The Montgomery tribune. (Montgomery City, Mo.) 1892-1910, 1909-02-19
| also-if I know her highly respected

"htiO uIu JOh ouul Cop yOut tOS
teri" Hartley asks, after q little.
Liverpool, care Of her usual hotel.
She'll get It all right-always pro-
vided she hasn't already organized a
settlement colony Of small Hooligans
In the Liverpool slums. But there!
Let's forget morals and matrimony.
Heigho! Wonder what's doing In the
Street? Not that I care a red"
They seemed to have forgot me alto
gether. But l was interested in their
talk all the same, and I've tried to put
1t down just as l heard It. Twas queer
talk, but they was queer folks, and l
was learning how the big-bugs done
their counting. From what I'd heard
so far I liked the Wellmouth way full
as well.
The front gate clicked. Van Brunt
looked up. Great Scott" says he, its
the photograph"
Twas Hannah Jane Purvis coming
home from the next house with a dish
pan full Of peas. Hannah was q kind
of scant patterned critter without
much canvas on her poles and her
oiSSNSo iiOot 6chCi Ill lOllcu up. ohO
had brindled hair clewed back so tight
off her forehead that her eyes wouldn't
shut good, and the impression you got
from the first look at her vas that she
was all square corners-not a round
one in the lot.
WE'LL" says she, coming up into
the wind in front of the piazza and
looking at me hard. 81 do believe it's
Solomon Pratt. Why, what a stran-
ger you be! l amt seen you for /
don't know when"
l didn't know when either and l
didn't try to remember. Sufficient
unto the day Is the trouble belonging
to It," the Scriptures say, II l recollect
1t right, and twas enough for me that
she'd seen me this time. She m
over. dishpan and all, and planks her
self down on the steps right in front
Of Van Brunt's chair. There amt
nothing shy OF unfriendly about Han
nah Jane; she's the most folksy fe-
male l eve come across, and always
was.
MY sakes!" says she, turning round
w Neht L oSS Iht. iatt Jill III
and l couldn't make out who twas.
Thinks 1: They've got company and
l must get there quick So back l
put, and / don't know as I've got a full
measure Of peas cause 1t seemed to
me that some Of EN- spilled off the
top when Cap'n Poundberry was
emptyin' 'em in. I hope not, cause
peas is high now. Not that it makes
any difference to well.off folks like
you, Mr.. Van Brunt, but"
Hadn't you better go back and
pick 'em up?" asks Van, solemn as an
owl.
ooh, land Of love! no. There
want enough for that. Besides 1 want
to see Mr.. Pratt. Well, Mr.. Pratt"
says she. 81 suppose you're surprised
enough to find mt working out. Dear!
dear! l don't know what Jehiel-he
that was my first husband-would
have said; nor my second one neither.
But there! we can't none Of us never
tell what's in store for us in this
world, can WEI"
I made some sort of answer; don't
matter what. She went ahead lament
ing over what a come-down twas for
her to work out. You'd think she'd
been used to marble halls to hear her.
She settles the dishpan between her
knees and starts in shelling peas,
talking a blue streak all the time. She
was a whole sewing circle in herself,
that woman.
"Jehiel was such a quiet man." she
says, after a spell. "He scarcely ever
talked" Didn't have a chance, thinks
l to myself.) when he died-did l
eve tell you how Cap'n Samuels-my
first husband as was-come to die, Mr..
Hartley?" says she.
Hartley had took up the Natural
Life book and was trying to read it.
Now he looked up and says, mournful
but resigned: mo, Mrs. Purvis, l be-
lieve we have never had the pleasure"
"The pleasure was wholly the
Cap'n's," says Van Brunt under his
breath. II Hannah Jan heard him she
didn't let it worry her.
We'll" she says, ""twas this way:
Cap'n Jehiel-him that was my first
husband-was the most regular a
in his habits that ever was, I guess.
Every Saturday night all the time we
was married--and we was married
eleven year, not counting the two after
he was took sick--he always had baked
beans for supper. l used to say to
him: 'Jehiel,' l used to say, amt you
tired Of baked beans? / should think
you'd turn into beans, you're so fond
of EN- But he never did and"
She stopped for a second to get her
breath. Van cut in quick.
That wasn't the cause of his death,
them" he asks. very rave.
"Who-what?"
Turning into beans? OF course
not. l believe o said he didn't
turn"
81 said he never got tired of 'em