The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1898-08-02
A WAR STORY.

grandchildren that had assembled to cele-
brate his sixtieth birthday. Yielding to
the clamorous entreaties of more than
dozen young voices, the veteran slowly pro-
ceeded:
''When enlisted, thought I'd go and
say goodby to DIR. Ailler's daughter. I
was only common farmer, and she had
another beau, student at Amherst, but
remembered once at a party when she
had to choose a partner she selected me in
stead of Jim, so I thought I'd go and tell
her was off for Dixie in the morning.
didn't stay long, for Jim was there.
Martha went with me out to the gate.
reached out my big sunburned hand, and
she took it in both her own and held it
quite a bit, and she said: Bonnie, I'm
sorry you're going to the war. You're too
young man and too good man to stand
up and be shot at. Then Jim appeared
on the scene, and I went away half ours
ing my honest hand for being so big and
so brown, while Jim's was as white as a
lily, with a great flashing diamond on the
smallest of his slender fingers.
"Talk about standing up as target for
bullets That's nothing, nothing at all
compared with lying down to starve in a
foul prison. As the days passed into weeks
and the weeks, SO long, into months SO
much longer that 1 lost all count, how
many and many a time looked at my
white, bony hands and wished they were
as big and as tanned as they used TO be, and
when would have prayed for an ending
of my misery, how well I remembered
that Martha had said was too young to
die, and the way she had held my band
still thrilled me and kept me alive, and
said over and over to myself thousand
times, with grim determination, what DR..
Miller had so often repeated, While there
is life there is hope, and at last 1 was ex-
ohaTcrod and 6iScharcrad oh hnvy
I was to be set freel did not regain my
freedom with a SIGH like the poor pris-
oner of Chillon, but with a great joy that
buoyed me up for the long, weary journey
home and enabled me to assist others who
were still weaker.
"When at last the stage set me down in
the familiar village postofice, I was so
weary and wasted no one seemed to recog
nize me, but looked at me in plying
way I could not understand, and so did
not speak to any one, but staggered down
the hill to the old farmhouse, trying in
vain to scent the supper or the Glove pinks.
I did not know my precious mother had
been dead almost a year, but when
reached the gate I felt the change. 1t
hung by ono hinge and swayed and creak-
ed with a dismal sound that seemed to me
like the grOaning of a ghost. 1t weakened
me so that had to rest awhile before go
ing down the long walk, still lined by my
mothers flower beds But, oh, how neg
lected they Iookedl AS I neared the porch
saw red calf tied to a lilac bush, one
that my mother had herself planted on the
day she was bride, and then seemed to
know that she was gone. War kills wom-
en- as well as men. She thought her only
boy was dead, and she had nothing to live
for-nothing but an empty home.
''That was too good a house to be long
unoccupied, and DR.. Miller had rented it
to a needy family of foreigners, requesting
that my room should be left just as my
mother had last arranged it.
"Oh, how had cheered myself with a
picture of that waiting tea tablet But
didn't drop down into my accustomed
place, for even the table had been moved
into the little overcrowded kitchen, and
the robust woman who did her best to
serve me could not understand my simple
language, but she did comprehend my sor-
row and WEAKNESS and bitter disappoint-
ment, and after 1 had taken a glass of
milk she allowed me to go right up to my
own airy chamber, where everything was
sacredly familiar. How deliciously soft
and clean the bed seemed, and cried my
self to sleep like a tired homesick baby.
1.-THE first thing heard in the morning
was not the chirping of the robins, as in
the olden time, but the loud bawling of
that steer calf under my window. I COW
cred my head with the bedclothes and was
the poor, weak baby over again. When
awoke later in the day, good DR.. Miller
was sitting by my bedside. He helped me
dress and took me home to breakfast,
where the talking as well as the cooking
was all United States, but somehow I
wasn't hungry and longed to ask what
had become of Martha.
81 soon found out. Her father was go
ing to Holyoke the next day to hear her
valedictory, and he took me along with
him. 1t was a long drive, but we took it
slow and eaSv and had my fiji of fresh
air and recovered my appetite. We were
a little late to the exhibition and found
the chapel already crowded, but the good
doctor finally succeeded in getting a seat
well up in 'front.' and there, right before
US, was Amherst Jim, just as slim and
white as ever. He Fingered his watch chain
and petted his mustache and made his
diamond glisten and devoured the plat
form with his eyes, just as he used to in
the old red schOOlhOuse when Martha was
going to speak her piece. Now he was a
full f1edged physician and DR.. Miller's
partner. We had long time to wait. The
essays were lengthy and learned, and
Martha was the last. The other gradu-
ates wore white, but she all in black,
with a Grape collar. looked questioning
ly into her fathers face. He put his arm
around me and whispered, She wears
mourning for your mOther-and for you
For my mother and for mech, the
pain of It'll Oh, the joy of It'll And whether
it was the pain or the joy, or the crowded
room, or the way Jim looked at Martha, I
cannot tell, but somehow everything slip
ped away into nothingness.
when 1 came back to consciousness,
the folks were all gone, all but DR.. Miller
and his daughter, and Martha was holding
me as handy as she is holding that blessed
baby now, and I was just as quiet and
submissive.
"Martha's children are my children
Her grandchildren are all mine, too, and