Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1908-06-30
The Fatal Three ;
MISS II. z. BRADDoN
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CHAPTER III.-(Continned.l
MISS n. z. BRADDoN

ChAPIEh lIl.-(Continued
1t was growing toward the summer
darkness when he rose and went into the
house, where he questioned the butler,
whom he met in the hall. Mr.. Porter
had been brought back and had seen Miss
Crossword. He had found her slightly
feverish, and had ordered her to go to bed.
Mrs. Greswcld was sitting with her. Did
DR.. Porter seem anxious? No, not at
all anxious; but he was going to send
Miss Laura some medicine before bedtime.
She was much the same next Gay
languid, with an aching head and some
fever. She was not very feverish. On
the whole, the doctor was hopeful, or he
pretended to be So He could give no
positive opinion yet. The polluted water
in the garden well had been the cause of
the village epidemic. Analysis bad shown
that it was charged with poisonous gas.
Mr.. Greswold FASTENED his preparations
for a journey to Scotland with a feverish
eagerness. He wrote to engage sleep
ing carriage on the Great Northern. They
were to travel on Thursday, leaving home
before noon, dining in town and starting
for the north in the evening. If Lola s
illness were indeed the slight indisposi-
tor which everybody hoped it was, she
might be quite able to travel on Thurs
day, and the change of air and the move
ment would do her good.
''She is always so well in Scotland, !"
said her father.
DIR. Porter came on Tuesday evening,
and found his patient not quite so well.
There was a long conference between the
two doctors, and then the nurse was cali
ed in to receive her instructions; and then
Mr.. Greswold was told that the journey to
Scotland must be put off for a fortnight
at The very least.
He received the sentence as if it had
been his death warrant. He asked no
questions He dared not. A second
nurse was TO be sen: over from Southamp-
ton next morning. The two doctors had
the cool, determined air of men who are
preparing for battle.
Lola was light-headed next morning
but with intervals of calmness and con-
sciousness. She heard the church bell toll
ing, and asked what it meant.
ITS for Polly Rainbow's funeral" an
swered the maid, who was tidying the
room.
'Oh, no." cried Lola, "that can't be +!
Father said she was better"
And hen her mind began to wander,
and she talked of Polly Rainbow as Il
the child had been in the room; talked of
the little girls lessons at the parish
school, and of a prize that she was to
get.
After that all was darkness, all was
despair--a seemingly inevitable progress
from bad to worse. Science, care, love,
prayers-all were futile; and the bell that
had tolled for the widows only child
tolled ten days afterward for Lola.
1t seemed TO George Greswold as those
slow strokes beat upon his brain, heavily,
heavily. like minute guns, that all the
hopes and cares and joys and expecta-
tons life had held for him were over. His
wife was on her knees in the darkened
house from which the funeral train was
slowly moving, and he had loved her pas
sionately; and yet 1t seemed to him as If
the open car yonder, with its coffin hid
den under snow-white blossoms, was car
rying away all that had ever been pre-
cious to- him upon this earth.
''She was the morning, with its prom
Use OF day." he said to himself. 'She
was the springtime, with its promise of
summer. While I had her l lived in
the future; henceforward / can only live
In the present. l dare not look back
upon the past ~