The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1907-04-11
The Awakening
of Charley.
BY Josephine Wentworth.


When Charley sauntered into the
yard and dropped down beside Jane
on the old bench under the elm, he
had in his mind just what he was go
Ing to say-he had been rehearsing
1t all day-but when he was beside
the little girl he had loved since
childhood, looking into her big, in
nocent blue eyes, b > suddenly be-
came speechless SO far as proposing
went.
Jane was In her usual mood; quiet
and confiding, telling hj:n the hap
penings of the day. But Charley had
some thing else on his mind, some
thing that he wanted TO say, and
most of her news fell on deaf ears.
Jane noticed his abstraction and.
thinking that he was not interested,
became silent.
For long time neither spoke,
then:
did you know that Ned Burley'B
cousin Violet, from Chiago, was COM
ing to spend the summer with
them?" she asked.
NO"
Ned says she is dream"
Stuck up, I'll bet"
He says that she will have all tho
fellows in town in love with her be-
fore she has been here two days
81 know one she'll not have"
Charley declared.
That night, after he had gone, she
stood before her mirror, critically
studying the reflection therein. Jane
was not what one would term pretty.
Her features were regular, but her
face was covered with mass of tiny
freckles.
Ned's boast ther all the boys would
be at her heels had not been in vain,
and much to James discontinue,
Charley was one of the foremost. To
him Violet was revelation, her red
lips, bewitching dimples and dancing
eyes played havoc with his heart. He
wondered what on earth he could
ever have seen in that freckle-faced,
red-haired Jane.
Charley continued to call on Jane
same as ever, but there was differ
ence in his attitude toward her. He
looked upon her now as simply
friend of childhood and she accepted
the changed condition of affairs with
fortitude that was pathetic had not
ChaFley's eyes been blinded by tho
flashing charms of the frivolous Vio-
let.
So passed the summer, and when
fall came Violet began talking of re-
turning to the city, and Charley
awoke to the fact that for him life
would become an empty void after
she had gone. Then he asked her to
marry him.
She threw him a saucy look, low
cred her eyes demurely and said she
would consider it. Charley had new
er made a study of human anture,
especially people OF Violet's stamp,
and SO foolishly went about In a
dream of ecstasy.
Whea the day for her departure
arrived he had not received his an
sve r, and she promised to write to
him as soon as she had spoken to
her mother on the subject.
During the following week Jane
saw nothing of him, as his time was
all taken up in dreaming OF the flu
ture, and in going to and from his
house to the post Office.
Family he was rewarded by re-
ceiving a dainty missive postmarked
Chicago. He did not open 1t till he
was safe from observation, then he
to- it open with wildly beating
he -.rt. A moment later he was star
ing at the sheet in amazement-it
was not his letter at all, but was
written to girl in New York.
Violet had written two letters and
had put them in the wrong envel-
opes. He glanced over the pages
Until he came to the last paragraph,
then his face paled and an angry
~ro titled on his brow. He read
H." it read, you ought
to have seen what proposed to me.
50 to amuse myself in picking
i out of his hair, and he had
So: lovely hair, too. And just
think, it was the only pop l got all
7'er: not much like the exDeri-
had at the seashore year
Well, I've written him a nice
lie letter of regret in which l told
him that my ma won't let me, It
nav wake him up"
1t did wake him up. 1t showed
in a type with which he was who'll
~ unfamiliar, and laugh. him les
son that he would remember the rest
of his life And while he was think
Ing of what he had just read there
came intruding into his mind a pair
of big innocent blue eyes. ami he
imagined that he saw look OF sad
ness in their depths. Then he tore
the letter into fragments and ground
1t into the earth with his heel.
When he sauntered into the yard
Jane was sitting on the old bench
under the elm. When he dropped
down beside her he had no idea what
he was going to say, or how he was
going to explain his conduct OF the
past few weeks; in fact he had ex-
pected that she might ignore him, ~
he deserved.
But she didn't.
And just how it happened he
hardly knew, Tut he suddenly real
ICED that she was in his arms, and
he was calling her his little wife and
smothering her with kisses.
II merchants would stop long