Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1915-12-11
BY DOROTHY DIX

Do you remember that story of o.
Henry's in which he tells of the man
who dreamed that he died and went up
before the Great Judge to receive his
sentence? Just as he was about to be
given a through ticket to Gehenna he
observed that he was being sent down
with a bunch of fat, prosperous looking
devils, and ne inquired who they were.
why" replied the Recording Angel,
| they are the men who hired working
girls and paid them S. or 50 a week to
live on. Do you belong with them?'
mot on your immortality" cried out
the Lost Soul, I'm only the fellow that
set fire to an orphan asylum and muir
dered a blind man for his pennies!"
A good story, that 1t gives you some
thing to think about. There are crimes
committed by perfectly respectable.
SNUG, complacent people that make you
feel that you would rather take your
place with thugs and murderers on the
judgment day than with them. For in
stance. listen to this little episode from
real life, which assure you is absolutely
true. every word of f.;
About thirty years ago a man died,
leaving a very young wife and a little
boy baby only months old. He had
|
town In which they lived. but that was
all that he left to his widow and his son.
People wondered how they would get
along. They said that she could sell the
house for So 600 or A.0vJ, and that would
keep them for a while. but after that was
gone heaven knew how they would live.
But the little widow did not sell her
home. She was a simple, domestic woman
who had never been trained to any trade
and had little education, but she had the
inspiration that comes from a great love
and an absorbing purpose, so she rolled
up her sleeves and went to work.
She took in sewing-plain sewing, that
pays a beggarly wage in rural communi-
ties. She baked cakes and sold them
She went out sick-nursing. She sold
vegetables out Of her garden. She stewed
over a hot stove all summer putting up
preserves for other people. She worked
eighteen hours a day at anything and
everything that would earn a penny. She
denied herself everything except the bare
lsustenance that would keep soul and body
together,
She kept her little home for her child.
She kept her boy fat and well. She
put him through the grammar school and
high school and college by some miracle
OF financing. and she had her reward
in seeing her son grow up into a splen-
did young man, who repaid her affection
in kind. for the mother and son were
chums and companions.
The young man went out into the
world 10 seek his fortune He got a
position IN a thriving mandatory IN
which he made good, and after bit
he was given an opportunity to buy
some stock in It. To enable him 70 do
, this the mother sold the little house that
, she had protected with her very hearts
blood and gave him the money 10 invest
in It. It was her all. the pittanoe that
stood between her and the poorhouse.
but she gave him her money as freely
as she had given him her life.
Everything prospered. The investment
proved a good one. The son was kind
and attentive to his mother. and II
! seemed that she was going TO be re-
warded for all OF her sacrifices. Then
| the inevitable woman came into the sons
life.
on. no. She wasn't bad woman with