Fair play., 1911-05-27

| tObh pidCe. OnCle fflThHn udu Deen
gone FIVE days when a friend from
| the village placed a thousand dollars
| In her hands and told her that she
would never see her husband again.
Uncle Hiram went west. He halted
in city for week to get slicked
up. When the barber and the clothier
/ had got through with him. not
even his wife of thirty years would
have recognized him. Farm life and
toll had been left behind He wasn't
married man now. but a widower.
So he told himself, and tried hard to
! believe It. There was no accusing
voice He had left thousand dollars
behind for the old woman" Some
men wouldn't have left dollar.
Uncle Hiram took another name,
and in due time he arrived some
whore. He found people who did not
hesitate TO ask him why he made
fool of himself by dyeing his hair
and whiskers Indeed. he was an OBJ
! ject of suspicion and was arrested.
When he arrived somewhere else he
was taken for a man of sixty instead
of fifty-three. The tailor hadn't
taken away that stoop. and he walked
with loose knees. as all farmers do.
Boys called after him on the street.
In place of amusement he saw
woman whom he thought he would
like to make his wife. He WAS the
dashing widower now. In the midst
of his gazing and thinking the woman
turned on him with:
See here, you old hundred-year-old
manikin. you quit your staring or
I'll have you thrown out Of here!"
Uncle Hiram was dyed and padded,
but he was deceiving nobody Peo-
pie offered to assist him up and down
steps and over rough places, and now
and then men appealed to him in re-
gard to dates of sixty or seventy
years ago. II was very often that
children called grandpa. and he was
cautioned that such and such weather
was dangerous for an old man like
him.
Uncle Hiram saw the elephant He
saw him literally and theoretically.
He couldn't figure where he was bet
ter OFF for so doing When he saw
the animal literally, the mahout eau
toned him against coming too near,
as Behemoth seemed to have spite
against old men
In one locality Uncle Hiram re-
newed his hair-dye and started in to
court a widow. She shifted the dye
and called him an old fool and held
the door open for him to walk out
In no one case was any one deceived
In most cases he was asked why his
wife wasn't with him, or how II
came that 2 man of his age was out
in the easy west seeking a divorce
II he would go into business many
inquiries would be made. If he tried
to buy farm he was asked when his
wife was coming on. When he got
rid of his dye and whiskers he was
no better off His speech was the
speech of a farmer who had got his
education In the little country school
house
Uncle Hiram had wandered about
and spent fifteen hundred of his hard
earned dollars before awakening to
the fact that he had made a fool OF
/
himself the question a great longing
came TO him. He tried to down it
but he couldn't. Then a feeling of re
morse came. He had been dog tC
abandon his wife. He sat down ant
thought it all over, from the day they
were we'd She wasn't so gray haired
r but if she was, what OF It? She
r wasn't so stopped, but II she was
If what OF it? II her face were wrinkied
e what Of his?
Uncle Hiram did not spare himself
v He administered kicks, He revileC
"a the man. He shed tears. And how 4
7 mend matters? He had had a wifi
rs and home for thirty years. He wa
H. now an outlaw,
g. Back in the east was a sad,face
ID woman waiting Aunt Jane ha
n. rented a little farm and was livin
70 all alone. The neighbors had con
Il miserated with her, but to one an
er all she had said;
10 Hiram will come back. am wal
ID ing here for him. He will remembe
as all that | did for him as a wife,
ID And one rainy night as she So
el alone. with her knitting and he
at thoughts, she heard step at tn
door. The one who knocked SCENE
10 timid
er Come in, Hiram!"
Id The door slowly opened and thei
Id stood Uncle Hiram. wet. bedraggle
nd and forlorn.
nd Il was waiting for you" said II
so wife.
To- do you mean-mean-"
Sc She rose and gave him a kiss ar
,st then set chair for him, and sa
she would have supper on the tab
re in just a minute.
TT "But-but--"
lot 81 told them you would come bac
on You saw the light in the window"
~
ellis to discover the modern Po