The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-05-08
EVENING STORY
A Solitaire for Susan.
BY IZOLA FORESTER

Il
after seven years of indecision.
| If you leave the train at Fairfield
Junction and take the trolley eight
miles along the shore you come to
Kittery Bend. 1t lies on small PEN
insula jutting out into Long Island
sound, one rambling main street, with
the residence section crowning P1ney
Point Here on the Point Susan had
| lived with her two brothers ever since
her father, old Captain Rogers. had
been laid away in the seamen's burial
| ground behind the old Point church.
| 1t had not seemed then as if any
body would ever ride along and play
| prince of romance to Susan's dreams.
/ She was too proud and exclusive ever
to attend the village social affairs, and
no local sutton had the temerlty to
| climb the hill and show serious atten-
| lions before either Susan or her two
elder brothers. So the early years of
| her teens had passed and she was
| twenty-siX when Dudley sold off his
| old rocky home for a quarry and sud
S.denly found courage to ask Susan to
| wear his ring.
| Susan stood on the veranda that
|, first day, with the new thrill of won
| derment yet upon her and the diamond
on her left hand. She had always felt
| it would be Dudley who would ask her
to marry him, and yet, now that it had
come true, she felt a curious sense of
| disappointment. He had been SO de-
| liberate and sure.
| II guess you've known right along
now how 1 felt toward you, Susan,
he had said. I've brought the ring
with me, and I don't think the boys
| can make any fuss about it now. I've
got as much as any of you"
No, she thought, there would be no
fuss There would be a quiet wedding,
and she would simply drive over to
the old Ames homestead and take
| Dudleys mothers place there for the
che 10 n
of it, somehow there came swift re-
action, a vague, haunting longing for
! all the dreams of her lonesome girl
days, when she had dreaded Dudleys
| steady calls, and had hoped somebody
might come to the Bend and carry her
| away from the everlasting samenesS of
| things.
You're in mighty good luck, Sue,
to get man like Dud," Dave told her
at dinner that night. you're not as
young as you might be, and there isn't
a girl on the Point who wouldn't be
proud to wear that ring on your
hand"
Susan turned the ring about
thoughtfully, looking at her other
brother. 1t had always seemed as if
Clayton understood her better than
Dave, yet he, too, smiled over at her
and suffered gently.
"I g-g-ave my consent y-y-ears ago,
sis
It was raining after supper that
night, raining with a light breeze
blowing in off the water, and all the
garden lifting its burden of sweetness
to the moisture. She slipped a long
cloak about her and went out softly,
down the back steps into the little
path that took the edge of the hill
above the shore. The tall spider lilies
caught at her thin dress as she passed,
and she stepped on wild roses growing
low along the patch, and the pink
Bouncing Betsies.
i And, oddly enough, she knew that
she was deceiving herself. 1t was not
the beauty of the night calling her;
it was the hope of seeing the lights on
Neil McCleod's schooner, down in the
littlescrooked channel that formed the
harbor of Kittery Bend. Neil was a
newcomer. He had even trespassed on
that hill path up to the Rogers place,
not knowing that only the family ever
first found Susan, watching alone from
the little old pilot house that served
as a summer house, and had come
from her fathr's first ship, the Three
Widows.
After that, every time he came to
the Bend he took the hill path, and
Susan watched for him, knowing in
her heart he was on forbidden ground
if the boys were to see him there.
Thru Jimmie, the, grocery boy, she
|
He amt steady going, Miss Rog-
ers they say Sorter wild. Spends all
his money soon as he gets it. Says
he wouldn't live on land for any
thing. Hes been everywhere in that
schooner of his. Says he'd just as
soon go round the world in her as
not. Ant afraid of nothing. Gee, I
like to hear him talk"
So perhaps Susan had woven a ro-
nance about him because of his wan
dering tendencies. Nobody ever
longed to travel away from the Bend
and the vistas of Piney Point as much
as herself
She saw the schooner's lights as
soon as she came near the edge of
the hill, and even while she held her
breath, one hand close to her throat,
she heard his voice singing as he came
up the path:
''Oh, Billy was a bo'sun, bold and
brave,
William was a gay, young sailor
How tall and straight he was be-
side Dudley's sotund figure, how the
rain chung in little diamonds of light
to his curry hair as he raised his cap
to her. Susan lifted her chin higher,
trying to keep back the telltale CULVER
in her voice when he greeted her.
I'm hearing news about you. Miss
Rogers he said, with a new ring in
his tone. After four months at sea
it's good to have news, and I wish
7 you all happiness
: News travels fast, it seems" she
tried to speak lightly. Faster than
the Rambler"
i've been around the cape and
back" he told her CURLY. And I
saved enough to come up here and
speak freely to you. You knew I'd
be back, Sue"
She shrank back from the authority
; in his tone Nobody had called her
Sue in years.
"Oh, I know I've no home to take
: you to like bud Ames." he said Il
was going to ask you to marry me
Y and we'd take the long trail of the
seawinds and go where we wanted to
] And 1 thought you were waiting for
me and you knew in your heart why
e I'd come back. Don't you suppose
S know what they say of me? But do ]