Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-02-18
CHAPTER VIII.

he had been in the presence OF MS lduS
love. and laboring under the strain OF q
matrimonial proposal, personally conduct
ed, as it were, by Betsey Bobbin. After ne
had secured fresh linen and been by him-
self long enough to really consider the stu
alton. the world looked very bright to him.
His subconscious mind reflected as he stop
ped at DennisJns store and the tavern, ana
talked with the delegates who had come in
to town for the next days convention, that
he must go to Philadelphia soon to see
that the renewal of the mortgage was duly
executed. He could now meet their propo-
sition, and give them the whole establish
ment, other than the presses themselves.
as security for his debt on them. He con-
sidered the plan of adding a power folder
To his equipment, and knew that they
would gladly consent to this. The circula-
ton OF the Express was picking UP pleas
antly under the influence of politics,
and he felt confident that by new methods
which he had in mind he would be able
to hold it after the campaign was over
His enga cement to Mercy Cooper put new
vim into his veins, although they had not
lacked energy before.
He did not plan so far ahead as to even
consider a wedding date as yet, but his
seriousness and general sense of response
hility undoubtedly doubled as he left the
Cooper house.
And then. in the absorbing interest of a
gossiping investigation OF what Jacob Mus
ssr's strength really amounted to. and how
much opposition Cooper was likely to have
on the floor of the convention. his thought
Of Mercy changed gradually into pleas
ant undercurrent. 1t did not interrupt his
planning of his reXt days paper. nor his
cautious work foT Cooper among the dele
gates.
But few hours later, after he had
handed his copy to the printers, helped
with his own hands AZ the accomplish
ment of more than one mechanical de-
tail and heaved that sigh of relief that
comes once year to the merchant when
he strikes his annual balance, oftener
to the physician when he cures or kills
an interesting patient. and, to the news
paper man. every time his paper goes
to press, thoughts of Mercy and his love
for her became his dominant mental note
again.
Indeed. so exuberant was his mood
that it attracted the attention of Henry
Hubbard. his foreman, and even made
him grin somewhat sourly through con-
tagiOn.
Hubbard was an expert printer, less
than forty years old. who had drifted into
the office looking for piece work. several
Years before, and who stayed there and
had been promoted entirely because of his
competency at his trade. and in spite of a
morOse and disagreeable personality. He
was a large man; dark and physically very
strong, whose forehead always wrinkled in
a frOwn, and whose service despite its
prOmptness and its excellence ever seemed
to be given grudgingly. When he had first
made him foreman of the paper Selkirk
had seen to 1t that the man had oppor-
tunities to make acquaintance and enjoy
life if he would but the Copper house was
almost the only one in Toms River which
he ever visited. and even to its eXuberant
and all-embracing hospitality he soon be-
came not a very welcome guest, although
no sign was given to him to make him
think So He neither talked nor seemed to
care to listen to others when he made his
visits, two or three times a month, but
spent most of his time in gazing at Mercy
steadily that more than once she had
avoided him in one way or another. On
these occasion his stay had been very brief
indeed. That his visits were even negative
" encouraged was due more to Selkirk's
wish to make life pleasant for him than TO
any pleasure which any member of the
Cooper family could find in his society.
AS for the rest of the village-it had
tried to make friends with him at first in
the way peculiar TO small towns by tell
ing him its own histories and then wait
ing for a return of confidence. But the
return of confidence never came. This
had for a time made him a fascinating
mystery; then interest in the past of a
man who was seen daily and whose pres
ent was very humdrum and unsociable
tagged; then 1t died out altogether, and
Hubbard was left alone, apparently not
greatly to his sorrow.
When Selkirk returned to the office
from another visit to the Cooper house,
during which he had been notified by
Mercy tidt she Hdu engaged an erGdnO
boy for him. he seated himself near 1.ub-
bards desk for a moment, and told him
OF the lad. He did not go into details
of the i'll fortune which the boy and his
mother had passed through before their
advent at the farmhouse; but merely
said that lie had found a boy who would
help about the shop. Hubbard received
the news with satisfaction Then. after
a moments hesitation. Selkirk decided
to tell him of the happiness which had
come to him. His relations with his
foreman were not of that intimate nature
which would ordinarily call for conf
dences but he knew that the news would
spread quickly through the little town
Gas news ever does through little towns),
and that, even If he did not tell him
of it, Hubbard would hear of 1t within
n few hours. Besides, he had a very
human impulse to talk of it with some
one.
But he did not go directly at the mat
ter. He began on a general discussion
of the subject of matrimony. He did
not notice it, but Hubbard glanced at
him keenly when he spoke almost his
first words on the absorbing topic From
the subject in the abstract, Selkirk was
(tO salve his diffidence) bringing the con-
versatton slowly around to his prospec-
tive marriage to Mercy Cooper in par
ticular. when, with the first mention of
her name, Hubbard threw a glance at
him which he did notice. Then the man,
To Selkirk's vast establishment. rose
abruptly, Strengthened up his desk, and
with no reply or comment of any kind
whatever, except a warning to be sure
to lock up when he went out grufily said
good night and left the office.
SelkiTk gaZed after him for a moment in
amazement, but he was too happy to allow
his head 10 be troubled about him for very
long. He prepared a paragraph or two for
the next afternoons paper and, finally
finding that trifies had busted him for more
than an hour and that IT was nearly z
O'Clock, left some copy on the hook for
hn rIaaY To hnay IN IN sha nyNIt,f
fully lowered the wick of the oil lamp
which he left standing upon the imposing
stone, locked up and went out to talk with
the delegates, who, he assumed would be
concentrated around the tavern or at Den
nison's store at that hour
At about this time Henry Hubbard sat in
the bushy fringe of piece of wet and lone
~ woodland a mile from the village. A
glimpse of his face would have astonished
his employer. The man had FASTENED
thther soon as he had left the Express
Office. 1t was a favorite haunt with him,
probably because OF it's solitude. Ordinarily
when he reached the gloomy outskirts of
the swamp he seated himself upon some
stump or messy bank and gazed with i'm
passive face at nothing in particular; but
on this late afternoon his face was not i'm
passive. Many expressions followed one an
other across IL as the day waned and the
sun sank His brow wrinkled in reflection
as II he were recalling past events: 4,