge of anyone with that desire.
You have treated me abOminably. and
eccentricty does not excuse YOU. Come
back to England, and will forgive
you but correspondence with You is
hopeless. Yours ever,
Edward Derrimer.
One more year passed, and then one
morning letter was brought me with
the postmark of Ayshurst, little
Buckinghamshire village. 1t ran:
Dear Edward You declined-right-
ly, think-to correspond with me.
My faults rs a correspondent are due
to several causes. I write letters which
| afterwards forget to post. | do not
send news of myself because it is i'm
possible for me 10 realize that people
must be told things about me which
do not require to be told about my
self Also, | have been very busy.
However, you said that if returned to
England you would forgive me, and
have returned | am thirty-two
years old and | have done my roam
ing I shall not leave England again.
have bought Sinden, and settled
here with Wilmay. You remember
that I once told you at Cambridge that
I knew of little spot which l meant
to buy som day That was Sinden-
an Elizabethan house and about forty
acres of freehold. The garden is a
dream. Wilmay and ! want you to
come down tomorrow and stay for any
period not less than one lunar month.
For the sake of old times come, and
bring my absoluton with you
Yours ever
Philip Amory.
P. S. Wilmay is the child Now
that's a case in point. How was ! to
realize that you require to be told
that. when l never required to be told
it myself.
hesitated, but the appeal 10 old
times decided me. | wrote him long
letter, abused him for all his little
failings, and said that | would most
certainly come on the morrow and my
train would arrive at seven in the
evening
evening
As l stood on the platform, watch
ing the receding train that l had just
missed, l suppose that felt and spoke
like an angry man, for the porter mild
ly suggested that it was not his fault
and that he did not make the trains,
How long is it to the next? Half
an hour?'
until the morrow rather than dis'ocata
my hosts dinner-hour But my bag
was packed, and il did not seem worth
while to go back after had orce