McNairy County independent. (Selmer, McNairy County, Tenn.) 1902-1969, 1918-09-27
PRO Patria"
JANE OSBORN


per Syndicate.)
1t was a good half-hour after the
last of the evening "office hours" neat
ly painted on the frosted glass sign
that was affixed to Doctor Burton's
front door; and so usually monotonOus
were his evenings spent in the little
neighborhood Of Germantown that he
experienced no little surprise when he
heard ring of his front door bell. He
had the evening paper In one hand, his
carpet slippers on his feet and his
shell-rimmed spectacles hanging peril
ously over one ear when he went to
the door. 1t was his neighbor, Miss
Margaret Kellogg-Margaret Kellogg,
noted In the neighborhood none the
less for her success as teacher of the
Infant class" In the one church Of the
neighborhood than for her dressmak-
ing establishment that consisted Of
one very young sewing apprentice. d
long pier glass in her front parlor. a
half-dozen well-thumbed and not too
recent dressmakers' journals with
French names and glaring colored de-
signs, and enough orders for dresses
quite different from those portrayed
therein-from the women In the neigh
borhood to secure for Margaret very
meager income. She was not yet thir-
ty, but her many years of self-reliance
and self-support led people to think
of her as considerably older.
"I've been given the street to canvass
for the new Liberty loan" she an
nounced when she had taken seat
rather primly in the Doctors cluttered
study. IL don't like prying into peo-
pies affairs, but it seemed that some
body Ind to do 1t, and when they asked
me didn't see my way clear to refuse
Are you thinking of taking out one of
the new bonds, doctor?"
1t was an embarrassing moment I'M
til the doctor, assured by the level,
frank, blue eyes of the girl seated be-
fore him, decided to tell her just how
matters stood He had been hankering
to make a breast of the situation to
some one and now he had an excuse.
After all, if he had canvassed the en-
tire neighborhood Of Germantown for
a sympathetic soul to whom he could
with least embarrassment tell his pre-
dicament 1t would have been to this
very Margaret Kellogg.
II would like to subscribe as much
as anyone in town." he said, ''but I'll
tell you how 1t is. I've been here-let
me see, three years. When my uncle
old Doctor Murray, died felt that
there was as good an opening here as
anywhere else, and | hankered after
the life of a country doctor. | found
considerable mortgage on this old
place of his and I've had to keep pay
ing off that. Then his equipment was
entirely out-of-date, and here, way off
from hospitals, felt there were GER
tain things | had to have. And, well,
you know that Germantown isn't very
prompt in paying its bills, and since
the war n good many people have left
here to be nearer the ammunition
works and the practice isn't so large
as 1t was to begin with. So, you see,
Miss Margaret, I'd like to do 1t, but /
can't. | can't even promise to take q
single bond, not this trip. I'd give up
the place here entirely, only somehow
1t seems that the people need me-"
Margaret had listened attentively.
She was aware Of the fact, for every
one In Germantown knew his neigh
boris business, that when the doctor
undertook to subscribe to two bonds
on the previous issue he had dispensed
with the services of his one man of
all work, and since that time he had
been running his own small car and no
doubt cooking his own meals, cleaning
his own house and hoeing his own gar
den. She knew also that Farnam-
town was ''slow pay" and she knew
that people had especially imposed on
the young doctor, who, because he had
bought new equipment for his office
and went about In an automobile
howbeit the least pretentious of its
tribe-instead Of in the old doctors
buggy. they imagined TO be possessed
of untold wealth. Hence payments
were deferred more than ever and
though they would have expected the
butcher or baker to suspend service
had they kept him waiting for pay.
ment as they did the doctor, they
would have been nightly offended II
the doctor did not rouse himself from
slumber to so0the their aches and
pains In spite Of bills gone overdue
for two or three years.
So after Margaret kellogg had
stayed just long enough, as she told
herself, to indicate that she "wasn't
miffed because he didn't subscribe
she went on to her next neighbor and
so back to her little cottage down the
street
1t was two months later. 1t was eight
pollock, just after the last of the doc
tors Office hours, and lamp burned
| In Miss Kellogg's front parlor, where
she was picking out long seams on 6
dress she had put together for the min