Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1903-03-28
"WHILE LUBIN IS AWAY"
BY L. PARRY TRUSCOTT.

their gaze; with a few years too many
behind him for the retention of absolute
freshness-only few, but what differ
ence they makei He struck chord, two
or three chords lin the minor), ard left
off again.
And yet he was scarcely what is con-
sidered middle aged by even the very ac-
curate. He had been called handsome in
face by-well, by women lit is usually
women who say such things); could not
be called uncomely in form; wasn't by
any means bald-iust thinning. Sitting
twirling on his stool, he looked again at
the slight, girlish figure in the big arm
chair at the other end of the long music
room.
"Poof!" he said to himself. "Too
stout? just comfortable-not an atom
more than comfortable. Stout, indeed!"
and he laughed.
What are you laughing at 2"
questioned the girl in the chair.
Not myself" he smiled. let me tell
you / was not laughing at myself" But
he told her no more.
Instead he let his hands wander over
y
cared nothing about mans age or his
figure; he might measure what he would
around the waist if his fingers had the
right sort of cunning at their tips. So
that a man understood them, they gave
him faithfully, truly, their best in re-
turn. For every year of devotion they
added little to his power of mast ring
them. Thinning hair! A fg-a demi-
semi.quavor for thinning hairl Unfail-
ingy they responded to his caress; his
lightest touch awoke them; they took his
widest moods for their moods; there
never was a time when they could not
give him back thousandfold all he had
bribed them with. For honest work.
melody; for love, sweet refreshment; for
untiring patience, unbroken harmony
What better companion could man.
beyond his first youth-possibly need
than his grand piano? He played a
snatch of n exquisite air with the most
loverlike touch of his supple fingers
"Poof!" he said to himself again. But
| am quite passably youthful And he
broke off the exquisite air in the middle
OF phrase.
why did you do that?" asked the girl
from the chair.
81 have no further use for the thing
at this moment" said he. But come"
ne went on, II have uncarthed song for
you. Come and sing. DO you know
this?" He played the prelude while he
spoke. You must know it, for your
great grandmother sang it--no. / didn't
hear her; your thought is hbelous-but
| she must have sung it, and you belong to
your great grandmother. You can say
what You like, but you are no more mod
en than music itself. And if YOU do not
| sing this song rs well as you can sing
anything-for what that is worth; and
God forbid that should turn ilatterer at
my age, so it isn't worth much--nor is
my age; dare you to suggest it! Where
We're we? Wen, well Come and sing.
Now, kindly tell me you know it,"
He left off playing, but he hummed the
opening lines in soft, flexible baritone
MY mother bids me bind my hair
with Hands OF rosy hue
Come, bind your hair! Bind your
HART How often have | told YOU that n
ribbon in the hair is the surest lure to all
masculine hearts? With dark hair-you
haven't got bad hair; there are some
middling tasteful curls to it, even-and a
rosy ribbon round it, and YOU might be
wearing my heart as an ornament as
well, and yet you go obstinately un-
| bound! Come, bind! Come. bind!"
You are not my mother!" laughed the
girl, but she came to his side and lent
her voice to his music. Almost it seemed
pity that so much faultless sound
should be spent on room otherwise
empty; but, at any rate, the man, put
ting his soul into the simple, Old World
tune, as was his incurablc fashion with
whatever he played, was vet alert for
every note every shade of expression. in
the won2erful clear voice he followed
Nothing OF its charm was lost to him. al.
though, as it turned out, there were thinos
he would willingly have lost. even at the
expense of music welded to dramatic ok.
preston, as he was always preaching it
should be.
For there was yearning there and sor
row and observation-disclosures, unshed. but
real. A great. passionate longing to an
almost imperoeptible hope. And he knew
her--well enough. He had watched her
acting for him, or it might he for others,
very pretuly and girlishly many times.
Tie had chiddcn her for lack of emotion
here, Of intensity there, leaving blank
A'i NutNH All the pure, true notes could
not wholly atone. And so he recognized
the occasion when she sang for the first
time with her whole heart, because the
words happened TO be the words her
heart was ever aching with: when. re.
gardless, unbnowingly. she became an
artist, because she was q woman who had
forgotten her audience and herself.
"Alas,-l scarcc-can go-or Green
While Lu.bin is away
Aud then
The Village seems -a-slecp-or dead
Now Lu-btn is away"
But in the silence that followed she re-
covered consciousness, looked at him
| quickly, read what he had read in the
face he had perhaps not intended to
mask. And with sob, stihed CIV, she
ran quickly, like the child she was, out
Of the room, taking his last faintest
| doubt out with her.
but it wasn't worth--a demi- semi.
quaver rest" said he.
] He got up; he wandered about the long