The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1898-01-30

coming And as the breath left her lip,
with the words, Miss Rhody declared
she saw as plainly as she ever saw any
thing in her life that girl with the sweet
brier. in one light lovely as youth and
JOY. in another with the look of age that
Sallys little grandmother had-saw, too
that cloud of cherub, faces wall 81
them. like roses thick upon a COLDER
trcliS. before Sally's desOlatc wai
brought her back to pain and grief and
her consOling work again. For Sally he
lieved that Rhody saw it all, and grieved
that she was not good enough to see il
herself She was bereft; but looking al
Humphrey she did not grieye for Polly
Ann did for always go to sea with her
husband. When she did, she left the
key of their house with Miss Rhody
who was to go in and air it once ina
while. 1t was aired much more fire.
0uently than need was-there seemed to
Rhody much danger Of the portrait !
getting mouldy or widowed or some
thing. Rhody used to let the sun IN
and gaze on it, those days, with a for
getful rapture. And the voyages when
Ann remained at home it went hard with
Rhody If she did not get in to see Ann
and the picture-every afternoon for just
a moment or two. And in the nights of
her sick watching she used to find q
window where she could look out at the
stars and wonder if Will saw them,
too. and If he was thinking OF the shore
and Of Ann and of her, perhaps, also.
And when down at the port the bark
came I'm safe and sound. she had re-
newed assurance that the world was
ltrr1f
ness and a sweetness in fine air, there
was a sort of sunshine even on rainy
day. and she thanked heaven for her
lot. and felt that there were few more
blessed among women than she, with
her home to go to, with the children
that were hers almost as much as they
were their mothers, with her work and
her friends.
But one voyage the bark did not come
back A typhoon swept the Indian seas.
and the bones of the Man o Null were
strewn from Celebes TO Malabar And
as for Will Mather no one knows where
his grave is to this day.
When the loss was a definite thing to
the underwriters, Ann received her III
surance money, tidy little sum for
her small way of life, and she put on
NJ
again. and a brisk and busy body, she
took her pleasure with her neighhors as
she had always done. If her wash was
out before Mrs. Burns whitened the yard
behind, if her baked beans were pro-
nounced one atom crisper than Mrs.
Dennis. if the recipe for her rule of
fruit cake was in demand, If she had
cherry tonic and jellies to send to the
ailing, if her house cleaning was over
the first along the shore, if her best
black silk would stand alone. if she
knew AID that was going on, and keep
ing one eye ON Sally Layendars door
for the last news of Humphrey and his
odd behavior, and another eye ON the
ton in Ivy Hodges admiration Of her
village, she was content enough, and
after a while Ann was not at oil I'M
happy, and even had mild satisfac-
ton in Try Hodges admiration of her
still buXOn beauty.
But it was much longer time before
Miss Rhody would accept the fact of
Will Mather's loss. He had been so full
of life and vigor she could never make
him dead. She was always expecting
to see him step down from the coach
every time it came numbering along
from port She did not see Il strange
boat in the stream along the shore but
she Thought it might hold Will. Every
time she ram over to AIMS she hoped
to hear a great voice roaring out a well
come; and when that failed to sound
she still had time to hope Ann had had
n letter saying he had been wrecked on
desert shores and was now on his way
hpme again. Her dreams We're all of
this. Now she saw him struggling with
might and storm in the black seas, now
wandering forloTn among sctrange folk
of strange tongue, now cast on barren
places and watching feverishly the gleam
OF a sail upon the sky line, and every
dream Il misery and chiefly a misery
because the atmosphere Of power with
which Win had always been clothed in
her mind was wanting there. But ON
the other hand, her day dreams We're q
joy In them, as she went about her
nursing, as she washed the newly born
or stroked the newly dead, as she sat at
home sewing in her parlor, VIII was al
ways returning, after multitudinous
deep+sea adventures; she saw him hur-
rying up the road and entering to Ann
big and bronzed and full Of glad ex-
pectation, and although she varied the
dream q Thousand ways, it was always
the same drean-Will Matller coming
home.
You may judge then of her dif may