The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1916-03-30
The Euening Story
The Confines of Freedom.
(By Catharine Cranmar.)

AS the morning sunlight came into
her little back bedroom Mary Hanson
turned her face toward the wall and
shielded her eyes with bent arm that
she might take her extra Sunday
morning nap unhampered by the
glare. The glimpse she got of green
trees and blue skies blended with her
sleepy alf-consciousness that she had
reached another, dong lonesome Sun
day when her leisure emphasized her
lack of companionship, and in the
jumbled dream which followed she
seemed to be toiling alone up d long
hill at the top of which she rested
under a shady tree and was Joined by
the tall man who lived next door
He had an open book in his hand,
just as he always did when sitting
under the big tree in that boarding
house back yard.
Then suddenly into her dream came
the magnetic voice of the man with
whom she had held daily business
telephone conversations for two years,
but had never seen. The strong mas
culinity and the caressing sCftness of
that voice never failed to rouse in
Mary's heart longing for protection
and companionship, although their
talks were always about mere de-
tails of printing and delivery of office
supplies.
The dream became confused, and
although she caught fleeing glimpses
OF the man next door and heard from
far away an occasional tone Of the
other mans deep voice, it served only
to intensity her loneliness, and the
dream ended abruptly in a sob half of
longing and half of Impotence
That afternoon when Mary went to
her room after the midday dinner
she again felt the loneliness of her
lot, for all the other boarders went off
pleasure seeking in groups or in pairs,
or to meet friends. She felt that al
though her years of hard work at long
otflce hours and her night school
courses had brought their hard-earned
promotions and satisfactory salarv
they had shut her off from the COM
panlonshlp of her kind and its attend
ant normal human interests.
through the open window there
came to her the wondrously clear song
of bird. 1t had the clearness of a.
canary's voice, but the abandon of a
hooking bird, and so rolIicking was
ITS song that it brought Mary to the
window to see what the singer looked
like Perched on the topmost branch
OF the tree in the yard next door was
a tiny yellow canary, intoxicated with
the JOY OF being released temporarily
from its cage which a maid was pIac-
ing conspicuously on the fence back
OF the large apartment directly across
| the alley from Mary's boarding house
A little girl chung sobbing to the maid,
safe and would return to it's cage pres
emily when tired of the bigger world
outside. he bird sang on and on,
with many a gleeful peck at the
leaves and many a frightened
start as the breeze swung the big
branches of tie trees.
The man next door sat as usual un-
der the tree with a book, and as she
saw him, Mary remembered her dream
The song of the bird seemed to pene-
citrate his thoughtful mood, and he
haf closed his book and looked aloft
until he located the songster Slowly
his face relaxed into a smile which
made his strong face handsomer than
Mary had before fancied it on the
many summer Sundays she had seen
him there.
AS he turned his head away he met
the smiling face of Mary, leaning on
her elbows in her window Before
either of them had time to become
self-conscious, their eyes had spoken
to each other so plainly that as Mary
returned to her reading she no longer
felt the old-time loneliness
Although she still held a book in
her hand, she read little, for the song
of the bird kept coming to her and
with 1t the memory of the sympathe-
tic smile of her neighbor Her oc-
casional surreptitious peeps showed
the man apparently absorbed in his
book, although if she could have
faced him directly, she would have
found that his eyes were dreamily
gazing at nothing at all
The maid and the child reappeared
and began to whistle to the canary to
lure it back to its cage, but the sing
ing speck of yellow fitted from limb
to lir without condescending to
notice their poor limitations of its
song.
Suddenly it came so near to Mary's
window that she looked out and saw
1t perched on the tall lilac bushes at
the corner of the back porch. The