The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-02-11
'.why do ye ask me that9s said

''why do ye ask me that?@ said sO'Connell.
 Because always feel little sharp pain right through my heart whenever ye talk about me mother. Ye see. fa- ther, I've thought all these years that I was the one ye really Ioyed''-
 We're the only one have in the wurrld, Peg"
 And ye don't love her memory bet ther than ye do mel"
 O'ConnelI put both of his arms around her.
 Yer mother is with the saints, Peg, and here are you by me side. Sure there's room in me heart for the mem ory of her and the love of you"
 She breathed a little sigh of satis- faction and nestled on to her fathers shoulder. The little ct of childish 1eal- ousy of her dead mothers place in her fathers heart passed
 She wanted no one to share her h. ther's affection with her. She gave him all of hers. She needed all of his.
 When Peg was eighteen years old and they were living in Dublin, O'Con- nell was offered quite good position fin New York. It appealed to him. The additional money would make things easier for Peg She was almost woman now, and he wanted her to get the finishing touches of education that would prepare her for a position in the world if she met the man she felt she could marry. Whenever he would speak of marriage Peg would laugh seornfulIy:
 Who would be afther marvin I'd like to know? Where in the wurrld would l find a man like you2'
 
 ry on the discussion or consider it's possibility
 It still harassed him to think he had so little to leave her if anything hap pened to him. The offer to go b Amer lea seemed providentiaI Her mother was buried there, He would take Peg to her grave.
 Peg grew very thoughtful at the idea of leaving Ireland. All her little likes and dislikes, her fmpulsiye affections and hot hatred, were bound uR tn that country She dreaded the prospect oE meeting number Of new people
 Still, it was for her fathers good, % she turned brave face to it and said;
 Sure 1t is the finest thing in the wurrld for both of us
 But the night before they left Ire land she sat by the little window in her bedroom until daylight looking back through all the years Of her shOEt life.
 It seemed as if she were cutting oG all that beautiful golden period She would never again know the free, care less, happy -go-lucky, living from day to day existence that she had loved so much.
 | It was a pale. wistful, tired little De- Ioiv,ad heIs esie T,--.-r fast next morning.
 His heart was heavy too. But ha laughed and joked and sang and said how glad they ought to be- goitg to that wonderful new country and, by the way, the country Peg was born in too! And then he laughed again and said how fine she looked and how well he felt and that it seemed as # it were Gods hand in it all.
 And Peg pretended to cheer up, and they acted their parts right to the end until the last line of land disappear ed and they were headed for America- Then they separated and went to thelr little cabins to think of all that had been. And every day they kept up the little deception with each other until they reached America
 They were cheerless days at first for OC0nneu. EFeryLH44B IeIAAA64 AAA4A of his first landing twenty years be- fore with his young wife-both so full of hope, with the future stretching out like some wonderful panorama before them. He returns twenty years older to begin the fight again-this time for his daughter,
 His wife was buried in a little Cath olic cemetery few miles outside New York city. There he took Peg one day, and they put flowers on the little mound of earth and knelt awhile in prayer. Beneath that earth lay not only his wife's remains, but O'Con- l nell's early hopes and ambitions were 1 buried with her. 1 Neither spoke either going to or re- turning from the cemetery. O'COn- nell's heart was too full. Peg knew what was passing through his mind and sat with her hands folded in her lap-silent. But her little brain wac busy thinking hack.
 Peg had much to think of during the early days following her arrival in New York. At first the city awed her with it's huge buildings and ceaseiee1 whirl of activity and noise. She long ed to be back in her own little green, beautiful country.
 6To Be Continped.E