The Mena weekly star., 1909-04-01

still find a zest in existence All the great passious gone; all the big inter- ests: and still her clever mind was working, happy, possibly, in its mere exercise. disdaining the stake, she who had had every success. What a vitality He looked at her, puzzlng Her complexity bewildered him, he not being of a complex nature himself As he looked, suddenly he found him self questioning why her face, in it's revival of youthful smoothness and tint, recalled some other face, recently studied by him-a face that had worn an absolutely different expression; having the same delicate aquiline nose the same oval contour, the same wide brows-who? who? queried the colonel Then he nodded. Of course; it was the man with the moles, the brother He looked enough like Mrs. Winter to be her kinsman. At once he put his guess to the test. Aunt Becky" said he, have you any kin l don't know about?"
 q reckon not I'm an awfully kin less old party" said she serenely. q was a Winter, born as well as mar ried and so you and Mel and Archie are double kin to me. l was an only child, so I haven't anything closer than third or fourth cousins, down in Virginia and Boston,"
 Have you, by chance, any cousin near or far, named Mereer%
 Resting her fnger-tips on the cards Aunt Rebecca seemed to let her mind search amid virginian and Massachu setts genealogical tables. Why, cer- tainly," she answered after a pause there was Gen. Philemon Mercer confederate army. you know-and his son, Sam Nelson; Phil was my own cousin and Sam Nelson my second, and Sam Nelson's sons would be my third, wouldn't they? Phil and Sam are both dead, and Winnie Lee, ths daughter, is dead, and poor Phil--the grandson, you know-poor boy, Ia shot himself while at Harvard, bat his brother Cary is alive"
 Do you know him?"
 Never saw him but once or twica. He has very good manners"
 "Is he rich?"
 "He was, but after he had spent his youth working with Incredible indus try and a great deal of ability to build up steel business and had put 1t into little combination-not a big trust, just a genuine corporation-some of the financial princes wanted it for club-to knock down bigger game, I reckon-and proceeded to cheapen the stock in order to control it. Cary held on desperately, bought more than he could hold, mortgaged everything else: but they were too big for him to fight It was in 1903, you know, when they had an alleged financial panic, and scared the banks. Cary went to the wall, and Phil with him, and poor Phil killed himself. Afterward Cary's wife died; he surely did have a mean time And, to tell you the truth, Der tie. I think there has been a little kink in Cary's mind ever since
 Did you hold any of Cary's stock?" He was piecing his puzzle together,
 "Yes; but my stock was all paid for, and held on to it; now it is over par and paying dividends. Oh. the prop erty was all right had it been kept in honest hands and run for itself The l trouble with Cary was that in order to keep control of the property he bought lot of shares on margins. and l fs nm AnWnnlIl was obliged to borrow money on his actual holdings to protect his fictluous ones. The stock went so low that he was wiped out. He wouldn't take my advice earlier in the game; and knew that it would only be losing money to lend it to him. later-still, sometimes I have been rather sorry didn't Would I better try the spade, Bertie, or the diamond?"
 The colonel advised the spade. He wondered whether he should repeat 10 his aunt the few sentences which he had overheard from Mercer and his companion; but a belief that old age worries easily, added to his natural mans disinclination to attack the fem mine nerves, tipped the scales against frankness. So, instead, he began to talk about Archie: what was he like2 was he fond of athletics? or was he a bookish lad? Aunt Rebecca reported that he liked riding and golf; but he was not very rugged and since his fathers death he had seemed hstless to degree ''But he is better now" she added, with a trace of eagerness quite foreign to her usual manner. Janet Smith has reused him up; and what do you suppose she has done? But really, you are the cause.
 "I?" queried the colonel
 Just you. Archie, Janet argued, is the kind of nature that must have some one to be devoted to-
 And has he taken fancy to her? Or to you?"
 Aunt Rebecca's eyes dulled little and her delicate lips were twisted by a smile which had more wistfulness than humor in it. I'm not lovable person; anyhow, he does not love eas- ily. We are on terms of the highest respect. even admiration, but we haven't got so far as friendship, far less comradeship. Janet IS different. But don't mean Janet; she has grown absurdly fond of him. and think he's fond of her; but what she did was to make him fond of you. You, Gen. Rupert Winter; why, that boy could