Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1904-11-30
STIN S ON'S
DIPLOMACY
BY Curran
Richard Greeniey
copyashi, 1894, By cuuau Riehapd o.ssnley

mittee leaned across the table and
wagged a heavy forefnger under
Brackets nose.
'Tve cinched the finest wire that
| was ever pulled, and when them wire
get done pulln' Bill Carrots chances
are dead and rained ON or my names
| not Jim Stinson. I've interviewed Miss
| Elizabeth Heath. and she's ours
The emphatic finger stopped as
| Bracket sprang to his feet.
'You-you interviewed Miss Heath
in my favor?"
Eyes. Why not? She's a power, she
is, with them fellows wives down in
| the Tenth ward. en- she's a lady right,
| you bet"
Bracket dropped Imply into the
chair behind him, while Stinson poured
out the history of his call upon Miss
| Heath, the president of the Hypatia.
in a mixture of slang plentifully sprin-
kled with ''sez l" and "sez She" Stin-
son took much glory to himself that be
should have thought of this clever
stroke just at the critical point Of the
campaign. Miss Heath's influence in
certain quarters was unbounded Down
| In the Tenth ward. where the tall ten
| ements gloom above the river, the little
| children of the poor watched for her
| coming, and the tired mothers told her
| all their trials and troubles, all their
| simple ambitions and little joys, find
| ing a ready sympathy. Stinson had
! heard of Miss Heath through that
| channel, and it was to those poor, tired
| mothers that he looked for a control
| ling voice in the vote that would go I'D
| from the Tenth ward. Stinson had
| also counted ON the lever welded by
| Miss Heath as president of the Hypa-
| tia, the woman's club that led not
only in the city, but In the state feder
| alton. The federation's interests once
aroused and its influence brought to
| bear would mean powerful leayening
| at work for his man from one end of
| the state to the other. All this and
more he poured into the unheeding ear
| of Bracket, whose mind was engrossel
| with the one thought, the intolerable
shame that this man should have APP
| pealed to Elizabeth Heath in his name
Beyond all considerations of the gov
| ernor's Office, of his political future
his mind reeled with the intensity of
this one thought
Stinson's last words as he stood in
| the doorway recalled him:
Il told her that you would call in n
| faxx lar- Nd
Their. She seemed right willing to take
| hand after she had chewed the rag a
bit, and saw as how a call from you
would sorter clinch it. Women folks
has to be made up to. l reckon you
know all about that? Well. so long.
Mr.. Governor" and Stinson was gone.
John Bracket turned off the light
and sat still in the glow of the fire
The warm rays danced over his fast
silvering head. bringing out the lines
of the tired, old-young face and ac-
centuating in grotesque shadow the
droop of his shoulders.
Her name on the lips of this coarse
man! Out of the silence of the years
to hear it for the first time in this man
nerr' He had been away so long in
the lower part of the state that he had
quite lost sight of the changes that
must have come to her as well as to
himself. So she was a social leader
u now, club woman. He remembered
the pleasant family circle as he had
known it and wondered If it yet re-
manned unbroken. Out of the Goals
sprang the picture of the girl, Eliza
beth Heath, as he had last seen her,
that night when he had told her good
by forever. He could almost hear him
self speaking the slow, fateful, reluct-
ant words, in which he had told her
that the bond between them must be
broken for reasons over which he had
no control-a half confidence that, in
the light Of present knowledge, he
knew to have been far more cruel.
more cowardly, than a silence that
would have left her the poor solace of
believing him utterly unworthy.
He had scarcely thought of her when
returning to the old town. He had
made the move for political reasons,
and one hotel is much Ike another to
man who had forgotten the meaning
OF home. Like one cropping through
the dark, picking up the tangled
thread of dropped web. John Braek-
EFT threaded back through the mazes
of fifteen years-fifteen!
-
Brackett's tread grew less resolute,
and his feet seemed to drag just a lit.
tie as he turned into the well remem-
bered square and saw the white col
umns of the Heath home among the
trees. Old Peter opened the door, A
little grayer about the fringe of wool
little more stopped. but the same old
: Peter, shutting down the hall ahead
of him.
The house was painfully familiar.
There in the corner was the little set
tee among the palms where they had
sat that rainy day. He remembered