The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1898-04-10


Bother! Why can't get itf'
The light, ringing step ceased fortunate
~ just as Rex gave vexed little stamp
Rex went on walking and singing. Inc
boyish vent to his feelings had renewed
him. His voice rang out exquisltely hlgh
and clear. 1t was like woman s-ilke
his mothers, from whom he bad Inherited
it, and it coniurod up a vision OF her to
her husband, shut in his library anu busy
with papers. Rex stopped again.
''Confound yon You're doing awfully
tonight, - he said, addressing his voice as.
If 1t We're a companion.
His full name was Richard Hamilton
Winsted, but years before--l to be ey-
plicit-his happy mother one day when
her husband laughingly said the baby
ruled the whole house, applied tho name
of kingly meaning to him. 1t was never
given up afterward.
Tho boys life up to tho time of this
story can be briefly sgetchcd. left moth
erless at {, with memories Of lovely face
and tender, breeding care which still lin
gered with her son, who associated her
vaguely with the nladonnas that he saw in
store windows, the boy lived alone with
his father.
Singing was his passion. He was enc
of the leading voices in a famous boy
choir and the best part OF tho year to him
was when tho Easter music was being
learned 1t wanted. but a day before that
great occasion, and all his spare timo at
home was devoted to practice.
Mr.. Hamilton Winsted was an ambi-
tious man. Ho was engaged in paying
though not extensive business. How to
enlarge il had been problem ever since
he had known what u wonderful voice his
boy had Within a few months he Lad
found new object to gain money for in
the promise of second wife. 1t was
handsome girl who had made him this
promise, and his pride amused itself by
fanoying how well she must be attired and
in what style she must live when she be-
came Mrs. Hamilton Winsted She was
quite as good as she was beautiful, and he
instinctively kept from her knowledge
some of the ways in which he was striving
TO grow rich for her sake and the boys.
As it grew later Mr.. Winsted s mind be-
came keener and more alert. The visions
of his promised bride and his son faded to
give place to some new plan of speculation
that suddenly occurred to him. He thought
it all out, aided by calculations on paper.
The sum that might be gained was large,
and his face grew elated with the JOY of
greed. 1t was look that Miss LeoDora
Ellsworth would not have cared to see
there, and it was not softened by any pity
for those who would lose If he won.
But in the hall there was another look
on handsome, boyisb face. Rex had for
gotten that it was past his bedtime. His
countenance, aglow at first with an artists
delight in his art, grew brighter with the
realization of the meaning of what he
sang. 1t was the first time he had entered
so completely into the spirit of his Easter
music, and he rendered it so we'll that
his father BECAME gradually conscious of
the words. The repetitions of the faithful
practice fairly burned the syllables into
his soul:
The day of resurrectioni
Earth, tell it all abroad!
The passover OF gladness,
The passover of Godi
From death to life eternal,
From earth unto the sky,
Our Christ hath brought us over,
With hymns of victory.
So sang the clear soprano that in a few
hours was TO enchant all hearers at Christ
church, and the change of his information
as he rendered the last half of the stanZa
was perfect The listener in that quiet
library began to grow very uneasy. Then
he heard
Our hearts be pure from evil
That we may see Alright
and the rest of those words composed so
long ago by John of Damascus. "Our
hearts be pure from evil, !" sang the boy
again and again, as if some divine impulse
guided him.
mime isn't, !" thought the man. "Mine
isn't. Mine is filled with evil plans to-
night. What am / intending to do? Per-
haps wreck some happy homes perhaps
for it is all a game of chance, though
feel pretty sure of winning perhaps
wreck my own. Then where would my