The Ely miner., 1930-08-15


Nv mediately there came the
sound of a jingle and slam
from the back porch. With leap she
was out of bed peeking through the
curtains of her bedroom window
Down the back walk strobe hand
some bareheaded young fellow in
brown, swinging metal carrier full
OF bottles lie was whistlng softly
an old tune "NIy Mary's asleep"
She thrilled Mary was not asleep
Nor could she again go to sleep that
morning.
She lay on her pillow thinking sweet
vague thoughts until Percy, the yellow
cat which slept on the foot of her
he'd jumped up and came TO rub her
cheek Percy wanted his breakfast
She arose, dressed and went down.
stairs
On the back porch she searched for
the little note she had painstakingly
written the night before Ii was
missing. He had taken il with him
II read: "My dear Mr.. Twaddell
please leave one dollars worth of
cream tickets Thank you Mary
Sandford." She had pinned the note
to "a dollar bill and inserted il in an
empty milk bottle Her cream tickets
printed on blue pasteboard. reposed
under the second bottle. She had for
gotten To tell him how much milk and
cream TO leave and he had left quart
of each. A quart Of cream was a
large order for single lady And il
did not keep good in this weather
But. undoubtedly Mrs. Gray could
make use of it. AS for Percy, he had
already tapped so much cream thar
never cared much for it, ii sort of
went against her And most certain
ly she could not afford TO make such
an excessive use of dairy products: ::
il necesSitated her cutting down on
other things. Still she would have
sacrificed far more than she was sac
riticing for the sake of putting joy
into the mikmans voice on a gloomy
morning
Mrs Mcintosh was out taking in
her milk as Mary tried TO steal by on
her way to Mrs Gray's. Mrs. McIn
tosh was a widow, snappingeyed.
much younger than Mary and much
better looking Mary fell that she
hated Mrs Mcintosh little.
"Sakes alive" exclaimed the widow.
eying the quart bottle of cream.
"What you going to do with all that
cream? You're getting extravagant in
your old age"
"What about yourself" retorted
Mary, flushing. you've got four
quarts of Grade A milk there. And
you are all alone"
I'm going TO do some baking" Mrs.
Mcintosh flushed in turn. She went
into the house rather quickly. And
Mary went down the alley to the
shack out OF which even at that early
hour many boys of assorted sizes were
splitting. They welcomed the cream
with many joyful shouts And Mary
returned home feeling that she had
begun the day well There was, how
ever. the painful consciousness that
Mrs. Mcintosh WAS also buying eX-
tensively of the handsome young milk
man. And Mrs Mcintosh could afford
to buy. She could take his entire
truckload of dairy products If she
chose Her husband left her forty
thuusand-dOllar life insurance.
Marys breakfast did not taste aw-
fully good Neither did Percy's He
passed up his second saucer of milk.
There would be a good pint left to
turn into the sink.
That day ii rained. The roof sprung
a leak Mary had TO climb into the
attic and put couple of pans under
| the caves TO catch the trickle. She
scratched her arm on nail and had
| visions of blood poisoning. Would
| Wirdy-she understood that was his
name-care if anything happened TO
| her? She wept a little out of self
pity.
Not for worlds would Mary have
admitted, even to Percy, the cat. that
she was in love with d milkman. She
had been brought up 10 have high
| er ideal than that Probably that was
why she had not married. Middle age
| found her lonesome and alone, with
| enough to live On if she used II dis
| creetly. 1t certainly wasn't discreet
in her TO buy such quantities of milk
and cream.
All up and down the street women,
some of them married. oo!-were
! buying lots of milk. II wasn't that
the milk was so much better than Mr..
Ransome's. bnt it was peddled from
blue truck by dashing young fel-