The Little River news., 1920-11-24

And why not? It's empty. and no- body would care In these deep woods there's nobody to care"
 A flicker of light crossed her face.
 "Pd get well up, there, under the strong cliffs, with the cool spring so near. And I've lived so long-since you were a child in arms-on the river the Ohio; the White; the Wabash!'
 Always, mother! Always the house. boat-drifting drifting-and you so frail, so beautiful !"
 The man left the window and knelt by the rocking chair. The Iron Cray Woman saw the question in his eyes a hunger for some word out of the past; word that had never come. All his life she had kept it from him whatever it had been that happened back there behind the veil of her si- fence that left him nameless; river ,waif a nOmad in an orderly world; a fisher of pearls; pearlhunter. Her eyes came back and faltered over him. No longer child; boy-the reflec- ton startled her. A man knelt at her SluC-tuG QuCSIlOu WI1ltCH us uPOh his face. And it was his right to know. Her head dropped back against the quilt that cushioned the chair. It's . solemn thing to be the mother of man-glOfiOus but solemn. The lustrous eyes-brighter for the fever wasting them-came back to him after time. He saw far-flung thpughtfulness in them; knew they had strayed into that past from which he was barred. The thin lips parted. The mans fingers curled tense upon the chair arm.
 ITO city on the Wabash, in carly days, came three families of Virginia's purest blood-my family. your fathers family. and the family of-of-another man." ty4e
 The Iron Gray Woman shuddsred and was silent for a moment. The man picked up a wasted hand; stroked 1t softly between his own, and she went on, strained and slow, like one desperately nerved to long-dreaded task.
 My parents both died when I was so small that I can barely remember them, leaving me, their only child, to the care of distant relative, a great uncle of my fathers. This great-great- uncle-well, as look back upon my life. cannot remember that he ever gave me pleasant word.
 My aunt was as different as dawn to dark. She was everything that he was not. A thousand times she loved my hurt away.
 "They had a daughter, an only child almost my age, and of the same name surname and all. When uncle was away on business trips, as he often was for weeks, it was like sunshine rfter rain. Such happy times They are high among the few pleasant memories of my life"
 The IrOn-Gray- Woman paused, her dark, deep eyes seeming to search back into the dead past, like traveller straining his gaze across a stretch of desert to where the oasis lies. The man shifted to his other knee and she went on.
 My aunt died when we were in our gtrlhOOd. After that-the gray days were ever more than the bright. A petulance settled deep upon my uncle. His best word was grOwl. The serv- ants moved about the house like silent shadows.
 "In this same city upon the Wabash lived two other families, as have told you-your fathers family and the family Of--Of-another man. Your father and this other man were both my suotors. But my uncle tried every means in his power to turn your fa- rher away from me to my cousin. while he secretly encouraged the at- tentiOns of the other man to me-
 Your fathers blood was of the best in Virginia. A soldier, as the men of his family had always been, he had alssady won, by conspicuous gallantry, the rank of colonel in the Indian wars"
 What was he likew
 The IrOn-GrayW Woman turned her eyes and studied him so long. so in- tently. that he trembled lest his uues- tion--a question that came in spite of him-had startled her into silence,
 Like you." she resumed, .'and. not like you. His eyes were blue his hair light Your hair Is dark like mine Your eyes are like mine. But he had the same height and breadth of shoul- der; like you. slow of speech. slow to strike, till the right instant came then. us the hawk strikes. ,~4a,s, ,.
 ''I never liked the-Other man; though my uncle made 1t impossible for me completely to dlscourage his attentions.- Her words dropped back Into the memory groove worn deep oy the years. T kept up . show Of Interest in him. for the sake of my cousin. She really loved him, and ii vas the only way she could get to see him. He was . very handsome man; though as it afterward turned out. the black sheep of his family. and deeply