The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1904-03-10

III uOuOr OF WISHING llQleS.' But you
mustn't think me comedian. Truly, ]
didn't plan it. My friend from Six
Crossroads must be given the credit of
devising the scene, though you OWNED
it."
1T was a little too picturesque,
think. I know about Six Crossroads.
Please tell me what you mean to do"
Nothing. What should II"
"You mean that you will keep on let
ting them shoot at you until they-until
YOU She struck the bench angrily
with her hand.
"There's no summer theater in Six
Crossroads. There's not even church.
| Why shouldn't they?" he asked grave
ly. During the long and tedious even
| 1ngs it cheers the poor Crossroader's
soul to drop over here and take shot
| at me- 1t whiles away dull care for
him, and he has the additional exercise
Of running all the way home"
"Ah!' she cried Indignantly. '"They
told me you always answered like this"
swell, you see, the Crossroads efforts
have proved so thoroughly hygienic for
me. AS patriot have sometimes felt
extreme modification that such bad
craftsmanship should exist in the coun-
ty, but I console myself with the
thought that their best shots are, I'M
happily, in the penitentiary.''
"There are many left. Can't you I'M
derstand that they will organize again
and come in a body, as they did before
you broke them up? And then, if they
come on a night when they know you
are wandering out of town.
| "You have not had the advantage of
IN intimate study of the most exclusive
wood. There are about thirty gentle
men who remain in that neighborhood
while their relatives sojourn under dis
cipline. If you had the entree over
there, you would understand that these
thirty could not gather themselves into
company and march the seven miles
without physical debate in the ranks.
They are not precisely amiable people,
even among themselves. They would
quarrel and shoot one another to pieces
long before they got here"
"But they worked in company
once"
"Never for seven miles. Four miles
all dead"
She struck the bench again. ooh, you
laugh at me! You make a joke Of your
own life and death and laugh at every
thing. Have five years of Plattville
taught you to do that?''
II laugh only at taking the poor
Crossroaders too seriously. don't laugh
at your running into fire to help fell
low mortal"
II knew there wasn't any risk.
knew he had to stop to load before he
shot again."
"He did shoot again. If had known
you before tonight, r. His tone
changed, and lie spoke gravely. II am
at your feet in worship of your divine
philanthropy. It's so much finer to risk
your life for a stranger than for
| friend"
"That is mans point of view. isn't
1t?'
"You risked yours for man you had
| never seen before"
"Oh, no. saw you at the lecture l
heard you Introduce the Hon. Mr. Hal
loway."
''Then I don't understand your wish
| ing to save me-
| She smiled unwillingly and turned her
gray eyes upon him with troubled sun
niness, and under the sweetness of her
regard he set a watch upon his lips,
though he knew it would not avail him
long. He had driveled along respect
ably so far, he thought, but he had the
sentimental longings of years, starved
Of expression, eliminating in his heart
| She continued to look at him wistfully,
searchingly, gently. Then her eyes trav-
eled over his big frame, from his
shoes "a patch of moonlight fell on
them; they were dusty; he drew them
under the bench with a shudder) to his
broad shoulders (he shook the stoop out
| of them). She stretched her small white
hands toward him and looked at them
in contrast and broke into the most de-
licious low laughter in the world. At
ILLS uC A14CW l1lC "dlCu Ou LIS llDS WdS
worthless. 1t was a question Of min
utes till he should present himself to
her eyes as sentimental and suscep-
uble imbecile. He knew it. He was in
wild spirits.
"Could you realize that one of, your
dangers might be a shaking?" she
cried. "Is your seriousness a lost art?''
Her laughter ceased suddenly. 'Ah,
no! I understand Theirs said the
French laugh always in order not to
weep. 1 haven't lived here five years.
should laugh, too, if were you.''
"Look at the moon," he responded.
1--WE Plattvillians own that with the
best of metropolitans. and, for my part,
see more Of it here. You do not ap-
preciate us. We have large landscapes
in the heart Of the city, and what other
capital has advantages like that? Next
winter the railway station is to have a
new stove for the waiting room. Heav-
en- itself is one Of our suburbs-it is so