The Madisonian. (Richmond, Ky.) 1913-1914, 1914-03-24

when that. big surgeon from Vienna
came to see the doctor last year?
Well the doctor brought him to me.
I'd known it before in way, but it
had gone farther than thought. No
one can tell just how long it may be.
1t may be years, Of course, but I'm not
taking any sea trips, Monty"
He cleared his throat and his voice
was husky when he spoke. Shirley
doesn't know?"
Certainly not. She mustn't" And
then, in sudden sharpness: you
shan't tell her. Monty You wouldn't
dare!''
mo, indeed he assured her quick
ly. "Of course not"
TITS just among us three, Doctor
Southall and you and me. We three
have had our secrets before, Ell, Mon
ty?"
Eyes, Judith, we have
She bent toward him, her hands
tightening on the cane. after all,
it's true Today I am getting old. /
may look only fifty, but I feel sixty
and I'll admit to seventy-fve. It's
joy that keeps us young, and I didn't
get my fair share of that, Monty.
For just one little week my heart had,
it a1l-all-and then-well, then it
was finished. 1t was finished long be
fore 1 married Tom cambridge. 1t
isn't that I'm empty-headed. It's that
I've been an empty-hearted woman,
Monty-as empty and dusty and DESC
late as the old house over yonder on,
the ridge"
81 know, Judith, know"
you've been empty in a way, too"
she said. But it's been a different
way. You were never in love-really
in love, I mean Certainly not with
me, Monty, though you tried to make
me think so once upon a time, before
Sassoon came along, and-Beauty Va
liant
The major blinked, suddenly
startled. 1t was out, the one name
neither had spoken to the other for
thirty years! He looked at her a lit
tie guiltily; but her eyes had turned
away. Everything changed then, %
she continued dreamily, everything"
The majors fingers strayed across
his waistcoat, fumbling uncertainty
for his eyeglasses. For an instant
he, too, was back in the long-ago
past, when he and Valiant had been
comrades. It had been curious
three sided affair-he, and Valiant and
Sassoon. Sassoon with his dissipated
fair and ungovernable temper and
strange fits of recklessness; clean,
high-idealed, straight-away Valiant;
and he-a Bristow, neither better nor
worse than the rest of his name He
remembered that mad strained season
when he had grimly recognized his
own cause as hopeless, and with burn
ing eyes had watched Sassoon and
Valiant racing abreast. He remem-
bered that glittering prodigal dance
when he had come upon Valiant and
Judith standing in the shrubbery, the
candle-light from some open door en-
goldening their faces: hers smiling, a
little f1ippant perhaps, and conscious
of her spell; his grave and earnest
yet wistful.
"You promise, John?"
st give my sacred word. What
ever the provocation, 1 will not lift
my hand against him. Never, never!'
Then the same voice, vibrant, appeal
ing. Judith! 1t isn't because-be
cause-you care for him?"
He had plunged away in the dark
ness before her answer came What
had it mattered then to him what she
had replied? And that very night hat
befallen the fatal quarrel!
The major started How that name
had blown away the dust! 'That'i
a long time ago, Judith
Thirty years ago tomorrow they
fought" she said softly, Valiant AMI
Sassoon. Evey woman has her one
anniversary, suppose, and tomor
do, every fourteenth of May, Monty
keep my room and spend the da!
always the same way. There's little
book read. And there's an old hair
cloth trunk that I've had since wal
girl. Down in the bottom of it arr
something's, that take out and Sc
Fround the room and there
is a handful of old letters l go ovel
from first to last They're almos
worn out now, but could repeat then
all with my eyes shut. Then there's ;
tiny old straw basket with yellow
wisp in it that once was a bunch o
cape jessamines. I wore them to tina
last ball-the night before it hap
, pened. The fourteenth of May used t.
be sad, but now, do you know, lool
forward to it, always have lot o
jessamines that particular day-Il
have Shirley get me some tomorrow
: and in the evening, when go down
: stairs, the house is full Of the seen
= of them. All summer long it's roses
!: but on the fourteenth of May it hal
: to be jessamines. Shirley must thinl
] me whimsical old woman, but I in
sist on being hunored"
Il He smiled, little bleakly, an,
! tcleared his throat.
Isn't it strange for me to be talk
ing this way now!" she said present
1 1y. Another proof that I'm getting
old But the date brings it very close;
it seems, somehow, closer than evel
this year-Monty, weren't you tire
: mendously surprised when married
Tom Dandridge?'
q certainly was"
RIO RI C0NJTJNIrErlA