The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1913-02-22
THE EVENING STORY
"PIease Read"
(By Jane Osborn.1

On a certain cold night in midwin-
ter, Walter Gateson was lounging in
great physical comfort in a spacious
upholstered chair before the crack
apartment. He was reading the even
ing paper-with keener eye to the
financial and sporting sections. it must
be admitted, than to the literary or
dramatic section. AS he was turning
to the stock quotations his eye caught
sight of two words, please read" in
large type, that stood out from the
other advertisements in the column
where people advertise the loss Of pedi-
greed dogs, sable muffs, diamond rings
and other priced possessions that have
an amazing way of getting away from
their owners.
Walter did what the advertisement
bade him to do. please read. If you
found a little channels bag containing
20 five-dollar gold pieces that lost on
Sixth avenue last night, won't you
please be kind enough to return them
to me-or at least part of them. They
mean everything to me, and I am
sure II You knew how much need
them you would return them ASK
for Miss Terry, 222 Tenth street.
Walter was at first amused at the
advertisement. Just as if, thought he
to himself, any one who intended to
keep the money would return it just
up. The next thing that amazed him
was the thought that 800, the price
of a box at the opera or a very SIM
pie dinner party for few friends,
could possibly mean everything to any
one. Walter crushed the paper in his
hand and sat for few minutes, star
ing at the fire, with the same look of
eager determination that came over his
face when he was planning out an i'm
portant business deal. Then he rose,
On his hat and coat and started
out.
en- Walter reached the street
there was genuine determination in his
step.
"Of course thought he to him
self, mo one is going to return that
money. Lost money never comes
back and then he began to con-
lecture about the probable appear
ance of the spinster, Miss Terry, to
whom 800 meant so much. Somehow
the combination of the name Terry
and the wording of the advertisement,
the fact that she carried her money
in five-dollar gold pieces in chamois
skin bags and then lost them, made
him think of her as rather near
sighted, tall, angular, pale blonde-a
shabby genteel lady, no doubt, too
proud to work, and yet too poor to be
happy in idleness.
1t was not far from Walters apart
ment to the address in Tenth street
given in the advertisement, and the
bitter cold air and the eagerness that
he felt within him made him cover the
distance in an amazingly short time.
AS he supposed, the house was one
of the shabby, very respectable look
ing lodging houses, tucked away in
various corners of the busy section
OF the city. An untidy, weary looking,
middle-aged woman answered the door
and left Walter standing in the hall.
Presently what Walter supposed to
be Miss Terry's angular feet-he was
sure that she had long, thin, genteel
feet-were heard on the stairway, but
when he saw he wondered. She was
very pretty, with soft yet eager brown
eyes. light yet robust build, and, in
spite of her modest black serge dress
and absence of ornamentation, rather
stylish Could this be the Miss Terry
to whom 500 meant everything? She
was radiantly happy as she looked
up at him, and she seemed to know
that he brought some news of her
money before he spoke, and then as
she saw how big and how unlike the
usual callers at the lodging house he
was. she nesitated with embarrass-
ment
81 am sorry I cannot ask you to sit
down." she said, "but I could not at
ford a lodging mouse with parlor privi-
leges.'
Walter expressed his willingness to
stand in a way that brought back
the smiles to Miss Terry's face.
1t took only a few minutes for Wal
ter to explain to Miss Terry that he
had found her money, which, he added,
keeping. The bag, he told her with
apologies, might have been destroyed
bv the banker. 1t was very muddy
when Walter had found it, and he had
said nothing to his banker about saw
ing it. However, he would see that
the money was restored to her the
next morning in a suitable chamois
skin bag. I'm fact said Walter, as
he looked for a second time into her
Young brown eyes, Il Will BRING 1t TO-
morrow evening myself to make sure
it comes safely.
the innocent abandon of a child. Wal
ter's curiosity was soon satisfied, for
with few courteous questions on his
part the little woman told him that
she was an orphan, that she mad work,
ed in a department store in a small
town for five years, ever since she was
that she had saved what she
could all that time with the nope that
some day she might come to the great
city and learn to be a milliner. AT
last she had 500 and she had come,
rented a room and found place as
at one of the most taSh1on-
able milliners on the avenue, where,
although she would receive no salary
for a while, she would be turned into
a full-fledged milliner by the end OF
the winter. Then she would go back
to work, and when she had saved
little she would go back to her home
town and open such a millinery shop
as was never dreamed of within
hundred miles of the place. The
money she had lost would be just suf-
ficient to keep her the few months
that she was working as an unpaid ap-
prentice.
When Walter left her after their
little talk he felt as if he had had a
revelation. He had seen happiness
as he had never seen it before-he
had seen pluck and sweetness COM
bined with that happiness in a way
that gave him a new interest in life.