Richmond planet. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1883-1938, 1901-01-12
: WHY THE YOUNG
! NAN DIDN'T PAY UP

THICAGO, Nov. 14.-My Dear Doc
~ tor: L haven't time to write you
a letter just now, old man, but sim
ply want 20 drop you line so you
will know 1 haven't forgotten you and
the lift you gave me out west, don't
mean TO make any excuse for not hav-
ing repaid that 40, which represents
any monetary Indebtedness to you,
long before this, but
Last week 1 managed to have SAT
left after paying my board. Fearing
lest the money should burn a hole
in my pocket went post haste down
so the office intending to mail you
shat 40 Immediately. Barely had ]
got seated at my desk when the
phone rang. Hark, now; the plot
chickens! A soft, sweet feminine
Eoice came drifting over the wire ask
ing if 1 was anywhere about 1t was
Billy.
Billy's other name Is Ruth Hard
ing Hampton. I met Billy down in
Kentucky about five years ago and
ave fell desperately in love with each
other. (Mors plot, see?) She was
then about II and 1 was two years
older. Billy's dad" as she called him,
had some of the best trotters in the
whole bluegrass region moonlight
drives and all thatl You know, doc
tor?
Billy was a great kid. She owned
n long~bodied, bench-iegged dog that
was exactly her age to day. Now,
please, treat that statement kindly,
doctor, for Billy is the only authority
4 have for the dogs age and how Billy
knew is more than 1 can tell. Any
now, the pup had woolly face and
"A hump on his back like weasel He
was fully three feet long without
counting his tail and he was not more
than six inches in height except at
the point where the hump came In.
There he was little higher, but as
4 said before haven't any statistics
relating to that particular pup, so it
IS possible that err slightly In the
matter.
Billy said he was a grounding dog.
Perhaps he might have been ct some
slime in the dim past distant rela-
SSve of the grounding, but In the
course of evolution the groundhog's
good looks must have gone astray be-
fore the dog developed. Between the
grounding and the dog there were
strained relationship joke intended
and / think possibly that state of
affairs might have been brought about
at the time when the dog claimed
kinship to the grounding. But what's
the odds?
BILLY used to take me and the dog
down through the tall grass of the
meadows to the little creek that wan
e1aered cool and clear through the rich
Lbottom lands of the valley. Here
Uva5 Billy's private hunting ground.
Along either bank Of the stream
whole colonies OF groundhogs had es-
Established themselves, and thus 1t was
that sport was never lacking for Billy
ard Bruiser-Bruiser being the dogs
name.
Billy always carried long club
- zEhen she started after groundhops.
I'm the hot summer afternoons. under
she butternut trees that fringed the
banks of the stream, she would sit
E1reamily for hours in the cool shade
= watching the shadows at play in the
/ placid waters until aroused from her
dreams by a bark from Bruiser. Then
IKE deer she would race to the dog
I'd see that the fight was pull~d off
sSn the square.
Billy wouldn't stand for foul fight.
If Bruiser happened to have fallen
Snto company with grounding that
was too big and savage for him to
handle, Billy would wade In with her
club and @whack the big rodent few