The Fairmont West Virginian. (Fairmont, W. Va.) 1904-1914, 1904-09-21
A NEW YORK.
AND A MIN)EzIR) s SHACK

Il guess Mary ard I wouldnst have
looked upon this as heaven away back
yonder in the tangle OF years he1.
a We We're struggling along best wayssse
Y knew how =,
Is The young nlatron had been pIcking
|. out chords On Ale piano. bur she
Z crossed over and sat down By her hus-
II band. EssSs
ss.Ioidn't have any such tiiiIlg as
tscoseS corners when Mary ana u made
our first@start at hoasekeepit he
old senator Went on crossing his
. legs, leaning back and putting away ae.
the hriar. Not many scrumt iferosis
& filings of envy kind, for the matter OF
that. 5s
Fact is. it was shack, and on top
of that a one-room shack. Built 1T
myself after working hours. and cut
1.-The scrub spruce and fir and pine to
build it, TOO
Il was a timberman then in a. new
silver mine thirty miles from tn raj 4.
road. Got twenty-five week, which
WASH much. counting how costly itS
was To live.
Well, after T got the shack built
went down. to Boise and asked Mary
she was teaching school there Mary
was agreeable; we'd been beaus since
/ first we met. a year before. although
after went to work In the new Infre a.
/ I didn't have much chance to see her
But Mary was ready. and we gosss
married in Boise and Itook her to the
shack. Marvellous days, those both OF
us young. you see,8and not caring much
about anything, nor Winding any sort
of Inconvenience 50 long as we were
close enough to each other 50 q I$couid
holler across the gulch on my wa " TO-
work and on my way home And IT.
was home, plumb and proper never
have had any such home since
made the stove myself, too, ont Y
of an old, rusty, horsepower boiler
that cribbed from the mine eng zine
house. Made most OF the furn fture
too including the bed, spare times.
Wagon freighting was costly, and beds
and gear like that. read ma q. cost
heap of money outthere In those days
how they We're wa beyond me.
Had a rag carpet on the floor Of
the shack that Mary'd been making
herself. after school hours, for Al year.
Dishes We're mostly wooden was
pretty handy with jack-knife those
days, Had calico curtains In che one
window-afary had an artistic eye.
and the way she draped those cur
tafns was something dainty
got the water from the creek "a
about 400 yards back Of the sl1 aels.
Used to fill up the three big barrels
once week, and let the water, which
was frequently rofIy, settle.
Didn't have any fresh meat, unless
shot it O Sundays--freIghters used
to fetch the salt in twice a week over
the trail. Canned vegetables too. ana
scandaIously high they were.
I'D started truck patch but the
soil wasn't adapted for truck raising.
All right for. flowers, though. Mary
got hold of some flower SEEDS
'cribed to dolIar-a-week WEEKLY,
believe, and got the seeds as sub
cription prize--and she had the pretti-
'st little open air conservatory in front
If the shack you ever saw
She used to sit in that; teenchy
lower garden of summer evenings and
'lay on the little old ten-stringed
ither, fixed out with numbers that
;ot for her down in Boise. Nj ghts
etching and sweet the music from
hat either sounded, too ont there III
he open air, with the wind stirring
through the branches overhead, and 3:
larry, with her pretty head tilted bach
gainst tree, humn1inga the tunes she
ayed.
Our first-born arrived in that shack
he medical man who oficiated On nv
hat occasion was a fellow who been
rrested and locked up in PocateTlo IA
'r horse thievery. They allowed him
} come to our shack in company with
deputy marshal, and then they took
i'm back again.
Well, Mary and land. later thes
rst one---keDt house in that little, Old,
and-mades shack, squatting at the base
the bare mountain for three years.
oeaking for myself--and if Maryawa
earth she'd join me in saying It.;
ose were far and away the shappie
sars of our lives n
After some music the oll3sS ena tor 81
r.I,o