The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-09-26
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of nettles and get up smiling; he had
seen her kicked by a COW she was
he had seen a humble bee sting her
on the neck without raising her dam
der. How could such a woman as that
have a temper?
One moonlight night, a week after
his talk with Uncle Joe. the deacon in
vited the soinster out for a row on the
river. It wasn't much of river. nor.
much of a boat. and the deacon WASH
much of hand at the oars. but 1t
seemed the proper thing to do under
the romantic occasion. The whiDpoor-'
Wills were singing, the harvest moon
blinking, and the weeping willows
waving their plumes in the soft night
| air as they set out, and everything
| went well for ten minutes. Then Miss
| Jones suddenly discovered that the
boat was leaking, and that she had al
| ready got one of her feet wet The
| deacon was sorry but, as far as he
knew, all rowboats leaked, and people
| who went out in them had to make
| the best of it. He bent to his oars to
| kepe time with the iwhippoorwills, but
| he zhadf't-@bee1l moving five minutes
when he fffirted soiie of them out of the
water, and at the same time fifrted
about a gallon of the. briny over Mary.
''Deacon Bradshaw she called out,
las she rose uD. soispa
: Jpn sorryss but Iseouldnt help it,
/ but you ought to- have Helped it 1t
1 was very clumsy in you. i'm all Wei
through, and we must turn back TINS
minute. I don't believe you know any
thing about a boat
IF you hadn't been bobbing around
it wouldn't have happened"
81 wasn't 1bobbing around. | say l
want to go right back home"
The Deacon started to pull the boat
around and lost an. oar! In trying to re-
cover that one he not only came within
an ace of upsetting the boat, but lost
the other.
why don't you jump out!" shouted
i the spinster at him.
.'Beca use the water here is over my
head and I can't swim.
Then what are we going to do
Deacon Bradshaw, you are nothing ou'
a blunderer!"
emit You were bobDing. this way ano
IT wasn't bobbing! You ought to be
ashamed of yourself to try to lay it or
to me. Amt you going to do any
thing?"
1.-The only thing we can do is to wait
for the boat to drive ashore
''And how long will that be?
mo telling If you hadn't been talk
ing about the moonlight on the water
should never have asked you to come
i out rowing. I guess you'll get moon
I light enough
/ Miss Jones didn't answer this taunt
She kept getting madden and madder
but she concealed the 1dCI ullNlA Xix
boat finally grounded on a sandbar IL
fnidstream When they had both scram-
bled ashore she found her voice. She
called the deacon names until she hao
ratified off d hundred of them. She ex-
pressed her pity for the wife dead ano
gone, and more pity for the wife te
come. She criticised his personal ap-
pearance his grammar and the shoes
on his feet, and she talked so fast thai
he couldn't get in word edgewise. He
stood there and took it for quarter
of an hour, and had just got ready to
say that she was no lady when she
/ plunged into the water up to her waist
and waded ashore and called to hin
from the bank as she set off for home
two miles away:
oh I'd like to be married to you
for about two hours! Wouldn't l Learn
youswhat was whati''
l. But they never married. After think
ing it over and wading ashore In hel
trail the Deacon unused:
+ Poor wieei What she meant to say
was that a year or so after shed gone
fId find out that Mary Jones was the
spitefuHest. catfish, nastiest woman II
jackson county, and I'll be burned If
haven fishes dropped right here ano
/ now like a pumpkin falling from the
! top of a haystackI'-( Copyright, 1905
tav Il ID Marshall