The daily Alaskan., 1914-06-25
DiSenChanted: A Pair of Lovers Meet After an Interval of
 Twenty Years
By ESTHER vANDEvBER

a
 Wheatield about the same age and in-
 innate friends. Helen Porter and l
 were bosom friends, and Jim MacAles-
 ter and Edward Dudley were insepa-
 rubIc. These two young men used to come to see Helen and me always to- gcthcr tilI a time came when we paired
 off, Jim and I making one couple, Ned
 and Helen the other.
 don't know a better way to make
 matches than for two girls, chum5,
 and two fellows, chums, to form a quartet for spending their leisure
 hours. Almost always one of the
 couples will get to lOvemaklng, and the other will catch the infection. Jim and | caught it from Ned and Helen. think it was their example that set Jim aml me Co thinking about mar riagp. At any rate. Jim began to grow
 snuuuv. and l. thinking that 1 was not l likely to do better, encouraged him. . In due time he proposed. and l accept ,I him. At this time Ned and Helen
 
 naI fixed their wedding day. But be 1 fore it came round Helen was taken . ..I. rud lt waS put off. Helen recovered. ] a.a another day was fixed. but thls . ..ur Nrd frI sick. and there was nu-
 other pu~Wuurmedt.
 When Nrd improved his doctor order . nd him lo the mountains. where he ! would breathe a dry air. He went out ] .o tur Gorkirs. to be gone few
 ..ulns. at line cUd of which time and ! au his return the wedding day was to l ar nNrd for thr third time. We all l arr. to tho station to see him off. He aI uut wish to go any more than ] .l.I.u wished tu have him go. Jim .1n~ulrd uim 'il the train started, and ] Helen went home in the carriage with l mr. weeping on my shoulder as though l her heart would break.
 1 Ned wrote that he was picking up margo.0usIy out in tue mountains, and . when two months had elapsed he wrote Helen 10 brush up her rousseau, l for he would be back in few weeks for the wedding. Poor Helen came 1 To me with a IugubriOus face about her rousseau. for the fashions had chang l ud u couple of times since it was first made. Articles that were cut short 1 then had since been cut long; those . that had been made scant were now made full She had bought several eL- l neusfvc hats, very small, and the fash ] ion had bIoomed out to enormous pro- ] portions
 ! | helped her prepare a new trOus- 1 scau. but, alas, it, too, passed out Of fashion in closets and bureau drawers. ] NcI instead of coming home, wrote 1 that he had bought a gold mine and was going to make a fortune. He had some property and put a portion of 1t .nto his gold mine and felt 1t necessary ] that he should stay where be vas till tue property had been placed on a l paying basis
 l When this next period had passed ] NpI turned his property into cash and put it all into his gold mine. He wrote ! Helen that this was necessary, because ] if he didn't he would lose what he had already invested.
 1 IIplpu's rousseau had now been made
 over SD many times that it would not 1 bear any more altering, and 1t was fortunate she didn't try to bring it down to date. for Ned was delayed in getting his mine into shape to leave. l All was going on swimmingly when considerable flow of water was struck l X large pump must be ordered, and when it arrived it was found not to be l large enough. Then there was a labor strike among the miners. And so 1t l went on. first this trouble. then that, tr finally all Ned's fortune had gone . down into tue big hole in the ground.
 Ned wrote Helen telling her what 1 had happened-that he had no Income and would remain where he was till ! he had recovered what he had lost. l He offered to release her from her en- l gagement. but so far as be was con- nerued he would never marry any one
 else. When he got his affairs in prop
 er shape to take a wife, if Helen were l free, be would claim her, Meanwhile
 he would not bl0me her if she married another
 Helen replied that she felt just as . Ned did about it. Her heart had been
 given to him and she could not if she
 would give it to another. If at the end of five, ten, even twenty years he ! claimed her he would find her ready
 to give herself to him.
 ] Meanwhile Jim and I were married and getting on nicely. We regretted
 that our companion couples affair had
 not turned out so we'll did my best 1 to cheer Helen. and Jim wrote to en- | courage Ned. But the case looked hopeless to us. Ned was a long while
 after the collapse of his mine getting . any kind of start and when he got one it wasn't enough to marry on. SeV-
 craI years passed. and be felt that he and Helen had waited so long that he didn't care to marry without getting his affairs into excellent shape.
 A dozen years passed, during which ] Ned Dudley went up and down hill ] .......r...,. ,g E;r,ng ravar -aTne lnfOeg on