Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1901-04-27

they reached the years which find most
welded pairs with their children well
grown up about them. They had been
happy. however, and when they died
left their daughter little income,
which, by close pinching, she could
manage to live upon.
Cornelia was not a pretty girl, but
thousands of palmer girls had married
and settled while she remained a
spinster. Perhaps the fact that she
Was by no means a good-natured per
son had something to do with it.
In her youth she had comported her
self scornfully to well-disposed young
men who belonged to the mechanic
classes and had declared that she would
only give her hand and heart to mer-
chant a physician, or a clergyman.
Merchants were rare in Bottlehole, the
only specimens Of that order being two
old bachelors, still connected with
New York firm. The two doctors were
both married and the clergymen al
ways had large families.
Miss Cornelia's ambitious hopes were
~SfOA ANAAA1Nu, anu hCA AalLCl dPPLSA
tice, Tim Cornell, who had admired her,
and had been quite believer in her as
an elegant and genteel person." final
~ pronounced her mighty proud and
naughty" and abandoned his suit. Miss
Cornelia at last awoke to the knowl
edge that she was getting on in life, and
that If she was not careful people
would find it out.
But for that dreadful family Bible in
which the record of her birth was writ
ten down., she would have felt safe in
sHcing off ten years of her life-6 pro-
ceeding which she fancied would In
crease her value in the eyes of certain
Mr.. Dumsday, who had recently paid
her few solemn calls. He was really
an old man himself, but the older the
man the younger generally, one finds
his choice of wife to be.
Poor Miss Cornelia! She eyed that
well-thumbed Bible which her compan-
Ion and assistant, Cousin Betsy Baker,
always would have upon a stand in the
parlor, with absolute horror.
She sat over her CRATE fire late one
aight thinking over the matter.
Who knew her exact age? Cousin
| Betsy. But Cousin Betsy would not
wish to quarrel with her, and was too
old a woman to think her anything but
young. The clergyman who baptized
her. But he was superannuated and
lived with his son-in-law in another
State. The family doctor was dead,
and the dear old gentleman who had
boarded with them from her babyhood
went to Europe years before, and was
probably dead Good Mr.. Noire! But
she should never hear of him again.
Yes, 1t was safe. She would do it.
1t was night-half-past II at least
the hour when ''churchyards yawn and
graves give up their dead" Miss Cor
nelia arose. She stood before the fire
with her back toward it, and took the
sandlestick in her hand.
Any one who had observed her would
certainly have I Seved that she was
going straight to poor Cousin Betsy's
room to end that lady's life by jab Of
the sharp little knife blade, aut she
DduSSA db tie CduultSllCh, kutlL uOWu,
opened the family Bible at the fyleaf,
and slowly, cautiously began N scrape,
scrape, scrape at the last two figures Of
the record of her birth.
Then she crossed the room, took from
fireslde cupboard pen and inkstand,
wrote two other figures in the place Of
those she had erased, blew upon the
leaf until it was dry, carefully touched
up the rest of the record to match in
brightness, and drew back to read the
amended lines, which now plainly
stated to all beholders that she had en-
tered this world thirty years before in
stead of forty.
"Cornelia."
I It seemed to come from above. Cor
nelia looked up expecting to see some
thing dreadful. 1t was repeated:
"Cornelia, amt you coming to bed?"
I 1t was only Cousin Betsy speaking
through a disused register, which had
once conveyed heat from a stove in the
sitting-room to the chamber above.
All in a cold perspiration, Cornelia
managed to reply that she would come
in a moment and then closing the Bible
and putting away the writing materials
she crept upstairs, a world of horrible
unseen things close after her.
Mr.. Dumsday regularly "came a
counting" now. And he was a rich
widower. whose married daughter pro-
fessed herself anxious that pa" should
bave some one to take care of him.
Miss Cornelia had quite made up her
mind that lavender should be the color