Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1913-06-28

unavailing in this circumstance.
She sat dry-eyed and brooding that
night in the dark of her lonely sitti ~
room; brooding vaguely, dreami1y, over
the events of the day, which had so
cruelty torn her heartstrings to
sLredr; 'hro, ng of the future as it
""e H." l. rlnent c her soul, uC sne
ght come to pass and specializing IN
tie hope which had no chance of full
flmcnt. She could even have faced
dcarh with a tinge of pleasure, sucn
was the torment of her soul, but sha
only prayed that her mind might be
come blank from that day forth, AMI
that two years might be blotted from
her life.
And as she sat there alone, thu
thought came: What had the jud'
meant by the poisonous white lies
the poisonous white lies-the pois
cnous-" The thought kept running
through her mind continuously. The
last word mingled with the first, and
Se sentence soon blurred into only
hazy streak which could hardly be
called a thought. What could he
have meant?" she asked herself again
and again, and finally sat up with a
start Why, she knew what he haG
meant; she knew we'll enough, but at
the moment she could not formulate
the impression into the semblance of
thought or an idea
Then her mind flashed back with
lightning rapidity to her early married
life when, as Bertha Sawyer she first
met and loved Robert Mailey. She
remembered that they had started mar
ried life with only a small fund. Their
housekeeping had been extremely mod
est, but as the circle of their ac-
quaintance among married people wild
ened they found they demanded more
of the comforts and Injuries of life
in order to be happy There had been
constant saving in the small ways that
the Maileys might hold up their heads
with the others of their circle.
When Tom, her first born, was sew
EN- years old, their telephone had been
installed. She could now remember
distinctly the day it was attached to
the dining room wall And she re-
membered that she had never depos-
tied the money for the call until she
had been asked several times to do 50,
She had even tried to get through with
her calls without paying for them at
all. 1t seemed a ridiculous thing to
be thinking about, but it doomed large
in her mental vision now in spite of
herself. 1t was as if some demon of
her brain were thrusting these insig-
nificant, trivial thoughts from dark
recesses into full view She could
think of nothing else.
She remeobered one day when young
Tom. fair-faced chap with golden hair,
looked up at her when she had finish
ed telephoning a friend and said with
a smile and a half-wink:
you didn't have to pay for that, did
YOU, mother?"
1t all came back to her now, and
with the poignancy of knife thrusts,
She saw young Tom answering the
telephone in his important way and
asking his father, under his breath, #
he was at home to the person who had
inquired for him. She wondered why
she had not given thought to these
things when they occurred; now THEY
were crowding into her brain like bees
into hive and she could couple them
with the shaping of her boys charae~
ter with a clearness that startled he".
She had taken Tom downtown with
her a number of times on her shop
ping tours and she could now see the
boy making mental notes when she
failed to present the conductor with
her nickel as he passed. The summer
Tom was thirteen years old she hal
gone with him into the country to