Waterbury Democrat., 1901-03-01

| l there.
 "Yes. she's going. She will soon be
 out of suffering" replied the doctor,
 very, very gently. No one. was ever
 more gentle than Dr. Saxon in the presence of the last enemy. He never
 relaxed his efforts until the last second
 of life He looked death in the face
 with a frown. That was a part of his
 rough, abrupt character. But he looked
 the dying and the mourning in the face
 with the look of a compassionate an
 gel
 Very fast the last great change grew
 now. The father cried out from the
 other room that he wanted to see his
 little girl once more. Stuart offered
 to bring him in. The doctor nodded
 and Stuart went in where the man lay and with Rhena's help succeeded in | getting him into the other room and propped up in chair where he could
 see the child. Great tears rolled over | his rough, coarse face as he sat there.
 It was not very long The doctor made
 a movement as he held the slender
 wrist. The eyes opened full on the fla | ther as he looked. There was q faint smile. It crossed the face as the sun | light, on a day of low lying clouds
 when the wind is blowing hard, cross l es meadow. It was gone, and the | gray shadow followed fast after The l form stitfened, there was a sigh, an- | other, and that was all The doctor | laid the little hand down and said l 'She is gone.' He turned his face away from the mother, and Stuart was startled at the look. It was as if Saxon had seen the death he was con | tinually fighting and was enraged at | the victory won against his human skill. But he turned again to the mother, who had, after the manner of women among the miners, flung her self over the bed with great shrieks and cries, and lifting her up he half led, half carried, her into the other room and laid her down. sobbing and grooming, on an old couch there. And Stuart could have sworn the doctors | face was as beautiful as mercy and as | full of blessing as mortal mans can ever be. When he came back after performing his office for the dead the 1 doctor went away. Those were days when sleep and rest were strangers to | him. He never fully recovered from the terrible strain of that winter. Rhena remained q little while to do what she could, and Stuart sent q boy who had come up from neigh | bors down for the undertaken and | promised all in his power. When Rhe- na went out, he went with her, and l they were soon walking together over | the very trail where Stuart had start | cd out the night of Rhena's fall. She | had other houses in Cornishtown to | visit and needed to save time by the | short cut which the upper trail af- 1 forded Stuart had not asked if he might go l with her, and she had neither assentcd | to his company nor rejected it. He had | forgotten all about his horse and cutter down the other path. She seemed pas sive and thoughtful. The scene they | had just witnessed affected them both | deeply. It was not an unusual sight [ these days with either, but death never | lost it's majesty to Stuart, and Rhena was never. more exalted in her feeling than in the presence of the great ene- | my.
 There was hardly room in the trail most of the way for two persons. Stu ! art walked behind her. They were si- 1 lent for the most part, except a Ques- | ton or two about different sick people, | until they reached the big stump in the | middle of the trail, the other side of | which Stuart had found Rhena lying.
 She turned her face a little as she | was about to walk around the old land mark, and Stuart spoke to her. He was very pale and trembled. It seemed to him that a great crisis had come for him. WhaH he had spoken the first word. he at once became more master of himself.
 "AIiss Dwight, I wish to tell you something. Will you allow me to say what I have felt 1 must say for long timeY
 Rhena locked startled. Her lip trenl- bled. She seemed unable to answer.
 Stuart went on. Now that he had made up lis mind, he was like his fla ther in the determination that drove him to his purpose with an iron energy that possessed his whole epsitive na ture.
 ''I have been loving you almost from the first moment I saw you. You must have known it from my manner. I am a poor actor. I have not been able to conceal much, even if had wished to. But my life has been transformed b. all tnis. I have reached the place where can no icnnSer De silent. l EnoW that love you as q man should love the Wo- man whom he asks with all the rever- ence and joy possible to him to be his wife"
 He had spoken, and it was not what he had once thought he might have said. But he was not prepared for the effect of his declaration upon Rhena.
 She was dressed as usual in her Sal vation Army costume. The face in the army bonnet of blue, with it's plain rib bons, was typical of the army faces seen everywhere. And yet while Stu art was speaking and all through the rest of the interview between them he thought. with a certain bewilderment, that it was no longer the Salvation Ar my girl who stood facing him, but the society woman. Miss Rhena Dwight, daughter of Allen Dwight, the million airc of New York. And yet she was in