Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 June 1879 — TWO LOVERS. [ARTICLE]

TWO LOVERS.

BY FLORENCE H. BIRNEY.

Joshua wanted me to marry him, but [ refuHed. He wasn’t my ideal at all. I was pretty, and my friends assured me that I might pick and choose. But I had read so many novels, and my liaad was so full of romance that I wasn’t inclined to choose any one of the t all, sandy-haired, freckled youths of Pikeville. The ideal of my imagination had dark, flashing eyes, hair like the raven’s wing, tseth like pearls, and a haughty mein. So, could any reasonable person expect me to be satisfied with plain Joshua Hobbs, who was fair and freckled, with pule brown hair, and fat hands, brown with toil. But mother and Jane expected me to marry him, and I was very foolish to think of t hrowing away such a ehance, for, in spite of being very plain in appearance and manner, Joshua had made his way in the world, and was in possession of a ve-iy handsome farm, well stocked. “ You will never receive another such offer,”said mother, one morning in May. “I cannot understand yon, Leah; you appear bereft of your senses. There isn’t another girl in Pikeville who would refuse Joshua Hobbs.” “ Then he will find no difficulty in marrying,” I replied. “ I am sure I don't begrudge him to anybody.” “ So moral, so upright, so honorable in every respect,” continued mother, as she stitched away on Ben’s diminutive pantaloons, which were suffering from a complicated, compound fracture of the knee. “ But homely, mother, fearfully homely,” I said. ‘‘How can you say so?” cried Jane, whom I had always suspected of a warm feeling for Joshua. “He is very nicelooking, and will make the best of husbands.” “I wish Joshua had had the good sense to fall in love with Jane instead of with you, Leah,” said mother. “ She would never have been so foolish as to refuse such an offer, and with me in such poor circumstances, too. But young men appear to care only for pink cheeks and curls, and marry women with not an idea above jewelry and ribbons. I did think Joshua knew better.”

This was rather hard on me, but I did not feel vexed, for I knew mother was too angry to be entirely just, so I excused her. We lived in Pikeville, a small, humdrum, sluggish town, and had just enough money to enable us to live respectably and make both ends meet at the time the year’s bills came in. Mother had a righteous horror of debt, and we owed no man a cent; but, of course, we had to pinch a great deal and deny ourselves any little extra extravagance in the way of a flower or a ribbon. There were five of us to support, and perhaps mother was not to be blamed for wishing to see Jane and me well married and in comfortable homes. She thought it really wicked in me to refuse Joshua, for his farm was almost the bes£ in the county, and lay only three miles from town. But I did not fret over the matter myself. I was too sure that my hero, the ideal hero of my imagination, would come along to claim me, and take me away from little gossiping Pikeville and the petty economies over which mother fretted so continually. I liked Joshua very well, but had no idea of ever marrying him. I was too vain to think my first offer would be my last, and had no fear of being left an old maid.

I know Jane envied me my good looks and my lover. She was a quiet, industrious girl, fond of country life and farm work, and it did indeed look to me very hard that Joshua should not have chosen her instead of singling me ont, and thus bringing down on me mother’s reproaches and complaints But then, things generally go crosswise in this bias world. Joshua did not come to the house any more after my stern and decided refusal of his suit. We missed the presents of butter, milk and eggs, which he had been so fond of bringing, and which were, of course, of more use than the flowers and jewelry most lovers present to their goddesses. This loss of the butter, milk and eggs fretted mother more than anything else, and not a day passed without some allusion to my “stubborn folly” in rejecting Joshua. “What can you have against the young man ?” mother would cry. “He is all that is honorable and good.” “His name is enough,” I would answer. “Fancy my name being Mrs. Joshua Hobbs!” “It is a Bible name as well as yours,” mother would say, sharply. “Hobbs a Bible name! Well, I didn’t know that before. I will look it up.” “ I meant Joshua,” and then in a lachrymose state mother would indulge in quotations from the Bible about the sharpness of a serpent’s tooth, etc. October came at last, and still my hero had not come upon the scene. Sometimes I was tempted to recall Joshua, to put an end to being harassed by mother and Jane. I could not ask for a new apron or collar but they would sigh, and complain of our scanty means and say, “If I’d married Joshua, etc.” Some times I really wished Joshua was at the bottom of the Red sea. But in the middle of October relief came in the shape of a letter from my aunt, Caroline, who lived in Barstowe, a large town sixty miles away, asking that either Jane or I should pay her a long visit. I felt sure that mother would say at once that Jane must be the one to go. She was the eldest, and generally had all the nice times and the best of everything. My prophecy was a true one, for as mother finished reading the letter she looked straight at Jane: “You can get ready to go by the Ist of November, Janie. You can stay until May; and I tell you what I will do: I will give you my pearl-colored silk, for you will see a great deal of company at your aunt’s.” The pearl-colored silk I Was it indeed true that mother had offered Jane that wonderful and much-prized garment? O, could I but be Jane! “I shall not go,” said Jane, very

quietly, while my eyes distended in amazement at her refusal of this boon . “Leah can go, for she will enjoy it more than I should.” “But, Jane, I wish you to go. Leah is younger than you are, and does not deserve any pleasure after her stubborn folly of last May. She may come to her senses if she has to stay here in Pikeville, and Joshua may possibly give her another chance.” “Nevertheless, I shall not go,” persisted Jane; “so you might as well let Leah take advantage of aunt’s offer.” So, when all persuasions and arguments failed to shake Jane’s resolution, mother told me rather ungraciously that I might prepare myself to go to Barstow©* “ Will you let me make over the pearlcolored silk, mother?” I asked, my heart beating high with hope. “Certainly not,” was the cold answer. “If you had chosen to marry Joshua Hobbs, I should have given it to you with pleasure, as a wedding present.” I actually felt sorry I had not married Joshua, so great an admiration did I have for the pearl-colored silk. As I whirled along in the train to Barstowe in the first week of Novem-. ber, I indulged myself in building many air castles. Of course I should now meet my hero, the ideal lover of my vivid and romantic imagination. In May I should return to Pikeville bringing’ him with me; and when mother should see that noble form, the eyes like midnight stars, the hair rivaling the color of the raven’s wing, the marble pallor of the haughty brow, and the proud carriage of her son-in-law, she would rejoice with me that 1 had not been sacrificed to homely Joshua Hobbs. So vivid was my imagination that I almost expected to see my hero in the car, but there were only four boys and an old woman, so I waited, with what patience I could, my arrival in Barstowe. My aunt greeted me very kindly. She lived in a handsome house, and had but one child, a son, who was at present stationed at a fort several hundred miles away. Thinking the winter would be a lonely one without her soldier sod near her, Aunt Caroline had sent for one of us girls. 1 expected to meet my ideal at once, but three weeks slipped by and still he had not made his appearance. I never went out of the house that I did not think that this might possibly prove a red-letter walk, and bring my lover to mo. But, as time slipped by and he came not, I began to grow uneasy. I felt as if I could not endure to return home without a solitaire diamond ring on my finger, and the prospect of a plain gold one, whereby I should cause mother to confess that I had been in the right all along. One rainy clay in December I put .on my waterproof and overshoes, an old hat and a once-discarded dress, and, with a family umbrella the worse for wear in my hand, started to go to the worsted store in the town for some split zephyr with which to finish a tidy I was working as a Christmas gift for my aunt.

The gutters were so swollen as to be almost too wide to jump. The deepest and worst of all came in view just as I neared the store. But I was not to be checked in my career after worsted by a gutter, so I gave a little run and a spring— and landed in the middle of the muddy pool. My hat went off at the same moment and the old umbrella went crashing against the curb stone, and became a wreck at once. I scrambled out on the pavement just as amelodious voice fell on my ear: “Allow me to assist you, Miss.” I Icoked up, turned scarlet with mortification and pale with surprise and dismay, for there, wonderful to relate, stood my hero. Yes; there were the flashing eagle eyes, the marble brow, the hair like the raven’s wing, and the haughty mien. I could only stammer out something about being very wet. “You must go at once to your home,” said the musical voice of my hero; “and, if you will permit, I will hold my umbrella over you.” I stammered my thanks as I walked by his side in the direction of my aunt’s bouse. How bitterly I regretted my plight! How unprepossessing I must appear in my wet, muddy clothes, battered hat, and clinging to the shattered umbrella! At my aunt's door he bowed, hoped I would suffer no ill-effects from my bath, thrust into my hand his card, and—vanished like a dream. I ran up stairs, and, before attempting to remove my wet garments, read the name on the card: “Horatio Fitz Allen.” What a delightful combination! How elegant and patrician in sound! How widely different from Joshua Hobbs! Oh, to think that I had ever been wooed by a Joshua Hobbs! My aunt laughed over my adventure, and said she had heard of Mr. Fitz Allen, who was reported to be very wealthy, and was in Barstowe for a few weeks on business. The next evening I met my hero at the house of a Mrs. Gaines, a great friend of my aunt. He paid me undi vided attention, and my heart beat in a transport of joy. The days now went by on golden wings, and I was the happiest of the happy. Mr. Fitz Alien was with me constantly, and at the end of three weeks proposed for my hand, and laid his wealth and heart (figuratively) at my feet.

My aunt gave her consent after requesting my Horatio to give her proper credentials of his respectability and honor. This he promised to do as soon as he should return to his home, which must be almost immediately, owing to the press of business. I wrote at once to my mother and Jane, telling them in rapturous language of my conqu«<t, and describing my lover. I compared him with Joshua Hobbs, and said I was happy that I had not been sacrificed to the latter and a farm-house home. How happy I was! I wanted everyone to see my lover, and so I was delighted when in March my Cousin Paul came home on a furlough of two weeks. It was unexpected, and a great joy to both my aunt and myself. “How fortunate that you came today,” I said to him;.“for Mr. Fitz Allen leaves Barstowe to-morrow for several weeks. I am so anxious that you should ■ee him.” “I am glad you have done so well, little cousin,” said Paul. “I am very desirous of making the acquaintance of this hero of yours, this paragon of excellence.” “He will be here to-night,” I said. Horatio came about 8 o’clock, and we were conversing in the parlor after the manner of turtle doves, when I heard my aunt and Paul coming. My lover rose to his feet as they came in, and so did I. “My Cousin Paul, Mr. Fitz Allen,” I said, blushing deeply. I heard no welcome, no salutation of any sort, and looked up in surprise. My cousin was looking straight at my lover, both livid with some emotion. “So!” at last gasped my cousin; “this is the man who has dared to woo my Cousin Leah! This blackleg, this swindler, this rascal! Joe Harris, alias Luke Hartwell, alias Horatio Fitz Allen. Hound I low, sneaking scoundrel, out of this house! ” thundered my cousin. “O, Paul! Paul!” I sobbed; “there must be some mistake.” “Ask if there is a mistake. Turn to him, Leah,” replied Paul. Oh, where was the man I had deified? Crouching ggainst the .like a

whipped cur, white as ashes, and shaking with fear! I approached him, but he waved me back. • Let me go,” he said. “ You will not tell of this, for it would shame her. The game is up, and I have lost her fortune.” “My fortune!” I repeated. “I have none.” “ Then I was deceived,” and he bowed himself out. Who can estimate the extent of my mortification! Cousin Paul had met Mr. Fitz Allen (as I will still call him) several times, and knew him to be a low villain, on the lookout for money, no matter how it was to be obtained. I was congratulated on my escape, and felt thankful for it, but it was a bitter mortification. The days now crept by, and I longed for home. I thought much of Joshua Hobbs, of his true, manly heart and tender love for me, and determined that when I went back to Pikeville I would give my homely lover some encouragement, and reward him for his faithful love by my hand. May came at last, and I was once more in Pikeville. .1 had not written of my coming, for I wanted to give mother and Jane a surprise. The very first person I saw whom I knew was Joshua, who was at the station in his buggy, talking to the ticket agent. “So you’ve come home, Leith,” he said, giving me a pleasant smile. “Let me drive you to the house in my buggy.” I consented very gladly, for we lived in the suburbs, and it was a long walk from the station. “Jane is not expecting you,” he said, as we drove along. “How do you know?” I asked; “do you visit there now? ” “Yes, very often,” he replied. “You must know that I am fond of going there, since Jane has consented to our marriage taking place next week.” I sat still, stunned by the news. So Jane was to marry Joshua, and she had not written me a line, telling me the news. “I was afraid she would not have me, since I’d been your lover first, but she said she didn’t mind that. I am very happy, Leah. lam sorry your marriage was—was— ” “Don’t speak to me of it,” I cried. “I cannot bear the mention of that man or my folly.” When I asked Jane why she had not written me of her engagement to Joshua, she said she was afraid I would write something back about her being second choice, so she thought she would wait until I came home to tell me the news. They were married the next week, and have been very happy together ever since, while I am only an old maid, of no use to any one except my small nephews and nieces. I have seen the folly of giving up the substance for the shadow; of creating an ideal and worshiping it blindly. I lost both my lovers, and my life has been a lonely one. Boston, Mass.