The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1922-12-06
A MONG all the memories of my | "A boyhood :n T-rkey Island the


 sense of a thing seen in a glass darlIly. And the darkness of the glass was my own adolescence.
 know that now. and I'm sorry. I'm ashamed to find myself suspect ing that half of Mary NIatheson's g
 mature beauty in my eyes may have been romance, and half the romance mystery. and half of that the un- settling discovery that the other sex does not fade at seventeen and wither quite away at twenty, as has been taken somehow for granted. I'm glad there is no possibility of meet irS her again as she was at thirty. and so making sure. I shall wish to remember her as the boy of sixteen saw her that night waiting in the dunes above the wreck of the Indian ship" with Itolldown EIckersOn bleating as he fled from the small, queer casket of polished
 wood he had flung on the sand. and the bridegroom peering out of the church window, over the moors in Uri1ey Village.
 The thing began when I was too young tc make much of it yet. a
 wonder of less than seven days among all the other bright, frag- mentary wonders of a boys life at six. Mainly I remember that Mary Matheson was a fool; every one j. Lrkey Village was saying that
 I can't tell how long the Blake boys had been cor~ting her. I came TOO late to see anything but the climax Of that unDrotherly tourna- ment. and only by grace of the hun dredth chs nee of luck did witness even one act of that.
 vas coming home one autumn evening just at dusk, lettering up the COW street from the eastward where the big boys had been playing Run. Sheep, Run" and I watching from the vantage Of Aunt Dee Nickerson's henhouse and getting whacked when I told. And I had come almost to the turning into Drugstore Lane when the sound of voice fetched me up. all eyes and ears. against the pickets of the Matheson place.
 It was the voice of my cousin Duncan the only father I ever knew He was constable of Urkey Village. and there was something in he voice as I heard 1t in the yard that told you why.
 Ditp IL. JOShus DEOp lI. or DY heIvens--!"
 Of Duncan I could see only the back. large and near But the faces Of the others were plain to my peep hole between the ptckets, or as plain as might be in the falling dusk. The sky overhead was still bright, but the blue shadow of the bluff lay all across that part of the town, and tt deepeued to still bluer and cooler mystery under the apple-tr canopy sheltering the dooryard. T neJ CT see that light to this day, a high slOaminG sifted through leaves on turf. without the faintest memory ot a shive~ For that was the first ! had even known Of anger, the still and deadly anger of grown men.
 My cousin had spoken to Joshua l Blake, and I saw that Joshua held a pistol in his hand, the old, single | ball dueling weapon that had be- | longed to his father. His face was l white, and the pallor seemed to re- | fine still further the bIade-Iike l features of the Blake the aquiIine | nose. the sIopinE. patrician forehead, | he narrow lip. blue to the pressure | of the teeth.
 That was Joshua. Andrew, his stood facing him three or l four paCes away He was the ! younger of the two. the less favored, | The more sensitive.
 He had what no other Blake had ! had. a suspicion Of freclIIe on his l nigh. flat cheek. And he had what | no one else in Urkey had then, a | brace of gold teeth. the second and | third to the left in the upper jaw. | where Lem Whites boom had caught | him. jiblng off the Head They | =HOwed now as the slowly working | .p revealed them. glimmering with | a moist dull sheen. He, too was | yh.Ta-
 lis hands were empty. hanging iown palms forward. But in his ayes there was no look of the de .enseless; only q light of passionate 1 -uuterpt.
 And between the two, and beyond hem. as looked. stood Mary. TaIned by the white pillars of the doorway. her hands at her throat l and her long eyes dilated with a -ir.'s fright more precious than sNultaEon- So the three remained in taaIeau while. as if on another D aueJ. the dusk Geepeued from mo IHut to moment: Gramma Pilot. NO wards away. brought supper to her SGuealiuE COW; and further off. Htt on the waning mirror of the -arhur. a conCh low ed faintIy for some ~choouer's h,t-t-
 Drop lt. Joshua 7" Duucan's voice .Anc loud and clear.
 And this time. following the hush. il SO med to exercise the devil of luietude. l heard Afarv's brath be wesn her lips. and saw Andrew wheel sharply to pick q .-clle From he tret.-Jruuk with d thuyu3-uail Iushua's eyes went down to the pre- 3ostero-s metal in his Lt,nd; he -hivered slightly like a dreamer awakening and thrust t in h's ,ackct And then. seeing D,ucar. uuins toward the rcn,e ana me, . . Cd, the better p.rt If 'ai0r I)1d ..4n. and saw no more.
 There were serious men iu town Lat night when < was kIsJvn what , sass tine thing mad come 10. men nat walked and women that talked. f was all Narg's -2ult. Long aSO .-e ought Ju have taken one of item an. sent the other uHc.>inE." That's what M:ah White said sitting behind r,, stove in our kitchen over the sr,on: that's what Duncan thought 1 IS he paced back and forth, shaking