El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1900-08-09
C:::
z HE RECOVERED
|. HIS HEALTH. .

|
by to the office force and went into the
country for two weeks summer vacation
his numerous friends nodded to each 9TH
| er and remarked that it was about time
that popular young man got away from
work and worry, for of late he had grown
thin and white and was looking fairly
wretched.
1t was a quiet, old fashioned little
farmhouse where the health seeking
young man finally decided to stop, with a
motherly little woman who had 'seen bet
ter days" in charge and with acres of
sloping lands and rich fields rolling away
from it in every direction, while mead
| ows of waving grass wound through by
gurgling brooks and inhabited only by
| birds and little animals Of every descrip-
| ton stretched far away back Of the low,
| never painted little home. An ideal spot
the young man thought it the day he
| drove up to the gate to ask for drink of
buttermilk, and an ideal spot he found it
| when, a few hours later, his telescope
trunk and valiSeS were put down in the
clean, best room and he himself en-
sconced there for the holiday. Before
Harold Barnes had become a mere slave
In the mercantile world he had achieved
some little reputation among those who
though the last few years Of his life had
been such as to drive all that sort of thing
out of him, when he found himself settled
In this picturesque old spot there came a
sort of aftermath of his former haryests
In the fields of rhyme and he went to
work again lazily scrawling verses when
ever the fancy struck him. And scrawl-
ing verses being conducive to RETROSPECT
ton, the past began to parade itself be-
fore his mind one day and bring back
great many things he might wish to for
get.
There are very few men of HaroId's
age who have not either had or are at
present going through with a love affair
of some sort or other, and he, being
rather up to date young man, had left
his far behind him. A long train of diff
ferences, misunderstanding and hot
words caused by too little thought on
her part and too much on his had caused
the breach between him and Beatrice
Harland. He had gone bis way in
sort of dazed but determined belief that
she was wrong and he right, and she
had done likewise. When he found that
she did not ask him to come back, he
only plunged deeper into work and tried
to forget, and she plunged deeper into So
ciety and did forgotten the time being.
A few months later her father went west
and soon after sent for his family, and
thus the two who might have been happy
lost sight of each other.
Young Barnes had dreamed of what
might have been for awhile after the es-
arrangement, but only for little while,
and today as he wandered slowly down
the little crooked path leading out into
the cool meadow, with here and there a
sunny spot lighting up the long grass in
to more vivid hues, there was little
thought of regret for the past in his con-
I'll .
tirely, as men are so often accused Of do
ing, he had put away that portion of his
life SO far it did not recur to him until
he reached the gnarled apple tree down
by the brook, quarter of a mile from
the house. Then a sudden flood Of mem
cries came over him, and he stopped
still and gazed before him at the object
that had brought them back.
1t was little white parasol, so like the
which she had sat when the last quarrel
reached its height, that his heart beat
fast and his self possession fed like a
cloud before the sun. The fluffy thing Of
lace and silk, stuck SO jauntily in the
ground near the old tree, drew him on as
a magnet the steel, and before he knew
it he was sitting with his back to the
tree, looking longingly and with mixed
emotions at that emblem of the long ago.
For half an hour he moved not, while
picture after picture of that past came
before his mind. Then the handsome
eyes closed, the pencil and pad Of paper.
with half finished poem on it, dropped
from his hand, and this romantic young
man, who would have scorned to do such
an unromantic thing had he known it,
fell quietly asleep as if his heart had
never been broken by any one.
Ten minutes later he woke to find the
sun beating down on him-but through
the white parasol, which had been care
fully raised and placed where it would in
tercept the hot rays. Red with anger at
himself, he started to his feet, when an
other bit of white silk caught his eye, this
time just on the other side of the tree
where he sat. For a moment he debated
what to do, and then there stole out from
under that white bit of finery still whit
er hand-a hand which he could never
forget, asleep or awake. 1t was the same
little fingers. the same little wrist and the
same little pink palm.
Harold's heart was in his throat, and
the love that had so long lain dormant
sprang to life again in the moment that
followed. Slowly the hand crept toward
the white parasol, and slowly his crept
toward the little one. A moment 1t hest
tated there, and the next his strong,
brown fingers had closed about hers, and
q muff1ed little scream came to his eager
ears.
"Beatrice!" he cried, springing to his
feet and striding around the tree, sis it
you indeed?"
To which very foolish remark she made
no reply at all, though her eyes spoke vol
umes. The ext moment the little white
parasol had urned over and was sailing
cheerily down the meadow before a mer
~ breeze, while it's owner was being
crushed to a certain young mans breast
and hearing all sorts of wild, sweet state
20 int hon