The St. Charles herald. [volume] (Hahnville, La.) 1873-1993, 1918-08-17
Larry's
Grandmother
ERT
By ANNE OTiAGAH
Observation-Disclosures
copyright, The Frank a. Munsey Coz


was as undimmed, their friendineSS
as unquenched, ut seventy As half a
century earlier. Out of a network Of
wrinkles they spanked cheerfully,
their blue luSter heightened by the
parchment provinces of her weather.
beaten skin. And whenever they dwelt
upon her grandson, Larry DOherty,
they took a new depth of kindness and
brightness.
She accounted herself very lucky
woman, she was wont TO tell her
neighbOrS. To be sure. her husband
little over q year, had been killed in
an explosion in the old country; but he
I had left her Larry, her own son
Larry. the baby in arms, who had
! grown to be the best and most stall
wart of sons. She dwelt upon Iarry's
memory with great tenderness, for he
! was only memory these many years
now. The ship that was bearing him
! to America with his mother, his pretty
! wife, and their rosy children. had
| been wrecked on the Banks. Only one
| Of the lifeboats had ever been heard
of again. That one Il schooner from
! Falmouth Cape had sighted and saved +;
and on it was old Mrs. Doherty with
| her youngest graudChiki, the baby
Larry, in her arms.
| 70 some the chronicle would not
| have seemed one Of good fortune; but
Mrs. Dohcrty translated calamity to
! blessing in her own fashion.
She was busy creature even after
! the dreadful struggle of her early
years in the new country was past.
Her cabin on the Hill >houc with a
cleanliness matching that OF her New
! England neighk0rS. She was a dairy
woman of note, albeit but two COWS
composed her stock. She had chick
en- yard screened from her small vege-
table patch and flower bed.
Larry. of course, had no conception
of the fact that She was q miracle
among grandmOtherS, but he loved her
and depended upon her and imposed
upon her and took her as an every
day matter-until the DOwnings came
to Falmouth Cape. Then his eyes were
opened to the fact that his relative was
not as other women are. Myrtle Down
Ing, blonde, given to giggling, and adj
hitting twenty-three years, enlightened
him.
! "Myw she said, when their acQuaint
ance had progressed to the point OF
personalities, "aint your grandma
funnyG"
whats funny about herr demand
ed Larry, startled as if it had been
suggested to him that some fact OF
nature was out of the natural order.
"Now, who did you ever see dress
like that?" rctorted Myrtle unanswer
ably.
| Whereupon Larry, recalling the diff
| ference between the customary dress
of the community and the neat peas
ant garb which his grandmother had
never discarded blushed for her Later
he sought with gifts to beguile her into
fashion which Miss Downing assured
| him was correct
Mrs. Dohcrty was Outwardly CRATE
full, though unbeguiled. TO herself she
said Shrewdly and sadly:
lie niver found out for himself
what 1 was wearin'. No! An it's lit
| tie he'd have cared for annyWan's
tellin' him, unless-unleSS"- sighed
heavily. "Wcll, could have wished i,
another"
And the more Larry's grandmother
saw of Miss Myrtle Downing, the NOR,
she wished that it might have been an
other.
She was much alone in her cabir
during the days of Larry's wooing
and the light went out OF her eyes as
| It had never gone in all the years OF
her labor and sorrow.
"Its not his leavn' me for another,
she used to assure some inward &c
cuser. Lord save us. didn't see 8t
own do that, an have joy wild him
But this girl-this baggage-what doe!
she know about carin'? He'll niNer b'
happy wild her-her an her curls!"
1t was Myrtle's obviously artificial
rinclets to which the old woman tool
the most violent objection, Dakin'
them the scapcgoat, as it We're, for al
the girls shalloWness and shamS.
Once, in Il desperate momenS sh
made the mistake that wiser ones thar
she have made. She spoke cOntemptu
ously of her granGSOn's sweetheart
she beSought him 10 give Myrtle VI
And she accomplished nothing but tn
erecting of a wall of silence and an
tagonism between herself and the DO
for whom she lived.
And so it finally came about that Sh
heard from the neighbors and not frOr
himself of his contemplated marriage
Mrs Downing, it was reported, had be
walled the approaching nuptials. 9TH
Dohertys were no match for the Dowr
ings," she had lamented.
Now, though she knew that low
would do strange things to the younl
binding them to the beauty Of oil
ways and bidding them shut the wiz
SowS upon peaceful old outlooks, sti
the stricken grandmother never doub
ed Iarry'G intentions toward herself
Never, she knew, would it occur t
him to turn her adrift in her old ag'
But she herself, could she stay wher