The Kemper herald. (Scooba, Miss.) 1875-1908, 1903-08-27

M%, ny his heart contained, all the
sK r. " idollzing worship of which
! @M va he was peculiarly capable.
SSkxx&x He would have declared
that he had never felt
very hopeful of gaining her, knowing
her too well, but he had desired to do
so with an intensity which had often
burnt up his fears for the time, at n
rate, so that he had lived whole days
IN Dlissful contemplation of the i'm
0 probable, had gone whole months with
!, eyes shut to the inevitable, the fast
approaching. Thus the news of her
engagement to her employer found
him almost u%nprepared, after all, and
Tor a time those who cared for him
watched him anxiously since it seemed
so likely that the blow was greater
than he could bear.
They were friends, Michael Richards
and the man for whom he worked. the
man she married, and they had been
much together in her company. There
We're those who said she had chosen
the employer rather than the employed
Just because he was the richer man
Just because an assured position, a
tine house, appealed to all that was
strongest in her-but that her heart.
what there was of it, would have led
her to a different choice, il she had
allowed her heart and not her head
to dictate to her. She had the pretty,
childish ways that so often drape a
nature inherently selfish, and it was
notable that those who knew her best.
as a rule, judged her most severely.
But Michael was not among her de.
tractors. He made his trust in heaven
conditional on his wholly trusting the
Woman he loved to do no wrong, and.
by a sublime disregard Of common
sense, he kept his faith in heaven, con-
Jointly with his faith in Mary, in spite
of all the bitterness of spirit he passed
through. Some wondered how he did
1t, and others why he thought it a
necessary thing to do, for men have
loved the faulty tenderly and we'll, and
heavens seal is set upon such toler-
ance. Yet it helped him; undeniably
1t strengthened him. For, so it was
said again, in his nature was this one
streak of idealism, needing an outlet
all the more, perhaps, because the rest
OF the man vas sternly set in an iron
mold; because, except that he turned
involuntarily aside, rs it were. to love
Mary, lOve was hardly allowed for in
his plan of life.
Work was his passion, the idol to
which he offered everything sacri-
flee, and when he at last lost hope
OF Mary it became his all. He worked
now unremittingly, to tire himself, to
woo forgetfulness, as we'll as for sheer
love of hard labor. 1t was nothing to
him that his unceasing energy was ex-
pended on his rivals business, that his
life was given to help a man to further
riches who had already robbed him of
his one ewe-lamb. He had to work,
not with any definite end in view, but
for works sake-and because there
was nothing else left to him to do.
And, quite in the ordinary course of
things, his alert, inventive brain hit
on a means of superseding the business
to which he was devoting himself so
entirely.
He was always striving to do things,
or to get them done, in the best pos
sible manner. incidentally, with the
least expense, the smallest waste of
labor, in the shortest time, but, before
and beyond all things, he had set ex-
cellence as his goal. Mary's husband
was a manufacturer of the bands used
in machinery. Mary's old lover, while
giving his thoughts as undoubtedly as
the memory of her would let him. and
all his time, to the turning out of these
bands in the greatest perfection and
number, was suddenly arrested by an
idea which made their use no longer
necessary.
1t was a simple and clever invention:
SO obviously better, cheaper and more
expedient than the old-fashioned bands
that it seemed wonderful to its dis
coverer that no one had thought of it
before. He tested 1t in his usual thor
~oughgolng fashion, making absolutely
sure he was not mistaken in his own
estimate of the Importance of the
change he was about to bring in the
S VI iioSAAinCly, GHu tutu lie sell
as energetically to work to turn his
invention to account. 1t was nothing
to him that in doing so he must sweep
aside a prosperous business, must in
evitably ruin Mary's husband, the very
man he had been helping on to wealth.
He would be giving a touch of finish.
OF completeness. to the method in
which the worlds work is accom-
plished. He hoped to do still more
for 1t before he was done, but here
was, at least, something definite to be-
gin with. Since he might not have
Maya wife to cherish and protect
he had extended his protection over the
great, whirling world of machinery.
He promised himself the pleasure Of
setting thousands of machines going
in an easier, more nearly perfect man
ner, as a lover promises himself to
perfect his lady's charms with ropes
Of pearls.
WhaU hie anapInuao -