Elk City mining news. (Elk City, Idaho) 1903-1913, 1907-12-14
CHAPTER 1.
: BY ID. c. Murray

A loosely clad man, bearded and Specta-
cled, and a little on the right side OF
forty, sat on a camp stool before a small
field easel, and libeled the landscape at
his ease pausing at his work now and
then and drawing back his head to survey
1t with an air of charmed appreciation.
Near him, on the gnarled trunk of tree
and in the shadow of a moss-grown rock,
sat lady some ten or a dozen years
younger leisurey torturing thread into
lace with a hooked needle.
A little way down the dell a boy was
clambering among the rocks, shrieking
every now and then with ecstatic news Of
a beetle or butterfly. He was sturdy.
bue-eyed, goldcn-haired little fellow Of
FIVE the picture of health, and he was
risking his limbs and chattering to all ami
mate and inanimate nature-a delightful
boy. and all alive from his golden head
to his restless feet and tips of his brown
little fingers. The mother snatched him
to her arms and covered him with kisses.
Suddenly she looked up, flushed. half pite-
GUS, with fash of tears in her eyes.
Austin, feel afraid. Have l right
to be 80 happy? Has any one a right to
be SO happy? Will it last?"
who knows?" he answered. Human
affairs run in averages, but then the av-
erages are not individual. We have had
almost trouble enough in our time to have
paid for little joy. Let us take it CRATE
fully"
Sometimes" she said "a shadow seems
to fall upon it all-the shadow of fear"
THE shadow of the past-experience.
The burned child breads the fire. We are
burned children, both of US. Five years
illness and poverty out Of seven years OF
married life is large allowance. And
after all, our present happiness isn't phe-
nomenal, my dear, though it looks 80. We
have health. and we value it because we
have each missed it in turn. We have a
little money. and we think it great deal
because we have been so deadly poor
And then" he laughed and half blushed
I'VE have little fame, and that is all
the pleasanter because we were so long
neglected. Sweet is pleasure after pain"
II am dangerously happy" she answer
ed.
Come. let us unpack the luncheon bas-
ket Cold chicken. Salad. Bread
Cheese. Milk. There we are. Fall to-
Sit down by your mother, Cupid. Take
a pull at the milk, old man. and then
you'll have an appetite. What a sudden
shadow p
A cloud had foated between themselves
and the sun, and strange quiet had fall
en- with the shadow on the woods.
Austin" the wife whispered there is
that dreadful man again. 1t seems as If
he had brought the darkness with him."
A brown sloping path, covered still
with the fir needles shed in the foregoing
autumn. broke the wall of green which
bounded the dell, and down this footway
between the silver steps of the birches and
the reddish stems of the frs, walked a
gray-bearded man, with his head dropped
forward and his hands clasped behind him.
He looked neither to left nor right, but
went by as if unconscious of their pres
ence, and in little while was lost be-
hind the thicker growth of trees. As he
went out of sight the sun broke through
life again and the birds renewed their
song.
Look she whispered; the shadow
follows him."
What an odd mood this is to-day -
said her husband, smiling at her. And
why is the poor old gentleman so dread
ful?"
but, Austin, do you know? You can't
have heard. He is known to have hatch
ed plots against the Gar"
well, yes. 1t is known also that he
has been wifeless and childless this TWEEN
ty years. His wife and his two sons
died in Siberia. They went there without
trial, and people who know him say that
the loss of them in that horrible way
turned his brain. Suppose anybody stole
you and little Austin? Suppose he drove
you on foot through hundreds of miles of
Ice and snow? Suppose that he made you
herd with the human off-scourings of the
world and that you died after three or
four long drawn, hdeous years? 1t might
be wicked, but surely it would not be
quite without provocation if / blew that
man sky-high. l don't say that regicide
Is thing to be commended l don't de-
fend the poor old gentlemans political
opinions. But do say that human ma
ture is human nature"
Luncheon over, he returned to his
painting, to find the lights all changed.
He worked away, however, with great
contentment for an hour or two, while the
wife and the boy wandered beyond the
limits of the dell. When they came back
they found that he had packed up his
traps and was lying at length on the
moss, with his face turned to the sky.
II do this better than paint" he said.
cooking an idle eye at his wife from BE-
meath the soft white felt which rested ON
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