The Van Buren press. [volume] (Van Buren, Ark.) 1859-1914, 1898-06-25
HrTHERE! It's stopped" announced


serene summer air and the dismal toll
ing ceased.
What did you make it?' asked her
daughter, lowering her voice TO an I'M
dertone, as if in Difference to the dead,
whomsoever it might be. 81 counted
SCI
$50 did |. And | warrant It's Amelia
Thacker. She was So last May. ! re-
member because her and Brother Seth
was just of an age, and Seth he came
So the 1st of June. Well, if it's Amelia,
her passing beyond is in some ways a
blessed release. She's been a dread
full sufferer of late years, and Thomas
he's been sufferer, too-in conse-
quence, you might say"
Mother" said Elizabeth, rising and
folding the napkin she had been darn
ing into an accurate square, "Dr
Bradley told me Amelia Thacker hadn't
a living thing the matter with her ex-
cepting whimsey. He said she was as
sound as a nut, but that her magma
ton had dropsy and she'd ought to be
tapped-hard. He said if Thomas
would do it just once-real thorough
it would be better for all concerned"
Mrs. Field drew her eyebrows togeth.
er in frown of disapproval.
81 don't want you should talk like
that, Elizabeth" she said. "Dr. Brad
ley hadn't ought to say such things &c
you, even If you are engaged to him
1t amt professional. And don't yor
repeat it. l wouldn't like you should
have circulated such a report when
Amelia was alive, and now she's dead
it would be twice as bad"
"Oh, Willard didn't mean anything
He was always as patient and kind as
could be to Mrs. Thacker, and never
complained no matter how often she
had him routed out of bed nights te
come and pacify her when she'd
dreamed a new symptom. But he does
feel awfully sorry for Mr.. Thacker
He says his ailment is genuine. A real
case of modification. Willard says il
often sets in after a fracture, and
Amelia's broken Thomas spirit, and
now he has psychic gangrene." She
laughed softly as she spoke, and laid
the folded napkin neatly beneath the
others in its pile in the linen press
going thereafter to her own room tc
make ready for her lover, who was tc
call and take her with him on his round
of afternoon visits. 1t was a diversion
whereof she was very fond; the doctor
called it playing hitching post"
She was glad to get out into the fra.
grant country air; glad to be in the
light top buggy with Willard beside
her. Death seemed far off and vague
and impersonal, like the distant clouds
that she saw shelving the horizon and
that carried no threat of storm in their
placid bosoms. The things that seemed
near and real were the calmness and
serenity Of the summer day-the soft.
ness of the air, the Pickering of the
shadows, the wistful sound of the bird
notes from meadow and branch and
the sense of her own immediate happi
ness-so close, so complete, so las il
seemed to her) immutable. Her deli.
cate prettiness was illuminated by he1
inner content until she glowed like q
beautiful, sunlit flower.
As they passed the prim, fast-shut'
tered Thacker place she lowered her
voice and her face grew grave, but
when they had been carried out of sight
and hearing her eyes began to shine
again, and she could not keep her lips
from smiling.
Poor Thomasl" she said; "well
never see him again sitting at the sew
ing machine with Amelia standing oveI
him to see that he stitched her seams
straight. How she used to make him
run that machine I never passed the
house but there he was sitting, tread
ing away as if his life depended on it
| always used to want to stop and say
something cheerful to him, he looked
so down-hearted and sad. But of course
| knew better Don't you suppose he
would have broken down and cried
Willard, if anyone had let on they saw
him?"
The young doctor flourished his whip
over the horses back to scatter the
flies before he replied.
81 don't know; I'm afraid so. He is
very highly-organized, and the inees-
SAINT humiliation of his position has
worked on his mind until he is scarcely
in a normal state. l suppose no man
would relish being turned into semp-
stress because his wife had freak that
she couldn't run a sewing machine
But a robuster nature would perhaps
have taken it with better grace and
put a laughing face on it. Thomas may
be aware that he's not very virile al
best, and when Amelia put him at the
sewing machine, and, what's more, kept
him at it, l presume he felt it was a
scorching reflection on his effeminacy
"a public testimony to his inferiority.'
They drove on between fragrant
hedges, down leafy arcades and
through shaded lanes, stopping here
and there before this trim garden OF
that, until, at last, the list of visits was
complete and the doctors daily duty
done.
The sun was setting as they passed
the Thacker house on their homeward
way, and though Elizabeth peeped curl
ously back as they went by she did not
see behind the close-drawn blinds the
eager face of Thomas peering out al
them from between the narrow Stats.
He was sitting in the living-room, ii
the very spot where for SO many years
be had writhed under the task imposed
upon him by his iron-willed wife. But