1
THE COURIER.
It
fr
HER POINT OF VIEW.
Hklkn C. Harwood.
Mrs. Auetia Martin was sitting in
one of the deep rockers in tbe general
assembly room, tbe office of the Hotel
Rockbound. A contented smile crossed
her face aa she spread her hands wide
before the blaze that sprang with cheer
ful energy from the broad hearth. Peo
ple looked upon tbe Martins with satis
faction. Mr. Martin was called a "fine
fellow" and in speaking of Mrs. Martin
the comment ran "No wonder that Mr.
Martin fell in love with her." The
spirit of unrest and indecision seemed
to till the room at this moment. Some
of the guests were already equipped
with walking sticks and a purpose.
Others were not sure whether Point
Lookout, The Steeple, a boat ride or the
Lion's Head should be their morning's
excursion. Jack Horton sauntered up
to the fire. -"'
"You Bet a bad example for this fine
morning," he said to Mrs. Martin and
then sat down beside her.
"Complete idleness is an art these
days you know. Then these first few
moments of grace just after breakfast
are such a comfort. My boys haven't
yet bad time to topple off a precipice cr
tumble into the lake.'
Horton turned, looked out of the
window a moment, gloomily. Mrs.
Martin looked also, in wonder at the de
pression of the always cheerful Jack.
A boat with Yale blue trimmings was
skimming over the water, and even at
that distance tbe strength and grace of
the young oarswoman were visible.
Horton moved a little nearer the tire
and away from the widnow, closing his
lips tightly until he wore what Miss
Stanton called the Horton compressed
Yeast expression. He picked up a book
a little vaguely from the chair at his
right. The cover was torn and the
pages indicated much handling.
"You have read Peter Stirling long
ago I suppose?" Horton inquired.
"Yes." She took tbe book and turned
over a few leaves. "Did you enjoy it?"
"Some of it was immense. Peter's
rise as a lawyer and a politician is finely
done, but I simply can't go the love
part, can you?"
."It seems foolish, I know, accept my
apMogy beforehand, if you will, but I
think it is true, to life," and Mrs. Mar
tin looked meditatively at the little red
castles in the fire.
"You don't believe that Mrs. Martin.
Come, you know that you don't."
"Indeed I do, Jack Horton. Men
usually stand up for each other and
they have a small inward feeling that
theirs is the only common sense point
of view. Jack it seems to me that you
are somewhat in the category to which
most men belong."
"Fatally bo, answered Horton, pick
ing up a cone from a heaping .basket of
them and throwing it with considera
ble vigor into the fire.
"Why so pessimistic?' asked Mrs.
Martin. '-Miss Stanton must have been
expounding her theories to you. She is
positive that she believes in them, but
she doesn't, not a bit She will make
the discovery some day."
norton shrugged his shoulders.
"But going back to Peter," continued
Mrs. Martin. "Men of middle age often
fall in love with young girls of eighteen
or twenty and in just that desperate
Peter fashion."
"Nonsense; a man of that brain and
ballast doesn't capitulate in any reck
less manner."
"Jack, this only illustrates your youth
and inexperience. Wait, if you don't
marry until you are forty or forty-five
you will be just that way. I will wager
you that mica yonder. To be sure, it
doesn't belong to me, but no matter."
"Accepted," said Jack, emphatically.
I tell you, Mrs. Martin, men are not
such fools at that age. If a man mar
ries at middle age, if there is one thing
he does take into consideration it is cer
tainly the prudence of the action."
"1 don't 6Py that he doesn't on rare
occasions, but usually, if he surrenders
at all to the 'happy stats' he does so far
more recklessly than a much younger
man. A man of forty has certainly had
time for a fair start on his career. He
is just at the age where he would not
grow any older or perhaps younger.
Nevertheless it is youth that appeals to
him. The charm, the freshness of it,
He has studied the common sense point
of view all his life. Now that is the
last thing that be wishes to consider.
He has seen the years of his own life
unfold and now he would Bee a fresh
leaf that has begun to open do eo at
his bidding."
"Mrs. Martin, I am sure of one thing
and that is that these theories are your
own and not Martin's. They are fanci
ful speculations, but not life. This is
the on time, when 1 can't accept your
opinion."
"Jack, I am thirty-five. I never made
a real match in all my life, but I have
helped to straighten out many a quar
rel. Never, though, have I been con
solation or peace attachee to the piogn
ant love affairs of a bachelor."
"Bachelors are not 'confidential in
such matters."
"Oh, 1 don't know. But there isn't
time for a quarrel. Ten days, two
weeks, a month, the affair is all settled
and before you know it you have cards."
"Men parse girls past a fragrant or
bitter remembrance; present, a peach
and a jolly good time or The Only Ones
that necessitates solitude, a puff of a
pipe, and a star to guide the dark path
at midnight; future.
"Well, Heaven knows it is a comfort,"
interrupted Jack. "But I fear that I
disturbed you last night, tramping up
and down. I forgot that there was any
one on that side of the house. I had to
do something."
"Jack," said Mrs. Martin in a sympa
thetic tone.
Just then a girl in a 'brown walking
suit and hat came quickly up to warm
her hands before the blaze. The fire
brought out the beautiful soft tint of
her hair. As Mrs. Martin's eyes swept
the line of ber figure her face expressed
the pleasure that tne inspection must
surely give.
"You look as if you and 'Rockbound'
were getting along very well together,"
said Mrs. Martin.
"Oh famously," answered the girl.
"Vacation is always jolly. Think of it,
I have been cooped up for two years
with boarding schools and teachers.
Last year I traveled with some of the
teachers during the summer bo I have
n't really and truly been away from
school for two years. I really thought
that I might get the intellectual eye,
but Mamma said that there was no
danger, but then she added it wouldn't
be becoming to me."
A ring of boys outside, a convulsion of
arms and legs and Mrs. Martin was up
and out of the door. '
Horton looked out of the window.
"There is an empty boat, Miss Brown.
Shall wo take it?"
Horton was a swift oarsman and they
went at a rapid rate down the long
length of the lake. He pulled up his
oars quickly as they came near tho boat
with Yale blue trimmings.
"You are working, as if you were
practicing for the college crew, he said
to the girl at thn oars.
"One can't forget old habits. Then
it is such a glorious morning; I feel like
a young lion," and she shook back a
dark, wavy lo:k of hair that had fallen
against the flush of her cheek. "But
we must be off," and she nodded to the
other girl in the boat. "We are on our
way to ask a pine tree to take us up to
board in one of his topmast branches.
Then we can view the world with a
more critical eye, can swing and breathe
pine oxygen and that will absorb all the
trying things in one's mind." For a
moment tbe animation left her face.
"Btu, dear-me, Mi6S Brown, what have
you been doing?" and she nodded gayly
at the store, toward which they had
been drifting.
A mac of rather portly figure was pac
ing up and down, his eyes upon the
ground and his hands nervously finger
ing a grey mustache.
"Oh," said Miss Brown, "Mr. Barrett
knows that I always like to dance until
twelve and last evening he stopped at
eleven. Consequently I am avoiding
him this morning."
"Aren't you Bevere? You know that
he gave up dancing twelve years ago
and has only begun again since your ar
rival, two weeks ago."
"Dancing is good exercise for him. I
think perhaps he will stay later to
night." "Well," answered MisB Stanton, ''it's
a bit dull for Mr. Barrett this morning,
but it is a handsome feather in Mr.
Ilorton's cap. He is an artistic soul,
you know, and for tbe sake of harmony,
I don't doubt, but that he will feather
his oars. Bon Voyage. We must be
going," and she turned the boat quickly
around.
"Ethel," Baid the other girl in the
boat with the Yale trimmings, "Is it
supposed to be very serious between
Mies Brown and Mr. Barrett?"
"Yes, at least on his part it is absolute
devotion. He is twenty-eight years
older, but some way his years only seem
to increase his ardor. His bachelorhood
has always been his toast. He is a
manufacturer of a good deal of wealth
and has been here summers ever since I
can remember. At times there have
been a lot of pretty women here, but
never an indentation did they make on
tbe time-piece of his life."
Ethel Stanton pulled in her right oar
a moment, brushed back the wavy dark
lock. "Gertrude," she said earnestly,
"boarding school is absolution from
many things."
"Yes," said the other, "in a way it is."
'You haven't for one thing any par
ticular haunting, nagging desire to be
useful, to do Bomethicg, to be anything
but yourself, provided that that is an
attractive self. There is Miss Brown.
She is charming and she is at peace
with herself. She hasn't any ambition
except to be through school, out into
society and into the world "
"It is convenient," admitted the other
girl, "but would you change, if you
could?"
"No," she answered. "Gertrude, I
had a letter from Miss Reid this morn
ing. She said that the money bad been
collected and that there was enough to
start the settlement school of Bookbind
ing and Pottery. A queer combination
isn't it? There are two little old French
women in Chicago who at one time had
one of those nice small bookbindiug
shops in Paris, on the rue de Levres
They understand the business thor
oughly and they are going to be in
charge of the classes. Then there is an
Englishman from Torquay that Miss
Reid has discovered and he has found
some valuable clay. Now there are to
be day classes and evening classes all
absolutely free. There are great op
portunities in the bookbinding line in
this country. The pottery works are to
be carried on in the same manner that
they are at Torquay. Every man, wo
man or child is to come and work out
his own design and some day we may
have a famous pottery like the one there
Whatever profit there is will be divided
among the laborers. Miss Reid says
that she will be there part of the year.
The rest of the time I am to be in full
charge."
"But Ethel, have you decided about
the other matter?"
For the next two weeks the habitues
of the hotel veranda had more than the
scenery, the nature of tbe dessert or tho
temperature to occupy th6ir minds. In
fact it would have been decidedly dull
bad it not been for this new developing
interest, for the thermometer had dis
played an unusual amount of conscience
for one belonging to a summer resort.
The tramps, the rides, the tete-a-tetes
of Mr. Horton and Miss Stanton were
not so interesting to be sure, for, for two
summers had they not been friends and
foes? But Mr. Barrett, the man who
delighted to expatiate on the peace of
his eight and forty years, and who
chuckled over the singleness of his state
that, was a different matter. The ve
randa missed the companionship of this
gentle, genial scoffer and the clock work
of his ways. His gifts of bon bons aid
flowers were the cause of intense ex
citement and deep concern. The se
riousness of the affair was not only ap
parent by tbe oblivion of bait, fishing
tackle and pipes in Mr. Brown's daily
career, but also by the fact that the ex
pression on Miss Brown's face and the
roses at her belt were the source of
much more enthusiastic conversation
than the fresh loveliness of hertfrocke.
Mrs. Martin was to leave the next day.
For a last vipw and breath of pine, she
started for the tall woods. She walked
some distance, until she came to the
skirts of the mountain wbere a high,
many sided rock had stationed itself.
On either end of the rock there were
email concave openings. These places
looked warm and comfortable, but she
walked on and around both ends nntil
she came to tbe farther Bide where the
sun came down more generously. She
sat down and leaned against the rock.
The kinnikinnic felt 60 soft and springy
Bhe put her head down and fell fast
asleep. The chipmunks came out io
play, then an occasional squirrel. They
eyed the sleeper with distrust, but she
was bo quiet. Certainly it was safe and
this was their favorite play ground. At
last they got into a dispute with one of
the younger squirrels and it was agreed
that his penalty for taking the wrong
view should be to go to the top of a tall
pine that apparently came right out of
the rock and shake down some cones
with which to flavor their five o'clock
tea. Mounting a tree is certainly not
difficult for a Equirrel, but the cones
were not quite hard and dry and the
young squirrel shook and shook first
one branch, then another. Suddenly he
S
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