The Logan Republican. [volume] (Logan, Utah) 1902-1924, 1916-01-06
Love THAT LIVES
BY WILLIAM L. viSScHER.

Z
Toward the end Of a specially good
utes, lost to the world apparently.
Major, I'll bet horse that you are
thinking, this minute, of some prehis.
toric love affair All! you sly old pi.
rate"
Arthur, boy you like me, don't
your" Queried the major, in a voice
full Of pathos and touched with solicit
tudo.
who does not, major, that knows
your"
well, I'm glad of that. You arc
| just the kind of a friend like to have.
You are fond of me without having
any very good reason for it.
in this way you remind me of q
sweetheart ! had once-got her yet,
as to that. But her husband and are
| friends.
often she and | call each other
Honey which is common express
| sion of friendly affection in the South,
where we both came from.
| "Now 1t may seem funny to you, but
that little woman doesn't know that !
| am homely."
rs she blind?" the younger man
| promptly and bluntly asked
"Of course she's blind. Blind as a
bat, and yet her eyes are as good as
anybodys. She is simply living ex-
| qualification of the trite old saying
that love is blind.
"Ill tell you just how It was. and
I'll test your credulity right at the
start. Make you smile, too.
| II was handsome boy.
Gee but you do laugh, don't you?
And yet had tried to prepare you for
| It, Well I was handsome. That sweet
heart of mine and I grew up to love
each other, Just naturally, and in fact
we dent know 1t until too late.
when the war came | went. Be-
fore the storm of patriotism was over.
4 great, big man, who was not nearly
so practically patriotic-or idiotic-as
/ was, came along there and told my
, sweetheart things that ! had not
thought to tell her. Moreover, he was
accommodating gold while ! was not
gathering anything more substantial
than glory, but | was fairly windrow-
ing that. II has melted like the snow
forts of boyhood.
"Those who had the direction OF her
ways directed her toward him and he
gathered her in. He has her yet.
After the storm went down, strange
as II may eeem, there was no calm for
me-perhcpl there was too much
calm.
AT first l frequently saw my old
sweetheart, then came long spells
when I diGn't see her at all At last
II dawned upon my opaque heart and
brain that | was in love with that lit
tie woman, and always had been
Sometimes I thought ! would try to
steal her But thought better Of II
and she-Heaven bless her!-wouldn't
have thought of 1t at all.
II did the next worst thing, how
ever. told her that loved her, al
ways had and always would. To my
utter establishment, dismay, and hap
piness, thereby perplexing me more
than ever, she confessed-that she had
loved me in the old days, and-but
she loves her husband.
"The other day was telling her that
she was the only woman | had ever
loved and that she was always a
pearl. She said
you're a dear old fellow, but you
must not talk that way
"'Oh! That's all right I said. 4
am old and homely enough to be a
privileged character
she leaned over, her elbows on
the marble between us, hands to her
face, and looked searchingly and in
quirlugly into my eyes. Then as II
deeply bewildcred and amazed, she
SAID:
Moo! Are Won homely, Honey?
Eyes, indeed, picturesquely homely
Don't you see that I am OLD, and wrin,
kled and bald, and STOPPING, and 'ane
and querulous, and fdRoty and
NO she exclaimed, I only see my
gallant boy sweetheart, and his pa.
tient, knightly, hidden soul. remem,
Der the iiash Of your sword in the sun
light that morning when. as the boy.
captain that you were, marching with
your men to tho var, YOU saluted The
cheering village girls in passing. The
CLEAN Of that blade has always kept
you and your eyes before me-
Say, my son have clung to spar
amid the craving canyons of the
ocean, until dosEed DIca;hless and I'M
conscious Ypcr y - = e.retch of white
beach on az arid island OF the seas:
have faced the ho~rr 7'-ccco and fore.
most focal fire OF battle, time and
again, ana felt its sery breath blow
back the brown locrs that then were
mine; inso!red by q something whose
achievement might be borne to her,
have poured out stream Of impas.
stoned eloGuonce before an audience
OF heroes and statesmen, until they
climbed to chairs ard tables yelling:
old man, you're king!' But never
even in the deepest intensity OF any