Polk County news. [volume] (Benton, Tenn.) 191?-1983, 1921-12-22
The Peppermint
House
By L. R. MONTGOMERY
be Newspapsr syndIeate.

I
I'd move on" confided Charles to the
cook.
Ellen looked up from her novel !:
You'd never find another place where
it's so easy" she retorted, "but it's
sure lonesome. l spent my day off at
my sisters yesterday and the children
are so cute. This house needs child
to brighten 1t up, the old lady gives
me the creeps the way she sits in
that darkened room all the time. The
big grounds don't do her a mite of
good"
That's what was thinking" an
| Swered Charles. 81 water and dig and
weed to keep the flowers nice and no.
body sees the yard. That high brick
wall shuts everybody out; seems
to me sometimes, that she shuts
her happiness outside the walls.
There's never the sound of a laugh
in here"
Ellen had returned to her tale of
the titled lady who yearned to be
down amongst people and she shook
her becapped head rather impatiently
as Charles, pleased with his own con-
versation, droned on. Ellen was lone
some. Years before when Charles had |
been younger he had regarded her |
with speculative eyes and she had
cherished hopes of being Mrs Charles |
Winter, but 1t seemed as though the |
quiet routine in the widows home had
dulled the man who did all the heavy
work about the place. He had grad
ually stopped inviting the pleasant
faced cook to go out. The grounds
were so spacious that they could stroll
about in the flower-scented dusk
without wishing to go outside the tall
iron gates that were only opened when
the mistress went out for her lonely
drive behind her fat horses, unique
figure in her heavy black garments
amongst the stream Of swiftly-moving
motorcars. And Ellen, who had found
herself unable to repress her liking for
the plump Charles had, in her first
angry moments of disappointment de-
cided to wound him into a proposal
and had accepted the attentions of the
policeman who often came In at the {
gate in the red-and-white
walk of bricks. This was, however,
the wrong tack to take with Charles {
who looked on at the quasf-courtship /
and Ellen finally fell back /
INTO the old pleasant friendship, as |
Charles seemed to have no intention S
Of cementing their friendship into any !
thing more permanent.
Ellen was almost pretty with her
blue eyes and satiny t
black hair but she wanted Charles $
md took refuge In the thought that I
even IL the almost enchanted stiffness /
If the wealthy estate had doubled him t
nto sleepiness he at least courted no G
,ther girl. SO she contented herself t
" living in the unreal world of rO- Il
nance where every pretty girl ulti- S
nately became q queen and never y
peculated upon q world which would
oon be uncomfortably crowded with
,rincesses and queens with no ordinary
,eople to cook and clean. She did not IL
,uess that Charles had once spoken t
o his mistress about marrying. Il
mo" Mrs. Meadows had said, ''if c
,ou marry Ellen you must both 60. a
Won't have my routine interrupted. / n
vas unhappy in my married life and =
.ou would be, also. believe 1t is in c
/ have remembered you both q
n my will, substantially. After ! have u
one out those big gates for the last
Ime you may marry. ' am going to "
ouble both your salaries, though u
foney compensates for everything" "A
Charles had not mentioned the mat ~
err to Ellen, he felt sure of her and L
he sleepy atmosphere of the place W
,ade him disinelined to any argument. Oh
lie knew, secretly, that Ellen would o.
ave left the fat living In the great ei
ouse. that was swiftly falling into III
ecay because Of the owners boarding,
, 90 to a cheap little home with him.
IJpstairs Mrs. Meadows felt strangely
estless. Perhaps the spring had ~
,uched her eyed blood with the old al
,ngings. Memories Of the past when OF
err daughter, long dead now, had u
lied the great house with the sound ~
I laughter assailed her. Moving nc
cavity across the priceless Oriental 70
1g with It's symbolic pattern of the 10
rec of Heaven woven In through the ~
Inn eolors of the background, she
,oked down into her garden from the
reat east window. The pale red of
he bricks In the bizarre red-and-white mi
all shone with the recent washing. no
RS. Meadows insisted upon a daily We
ASKING of the bricks and Charles sic
lrned his large wnges honestly. an