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About The Hesperian / (Lincoln, Neb.) 1885-1899 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 1, 1893)
SS52 i ?' THE HESPERIAN p Ml ' tj . r In the evening, when ho could no longer see his dear angel, ho would sit with folded hands listening to his father and Henri toll stories of their better days. Sometimes ho would laugh aloud when they wore merry, or again would gravely wonder when his father spoke of his mother, the- pretty, light haired, blue-eyed lady, for ho had never even seen her. Dark days came to the Ronnard room, days of tOBsing fever, when tho little boy lay raving, with his father always at his side. "The bells the bells they must ring the bells for me now the stairs whore is Ga- -Gabriel!" are so steep, I can't climb briel mother! Gabriel !- Then for a time, perhaps for a long, long time, he would lie quietly sleeping, and tho weary father would go down to the street to attend to their wants. Thus the days wore on, and the little boy, tnoy thought, waB growing bettor. Tho people of tho busy street stood still one day to listen. Tho bells wore ringing, not for a marriage nor a death, but so strangely; first faintly and slowly loudly then a sudden hush. Men then climbed the steep and winding stairs to the belfry. Upon the floor lay a 'little boy with yellow hair, and dark brown-eyes, which now wore strange and wide. His hands were all bruised and bleeding. Close by his sido was a single feather, soft and beautifully white. Amy C. Bkunek. A DELICATE QUESTION Mr. Charles Do Peystor Thompkinson steadied himself with an effort, and for tho third time read through the note that had just boon brought him. Yos, there could bo no mistake. There it was in neatly formed, "thready" letters: Deal Mr. Thompkinson: I accept with much pleasure your invitation for the theatre Friday evening, November tenth. Sincerely, Dardanelle Durham. Still keeping his ey.es on this note, he staggered to his table, seized a email folded shoot of pink' paper lying there, and read: Miss Verbena Watson is charmed to accept the kind invitation of Mr. Charles DePeyster Thomp kinson for the theatre Friday evening, November tenth. Mr. Charles DePeyster Thompkinson sank into a chair with a groan, and let fall the two notes on the table. "Some ruffian has played a trick on mo," was his first thought; and having no moan opinion of himself and his dignity, which ho often told his friends was not to bo trifled with, ho was muttering to himself throats to "punch the head" of the follow that did it, should he ever be found out, when a possible solution flashed over him. "Let mo think," said Mr. Charles Do Peystor Thompkinson, "I - meant to ask Verbena to tho theatre, and to accept Miss Durham's invitation to cards next week. Can it bo that, still thinking of the first note, I inadvertently wrote the sumo in the'socond? No, for I well remember composing an ac ceptance. It it must be that I took up ono of those practice notes I had written to Verbena, 'Mr. Charles Do Peyster Thomp kinson requests tho pleasure of your com pany to, etc.,' and directed it, instead of tho right ono, to La Durham. Yob, that must be what I did." Ho arose and walked back and forth un steadily for a few moments. Then, throw ing himself into his favorite oratorical atti tude, and absent-mindedly raising his right" hand toward the coiling, he tried to reason . out within him what to do. "In tho first place," ho said, "I must go with ono or tho other because I have already bought the tickets. So the sudden death of Bomo distant relative preventing my attending tho theatre that evening would do me no good. In tho second place, I can't take both because they hate each other too much," and ho smilod complacently in tho mirror, "and because I haven't got three tickets. No, I have got to choose botween them, that's all." i !VJ ! V " ' f it i r;