The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1906-08-30


ed. HE would have come--I would
have brought him, but l wanted to
tell you about him first"
And she told her about him now,
and It was all only that she loved
him, and she loved him more than all
the world, and she had promised to
be his wife, but
There was bound to be but" 1t
was what Miss Gurney had been lis
tening for.
But 1t will not be for a long
while, because he Is going away"
Going away, childl Why? Where
to-"
"He has spoken to his father
about me-" said Hester, her lips quiv-
ering, "and he refuses to see me, and
threatens to turn Richard into the
street If he will not give me up"
They are rich, you see, DEAR"
murmured Miss Gurney, bitterly,
"and we are poor. Probably his
mother"
'She has been dead several years. ="
Then it is his father He prob
ably intends his son to marry money,
or social influence--"
But Richard won't. He says he
will never marry any one but me. If
will wait for him."
why is he going away?"
"His father is sending him to man
age large branch of his business in
Ceylon. He is to be out there three
years-perhaps longer. His father
is only sending him, he says, so as
to separate him from me, and he
can't refuse to go without running his
prospects, and for my sake he does
not want to do that. l don't care
whether he is rich or poor, but Rich
ard says If his father turns him
adrift he would have nothing-and
so it is best to wait, because he will
never change, and 1 shall never
change. And so he is going away at
the end of this week. l can't bear
him to go. l might never see him
again; but if he lives, he will come
back to me-"
She said it half defiantly, half de-
spairingly, and laid her head on Miss
Gurney's lap aagin to hide her tears
For fully ten minutes neither OF
them spoke; then, rousing herself
with heavy sigh, Miss Gurney said
hesitatingly:
II might do something. I don't
know what / can do-but bring him
home with you tomorrow evening
and let me see him, dear. If he Is
all you think he is-but let me see
him for myself. Bring him with you
tomorrow evening""
And the following evening, wher
Richard Harwood came, Miss Gurney
was easily converted to Hester's opin
ion of him. His frank, honest eyes
his unaffected simplicity of speech
and manner, his difTidence, his sh.
alteration of Hester, his ureonceal
able love of her-all conspired t
win Miss Gurney's confidence and ap
proval, and won them in spite of her
self.
Again and again, while he wa!
| there, and after he was gone, sht
owned, grudgingly at first, but will
a growing satisfaction, that he real
ized her girlhood's ideal of the maj
she had loved years ago, and was not
as she had feared, reincarnation o
that man as she saw him now in thu
light of bitter emembrances-cru
heartless, faithless.
She lay awake that night livini
through again in thought the loni
past happiness and misery that tn
sight of Richard Harwood hat
brought back upon her with renewed
intensity. She had loved, and wa
to have married, but seemed predes
tined to misfortune. First it wa
her mothers death that postponed
the marriage; then, a year later, he
fathers; and her father dying bank
rupt, the man she loved had ulti
mately yielded to the wishes of hi
family and broken his engagement
with her, through her blind love o
him, and could leave her to bea
alone a shame whose memory wa
not buried in that little grave in tn
far off country churchyard, but live,
to haunt her yet, and scar her yer
soul as often as it returned to her
She had never seen the man since, o
written to him. she was too proud t.
ask anything of his pity, and all tn
love she had felt for him had die
within her
She left her old home and came t
earn her living IN London anon
people who knew nothing of her his
tory. Being clever with her needle
she was soon able to support hersel
in reasonable comfort, but the har
work and the solitary, loveless lif
were fast aging and hardening an
embittering her, when Hester cam
with her childish needs and sympa
thies to melt the frost that had gath
cred about her heart and reconcil
her to humanity and make the worl
habitable again.
Hester was the orphaned child @
Miss Gurney's younger sister, and
> was not strange that the two, eac
left desolate, should grow to be a
| in all to each other. If Miss Gul
J ney's love was the deeper, the NOR
self-sacrificing, that was not strang
| either. She was no longer yount
and had not hoped that her forlor
, heart hunger would ever be satisfied
but Hester had come and satisfie
D 1t. II was enough for her now tha