The Carlisle independent., 1909-03-11

| found necessary. If the young man should happen to look at any other l gum masticator Eliza Alice would throw him glance that would bring him to the low stool beside the throne. l Well, the people thought it would be good thing if she did marry him: it might cause her to take a reef in her | sails-but they didn't know Eliza. Al | Ice as well as she knew herself. She was only dallying with the gospel ex- | pounder because she knew Samantha Ann would like to have him, and also because he was the only thing iE | sight
 Just when the trustees began to wonder if they would live with pa and ma, or if Eliza Alice would insist on parsonage, an Uncle ToSa's Cabin troupe hit the town Eliza Alice heard some one say that the girl who played Topsy in the show had got mad and | quit, and that the manager was in | quiring if there was anyone in the town who could take the part until he could get another girl from the city.
 It was case of seeK no farther | right then and there. Eliza Alice struck for the job and got it. | When the show wagons left that | night Eliza Alices trunk was in one of them, and she was on the payroll at s per week. The people did not | get through talking about her sensa- tional departure for at least month, ! tn hnp h. CT would drop an occasional hint of her great success on the stage.
 Nearly two years had passed when Sim Nipple returned from a trip to | Chicago and brought a paper with a | glowing account of the great success of new comic opera. An entire page was given to describing the tai | ent and beauty of the star of the opera, Miss Elza Alys, and iii the many photographs old friends (and enemies) had no troublein distinguish ing the features of Eliza Alice, though | she was evidently a graduate of some | beauty parlor, and had gained by the l course of sprouts she had undergone.
 Samantha Ann was the bright par | ticular star at church festival that was pulled off just after Eliza Alice | shook the dust of her native town from the ruf1es of her skirt. She not ! only played the organ, sang a solo and | helped wait on the tables, but she did most of the elbow work in scrubbing | out the church after the big event | The young preacher was completely l na nti xr-i+h around ability, and fearing something might occur to switch him off again, he immediately began negotiations, and before Samantha Ann could req lize it she found herself duly author | ized by law to half-sole the seat of the minister's trousers. It was all done so quickly that the church trustees suggested they live with Pa and Ma Smith awhile, and having thus side | tracked the parsonage talk promptly forgot it.
 In the course of a year Pa Smith was "a grandpa, and the next year he was another. The minister made a | dignified howl for an increase in sal ary. but the church people could not
 
 more for salvation because his family kept growing.
 Samantha Ann might have been in her early twenties, but the bloom was gone from her cheeks, there was a ] stoop to her shoulders, and she looked more like woman in her late for | ties.
 Still, with all her drudgery and toll, she often thanked heaven that no one had ever talked about her as they had about Eliza Alice, and she was glad she could walk along the street with head high in the air, knowing that no one was going to say some thing mean after her back was turned. ! Samantha Ann was thus we'll satisfied with her condition in life until the | town decided to hold a chatauqua one year, and deputation of leading citi- zens was sent to Chicago to get Eliza Alice to sing at the doings in the park. ! She agreed to come, but she stung them for $250 for three stingy songs. | While she was in town she was en- i tertained by the local magnate's wife,
 
 | ball with her reputation every time there was the slightest opportunity quarreled with each other in the effort to heap her with attentions, even the 1 preacher giving evidence by his ac- tions that he had forgotten that she had thrown him to play Topsy
 Samantha Ann had never been known to make display of temper, but when she saw Eliza Alice so high ly honored by the Hammer club she went home with well-defined upward i tilt to her nose. When she got there she took one long look at her faded face in the mirror and then smashed the reflector with the rolling pin When the rest of the folks came home they found her rubbing some color into her cheeks with a piece of cham ois, paying no heed to the baby, which was lying on the floor and yelling like a small boy with too many green ap- 1 pies in his midst.
 Having fixed her face to suit, rear