Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1903-10-22

weeks rent due tomorrow"
She was hard, but honest. There
was still a remnant of gold among
the silver-enough to last, please
heaven, until he was strong enough to
crawl out again, with the hope of earn
ing a precarious living.
Where the money had come from
goodness alone knew. A purse of
gold, where not one copper piece had
been!
AS Colin lay back on his lodging
house pillow (hard and rather grimy)
unshed tears burned his eyeballs as
he thought of that doctor, who, see
ing at a glance that he was dying from
sheer starvation, had not hesitated to
give the two pence" of the Good
Samaritan.
"The mere money l may repay some
day." he thought; but the action
never! Whether one pound or so at
the last day, it will speak-it will have
a thousand voices. God will hear
them"
AS soon as he could crawl he
dragged himself to the piano., If even
now he could only be in time-time to
win that grand prize offered by the
conservatoire at Florence for the best
setting of a song to words supplied by
them-e250 English money, with the
situation of harmony master at a
large salary to, perhaps, the cleverest
group of students the world had ever
seen.
There was an exquisite but madden
ing elusive melody in his brain-an
angel song; but his head was weak
from illness, and it was evidently
doomed to remain M of those untold
dream w%itcheries which thrall most
soul musicians at times and draw
away their thoughts to cloudland. He
could not hum it, could not find it's
beginning or end, though he tried each
note in the gamut; but he felt it, he
had dreamed it; some day-too late,
perhaps, to make use of in this world
it would come to him in it's full, glori-
Gus beauty.
Song after song, tune after tune, he
painfully evolved, only to throw them
aside with a cry of despair when fin
ished.
Mechanical, wooden! Correct har-
mony? Yes, but oh, We gods, how com
monplace, how evenly on the dead
level! and only "a hours left before
the MS. must be posted. l am like a
drowning man who sees the life belt
hanging just out of his reach. The
prize, the position, the melody and my
utter inability to grasp it. What is
that?" springing to his feet and al
most ceasing to breathe as certain
notes, hating, faulty, but still glori-
ously beautifully, reached his ear.
who is that? What is that" A
long pause, then he said deliberately,
r~esolutely though his face was white
as snow, THAT is the music that shall
win the prize! 1t is mine, not his! 1
dreamed it. l can write it into some
thing that will electrify the world; my
harmonies shall be ~transcendently
beautiful, his are hopelessly faulty;
| JllC luCIOuy 10 WOllLlCoo W IT'LL, L IL
it is salvation for soul and body"
The notes were played through again
slowly, %tenderly, with wrong chords,
with right chords, with finger only,
a rich deep voice hummed them, a
girls clear soprano corrected the man
to a curious minor resolution that
Collins soul had already leaped to
they-these unknown two-had given
him the clew to his dream melody;
theirs was of the earth earthly; he
would Gurn it into something that was
worthy even of Heaven itself.
Down he sat and set feverishly to
work and the melody fitted the words,
as a glove the hand:
Hall, victor! in the generous strife,
This is the golden hour of life;
The struggle and the task are done,
The guerdon and the chaplet won.
Thine is the fadeless olive CROWN,
Blazon and badge of bright renown;
For thee the poets Tyre is strung,
For thee the song Of triumph won.
He wrote on, and on, and on! Night
passed into day, and day nearly into
night again before it was finished, and
he managed to stagger out and post it
himself; then he tainted, and Mrs. Will
cox told him he must leave her house
at the end of, the week. She couldn't
abide invalids, besides which she had
a chance of letting her rooms for al
most double the money; but her first
floors were going, and new people COM
ing in who wanted an extra oom
Colin was thankful to go. He felt
like a thief who had robbed a blind
man. Flo was a thief, and he had
stolen what was far more precious than
gold-he had stolen fame from an old
man, a foreigner, from a girl perhaps
as poor as himself-and he hated him
self for it. He had done it almost in
his delirium, but as health and
strength returned every hour, SO did
his moral sense of right and wrong.
He was a thief.
The letter with the good news came
to a dreary London attic, one Of those
tiny, ill-furnished rooms which shelter
broken hearts and hide blighted hopes
from the mock Of the. world.
Colin Stuart had won the prize for
his superb setting of the classic ode
he held the check in his hand for
$3.50, with the formal offer of the
post he had craved, with more than
formal appreciation Of his work, for
the famous Signor Tiorno pronounced
ii worthy of the highest praise.
Colin threw the letter down in Bit
teri contempt. "Stolen honors-a
giants robe," he muttered, "only, thank
heaven, there is still time to make
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