The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-02-15
THE GENTLEMAN
FROM. INDIANA
BY BOOTH HARRINGTON.
Copyrighted by Mcclure, Phillips & Co.
BY BOOTH HARRINGTON.
Copyrighted by Mcclure, Phillips & Co.
fContinued from Last Sundays News.)
CHAPTER TX.
NIGHT: IT is BAD LUCK TO SING
REFORE BREAKFAST

BEFORE BREAKFAST.
There was a lace of faint mists along
the creek and beyond, when John and
Helen reached their bench (of course
they went back there), and broken
roundelays were croaking from a bayou
up the stream, where rakish frogs held
carnival in resentment to the lone
someness. The air was still and close.
Hundreds of fire-f1ies coquetted with
the darkness amongst the trees across
the water, glinting from unexpected
spots, shading their little lanterns for
a second to glow again from other
shadows. The sky was wonderful
olive green; a lazy cloud drifted in 1t
and Tapped itself athwart the moon.
THE dead painters design the skies
for US each day and night, I think"
Helen said, as she dropped little scarf
from her shoulders and leaned back on
the bench. at must be the only way
to keep them happy and busy up
there They let them take turns, and
those not on duty, probably float
around and criticise."
They've given a good man his turn
tonight" said John: ''some quiet col
orist, a poetic, friendly soul, no Turner
though I think I've seen Turner
sunset or two in Plattville."
1T was a sculptors sunset this ev-
ening. Did you see it?-great massey
clouds piled heap on heap, almost with
violence. I'm sure it was Mcclellan
gelo. The judge didn't think it meant
Michelangelo; he thought it meant
rain"
"Michelangelo gets a chance rather
often, doesn't he, considering the num-
Der of art people there must be over
there? 1 believe I've seen a good many
sunsets of his, and a few dawns, too;
the dawns not for long time-I used
to see them more frequently toward
the close of senior year, when we sat
up all night talking, knowing we'd
lose one another soon, and trying to
hold on as long as we could"
She turned to him with a little frown.
why have you never let Tom Mere
dith know you were living so near him,
less than a hundred miles, when he has
always liked and admired you above
all the rest of mankind? / know that
he has tried time and again to hear of
you, but the other men wrote that
they knew nothing - that it was
thought you had gone abroad. I had
heard of you, and so must he have seen
your name in the Rouen papers-about
the 'White-Caps,' and in politics-but
he would never dream of connecting
the Plattville Mr.. HAIRLESS with his
Mr.. Harkless, though I did, just a lit
tie, and rather vaguely. l knew, of
course, when you came into the lee
ture. But why haven't you written to
my cousin?"
'Rouen seems long way from here"
he answered quietly. 1--WE only been
there once-half a day on business. EX-
cept that, I've never been further away
than Amo or Gainesville. for conven-
ton or to make speech, since I came
here"
Wicked" she exclaimed. ITO shut
yourself up like this! ! said it was
fine to drop out of the world; but why
have you cut off your old friends from
you? Why haven't you had a relapse,
now and then, and come over to hear
Ysaye play and Melba sing, or to see
Mansfield or Henry Irving, when we
have had them? And do you think
you've been quite fair to Tom? What
right had you to assume that he had
forgotten your
"Oh, didn't exactly mean forgot
ten," he said, pulling a blade of grass
to and fro between his fingers, star
ing at it absently. ITS only that I
have dropped out of the world. you
know. l kept track of every one, saw
most of my friends, or corresponded,
now and then, for a year or so after I
left college; but people don't miss you
much after while. They rather eX-
pected me to do a lot of things, in a
way, you know, and 1 wasn't doing
them. l was glad to get away. l al
ways had an itch for newspaper work,
and l went on a New York paper. May
be it was the wrong paper: at least, /
wasn't fit for it. There was something
in the side of life l saw, too not only
on the paper, that made me heart
sick; and then the rush and fight and
scramble to be first, to beat the other
man. Probably l am too squeamish I
saw classmates and college friends div
ing into it, bound to come out ahead,
dear old, honest, frank fellows, who
had been so happy go-lucky and kind
and gay, growing too busy TO meet and
be good to any man who couldn't be
good to them, asking (more delcately)
the eternal question, What does ii get
me? You might think had met with
unkindness; but it was not so; 1t was
the other way more than / deserved.
But the cruel competition, the thou
sands fighting for places, the multi
tude scrambling for each gingerbread
baton, the cold faces on the streets
perhaps it's all right and good: of
course it has to be-but / wanted to
get out of it, though l didn't want to
come here. That was chance. A new
man bought the paper l was working
for, and its policy changed Many Of
the same men still wrote for II, facing
cheerfully about and advocating a
tricky theory, vehement champions of
a set of personal schemers and waxy
images"
He spoke with feeling; but now. as
though a trife ashamed of too much
seriousness, and justihably afraid of
talking like one of his own editorials,
he took lighter tone. 81 had been
taken on the paper through a friend
and not through merit, and by the
same undeserved, kindly influence, aft
er month or so, was set to writing
short political editorials. and was at
1t nearly two years. When the paper
changed hands the new proprietor in
dictated that he would be willing to
have me stay and write the other way.
i refused; and it became somewhat
plain to me that 1 was beginning to be
a failure.
"a cousin of mine, the only relative
] had. died in Chicago, and went to
his funeral. l happened to hear of the
Carlow Herald through an agent
there, and the most eloquent gentleman
l ever met. / was younger, and even
more thoughtless than now, and l had
little money and handed it over for
the Herald" l wanted to run pa
per myself, and to build up a power,
And then, though / only lived here
the first few years of my life, and all
the rest of it had been spent in the
East. 1 was born in Indiana, and. in
way, the thought of coming back
10 life-work in my native state ap-
pealed to me. l always had a dim sort
of failing that the nanrnla nlit IN H..