Fulton County tribune. (Wauseon, Ohio) 1883-1925, 1918-04-26

lnd Gretchen, der cow, Won week 1t
take me, nit half der ioat."
Four altogether pleasant and salts
tying days they were to Hazel. The
worst of the fly pests were vanished
for the season. A crisp touch of frost
the night winds. Indian
hung it's mellow haze over the
The clean, pungent air that sift-
ed through the forests seemed doubly
sweet after the vitiated atmosphere of
town. Fresh from q gridiron of dusty
and stone pavements, and but
stepped, as one might say, from days
of Imprisonment in the narrow con-
of a railway coach, she drank the
whey air in hungry gulps, and joyed
in the soft yielding of the turf be-
peath her feet, the fern and peavine
carpet of the forest floor.
It was her pleasure at night to sleep
as she and Bill had slept, with her face
barred to the stars. She would draw
her bed a little aside from the camp
fire and from the low seclusion of a
thicket lie watching the nimble flames
at their merry dance, smiling lazily at
the grotesque shadows cast by Jake
and his frau as they moved about the
blaze. And she would wake in the
morning clear-headed, alert, grateful
for the pleasant woodland smells
arising wholesomely from the fecund
bosom of the earth.
Lauer pulled up before his own cab
in at mid-afternOon of the fourth day,
unloaded his own stuff, and drove to
his neighbor's with the rest.
"TIl walk back after a little" Hazel
told him, when he had piled her goods
in one corner of the kitchen.
The rattle of the wagon died away.
She was alone-at home. Her eyes
filed as she roved restlessly from
kitchen to living-room and on into the
bedroom at the end. Bill had I'M
packed. The rugs were down, the
books slowed In familiar disarray up
on their shelves, the bedding spread in
semi-disorder where he had last slept
and gone away without troubling to
smooth it out in h%ousewifely fashion.
She came back to the living-room
and seated herself in the big chair.
She had expected to be lonely, very
lonely. But she was not. Perhaps
that would come later. For the pres
ent 1t seemed as if she had reached
the end of something, as if she were
very tired, and had gratefully come to
a welcome resting place. She turned
her gaze out the open door where the
forest fell away in vast undulations
to a range of snow-capped mountains
purple in the autumn haze, and a verse
that Bill had once quoted came back
to her:
oh. to feel the wind grow strong
Where the trail leaps down.
i could never learn the way
And wisdom of the town.
She blinked. The town-it seemed
to have grown remote, a fantasy in
which she had played a puppet part.
But she was home again. If only the
gladness of it endured strong enough
to carry her through whatever black
days might come to her there alone.
She would gladly have cooked her
supper In the kitchen fireplace, and
laid down to sleep under her own roof
1t seemed the natural thing to do. But
she had not expected to find the cabin
livably arranged, and she had prom.
Used the Lauers to spend the might
with them. So presently she closed the
door and walked away through the
woods.
September and October troopeC
past, and as they marched the willow
thickets and poplar groves grew vel
low and brown, and carpeted the foo
of the woods with fallen leaves. Shrul
and tree barred gaunt limbs to ever.
autumn wind. Only the spruce ant
pine stood forth in their year-rount
habiliments of green. The days short
ened steadily. The nights grew long
and bitter with frost. Snow fell, blank
citing softly the dead leaves. Old Wiz
ter cracked his whip masterfully owe
all the North.
Day by day, between tasks, an
often while she worked, Hazel's eye
would linger on the edges of the clear
ing. Often at night she would lift hel
self on elbow at some unexpecte
sound. her heart leaping wild with e1
pectation. And always she would Ii
down again, and sometimes press he
clenched hand to her lips to keep bac
the despairing cry. Always she az
jured herself to be patient, to wa
doggedly as Bill would have waited, I
make due allowance for immensely {
distance. for the manifold delays whic
might overtake a messenger farm
across those silent miles or a man hu
rying to his home. Many things migl
hold him back. But he would com
It was inconceivable that he migl
not come.
Meantime. with only a dim co
sciousness of the fact, she underwel
a marvellous schooling in adaptatio
self-restraint. She had work of q sol
E6THN