The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1905-02-11
THE HIRED coat.

Matthewson was placed in an epbar-
RAISING position when he received the
invitation to act as one OF the. ushers
at the wedding of his oId-time college
chum, Arnold. 1t was to be a swell
affair in one of the churches affected
by the high school of society, and the
trouble with MatthewsOn was that he
was only just emerging from the Sub
merged TENTH" Playing the ponies"
and thinking that he was wise ON the
turns the stock maket was going to
take had scattered his substance among
the bookmakers and the bucket shops
and he had been down in the free lunch
class before he had picked himself up.
forsworn all kinds of uncertain VEN
lures and included among his New
Year resolutions one to earn his wages
in the small job that he had obtained
and to save as much of it as he did not
require for economical living. He didn't
want to throw Arnold down as to the
matter of acceptance. He knew that
Arnold knew nothing of his run of
hard luck, but he was entirely certain
that he could not afford to squander
the $50 that the purchase of the neces-
sary dress suit for the marriage func-
tion would call for. He saw a way out
of the dilemma when he noticed on the
front window of a hand-me-down cloth
ing store a proclamation of DRESS
Suites for Hiar." The negotiations were
speedily concluded and he went to his
back attic room with a big bundle in
his arms. ..4z, Z.
He sent. Arnold note accepting the
invitation and then sat down to in
spect the garments that had come into
his temporary possession. They fitted
him as if they had been built for him,
but he distressfully took note that there
was grease around the back edge of the
coat collar and that the edges of the
cuffs We're rather shiny. He put a
little ink on the Objectionable termini
and congratulated himself that the out
fit would show up well enough in the
crowd and under the electric light.
! There was a gap in the silk lining
| around the waist, where it had been
/ frayed by hard service, as Matthewson.
reflected at the balls of the Walters
Beneficial Societyand the BARRIERS Ben
fetal Union but he sewed the tattered
sections together, remembering at the
moment in which he clumsily piled
the needle and thread that If every
thing had gone well with him he would
have been able to buy new dress coats,
or that Mabel would have been ready
Ito repair the rent in a coat that would
J have been too recently bought to war;
rant its retirement. Then he thought
of the last letter that he had sent to
her and recalled that he had written it
at the club Of which he had been a
I member in his halcyon days and that
! in it he had proposed marriage He re-
/ membered, too, that the writing Of that
: letter in the early hours of the morn
/ ing had followed the night before at
the Everson's reception, when It was
about an even balance whether he had
been intoxicated the most by Mabefs
/ beauty or by the liquid refreshments.
I'm drop that question now was his
| conclusion as he passed away into
dreamland. mabel never answered the
letter and I soon afterward made a
/ monkey of myself and my money and
suppose that she has forgotten me-
When he stood at the silken rope that
separated the resered section of the
i church from the open pews and the
i bridal party came up the central aisle,
Mabel was the maid of honor. Matthew
son fancied that she took no parti-
| cular notice of him as she swept past In
the glory of the uniform that society
prescribes for such occasions, and he
| formed plan of slipping away as
soon as the ceremony was finished. He.
was amazed when he was requested BY
a messenger from Arnold to step into
the vestry room and affix his sigma
ture as witness of the marriage con-
tract. s51
Yes, Mr.. Matthewson, it was / who
suggested to Mrs. Arnold that she
might like to have your. John Ham
cock penmanship on the record" said
/ Mabel to him, land what is more she
insists that you shall come to the we'd
4 ding breakfast. You can't possibly de-
cline. for l am sure that you would
not affront bride through her nearest
friend'' a." -
And so he found himself in "the
solitude of two" in the carriage with
Mabel, she was chatty concerning
, events in the circle of which he had
drcrped, but he did his best to turn
the versation into such channels as
thu .ure of Port Arthur and the
prob.3ie effect on the result of the war.
1t was an unpleasant half hour for
him.
: They were sitting side by side in the
dining room of the brides home,, and
: everybody was waiting with the re-
: gulation equipment of rice for the new
Mrs. Arnold to be escorted to the car
lriage that was to be the first convey
ance in the honeymoon route. Mabel
arose as the bride came down the
, stairway. There was crush in the
room and Matthewson wedged HIM
self into the worst Of it. The tail Of
: his coat was cought between the table
and the pressure of a weighty do
wager, and there was a rip. Mabel
= gathered from the floor the sundered
fragment, and whispered to him that
\ If he would come up to the sewing
room she would repair the damages.
AS she was stitching up the seams
she remarked to Matthewson that there
was something crinkly in the tail Of
the coat He went down into the
, rearward pockets and fished up the