The Miller sun. (Miller, Hand County, S.D.) 190?-19??, 1907-04-20
CHAPTER V.

l put the candle in a Crevlce and
wedged in piece of chalk before it, so
subduing the light as to make it bearable
to the poor things eyes, and then / gent,
ly drew her hands from her face and
raised her to her feet. She was tall
slip of a girl, quite a child seemingly,
though in reality she was eighteen. Her
face was quite colorless, long and thin,
but her features were modelled with ex-'
quisite delicacy. She looked like one
of those frail and tender plants that are
reared in darkness. The darkness and
lustre of her eyes gave to this strange
colorless face an expression more than
Misunderstanding spiritual, and not of
our world. l found that the rctina was
almost invisible, and by long disuse had
lost its power of contra ction, while the
pupil had become abnormally distended
to catch the scant rays of light diffused
in the caverns. She was dressed in
sack of blue serge, without sieeVes-a gar
ment fashioned to the idea of fitness
evolved by my grandfather; yet this rude
garment looked well upon her, falling to
the graceful curves of her figure, and
throwing into relief the long white arms
and pretty nude feet; it seemed to me
that dress of modern cut would have
been less in character with her unnat-
ural beauty, and have pronounced her still
more pathetically not of our world. We
stood looking at each other in silent
amazement, for pity choked me.
Presently she lifted her hand slowly
and touched my moustache; then walking
to the back with a step as graceful as
the rise and dip of a gull ON the wing,
she looked at my head, and finding that
my hair was cut short, she clapped her
hands together and burst into pea of!
laughter. Then she came round TO look
me in the face again, and finding the tears
running down my cheek-for her laughter
told a tale of lifelong captivity in this
sunless prison that touched my heart to
the quick-she became instantly grave,
her own eyes filled, and with inarticulated
sounds of sympathy she stroked my head,
as though she would console me for the
loss Of my hair, which she must have
conceived was the cause of my grief.
Cannot you speak, you poor little
thing?" l asked.
The sound alone was ineligible to
her, and she responded with sounds that
were but a musical echo of my words.
Hearing her voice the jackdaw cawed,
and she replied with a cav as like his as
she could accomplish. Clearly she had
no notion of speech, and it was hopeless
to think of getting from her any expla-
nation of her strange condition and how
she came there. Had she never learned
the use of speech, or had she been there
so long that the early days of her child
l,no1 ,vara foronttan I wnndaroJ tr;aI
her again, saying a few words in the few
languages that / knew. She listened at
tentively, smiling as if it gave her pleas
ure to hear the sound of a human voice,
but showing no other signs of intelli-
gence; then she, to give variety to the
amusement, sang, making a kind of mu-
sic like that had heard from the mouth
of the well, a continued undulatins rise
and fall of sound as long as the breath
could be maintained. In all my life I
never heard anything so plaintively sweet
and sad. 1t seemed to express more than
could have bene told by words; it was
the revelation of a joyless life, 0; un-l
speakable yearning, and indefnable re-
grets.
Poor child, poor child" l said invoI-
UNFAIRLY.
"Poor child, poor child" she echoed,
in the same tone of sorrow and commits
Grafton. She seemed to see the signif-
canoe of my sympathy, to understand that
my words were an expression of kindness.
for she took up my hand and smoothed
her cheek against it caressingly.
I bent down and kissed her head-for
she was to me no more than little child.
The sound of my kiss perplexed her. and
looking up in my face she Oade me by a
gesture to kiss again. ! lifted the hand
that still chung to mine and kissed the
back of it. She kisesd mine, and repeat
ing the action of her lips once or twice.
laughed at the sound she had never heard
before.
(To hn \