The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1909-04-01
He EVENING STORY
The Tragedy of Being Twenty-Eight.

times to Miss Edwina Lincoln, his de-
lightful little scampergrace of
wealth ward. whereas Mr.; Thomas
being all of twenty-eight and extreme
ly serious, would never have dreamed
of the thing.
The colonel began the business when
Miss Edwina began to stick up her
chestnut hair, as do young ladies when
they attain delectable sixteen. The
colonel, though fifty-five at the time,
had nothing to his credit in the way
of discovery, invention or production;
but then the colonel did not stop for
little thing like that.
81 know I'm old" explained
Colonel John Andrew. and Miss Ed
wilma interrupted:
You're not-you're not old!" >she
cried in heated denial, for they were
comrades Of years and had enjoyed
many great times together.
'Then.'' said the colonel, optimistic
as Old King Cole, 'you will have me,
Edwina laughed and half cried. in
formed the colonel that he was a dear
old classmate of Methusaleh and end
ed up by kissing him, while he patted
| that Edwina sought out Master
Thomas, pottering about his maze of
| mathematical theory.
"How old are you. Tom? ?" she ask
ed: though She knew like A, B. e ~,
soberly, as he went on figuring.
'eTwenty-three," he repeated, with a
solemn look at Edwina. perched upon
a table of messed formulate Getting
older every day, Edwina, and nothing
to show for the years. He gioomed
at her, like Jupiter displeased, and
she went out and dimmed her big,
brown eyes with tears.
The colonel continued to entertain
the fondest, rose-tinted hopes, which
possible. Miss Edwina persisted in
becoming more entrancingly lovely
day by day. Tom went on working
wilma, radiant and beaming with the
glory of another year cast behind with
the despised gildings of childhood,
came to announce her seventeenage,
not help it-dear soul. Edwina
tweaked his nose, puffed him an
ethereal little kiss and scampered
| from the room.
John Andrew, when she left him with
his hands still in the attitude of dra-
matte pleading. NOW, wouldn't she
| and I make a pair of high steppers in
evenings" Then he tiptoed over to an
old trunk and looked for a long while
| at the picture of a kindly. faded lady
| in locket.
| where she 1ol1ed upon a desk covered
| with gay equations in algebra.
"Ton," she asked softly. "did you
know I was seventeen"
wilma. I'm keeping track of these
things
ceased his calculations and turned his
| dark, solemn eyes on her.
"Tom," she asked, ARE you ever
do you expect ever to get married?"
| Tom blushed and turned away to
his papers. 81 am twenty-four. Ed
wilma" he declared in slightly tremz
nothing. How could I think Of
He stopped at that, and Edwina
slipped up to her pinkish boudoir and
wept softly for perhaps five minutes.
| When Edwina ripened into charm
| ing eighteen and after the colonel's
| third fervent proposal the light in her
brown eyes, the gold-brown CLINT OF
her hair and the note of her clear.
young voice became a topic here and
there, and wooers could no longer be
| held back from the threshold.
| The colonel eyed them balefully,
| then slapped them on their young
backs and adjured the best man to
| twenty-five, six and seven bowling his
handsome, curly head, worked with
| his noxious mathematics and worried
over the respective merits of Edwina's
| army of signing Romeo chaps.
| And Edwina coquetted, mercifully
| as possible, with the whole idolatrous
| band. refusing Colonel John Andrew
as often as twenty times a month and
| extending delicious sympathy to Mas
ter Tom in his struggle with Old
Time, the Scytheman.
OF course, the time had come when
| Edwina became all of twenty-one and
spectacle fortune. The event was
signalized by a masterful proposal on
| the part of the colonel and by little
spit-spat of an interview between Ed
| wilma and Tom in the dull library.
Master Tom was twenty eight-twen-
ty-eight, mind you-he had declared
with a sigh; and Edwina, slamming
the door, remarked that he acted as
eight. And Tom. much puzzled, al
lowed precious mathematical
thought to evaporate while he sought
out Colonel John Andrew.
'Tt is about Edwina's future" be-
/ gan Tim ''She is twenty one now and
/ I am worried"
"Oh, don't worry." exploded the
| colonel. 'T never did in my life-and
| look at me-" And the colonel noted
/ in the mirror how kindly the scythe-
/ bearer really had been to him.
| 'But she will necessarily be marry
| ing" continued Master Tom.
| "Of course" Colonel John Andrew
acouiesced softly. while mellow glow
| came into his good, hale eyes.
There's young Shipley," suggested
/ Tom.
. milk and water snapped the
colonel. "She's too good for million
like him.
"She's too good for any of them,"
said Tom, "but we must see that she
gets the best. Now, there's Landis.''
"Wooden-headed as any Indian
cigar sign" objected the colonel. He
objected to all the other callow ones
until Tom, in perplexity, demanded,
what them"
J what then?'' snapped Colonel
John Andrew why, before our lit
tie Edwina shall tie herself to any of
J these, I'll go downstairs and propose
myself" And the colonel went. Tom
followed.
as it because I am too old?" the