Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 January 1894 — TWO THANKSGIVINGS. [ARTICLE]

TWO THANKSGIVINGS.

BY CECIL CHARLES. “Down on my luokf Well, I should say to.” Cory Dickinton shouldered his pack and got up. lie left the shadow of the mountain foliage reluctantly and began again hi* toilsome ascent of the road. The blaze of the tropical sun produced upon him a strange sensation. It did not blind him; on the contrary, it •eemed to stimulate his faculties. Or waa it wholly the varied atmosphere as he climbed higher and higher? No, it was the sun, he decided. The atmosphere was partly responsible, but the sun—the tropical sun—seemed to show him constantly new, strange sights, somewhat even as the tropical night sky with its thousand new stars, had divulged new secrets to bis marveling senses. So he trudged under his small pack over the mountain to reach the oapital. Meeting him, one would have hardly suspected him to be “down on his luck,” as he had but lately declared. Tall, » good looking, well dressed, barely thirty years of age, Cory Dickinson looked like the son of a rich man out on a pleasure tramp—not like a self-exiled evader of the law seeking an unknown field in a remote Central American republic. But that was what Cory Dickinson was doing. As he plodded along the dusty road in the afternoon splendor, his thoughts wandered far away from his actual surroundings. He lost sight of the distant, dreamy peaks, the still hollows, the intense emerald hues of foliage, the trickling, musical mountain streams and saw only the small New England town whence he had lately fled, late Autumnsombre, staid, matter of-faot and Sun-day-observing. He saw his late home, his stern-faced uncls, his invalid aunt, Mason, the hired man, with his grim scowl, and Hannah, the servant girl. Mason’s face and Hannah’s stood out particularly clear and obnoxious. Mason had rejoiced at his trouble, revengeful of the day wheu Cor; had come upon him brutally kicking the poor old family horse, and struck him a smart blow with bis umbrella. Mason had never forgotten that blow nor the way in which Cory had threatened him if he ever illtreated the animal again. Hannah, too, had been overjoyed at his disgrace; she was Mason’s sweetheart. Then, all at once, there came another face that Cory could only see in a thick blur of—something like mist. The face of little Lydia Post, the school teacher, the only one of those who knew, who believed in him.

He had to dash something away from his eyes as he strode on. Late in the afternoon he came to the first outskirts of the town and entered a small road-side dwelling. He could speak no Spanish; the woman with her numerous children clinging to her could speak no English. But she looked at him with generous eyes and made him sit down on the best seat in the poor room. He made a motion of drinking and said appealiugly “Aqua ?” For he had not paused to drink at the last mountain stream, fearing night might overtake him on the way. She brought water quiokly, and when he would have risen, made signs for him to wait, that she might prepare food for him. He drew out the last bit of money left him—less than a dollar, for he had little remaining when he left the steamer at the port—but she waved it away and made him see that she desired no pay. The humble food of the country was very good, he thought. He had had nothing but a biscuit since early morning. He ate the eggs and black beans and tortillas and drank the black coffee that had grown and blossomed out a few miles away as if they were the choicest delicaoies. As he sat eating he wondered what they were doing at home; it was their supper time, and it was a bleak autumn day—a late November day, almost the last of the month. Something rose in his throat, lump like, and he made haste to finish, fearful of breaking down. The woman would take no pay; he thanked her over and over in words that the conld not comprehend, but with looks that she surely read, and continued on his way. But continuing on, he found that this was but a small villag and that there were yet some few miles t> traverse before he came to the oapital. The upland soenery seemed less strange to him now, but for the queer, low houses, with the heavy tile roofs, he could almost have fancied himself back in the States. Only, all at once, the twilight had turned to a marsh gloom and he remembered that he was very far off from home—under the equator —with no place to lay his head. He sat down by the.foadside, utterly exhausted, “I cannot go any further. I’m dead tired,” he murmured exhaustedly. He leaned his head back against a kind of stone wall that seemed to protect property of some sort, possibly a deserted country house. It had been getting chilly since sundown, but the ground was dry. He began to undo his pack to take out the blanket. He spread it ont end dropped his weary head upon it. He eould have fallen asleep at that instant, only that be was startled by the clatter of horse’s hoofs that seemed to ride up his side. “Olal" said a voice, and other words that he could not understand. He sat up and spoke with appealing gestures In the clear starlight. “No speak Spanish; I American.” The rider dismounted. “American, are you?” He spoke with hardly any accent, a tall, fine-looking iolker, not quite middle-aged. “Just arrived? But why do you lie on the ground? It’s not good. You’ll have fever. You're not acclimated.” Cory was on his feet. “This is providential,” he oried. “If you knew sir, how terrible it is to be dumb—unable to ask for anything. I’ve just come up from the port—walked up from the end of the railroad line.” “A pretty long walk. I don’t wonder voufaelit And it’s a goad five miles on

to the dty. I’ve only this one little horse, you see. It won’t carry double or I'd take you along. Who are you, by the way!,' “My name is Dickinson,** said Cory. •‘I suppose I've come dow* here on a soil’s errand. Had e quarrel with my relatives and left in a hurry. Brought no money. Just a dollar left in the world.” Unconsoiously be adopted the short phrases of ths others, as If thus to be more easily comprehended. “Well, you are not the first,” said his new acquaintance. “Some succeed, some don’t. If you only knew a little Spaniah, you see. However, by the way, this Is an old hacienda of mine. There’s a house and you can sleep in it—under shelter, you know. There’s the plank of a bod, that used to be a servant’s. You’ll be safer inside. Come, I’ll take you In. To-morrow come into town and inquire for Julio Vargas Verea; spelt with a J in English and pronounoed like an H, remember. Cory had followed him in with a feeling of unreality. Julio struck a match and showed him ths boards on trestles that should be his bed. “By Jove! there’s s bit of caudle," ha said. “Put your blanket double on the boards and creep into it. Wrap it well around you. You’ll be safe from insects, alacranss and the like. I'm off new. Lock tbe door carefully in the morning and come to town as early as possible. You can take coffee with me if you’re in before eight. Good-night.” Cory locked the door after him and heard him ride away in the calm night; then went back and crept between his blanket folds and blew out the oandle. As he drifted into a first doze he suddenly remembered that this was Thursday—the last Thursday of the month—and therefore it was Thanksgiving Day at home. He wandered if Lydia had thought of him. He hardly believed that she had gone to take Thanksgiving dinner with his aunt, as she had formerly done. She loved him a little—perhaps a good deal —if only as a sister. She wee too loyal for that. Thue he fell asleep and slept steadily, despite his uncomfortable couch and the chill temperature.

Julio Vcrgas Verea was pretty well known in town. A lawyer by profession. with hardly any practice, because he had neglected it; formerly a Legation attache abroad—the husband of a pretty woman and father of several pretty children—a thoroughly honorable fellow with one deplorable passion for gambling at the exciting country cook-fights. Who did not know Julio Verges Verea? Cory found his way to his new friend's bouse without trouble and bad coffes with him as agreed. And Julia Vergae Verea bade him oonsider himself a welcome guest at his house until ha should find work. For Cory was penniless. He would aocept any situation, he said, anything, however humble. Shame and humiliation were his, to find himself helpless, a fellow of twenty-nine. He had supposed a stroug young fellow of that age oould find work in any part of the globe. He bad forgotten the difficulty of a different language. And so for weeks he had a blue time of it. He wanted to go back to the port, where aome English was spoken, but Vargas Verea objected. He wanted to seek employment on the primitive little railway, but Vargas Verea objected. Vargas Verea was the kindest fellow on earth, but over proud. And Cory chafed under his objections. Night after night he lay awake suppressing groans at his helplessness and his tormenting memories. Ob, to have come to this land of eternal sunshine under different circumstances 1 Oh, to have come to this land of eternal sunshine under different circumstances 1 Oh, not to have had to run away from home and friendal But could he have remained there after the accusation of theft? Aud who had been the thief? Who had taken his uucle’a thousand dollars from the open safe on that fatal afternoon when he bad sat reading in the next room and had hardly noticed his uncle passing out into the kitchen for a moment? He had sat in the sitting-room; the safe was in the sitting-room bedroom; one could only enter the bedroom from the sitting-room. His unole had gone into the kitchen—and had left the safe unlocked. Hannah, the servant girl, had let a kettle of soap grease boil over, and for a brief time the kitohen waa almost on fire. Cory, a little lazy, had heard the uproar, and had gone to see whst the trouble was. His uncle, in a fury at the servant’s carelessness, called him a stupid fool and ordered him angrily not to stand gaping there. And Cory, angry in turn, had quickly come back,aeized hie bat from the sitting-room table and left the house. He had not returned very soon. His uncle had seemed to hate him of late. And he had gone off with some young friend* of his to a neighboring town, not venturing back until the next afternoon. Then he had found his uncle in a state of excitement bordering on insanity. The thousand dollars that had been destined for the payment of a mortgage was gone from the safe. It had been taken while Cory’s uncle waa in the kitchen helping extinguish the fire. No one oould have entered the house in that brief space, and no one but Cory, his uncle and his invalid aunt was aware of the presence of the money in the safe. Nothing else had been disturbed. It had been but an instant’s work to extract the package for one who knew it was there and in precisely what spot. And—but for the shock and misery for the invalid auut Cory’s uncle would, he said, have sent an officer after the young rascal, all of which Cory had listened to in a dumbfounded way and then said: “You are either crazy or else you think me capable of stealing. I will never pass another night or eat another crumb under your roof —much less remain in your employ. If you wish to have me arrested go about it quickly and proclaim your inhuman feelings toward a relative to the world. You will be laughed at when the true theif is found. But go about it quickly, lor I am going as far away from you as I possibly can. You can keep my last month’s salary. I won’t touch it.” And, as his uncle was silent and dogged, Cory left the house and presently the town. But before leaving the town he had confided his story to Lydia Post

“It is true,” he said, “that I did go off with the fellows last night, but I took no money to speak of. You believe me, don’t you, Lydia?” “Can you ask?” she said, her voice faltering a little and tears rushing into her soft eyes. All this came back vividly to Cory Dickinson during the weary weeks in which he felt himself so thoroughly “down on his luck.” But at last a chance came. He eeized it with avidity. It was to go out on a new cacao plantation, remote from the capital, sixty mites by land through impassable woods and over dangerous mountain paths, or sixty miles by sea ip a sailboat down the coast and by canoe* up a river of dangerous rapids. '-Julio Yarns Vena shook his head. “I’m alraUjou will die eot these. It-

is away from all civilization. There ! only an Indian settlement and aome negroes. The climate is bad—it is very hot—and there are marsh** just below. It is a four day’s journey at the very best, and mails are a week in coming and going. I’m afraid you will have the fever at onoe.” “I am not afraid,” mid Cory. “I •hall have fever if I stay here, my dear friend. -You are good as gold to me, but I can’t stand idleness. For heaven's sake, let me go.” And so he went Out into the wild* impenetrable, beautiful, silent, tropical wild*. And he went faithfully to work and became happy with a aew hope. He did not take the fever. He got fairly started by the following midsummer. That is, what was midsummer at home, for it waa always midsummer in this new countir. But he had never cessed to reckon by the seasons of the far North. And by midsummer he wrote to Lydia Post. After he had written he counted the days. A week to take the letter to the port. A fortnight more—allowing for delay of the steamer to sail as he bad expected—for it to reach the United State*. In three weeks Lydia would have it. Ia three weeks more he would have her reply. He knew that his fingers would tremble so that he could hardly open it Alas! the six weeks had passed, and yet another and another. And no reply. And as another mouth drifted along and November waa begun, Cory began to give wp hope. Had ehe not received his letter? Had she not cared to reply? Was he lost to her—even to little Lvdla —of whose faith he had dreamed ia darkest hour*? Sadly he realized one evening that it was the 10th of November, just a year since he had left home. A day or two later he fell ill. It was not from tha climate, not from the heat. The plantation was not as deadly as Vargas Varea had believed. But it was the snapping of hie last hope—his hope of Lydia. It was more of a low nervous fever. And he could not rise from his bed any more. And he did not care if death came. There was no dootor near; there were a few simple remedies on the shelve* of his cans hut, but he hardly cared to take them.

One night his fever was higher—much higher—and he raved of Lydia to the Indian woman who sat beside him and the negro servant who liked him well. The next day he was conscious again but very week. He felt as if he oould easily slip away. And he aaked the negro to send to the post a certain letter that was going to the Uuited States, thousands of miles away. Hardly had hs clone giving his few, feeble instructions when tome of ths Indian boys came hurrying in to tell him that a canoe had oome up the river with people, white, tali, and a lady, with many bundle* and other things. A beautiful young lady. Cory wondered vaguely until a shadow fell upon the threshold —and a moment later, as if an angel dawning from heaven, Lydia stood beside him and bent to take him into her arms. “I knew,” she sobbed softly, and in her tears his face felt as cool and refreshed and joy-lighted as a rose in the Summer rain. “I knew that you would be ill. And I would not write—for I was almost ready to fetch you. For I knew you would not come back alone. And I had been working and saving the money for months—and only a few weeks were lacking. So I would not write—but came. And your uncle asks you to forgive and forget. For it was Mason who stole the money—with Hannah’s help. And so you will go back with me.” “Lydia.” he whispered, “how could you come to this plaoe—thousands of miles—through all these dangers—by land and sea and sea and land ? Am I dreaming, Lydia ? Have you come all this wny alone 1 Through all these strange ways ?” “Do you think,” she sobbed, “do you think there is any road too long, too hard for a woman to travel if the one she loves is at the end ?” “No road,” said Cory, softly. “But you knew I loved you—eveu before my letter—and then you knew it again. And you took wings and flew to me. And so we shall go back together, dear, est 1” Another shadow crossed the threshold. Julio Vargas Verea, also on his way to find Cory, having heard of his illness, had met with Lydia at the port and had come with her in a sailboat and canoe. He had discreetly remained outside tha hut until after the meeting of the lovers. Not many days later there was a wedding at the capital. Cory and Lydia were married by the American Minister, and Julio Vargas Verea stood sponsor to the bride. It wasThursday—ana Thanksgiving Day.