Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1910-09-09

CANDLES.
them they would suddenly find their
fields destroyed, their houses sacked
and themselves exposed to the danger
of being suffocated by the flames
when their matched roofs would
spread sickening and poisonous fumes.
Gafarro, the bravest lad Of Ruzafa,
had sworn to discover the malefactors.
Every night, his gun across his arm,
he concealed himself In bunch OF
bushes or traversed the roads. One
morning some one found his corpse In
a brook, his body riddled with balls
and his head crushed in.
All the papers in Valencia reported
the facts regarding the crime and
reused the fears of the residents Of
the huerta so that from then on every
householder closed his house with
locks and bolts and forgot his neigh
bors in selfish fear. The alcalde of the
district answered in thunderous tones
when the authorities, respecting his
electoral powers, entered into discus
sion of this matter. He declared that
he and Sigro, his faithful alguazil,
were quite sufficient to put an end to
such a calamity and scandal.
Nevertheless SeAto did not think Of
going to the alcalde. He was not
man Of vain words.
That Of which he was certain was
that some one had ordered him to
place the forty duros in the oven and
threatened to burn his little home If
he failed to do so. He loved that lit
tie house as a father loves dying son.
The walls We're Of a dazzling white
ness, the thatch Of sunburned straw
which covered it, with the little crosses
at each point in the matched roof, the
blue shutters, the trellis at the door
like a sash, where the golden sunbeams
filtered through the green vines; the
masses of Dom Pedro geraniums bor
dering the trellis in rich banks, tall
and thick. Besides, there beyond the
old fig tree stood the oven made of
clay and tiles, round and low and
shaped like the ants nests in Africa.
All this combined made his fortune,
the nest which sheltered his dearest
affections, his wife and their three
children.
How many days of labor with his
pick and shovel he had done in his
four fields to earn the little handful Of
duros! How many years his ancestors
had toiled to make this little home
what it had become! The handful Of
money he had hidden in small clay
jar and buried beneath his bed And
LACED Of forty duros!
AS the night was falling and he had
not yet decided upon anything, he
went to his nearest neighbor, an old
man who had lived and worked SO
long that now he could do nothing more
than cut the weeds and brambles by
the roadside, but who was said by
those who had known him in his
youth to have enriched more than one
field
The old man listened with his eyes
fixed upon. the fat cigarette which he
loileu DelWeel LIS Sullouoeu anu sudh-
ing fingers. His words were wise:
you are right not to give up your
money. Let them come out in the
road like men, face to face, risking
their skins. | am seventy years old
but they don't dare try such foolish,
ness on me- Let us see, Sento You
are too much Of a coward to defend
your own"
This firm assurance penetrated the
rather sluggish brain of Sento, and ht
felt capable of anything for the sake
of keeping the means Of assuring
bread to his children.
With as great solemnity as though
it had been sanity relic the old man
drew from behind the door the treas
ure of his house, an old fiintlock mus
ket and he caressed its worm eaten
stock.
He loaded it himself. He knew that
old friend better than any one. His
stiffened hands grew timber and young
as he handled the old gun-a hand
full of powder and wadding made OF
tarred rope and now the charge OF
balls (buckshot they were) double and
more than he would have put In had
the game been other than what be