The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1905-06-06
Fishing
By KEITH GORDON
Copyright. 1905. BY Keith Gordon.
By KEITH GORDON

Copyright. 1905. BY Keith Gordon.
When the young man at last reluc
family furled his lines about the long
he might in the covered buggy that he
had procured In the village the shad-
ows were already long and pensive.
When he reached the village the hush
Of early twilight lay on the broad, dec
orous streets which were almost desert |
ed. Their very emptiness, however,
was full of suggestive cheer. Pictures
of broad, low rooms with bountifully
spread supper tables, on which feath-
cry biscuit, cold chicken and preserves
made tempting array, rose before his
dreamy eyes; cheerful, natural faces
doomed in the thick, red light of old
fashioned lamps; the rag carpets, rock
ing chairs and secretaries-all the de-
tails Of the rural household scene were
wildly, pleasurably before him.
Behind him the long poles dipped
with rhythmical, monotonous motion
as the horse logged evenly along. At
the crossing of two streets the slight,
graceful figure Of girl paused for him
to pass. In the shadowy light she
seemed like spirit-the spirit of the
advancing night
Thus sunk, lost, wrapped in revery,
he drove on, the poles waving up and
down behind him like long, hungry ten
tacles, exploring the evening air for
something to catch and hold. A jolt
and rumble and the buggy rolled
over the crossing with an energy that
sent the poles dipping lower than ever,
and then the tentacles hooked some
thing-hooked it tight and after brief
resistance on the part of the hooked
thing, which manifested a strong in
clination to remain where 1t was-lift-
ed it high in a triumph and maliciously
disappeared down the dusky street,
leaving paralyzed, shadowy shape
staring after it with astounded eyes.
For moment the girl stood speech
less, bewildered To have her hat sud
denly plucked from her head as If by
hand thrust from the sky in a sleepy
little village of the new world-well,
1t was an experience that stopped her
mental machinery with jerk
Had 1t been in Greece in the year
something or other B. c. it would have
been applicable as the deed of some
goddess, Jealous and angered at the
beauty of her love of a hat Jealous
goddesses, she recalled, had done even
more extraordinary things than snatch
ing a mortars hat
Or had it been later, In medieval
times, she might have ascribed this
hat lifting to black magic. But in the
United States of America in the year
of 1905 neither of these explanations
could hold, and that was the reason
she stood as if she had taken root
while these thoughts shot rapidly
through her mind
Meanwhile her hat, dancing up and
down in tantalizing, diabolical fash
ion, as IL to wave her a hooking fare
well, was being borne, slowly but in
exorably, into the cleaning. Before
she recovered the power of speech and
motion the buggy was halfway down
the block She made a step after it,
then stopped. She had a sharp, hui
morous vision of herself, hatless and
disheveled, pursuing that dancing,
mocking. bobbing will-o'- the-wisp of a
hat through the village streets, making
frantic, Intellectual jumps at it, as a
dog at a biscuit held just beyond its
reach, and the vision caused her to
pause.
Here! Oh, say, stop, won't your"
she called imploringly but the quad
ruped drawing the buggy proceeded
with a deXterity that reminded her of |
the juggler who keeps four balls in the !
air at the same time, while the fall of |
its hoofs came to her in more and !
more distant cadence.
"Oh, mani" she called desperately, |
but the owner of the fishing rods was
wandering in a dream world, smiling
the damp, earthly, evening smells, com
muning with the approaching spirit of
night, deaf to any but trumpet voices
'Wellr' she exclaimed explosively, |
with an energy that emptied her lungs
to the remotest corners. well, l like
that I'd just like to know what I'm
going to do?''
And in answer to the query the Of
flcious, obtrusive, subconscious self
set her in motion, and she found her
self heading toward her boarding place
to the monotonous inward wall of,
"And it's the only hat l have with mer'
Meanwhile the young man drove on
musingly, blissfully, until he reached
the house where he was staying, all
unconscious of his latest and most I'M
usual catch The light was stream
ing warmly from the windows as he
drove past the side of the house up to |
the barn and jumped out
At the sight of the dark object dimly |
visible at the end of his poles he stared |
in surprise. A moment later, when he |
had carried them into the patch of
light from the nearest window, his |
hands dropped helplessly.
There it was, trim. natty hat-a wo-
mans hat, or, no. a girls hat Even to
his cropping masculine sense there was
something coquettish, playful, alluring,
H. Dul liltEG IL W els, UClQ
as an ensnared fish by the two sharp
hooks, surely the strangest object a
fisherman ever caught.
"Where'd it come from?' demanded
the boy who had come out to unharness
the horse. Then, suddenly, as if the
joke were just revealed to him, he
burst into a loud guffaw, In which the
young man joined in spite of himself.
Later on he worked it out. 1t must /
belong TO the slender young girl who !
had waited for him to drive past. He
remembered distinctly now that she
had paused there at a certain crossing, |
waiting for him to get by, sort of
shadow girl who had seemed part of
his musings Doubtless she had passed /
close behind the buggy and the bobbing
poles with the dangling hooks had par