The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1896-1929, 1909-04-22
Copyright. by Shortstory Pub. Coz


copyright, by Shortstory Pub. Coz
Any student of mental philosophy
will tell you that every impression re-
ceiyed by our brain cells at any time
and under all circumstances, no mat
ter whether we be sober or drunk, on
the field of battle or in the region al
abstract thought, is recorded or the
tablets of memory, and is never lost.
Moreover, Il is d singular fact that the
proper degree of molecular vibration
being excited in the brain, no matter
by what cause-and the possible
causes are without number-these
thoughts spring into active and con-
scious re-existence, for they have
never been destroyed. Here lies the
key TO some interesting phenomena.
I Have you ever On making a call
thought you had hung your hat up
/ on the hall rack, and when leaving
sought there Tainly for the very hat
which perhaps you were holding in
+ Eocr hand? If you have, you know
I hOW unpleasantly this little trick of
our brain Jared your reason, in spite
Of your Involuntary apology that ''it
was only mistake. a trifing, absent
! minded mistake, after ALL
1t was ali because of just such &
little mistake, on the part of Mrs.
Starr, that foolish persons who postu-
late, wharfage is a failure" used to
point triumphantly at Starr and his
wife. All on account of queer little
brain trick, Mrs. Starr blighted scr
/ uSb9n1'S life and her nUn
Still. when they harnessed up to-
gethar for better or for worse, no
couple could be more devotedly in love
with one another than were they
This forms a rather sad but, l think
profitable little story.
Now that the principals concerned
are dead and gone, the physician who
attended Mrs. Starr says | am at lib
erty to tell the tale. He laughs, as
he is entitled TO, at the construction I
put upon the facts-but inconsistently
evades sitting in Judgment on the case.
Men remember Mrs. Starr as the
beautiful Miss Smell, for her face in
those days was face that no man
could quite forget. She was the most
utterly ruthless coquette of her day.
The family means, in her generation,
had fallen far below what was neces-
sary to keep up the prestige Of the
family name.
Her papa and her mamma never
ceased to lament that fact, and Miss
Smell was dutifully impressed in her
early girlhood that her beauty must
win back the departed family glories
by social achievements. How we'll it
did everybody knows.
By a mere coincidence, among the
persons chained by her smiles was a
Boy who did not have much of any
thing but a naval commission, some
brass buttons, and q sword.
This business with the Boy was
quite unnecessary. Miss Smell had
nothing to gain by winning the Boy s
love; still, she even went out of her
way to Go it. The Boy avoided her
because he knew she was unobtain-
able for him, and because the first
time he locked into her eyes he knew,
with but half chance, he would love
her very badly. Miss Smell knew it,
too, but if the Boy had not avoided
her she would not have done what
she did.
She was engaged to another man
1t the time-it was her third-and
she deliberately broke that engage
ment that she might be free to deal
with the Boy. This was most effec-
tualiy accomplished.
He was q queer mixture Of poet and
sailor, the Boy was, and Miss Smell
was a little shocked at the tempest
sIe invoked within him. There was
something in his glorious avowal OF
love that made former protestations
| pale into insignifcance. 1t carried hei
/ anay for the moment, and she gave
him her lips and she gave him he1
promise, knowing very well in he,
heart Of hearts it was the old story
of love on ore side and submission or
the other. But marriage on his pay
was impossible, 50 the Boy went of
to his ship, and Miss Smell back to hel
triumphs in the social whirl of the
citg.
The letters that came to her from
every port the Boys ship made were
rather Temarka bic. They were of
/ new breed and species. The writel
seemed to have an uncanny divinatior
Of everything the woman he loved die
or thought In spite of that, and mos
uitiful of all. an immeasurable love
breathed forth from every line. NJ
. man should write the things he wrote
to any living woman. At last lette
came from Honolulu that was so touch
ing in it's pathos, SO abject in it's devo
, tion. and still so marvelously prophet
jc in its conception of Miss Snellt
, life that she felt called upon to writ,
! him some truths. This was just abou
3 The time she met Starr, and fell
s victim herself to the passion she hat
s tfjfed with so often
When the Boy received her lette
q ne went down to his quarters in th'
wardroom, and blew his brains al
over the nice white paint that covered
the cruisers armored walls. Out Q
q decencys sake the surgeon called it
q nistol-cle aning accident, but he wa
brutal enough to send back a blood
4 smashed letter that he found al
twisted up in the Boys hand, to th'