Rose of Old Harpeth

r a poem or so in the Rucker family? And are you succeeding in keeping the peace with Mrs. Plunkett for young Bob?" And firing this volley

tree as he turned to beam a welcome on the Senator from behind the counter where he was filling kero

ry journey with a stop at Sweetbriar in view, and it seems a long time until I make the haven I assure you,

at frizzling over to Providence to a ice-cream festibul Mis' Mayberry was a-having for the church carpet benefit last night. After I told her I would put up early, and me and her could jog over in my buggy along behind them flippets to see no foolishness were being carried on, she took it more easy, and it looked li

her grief has advanced a hundred per cent by her consenting to go at all. Did any of the other Sweetbriar

ike sinct Mr. Everett left us, though she'd never let anybody lack the heartening of that smile of hern no matter how tetched with lonesome she was herself. When the le

r in a casual voice, but his eyes narrowed in

Miss Amandy has tooken a bad cold in her right ear and has had to keep her head wrapped up all the time. Mr. Tucker's mighty busy a-trying to figure out how to crap the farm like Mr. Mark laid

his confidence, "what you say of Mr. Alloway's being too old to farm his land with a profit is true. I have come this time to talk things over with him and-er-Miss

the Briars. I shipped a whole box of sand and gravel for him according to a telegram he sent me just last week and I had sorter got my hopes up for a find, specially as that young city fellow came out here and dug another bag full outen the same place not any time afte

ck gleam coming into his ugly little eyes and the smile veil took on another

o hopes now for Mr. Tucker and the folks from him. We'll all just

e I can find Mr. Alloway? I think I will go have a business talk with him now." And in a few minutes the Senator was striding as rapidly as his ponderosity would allow

to the counter in front of Mr. Crabtree. "They ain't a thing in that sack 'cept Miss Rose Mary's letter, and he must make a light kind of love from the heft of it. I most let it drop offen the saddle as I jogged along, only I'm a sensitive kind of cupid and the buckle of the bag hi

few minutes," answered Mr. Crabtree as he searched out the solitary letter and started to the door with it. "Sample that new keg of m

hat it should be delivered promptly by a messenger whose mercury wings should scarcely pause in agitating the air of arrival and departure. And suiting his actions to his instinct he whirled the

both stick some when you're got your full of 'em at the time," phi

'hair-despair' tangle straightened out. She hasn't seen me to tell me things for two hours or more and I know I won't get no thinking done this d

r, it would seem, just to throw a glow over the wide sheets of closely written paper. Rose Mary had been pale as she worked, and

ger. I'm tired, I'm hungry, and there's no balm of Gilead in New York. I can't eat because there are no cornmeal muffins in this howling wilderness of houses, streets, people and noise. I can't drin

n't seem to be able to make some of these stupid old gold backs see things my way, even if I d

hings-that the heat and friction of them and the hand combined have brought out a great patch of prickly heat right over my heart in this sizzling weather. I know it needs fresh cold cream to make it heal up, and I haven't even any talcum powder. How's Louisa Helen and doth the widow consent still not at all? Tell Crabtree I say just walk over and try force of arms and not to-That force of arms is a good expression to use-literally in some

ding over a tall rose girl thing who stands in the doorway with her 'nesties' all asleep in the dark house behind her-and if any man were lounging against the honeysuc

.

to let Stonie sell me the little dogs. Women ou

nder her lashes, her rich lips curled like the half-blown bud between the flower of her cheeks, and her eyes shone like the two first stars mirrored in a woman's pool of life. Also it is one of the mysteries of the drama wh

an of the fields would have come crushing, cruel, tearing doubts of the man beyond the hills who said so little and yet so much. However, Rose Mary was one of the order of fostering women whose arms are forever outheld cradle-wise, and to whose breast is ever drawn

er feeble folk, with a song in her heart for him and them and to answer every call from along Providence Road. Thus it is that the motive power for the great cycles that turn and turn out in the wide sp

er a still rosier hint in her cheeks, she tucked it into the front of her dress and smoothed and patted the fo

in the doorway under the honeysuckle vines, a complacent smile arran

in one hospitable breath as she beamed at the Senator across her table with the most affable friend

to add as she took up a cup and started for the crocks with a still greater access

r with praiseworthy ponderosity, and he shook out the smi

e added as she poured half a ladleful of the golden top milk into the foaming glass in her hand and gave it to the Senator, who received it with a trembling hand and gulped it down desperately; for this once in his life the Honorable Gideon Newsome was completely and entirely embarrassed. For many a year he had had at his command florid and extravagant figures of spee

to be my wife just as soon as you recovered from your-your natural grief over the way things had gone with you and young Alloway. I have waited longer than I had any intention of doing, because I was absorbed in this political career I had begun on, but now I see it is time to settle matters, as the farm is running us all into debt, and I'm very much in need of you as a wife. I

bower. Quickly she raised her hand to her breast and just as quickly the pressure of the letter laying there against her heart sent a flood over h

clear when you lent the mon

but must be paid in a richer harvest. We will take charge of this place, assure a comfortable future for the aged relatives in your care, and as my wife you will be both happy and honored." The Senator was decidedly coming into his own, and smile, glance and voice as he regarded Rose Mary were unctuous. In fact, through their slits his eyes shot a

d, and she was even able to summon a smile with a tinge of coque

any longer for the place, which has been run at a loss for too long already. We may say that in accepting me you are accepting their comfortable future. Of course you could not expect things to go on any longer in this impossible way, as I have need of t

nto his, and the wounded light in their blue depth was shadowed in the pride of the glance. "You are right-you must not be kept out of your own any longer. But you will-will you give me just a little time to-to get used to-to thinking about i

g voice, but some influence that it is given a woman to exhale in a desperate self-defense kept him from bestowing anything more than an ordinary pressure on the cold hand lai

per against her heart; then she sank into a chair and, stretching her arms across the cold table, she let her head sink until the chill of

weakness-the throb of it hurt her now. And perhaps he would never understand. She couldn't tell him because-because of his poverty and the hurt it would give him-not to be able to help-to save her. No, he must not know until too late-and never understand! Desperately thus wave after wave swept over her, crushing, grinding, mocking her womanhood, until, helpless and breathless, s

get the kite to going again. I've been under the waters, too, but I've pulled myself ashore with a-thinking that nothing's a-going to take you away from me and them. What does it matter if we were to have to

at him quickly with the tenderness breaking through the agony in a

t in his fields, now no longer his as he realized. "Gid has got the right of it, and it wasn't honest of us to hold on at this losing rate as long as we did. There is just a little more value

in a guarded tone of voice, as if she wanted to be sure of all the facts bef

d it up friendly for them, cause the swalloring of the trouble has to come in the end; but Gid minced facts faithful for me, according to

Rose Mary, still suspending her a

pit out with good sense. But I reckon I was kinder confused by the shock and wasn't right peart myself to take in his language." And Uncle Tucker sank into a chair, a

r going to leave the Briars. He has just left here and-and, oh, I am so grateful to keep it-for you-and them. I never thought of that-I never suspected such-a-do

ssion of indignation. Slowly he rose to his feet, and the stoop in his feeble old shoulders straightened itself out so that he stood with the height of his young manhood. His gentle eyes lost the mysticism that had come with his years of sorr

ill she dropped down to sleep, worn out with the journey. And while she was asleep he stuck a stake at the black-curled head of her and one by the little, tired, ragged feet. That was the measure of the front door-sill to the Briars up there on the hill. Come generations we have fought off the Indians, we have cleared and tilled the land, and we have gone up to the state house to name laws and order. In our home we have welcomed traveler, man and beast, and com