Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1919-05-16

where Ruh&urah worked, had begun
| to irritate her throat and bronchial
tubes; and the girl developed an in
| termlttent cough.
When the first blue bird arrived
in Gayfeld the cough was no longer
Intermittent; and her mother sent
her to the village doctor. So Rue
| CareW was transferred to the box
factory adjoining, in which the mill
made it's own paper boxes, where
gent machines and fed them. with
! Squares of pasteboard and strips of
gilt paper; and the intelligent and
grateful machines responded by
of completed boxes, all neatly gilded
pasted and labeled. And afer a lit
| tie while Ruhannah was able to
nourish. one of these ocbligiing and
responsive machines. And by, July
her cough had left her, and two
delicate freckles adorned the bridge
| OF her nose.
The half-nile walk from and 90
Brookhollow twice day was
keeping her from rapid physical de-
generation. Yet, like all northern
American summers, the weather be-
came fearfully hot in July and Au
gust, and the half-mile even in early
morning and at in the evening LETT
her istless, nervously dreading the
great concrete-lined room, the ree!l
of blue and oil, the sweaty propin-
| guilty of her neighbors, and the mo-
| notonouS- appetite of the SpraWling
machine which she fed all day long
with pasteboard squares.
She went to her work in early
morning, bareheaded, in limp pink
dress very much open at the throat,
| which happened to be the merciful
mode of the moment-a slender,
sweet-lipped thing, beginning to
move with grace noW-and her
r. haj NV
| the sun.
There came that movable holiday
| in August, when the annual shut
down for repairs closed the mill and
box factory during forty:-eight hours
"a matter OF. prescribing oil and
new bearings for the over-fed ma
chimes so that their digestions should
remain urimpaired and their dispo-
| Sitions amiable.
1t was. a hot August morning, in
slow, subtle concentration of sus-
pended power in the sky, ominous
| of thunder brooding somewhere be
yond the western edges of the world.
| the housework, picked peas and q
| squash and a saucer full of yellow
| pansies in the weedly little garden,
| and, at noon, dined on the trophies
Of her husbandry; physically and aes
| thetically
After dinner. dishes washed and
| room tidied, she sat down on the
| narrow. woodbine-infested veranda
with pencil and paper. and attempt
| ed to draw the stone bridge and the
| little river where it spread in deeps
and shadows above the broken dam.
Perspective was unknown to her;
| of classic composition she was also
| Serenely ignorant, so the absence OF
| these in her picture did not annoy
her. On the contrary, there was
Loi1 l.
cessional in her vigorous enGeavor
| to include in her drawing everything
| her grey eyes CHANGED to rest on. She
| even arose and gently urged a COW
| into the already overcrowded COM
| position, and having accomplished
| ty, was beginning to look about for
| Adoniram TO include him also, when
| her mother called to her, holding out
| a pair of old gloves.
| Dear, We are going to save a lit
| tie money this year. Do you think
you could catch few fish for sup
| per-:
The gtrl, nodded. took the gloves,
| OF ~ tde long bamboo pole from the
| YER ada tioor and walked slowly out
| ;utn i'7H Garden.
| earth near the flower bed, where
| popni@s. and pansies. and petunias
and phicN bordered the walk.
| Under q lilac the ground seemed
| molster and more promising for yer.
| micular Investigation; she drew on
| her gloves, dug a few holes with
| the trcwel extracted an angleworm.
frowned slightly, holding it between
| gloved fingers, regarding it's contoI
tions with pity and aversion.
To bait q hook was not agreeable
| to the girl; she managed to do it.
| however, then shouldering her pole
| she alI1ed across the road and down
| to the left. through rank grasses
| and patches of milkweed, bergamot,
! and queens lace, scattering a cloud
| of brown and silver spotted butter
| flies.
| Alder, elder and Indian willow
barred her way; rank thickets OF
| jewelweed hung vivid blossoming
| drops across her path; woodbine and
| clematis trailed dainty snares to
patch her in their fairy nets; rab-
bit scurried out from behind the
ruined paper mill as she came to
| the swift, shallow water below the
| dam.
| Into this she presently pumped
| her line, and the next instant jerk
| ed it out again with wriggling, sill.
very minnow flashing on the hook.
Carrying the pole with its tiny,
| glittering victim dangling aloft, Rue
| hastily retraced her steps to the
| road, crossed the bridge to the fur
Their end, seated herself on the lime
| stone parapet, and, swinging her pole
| with both hands, cast line and hook
! and minnow far out into the pond
1t was business she did not care
| for-this extinguishing of the life
| spark in anything. But, like her
| mill work, it appeared to be a neceS-
| sary business, and, SO regarding it.
| she went about it.
The pond above the half-ruined
| dam lay very still; her captive min
now swan about with apparently no
discomfort, trailing on the surface
| of the pond above him the cork
which buoyed the hook.
Rue, her pole clasped in both
hands between her knees, gazed
with preoccupied eyes out across the
water. On the sandy shore, a pair
of speckled tipups ran busily about
| dipping and bobbing, or spread theiI
| white, striped wings to sheer the
| still Eurface of the pond, swing
| shoreward with bowed wings agaiC.
| and resume their normal, quaint, and
! busy manners.
From the interstices of the lime
| stone parapet grew Il white blue
| bell-the only one Rue had ever
| seen. AS long as she could remem.
Der it had come up there every
! year and bloomed, snow-white amid
a world of it's blue comrades in the
grass below. She looked for it now,
saw it in bud-three sturdy stalk,
sprouting at right angles from the
wall and curved UP parallel to it,
Somehow or other she had come to
associate this white freak of nature
with herself-she scarcely knew
why. 1t comforted her, oddly, to see
it again, still surviving, still deli
cately vigorous, though where
among those stone slabs it found it's
nourishment she never could mag
inc.
The intense blue of the sky had
altered since noon; the west became
gradually duller and the air stiller;