The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-01-26

rls scornfully. And continued his read ] ing
 And now for gossip, which you can be- | lieve or not, as you choose. My eyes are
 still blue as-but l need not continue the same old thing. l am palmer than ! ever, but rather fun to talk to. I have 1 only one father, however-the same one, ] and this renders me uninteresting. Three i young men have left our choir lately to
 go and sing in Mir. Irongray's. I sing ] in the abandoned choir, and l need not l tell you whose pew there is a good view | of from the other. You know. All the I youths became Cameronians because of
 conscientious scruples as to fathers 1 preaching. I hope you always respect i such, even in a foreign land and among
 benighted Paplstsl My father says that
 he hopes you will use your newly ac- ! uuired f1uency in the Spanish language
 to bring some of these benighted people i to sense of the error of their ways by l insulting into them the principles of the 1 Westminster Shorter Catechism!' i Your father never said any such a
 word, Missy!''
 Rose Nunsby, who used to beein love i with Phil Calmont-only had no Second i Exit, is now beloved by MT. Irongray, i who has had he-msfortune-to lose his
 mother (she has gone to a daughter. be- l cause she thinks she can annoy a son-in- ] law more than the Reverend Benjamin.
 Also the scullery was damp and there
 were rats in the coal hole) So Benja-
 min Is bereft of a mothers care. Weep 1 for the Orphan, lone and lorn,' as the
 poet says. I would go up and comfort
 him myself, only he doesn't like me | even enough to write to me as Dear
 Miss Janetr"
 "Oh, the sweet angell" muttered Vic 1 Morris. grinding his moustache between i his teeth so hard that he bt off an end 4 1,1 x,In x,ft1 l He became conscious that he had
 lacked that suppleness of pen and ex-
 pression possessed by his correspondent. i Yes, he had actually addressed her as l Dear Miss Janet'-and what was the
 matter with that? It was a plain, re-
 spectable, respectful mode of addressing i a lady But-eonfound the girl what did
 she mean by laughing at him? He put
 down the letter, turned to a file of in- i dents and invoices, bills of lading and i so forth, sighed a deep sigh. and picked
 up Janet Fowler's letter again.
 "I am a fool" he said; perhaps it is l because I am out here all alone' But even then the vision of Janet Fow- | Ter yelling her sapphire eyes, hypocriti- 1 eally, with the corner of her morning apron, and reciting round the corner of
 folded Madonna hands Weep for the , Orphan, lone and lorn'-moved him to
 helpless laughter.
 Its no use getting wrathy with that 1 girl-or pretending to. A fellow likes her l letters. No mistake about that She i tells you things, and you never know
 when the whip is going to crack about i your own ears"
 There was not much more of the letter, | at any rate, and, involuntariy, in spite
 of the crack of the whip, he mourned that | there was so little
 How would she end it? He always l thought of the endings of Janets letters ! They were nice to think about down in 1 the mine, or out on the great open lodges 1 of the mountain, whence the big loaded | sledges handed themselves down from
 the heights to the banks of the sluggish l Nervion. some thousand feet below, as 1 easily as a monkey comes down a rope.
 This is how Janet of the plain face and 1 beautiful eyes concluded her letter to Mr. ! Ludovic Morris. First there was a crack
 of the whip.
 q see-and hear-a good deal of the
 Healthy Family these days (she wrote). ] the Calmonts. I mean. Excepting Phil ! who is busy digging his way through to i Miss Vida B. F. Romer, l declare 1 can't 1 keep them off our doorstep. l have to
 'shoo' them out of the hall-or set father
 on to them to explain church history 1 Then only they will go. Church history ! and hunger are to them the extreme pen | altes of the law. But Aaron and Hur
 are dabs at holding wool. taught them"
 'Tndeedl" snorted MT. Morris, fiercely
 "about all they are good for!'
 But somehow the thought did not com
 fort him. Then, after a pause, and with
 an air of disgust which may have been due to the slang or may not, he added,
 ''Dabs, indeed! I'll dab them!' He had crushed the letter in his hand l Somewhat too hastily, 1t appeared, for it cost him the trouble of smoothing it
 all out again.
 The ends the thing. And he wanted that.
 He knew very well that she was teas ing him, but somehow that did not seem to help matters He wandered what a girl like Janet saw in the Calmonts. Phil
 was well enough. There were the making
 of a man about Phil But as for the
 rest-a cloud of butterflies In a garden
 flight of wild geese alighting with a splash in a lonely pond and then with a squawking, taking their way again the
 next moment-to these and other things
 less savory, did Vic Morris compare the Calmonts
 Janet ought to know better-and she doesv" he murmured. And the reading of the letter continued.
 \ .'You always ask me to tell you more about myselfl We'll there Is nothing to
 tell I rise at six of the morning to see
 that Susy Mitten does the grates. Some times l help her. Then I wake Raif (when he is at home) and we two brush the shoes. (You call yourself an engn- ger and yet can't invent machine to do
 a simple thing like thatD Breakfast fol-
 lows prayers-which makes one hurried
 and the other cold. But what can one
 do with a father who is consumed with
 doubts as to eternal punishment. What
 does he care about cold eggs at break fast?
 "Then I do my households, count the linen Tor the wash (when there is wash, which is mostly. If I have a spare mo-
 ment I go to the piano and play Where Is My Wandering Boy Tonight'-till Raifs fox terrier Vic scratches at the door to be let out.'
 "The daughter of a minister and tells
 such-humph!' broke off aggressively; "I wonder why care about getting such letters. Pm made different from other fellows, I expect--ah, we'll! So is she from other girls!''
 And he returned to the subject in hand, secretly vexed>ta see that so lit-
 tle remained to be read,
 Dear Mir. Ludovic, the roaring winds do blow-on the Bay of Biscay-O. And you are just at the far side of 1t, sitting