The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1916-06-10
The Euening Story
AT Sherifrs Sale.
(By Catherine Cranmer. }

/
ton and cstabli. 1ment IN exclusive
bachelor quarters. All this had kept
him so occupied that scant time had
been left to keep up friendly inter-
course with the Prineville people, and
since the death of his only Prineville
relative, John Daniels, the lawyer
with whom he had first read law. he
had not been back to visit the little
county seat town.
| Seated in lis book-lined office one
summer morning, John Morton was
going over his personal accounts, and
certain items of his living expenses
rather staggered him. He got to
thinking of the vastly smaller sums he
| had spent for similar items five years
| before.
Its a pretty stiff pace I'm going,"
he unused, but the real point is where
| will 1 land if 1 keep up the pace? Is
| it worth the price ?"
Just then the postman came in and
deposited some mail on Johns desk.
| There were soma letters of profess
| Sional import, club notice OF a ban
quet for a distinguished visitor to the
city, q legal publication or two and
the little home paper from Prlnevllle.
| with its four pages tightly folded and
enclosed in a manila wrapper.
Many a copy of the Weekly Argus
opened, but on this particular morn
ing it was the paper that claimed
precedence over all the other mail.
John tore off the wrapper, spread the
small sheets before him on the table,
and smiled at the familiar names and
the accounts of trivial movements of
various leading citizens.
Over in the right hand column of
the third page was a 'ow of legal
notices. and glance over these
i 1l1-ar1 crI1f dray EyT1
prise from John. He smoothed out
the paper impatiently with one hand,
while the other hand went 20 his head
and roughed up his well brushed hair.
The cause of his agitation was this
notice: Pursuant to the order of the
county court, I the undersigned, sher-
iff of Cornwall county. will, on Mon
day, June tho twelfth, at the north
door of the courthouse, at 10 o'clock
in the forenoon, sell at public sale to
the highest bidder for cash certain
property of Barbara Anderson, con-
sisting of the following" There fol-
lowed a detailed description of what
John readily recognized as the old
Anderson homestead, which stood on
the outskirts of Prineville and which
he recalled as the scene of many a
lively tennis game with Barbara. With
his elbows on the desk and his head
in his hands, John sat staring at the
notice, but what he really saw was a
thousand incidents of summers gone
by.
He also thought of the friendly cor
respondence he had kept up with Bar
bara when he first came to the city,
and he WINGED as he realized that it
was largely due to his negligence that
the correspondence had entirely died
out. Other causes were that he had
been busy with his profession and
Barbara had been tied down by the
inyalidism of her mother following the
shock of her fathers death in a rail-
road accident.
He shook his head ruefu1ly for he
knew that this REIMBURSEMENT of her
old home must be the climax of long
series of smaller sacrifices. He re-
preached himself that he had not writ
ten to Barbara after her mothers
death, but weakly defended himself
on the ground that he had not heard
of it until a month after it's occur
renee, when he felt that to write to
her might reopen a wound which mad
begun TO heal.
He still sat staring at the little
country newspaper fifteen minutes
later when his stenographer returned
from the law library where he had
sent her on an errand. In the little
anteroom to his office she began
clicking out a bill of particulars and
John resumed the opening of his
mornings mail. The last letter he
opened contained a draft for five
thousand dollars, his fee for the sue
cessful handling of a case involving
titles to valuable residence property.
He looked long at the check. then
suddenly pocketed it and began to stir
about among the papers on his desk.
He called the stenographer in and let
loose such an avalanche of rapid die
tation that she had to bend over her
note book with flying fingers and alert
ears to catch all he said. At 10 o'clock
Monday morning, enough of her whirl-
wind notes still remained to be tran
scribed to keep her busy all day but
there was no danger of her work be-
ing augmented, for John Morton was
hundred miles away and was at that
moment alighting from his dusty road
ster in front of the old Anderson
homestead.
He removed his linen duster, slap
ped it at his dusty shoes, and went
striding up the walk to the front porch
just as Barbara looked out of the win
dow for the expected drayman who
was to convey her trunk to the sta
ton. As her eyes were misty with
tears, she failed to observe that the
approaching man was other than the
stalwart son of the drayman. When
she opened the door to admit him. she
was speechless with surprise, but when
John took both her hands between his
and looked with friendly inquiry into
her eyes, mere speech would have
been an inadequate form of express
sion anyhow.
With the direetness and determine
ton which had in five years time put
him on professional plane with men
ten years his senior John had in five
minutes time, told Barbara that sue
cess had brought him nothing that
took the place of their comradeship
of five years before, and he begged
her to renew it and to let him be a
frequent visitor at the old home, as
before.
You'd always be welcome, John"
she said cordially, but sadly, but the
old home is being sold this minute at
the court house door. If it brings
enough to pay the mortgage and to
keep me in New York until 1
qualify for office work. I'll be in luck.
You see. couldn't leave mother to