The herald-advance. (Milbank, S.D.) 1890-1922, 1920-12-17

was delicate and must be sheltered.
Never in all the history Of his family.
so far as Dan knew. had there been a
death from the malady that AFFLICTED
him. Yet his sentence was signed and
sealed.
But he harbored no resentment
against his mother. It was all In the
game. She had done what she thought
was best. And he began to wonder
in what way he could get the greatest
pleasure from his last six months Of
life.
Good Lord" he suddenly breathed.
81 may not be here to see the SHOWS
Gomez Dan had always been partial
to h winter season. When the snow
lay all over the farm lands and bowed
down the limbs OF the trees, It had
always wakened q curious Hood Of
feelings in the wasted man. Il seemed
to him that he could remember otl. err
winters. wherein the snow lay for ent!-
less miles over an endless wilderness.
and here and there were strange
many-toed tracks that could be fol.
lowed In the Icy dawns. But OF course
1t was just a fancy. He wasn't In the
least misled about II. He knew tina.
he had never. In his lifetime, seen
the wilderness. OF course his grand
father had been q frontiersman Of the
first order, and all his ancestors be-
fore nina rangy, hardy breed whose
wings would crumple in civilization
but he himself had always lived il
cities. Yet the falling SHOWS, soft and
gentle but with a kind Of remorseless-
ness he could sense but could not un-
derstand, had always stirred him.
He'd often imagined hat he would
like to see the forests in winter.
In him you could see a reflection Of
the boy that played beside the pond
of snow water, twenty years before.
His dark gray eyes were still rather
large and perhaps the wasted flesh
around them made them seem larger
than they were. But it was u little
hard to see them. as he wore large
glasses. His mother had been sure,
years before. that he needed glasses;
and she had easily found an oculist
that agreed with her.
Now that he was alone on the path,
the utter absence of color in his
cheeks was startling. That meant the
absence Of red-that warm glow Of
the blood eager and alive in his
veins. Perhaps an observer would
have noticed lean hands, with big
knuckled fingers, a rather .irm mouth.
and closely cropped dark hair. he
was twenty-nine years of age, but he
looked somewhat older. He know now
that he was never going to be any
older. A doctor as sure OF himself as
he n he had just consulted couldn't
possibly be mistaken.
He sat down on a park bench, just
beneath the spreading limb of a great
tree. He would sit here. he thought,
until he finally decided what he would
do with his remaining six months.
He hadn't been able to go to war.
The recruiting officer had been very
kind but most determined. The boys
had brought him great tales of France.
1t might be nice to 60 to France and
live in some country inn until he died.
But he didn't have very long to think
upon this vein. For at that instant
the squirrel came down to see If he had
a nut.
1t was the squirrel Of Destiny. But
Dan didn't know it then.
B~ushy-tail was not particularly
,fro;l OF <ho human ho;pr. that
passed up and down the park, because
he had learned by experience that they
usually attempted no harm to him.
But, nevertheless, he had his instincts.
He didn't entirely trust them. After
several generations, probably the
squirrels OF this park would climb all
over it's visitors and sniff in their ears
and Investigate the back Of their
necks. But this wasn't the way Of
Bushy-tail. He had come too recent
~ from the wild places. And he Won
dered.. most intensely, whether this
tall, forked creature had q pocket full
OF nuts. He swung down on the
grass to see.
"Why, you little devil" Dan said
in a whisper. His eyes suddenly
sparkled with delight. And he forgot
all about the doctors words and his
own prospects in his bitter regrets
that he had not brought a pocketful
Of nuts.
And then Dan did a curious thing.
Even later, he didn't know why he did
It. or what gave him the idea that he
could decoy the squirrel up to him by
doing 1t. That was his only purpose
just to see how close the squirrel
would come to him. He thought he
would like to look into the bright eyes
at close range. All he did was sud-
denly to freeze into one position-in
an instant rendered as motionless as
the rather MISUNDERSTANDING stone
stork that was perched OF the foun-
tain.