River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1901-02-21

| some action, so she gave reluctant
| consent, stipulating, however, that the
masquerade was 10 be an unostenta-
tious one, and that its sanction on her
part was to be of an entirely tacit
character,
"Bemember," cried Graysop, clad in
hickory shirt and blue jeans, as he
gayly drove out of the farmyard gate,
remember, my name is John"
IT.
There was a bit Of the desolate in
the scene at the backwoods station
that night when the train which had
! borne Miss Celia Dorchester thither
glided down the long snaky track
! toward civilization, leaving behind it
trail of black curling smoke out of
| the engines smokestack -emblematic
Of woe and loneliness.
The seven big trunks were side by
| side on the platform. and, in the fad
| ing dusk, Miss Dorchester could just
| discern a look of anxiety on the face
| of the man who had come to meet
her; an anxiety which had its origin
| in a mental endeavor to determine
! the best mode and means of trans
ferring the appalling accumulation of
luggage TO the rather cumbersome
vehicle which had been drawn up to
| the roadside.
You will find these trunks pretty
heavy, / am afraid" said Celia.
yes" said the man, as he backed
the wagon to the edge of the platform
and lifted on the trunks with APP,
parent case.
During the fve-mile ride over the
soft dirt road the man was to all APP
pcarances as little interested in Miss
Dorchester as that young woman was
interested in him The wheels of the
wagon made small riffs in the brown
sand, thin clouds of which followed
the painless spokes half way around
their gyrations and fell back again
after the manner of water in a mill
way. The wagon swung with a lat
eral, monotonous motion, emitting a
droning sound which resembled the
creaking of a boom on the spar of a
yacht. Aside from this and the chirp-
ing Of a cricket from a nearby mead
ow, there was nothing to break the
oppressive stiffness. Somehow or
other Miss Dorchester could not keep
from her mind the lights of Broad
way
lis it far to Johnson's?" she asked,
although she had been already in
formed with much particularly as to
the exact distance.
Five miles, said the man, and he
made a clip at the horses with the
whip that caused them to spring for
ward with so much enthusiasm as to
nearly result in the loss of Miss Dor
chester's new summer hat.
"Oh!" cried Celia, and then a mo-
ment later. when she had regained
her composure, she asked:
"Will it take us long to reach
there?"
When the horse got down to trot-
ing PAGES again the man said: mo,
ma'am,"
Celia enjoyed rambling through the
dense woods alone. The people at
the house had warned her against
going too far.
you might get lost" said Farmer
Johnson, land then you know. Miss.
the Maine forests are not entirely free
from bears"
Miss Dorchester laughed.
Il am not afraid of the bears" said
she. 81 am afraid of nothing except
men, and then she added, as she
noted the puzzled look of her host
81 mean young men, you know. Just
keep the young men away from me
and am willing to take my chances
with the bears"
She had only seen the man who had
driven her from the station a few
times. On these occasions he had
nodded good-naturedly, but did not
seem at all inclined to become better
acquainted with her. He was always
| busy cleaning a gun or arranging
/ fishing tackle. OF course she didn't
/ care, but she had so much time on her
hands that she sometimes wondered
/ il he We're one of the hired men, or
/ the old farmers son, but she was too
/ highly cultured and had too high a
sense of her own dignity to ask any
/ questions about him. He sat down to
/ the table with the others of the family
all the hired men in the country do
/ that-and on these occasions she had
/ cndcnvored TO draw him out-just to
relieve her ennui. He did not seem
much inclined to talk, but when She
/ with considerable adroitness, had
4 placed him in what she considered a
/ close corner in conversational way,
she was surprised at the ease with
/ which he eXtricated himself and left
her very seriously entangled in the
net which she had set For the first
/ time in her life she found herself en-
barraSsed by a man, and she was not
backward in hiding her confusion by
4 once more affirming her hatred of the
entire sterner sex. and, on this par
tieular occasion, drawing no invidious
distinctions between specimens bucol-
ic or metropolitan.
As for Grayson, he simply smiled in
~