Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1900-02-28
CHAPTER III.
WAS 1T A GHOST

| uOuI
With q sense Of fright and recreancy
impelling him, Tom Broxton deserted
his bed ut bound, to stand, dazed and
trembling, amid the familiar surround
ings Of his own bedroom.
Had he dreamed the utterance, OF
had the reproach been whispered into
his slumber dulled ears by voice of
mortal or spirit? He passed his hand
rapidly over his bewildered brow and
tried to pierce the encircling gloom
with startled eyes. Was it part of
his hallucination that the gloom in
creased as he stood and stared?
A dim, faint radiance seemed to re-
cede slowly from him, leaving his cham
ber in the absolute darkness that had
enshrined it when he retired. Present
ly everything came back to him-the
utter weariness that had overtakeD
him when the minister's monotonous
droning Of his fathers summarized
merits had come to an end; his sicken-
ing sense of the futility Of all the
wordy condolences pressed upon his
shrinking ears; his longing to be alone
and in utter darkness, alone with his
grief, yelled by friendly darkness; his
| turning away with sense Of dismal
relief from the nelghbor crowded par
lors and halls, conscious Of having paid
the last outward show of respect to the
only friend the world held for him.
Even Olivia Matthews had been an
unwelcome intruder upon his solitude
when, with a sweet womanliness that
quantity crowned her childish head,
she had followed him up stairs with a
motherly injunction about not sleeping
in a draft and had placed on q table
by his bedside the cup Of tea she had
brought him herself. Ollie was not
much given to serving others, and even
In his exquisite anguish Tom realized
this unusual element in her lowering
attitude.
Had he ever shown her the grace Of
word of thanks? He could not recol-
lect. The awful irrevocableness Of his
loss, the terrifying stretch Of his COM
panionless future, had swallowed up
thought for anything else.
A portrait Of his father stood on an
easel in one corner of his room. He
had knelt before it as soon as Ollie
had left him and communicated the de-
sire of his lonely young heart to the ia
ther who had been father, mother,
sister and brother to him.
81 should like so to carry out your
slightest wishes about everything, ia
ther, If only you had waited for my
coming. If it Is permitted the angels to
stoop to poor mortality, guide me still,
so that may not miss the turning in
the road that shall finally bring you
and me together again"
That had been his last thought be-
fore falling into sleep Of utter ex-
haustion. 1t was his first recurrent
one as he stood pondering his sudden
awakening. The easel that held his IA
theirs portrait was hidden from him by
the tall footboard Of his heavy four
posted bedstead. How long he had
slept he could not compute.
On retiring he had topped his bed
room candle with the extinguisher and
had excluded every ray Of light from
the moon flooded world by drawing
the heavy brocatelle curtains. His eye
balls were hot and swollen with the
tears that lay too deep to moisten his
dry lids.
In the first second Of his startled
awakening be did not speculate upon
the dim light that pervaded his large
room briefly nor upon its gradual with
drawal. He was wide awake now and
self reproachful. He had fully meant
only to take a short, needful rest be-
fore joining the watchers down stairs.
He had thrown himself upon his bed
half dressed. He lighted his candle
now and passed beyond the high
carved footboard. He would look once
more upon the dear, familiar face from
which he had drawn strength and in
spiration all the days Of his short life.
Conscience smote him for a coward.
He had purposely turned himself on
retiring so that he should not see even
the pointed tips Of the easel that held
the portrait.
Death Is very awe inspiring to the
young and the lusty. The revolt against
it is natural and strong. 1t is only as
we grow older and the prizes we have
failed to grasp show their tinsel side
that we come to think of the great
Mower and his personal attitude with
friendly tolerance born of sense of
the inevitable.
The boys at Andover college would
have stared and perhaps protested to
hear Tom BroXtoD called a coward.
Among his fellows he was esteemed
one who was not provoker of quar-.
rels, but quite incapable Of quailing in
the face Of danger.
And yet with his first glance toward
the easel that held his fathers portrait
he recoiled with an audible cry of ter
ror, but only for second. Then he
advanced resolutely toward it.
The easel was not as it had been when
he fell asleep. Dropping over the
broad, calm brow of the pictured face
it held was bunch of white cosmos
flowers precariously clinging to the
frame of the portrait by Il twisted stem
or two. Tom touched the flowers with
q skeptic finger. Were they real or
part of his troubled fancy? They fell
to the floor at his touch, and from
about the green stems twisted paper
uncoiled in their descent. He stopped
and picked the paper up.
Some one of his many kindly inten-