Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1901-04-05

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taglon In the AIR. ana anXious women
went about with willing hands TO aid
in every department. they might in
wade. Among these, her life adjusting
itself easily and gratefully to the new
demands. was Frances Brookin. the
tenderness of her fine face softened
and deepened into divine womanliness
the love-ray eloquent in her melting
eyes.
Swiftly the holiday side of the war
had faded out of view Agonized ST.
lence swallowed up laughter. For the
drift was coming in from where the
storm OF battle ragged. wrecks of hui
man forms once freighted with life's
rarest merchandise. Soon every hos
pital, every available space in church
and public building and the most spa
cious of private homes were to have
!, their quota of the wounded, the dying,
and the dead. The southern woman was
entering upon that field of labor in
which she achieved her noblest dignity,
her fame its immortality. Foremost
among those who first gave their en-
ergies, their whole lives to the allevia-
ton of suffering, the inspiration of the
hopeless and the despairing, was Fran
ces Brookin. Free to dispose of her
time as she would and with an album
dant means at her disposal, she made
herself ministering angel wherever
soldier suffered Day and night she
labored, sustained by boundless patri-
otism and an elation for which she
could not account, try as she would
She failed in her self-analysis from
ignorance of the fact that voice that
has once spoken to the heart is never
quite silent afterwards, and that
youth when it buries its dead tramples
not the sod above it. Fiery hatred of
the invader possessed her, as it did
her sisters; bred in the bone and nour.
ished with the mothers milk, it could
not be quelled except by years OF gentle
association and common cause, but
BY o strange paradox this bitterness
excluded every stained and bloody
blue uniform or haggard northern face.
Out of the fight, these were ever out of
geance. Upon the suffering prisoners
Frances delighted 10 lavish the tender
ness of her nature, now broadened and
deepened by its own ministry; and
something touchingly human carried
her among them. although she was not
conscious of it.
For this had come to pass: within
the heart of Frances Brookin there
lived fiction, the Richard Somers of
her girlish dreams: Richard Somers as
she had seen him face to face one night
under the burning match, his voice
ringing strong and true and tender
nnan hAn- hAarir n-1-~.-hir, i'm, strut
SIZE had q dropped veil OF iridescent
gossamer, and within that room, seen
only through the veil, the man lived
and reigned and had his kingdom.
Through this veil, too, stirred by the
| breath of the suffering and the dying
of his own country, he spoke gently,
tenderly to her in the lonely hours of
her vigils. The other Richard had
been dismissed, not harshly or hastily,
not in anger, but sadly-a man I'M
worthy; man at war with the truth
and nobleness of her nature and at war
such fctions come about, but the
hearts of most women carry them.
And time had helped Frances, for
looking back she re-established many
vital facts that lessened the sadness of
memory; the man must once have been
noble-his deeds of mercy and gentle
ness proved that; innately noble he
must have been when she met him, for
in the face of IA great temptation he
had kept his promise to his friend, even
+, to the extent of shutting his eyes
against the girl whose arms had been
about him. whose lips breathed love for
him. And somewhere, despite all the
| trickery, there was still nobility, for
silently he had ridden away, faithful
to his friend He had lain under her
hands wounded by the pistol shot, and
no woman ever hated a helpless, suffer,
ing man. AS for his receptions, his
plots, some fearful necessity must have
compelled him. The other woman
She had been too base for him--she had
been at heart a murderess. She il was
who had dragged him down. And was
he not caring for the child? Frances
would not have admitted it to hersel1
had she realized it, but in the depths
of that heart she had forgiven Richard
Somers. Her heart was big enough t.
hold him and all his weakness. Wa
there loss of something from her ma
ture? Or was there gain?
No message had ever come to he
from Somers, no good or evil report
None? Yes, just a scrap soon after TIL
war began. From some one, Brodna1
probably, since his name was upon it
she had received northern paper Civ
ing in its war gossip Information tina
Richard Somers had been reinstated il
the army and promoted to be captain
of artillery.
But one day early in the spring c
1862, when the great federal mcyemen
against Richmond was beginning an
when every train was bringing in
bloody harvest, she leaned above
wounded enemy. The question so ofte
J asked, TO what command do you bt
long?" drew forth an answer tina
filled her with excitement. She fel
: her heart begin to beat madly and he
limbs yielding to sudden excitemen
Your captain! What is his name ::
Richard Somers, miss!' Ho
strangely thrilling sounded the nan
:, that morning! 1t was the first tin
= she had heard it spoken since its bea
. er had said among the Pickering sha
). ows of her room: IF to carry in men