Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1903-03-25
Her Beau
From
Hartford
By Zoe Anderson Norris

| out to me house In the middle OF the
second block away.
"It is there that have engaged you
room," she told me. 81 engaged it
particularly for tonight"
l had not taken off my things. /
started out.
You will be back for dinner, won't
your" she asked, with wistful you
won't be back for dinner, will you"
air. And 1 had replied: mo. I may
as well stay to dinner there. They
will charge me for it all the same"
The room was not so bad as it might
have been, and the house was hand
some one, but the general atmosphere
of it rather struck me with amazement.
The little woman who kept it had just
moved in from q fiat. The carpets
consequently fitted like postage stamps,
the furniture appeared to have shrunk
and the curtains when they hung at
all hung three feet from the floor.
l said to myself at first, II cannot
stay here"
Then | began to grow interested.
III SDllt VI lIlt luIl lhut StNtlul urge
trunks whose contents should have had
to certain degree the effect of estab-
fishing my respectability followed in
my wake, l was politely but firmly re-
quested to pay in advance.
l did so.
The money went to buy necessary
| furniture for my room.
Having struggled some myself-and,
alas, the struggling isn't quite over yet
1 looked upon the convulsive efforts
of that little woman to furnish her
house and her table at the same time
with such increased interest that ult-
mately l paid her two weeks in ad-
vance instead of one.
Thus the stairs were carpeted and
rug was eventually placed at the EN-
trance in the hall.
| In the intervals of cooking, washing,
ironing and scrubbing the little woman
came to me and told me her tale Of
woe.
1t was in vain that l sat before an
expectant typewriter, glancing signif-
cantly down now and again at waiting
keys.
| She talked to me.
"It is all for Muriel," she said. 81
want to make that girls life worth liv-
ing. Mine never was. l want her to
have things she should have-things
girls love-pretty clothes, hats, shoes,
gloves, ribbons. | want to make her
happy girl Why, after all my work
yesterday what do you think l did"
l couldn't imagine, but l knew well
enough what / must do If l wanted
any butter on my daily bread, and
what couldn't do if she kept on talk
ing.
81 sat up till O'Clock making
party dress to send her at Hartford"
she informed me. "She's going to a
ball there tonight. l had to have it
ready for the express this morning.
sat up nearly all night long finishing
| it."
1t was In this way that she repeated
herself, taking up the time.
leaned my elbows on the table and,
looking hard at her, tried to mesmerize
her into going away.
"She is coming home In three days or
four" she went on, and talked blue
streak for half an hour before she
finally took herself off.
In due time she came, that wonderful
Muriel.
Going down to dinner one evening l
found her at table.
/ was filed with astonishment at the
sight of her Her mother, with all her
talk, had not prepared me for her ex-
quisite beauty.
She was not only beautiful, but she
possessed a certain style incomprehen-
sible In girl of her position. l discov
cred later that her mother made her
clothes. This served to increase my
surprise, for her mother had next to no
style at all. The reason for this how
ever, was forgivable. She spent moth
| ing on herself and every cent that she
could spare from the furniture on the
girl.
/ confess that 1t gave me sort of
shock to see this exquisite creature
take up the bell and ring for her moth
er to bring in her dinner, as if that
mother were servant, but the mother
allayeu Iue SnOch Ds eAplhlhihS' chS
wouldn't allow Muriel in the kitchen.
There were various and sundry rea-
SONS, it seemed, for this. First, the
girl didn't know enough to pound sand
when 1t came to cooking; second, she
wouldn't be bothered with teaching
her, and the thirdlies, fourthlies and
fifthlies | have forgotten.
The shock was entirely dispelled
when l found her on the following
morning prone upon her knees on the
hall floor washing up its marble. 1t
changed to respect as she swept down
the stairs, cleaned the parlor, busted
the banlsters, tables and chairs, and
when, with uptucked skirts and dust
cap, like a maid in comic opera, she
knocked at my door to clean up my
room it vanished entirely and, stopping
my work by way of reward, l talked
| to her.