The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1915-08-20
At PINE COTTAGE
BY ANNE MANNING.

Dear Audrey" wrote her cousin
! Dora Petty, cant you come and stay
| with mother for a week? want to &c
/ to Pennington for q visit and l sim
j ply will not leave her in that disma
house all alone, for Sukey is worse
than no one at all, with her 'sperret
rapp1ngs' and her firm belief that
! Pine Cottage is haunted. Come, like
the angel you are, and bring your
music so that you can exercise any
spirits that might be at large. Let me
know when you can come and earn the
eternal gratitude of your bored-to
death Dora"
So Audrey smiled and packed q lit
tie trunk, not forgetting her music,
and took an early train for Quemiss,
! the quaint Long island village where
her widowed aunt and cousin lived.
Pine Cottage was low, red house
set back in grove of gloomy pines
that struggled out to a little inlet.
|, Mrs. Petty and Dora had tried with.
out success to make the place cheer.
full. There was a garden with many
gay flowers, but no matter how many
pines were sacrificed there was ever
a feeling of chill dependency over
garden and cottage.
How can there be shadows where
there are no trees to cast them?"
protested Audrey the next morning as
she walked in the garden with her
aunt Il don't see any shadows,
Aunt Ella; it is lovely"
Mrs. Petty spread out her palms
with a little helpless gesture.
You have not been here long
enough. dear" she said gently. you
have not lived with the tradition of
Pine Cottage as Dora and have ever
since Uncle Potiphar died. Time and
again have wished that he had
never left the place to me, though,
goodness knows, / needed it sadly
enough, for l was penniless at the
time"
1T ought to make you a lovely
home, Aunt Ella" said Audrey, her
lovely face warm with sympathy.
Don't you think the idea of the place
being haunted has created shadow
an imaginary shadow"
Perhaps" admitted the elder WON.
an moodily. IF anyone could lay our
ghost, Audrey, it should be you with
your sunshiny nature. But you have
never seen the ghost of Pine Cot
tage"
No, but | should like to-" declared
Audrey. I'll confess to a great and
solemn liking for ghosts Of all sorts.
DO tell me the story. Dora merely
shivers and turns pale when ask
her about it and you never will say
right out what it is that haunts Pine
Cottage"
Mrs. Petty sat down on a stone
bench in the sunniest part of the gar
den. Audrey dropped down on the
grass at her aunt's feet and cupped
her round chin in her palms.
Uncle Potiphar had a great-uncIe,
BENJAMIN. who in his youth was q
very studious young man. Instead of
engaging In the pleasures and pas
times Of his own age he was always
sitting In some retired spot with his
nose in q book. They say that he
was q singularly handsome and
charming young man when he chose
to make himself agreeable, which he
seldom took the trouble to do.
so Uncle Benjamin's youth passed
without love and when he was forty.
five years old he lived all alone in
this cottage. Here he studied 'an6
wrote his famous treatises, for ne
became q very learned man, but he
never appeared to be quite happy.
Then one day he fell in love for
the first time. Strange to say, he
chose a young girl Of the neighbor-
hood. a farmers daughter, whose
tastes were uniformed and who had
nothing much TO recommend her ex-
cept a sweet simplicity of nature and
lovely face. The girl was nattered
by the attentions of Doctor Ben, as he
was called, and in time she promised
to marry him. Her parents were de.
lighted with the match and Ben.
tamin's relatives were glad that he
was to end his solitary mode of liv.
ing.
Pine Cottage was refurnished from
top to bottom by the middle-aged
lover, whose infatuation for mis-
sweetheart was remarkable in one
who had always appeared blind ana
deaf to women. II was arranged that
the wedding was to take place in the
newly-furnished cottage.
THE day before the wedding the
girl. Stella Smith, eloped with a
young farmer OF the neighborhood
and was married to him the day and
hour she was to have welded Ben
jamin. She left a note for the Tilted
bridegroom. saying that she could
never marry a man so much older
than herself: that she could not love
him.
That night Benjamin drowned
himself in the inlet. Before he went
out on that fatal errand he cursed
the little cottage which he had pre-
pared for his bride and he vowed that
his spirit should haunt II until the
day when a young girl should love
an old man and marry him in Pine
Cottage. There you have the story"
What sad story. Aunt Ella" said
Audrey soberly. But has anyone ever
seen Benjamin's ghost?"
Mrs. Petty hesitated.
I'VE have never heard or seen any
sounds in the house, but we have felt
the oppression of shadow that we
could not see-if you can understand