Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 278, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 November 1918 — A Government Pen [ARTICLE]

A Government Pen

By AGNES L. PRATT

(Copyright, »U, by the McClure Newepeg/z per Syndicate.) • * ; From my position on a desk £y the Window I can look out over the greensward, just at present with beds of flaunting tulips and its great fountain, whose jeweled drops scintilate in the sunny air. The grass is like a square of emerald velvet, bordered along its sides with gray, chiseled granite; and the lacquered Iron seats scattered here and there, look inviting. X myself, am old and battered, having been busy for months recording the emotions of the human souls that stream in at the revolving doors yonder, and out again, at the one near me. I can see for myself that the building wherein I have an abiding place is magnificent. I behold the massive front of red brick, with costly trimmings of brown stone. Two immense electric lanterns throw floods of light, nightly, through the lace-like iron filagree that protects them, on the masses of" humanity that beat with rythmic tread the wide sidewalk beneath the window. In my short life, for the existence of a pen in the service of this great government must of necessity be abbreviated by the democratic handling it re- ‘ ceives, I have recorded more than one pitiful -life story. It is not long ago the noble elms surrounding the green were bare and gaunt against a grayer sky, that a young men with hopeful eyes leaned over the desk where I was lying, idle for a wonder, and reaching out, grasp- • ed me tightly. As I flew, with impatient strokes over the white sheet, I found that I was writing thus: “Dear Mabelle—l may write —may I not T—what I cannot say, for when I am wlth-you my lips are ever silent. I . followed you to the city, dear, I sought and found work —because —because—-I wanted to be near you. And now I find that I want to be near you always, so much so that I am willing to brave your disapproval, which I have often seen growing in your clear, brown eyes —and ask you to marry me, dearnow, tomorrow —next week —any time, only that you will have it some time. “I am in an awful hurry, or I would say more. But I have an appointment at the quarry and all this means money —and perhaps you—to me. I have stopped here, in the post office, to pen these few lines, with a horribly poor pen, by the way. "Please answer at once, and say yes —to—Jack." 4 I could forgive him the 111-mannered reflection on my character, when I felt the pace his heart was going communicate itself to me through his fingers. I hoped she would say yes as I rolled complacently over on my side, when he laid me down, and amused myself watching the gardener raking here and there among the stubbly brown grass that clothed the green. Dipped thousands of times in ink, as I was daily, the foregoing episode had nearly faded from my mind, when presently it was abruptly recalled. A young girl in a jaunty gray jacket, with an aureol- of violets shading her sunny brown hair, came hastily to the desk, picked me up, looked at me with disapproving eyes, laid me down, tried another pen, and then returned’ to her old lover, meaning myself. A straggling sunbeam kissed her shining eyes till they glinted an old-fashioned goldstone and lovingly caressed, with ruddy fingers, the chestnutty ringlets of hair beneath the violet aureole. And, as I reposed snugly in the embrace of her gloveless she moved me rapidly over the inscribed, in graceful characters, an application for a money order. It was a prosaic culmination of my ardent and romantic desires, but I had only to wait a few moments when something followed. Without hesitation, though each stroke of my rustedtip was cutting through two quivering hearts, she indited the following: “Dear Jack—l know what you will say when you read this —you will say I am hard-hearted, that I do not care—that I ought to leave all and cling to, you, If I love you—but. I cannot do\ what you wish me to. And Jack, dear, I do love you, too. But they, my parents, need me—need my help, .x' have left them up there, In the cotintry; home, while I go battling with\the criiel world, so that I may be of use to them, who did for me as long a? they were able. You know the whole pitiful story. Jack. “A breath just now from the newly springing grass on the green brought it back to me, and I have half-closed my eyes so the tears should not fall on my letter. Father blind, mother his only attendant, and . feeble herself, with only my arm —Jack, my woman's arm—between them and want. You would say, if you were here and I was talking now instead of writing this, that your arih was stronger than mine nnd you could do for them and me. But think, there would be four of us Mien, and could you do for sou you a young man, with such prospects us you now have? Could you .weight yourself with your own burdens and mine, too? No, It can never be. "Better for both of us that we should put such thoughts far away from our hearts. This is a cruel old world, Jack,Hn<i diamonds, not hearts, are trumps. I mifist not many while they Ihq, unlewe -Jack* it is cruel, but I

must sell myself for gold if I marry at an.” ' I was glad when she finished, abruptly and laid me down where I could watch the streets pouring their seething masses of human beings, God knows where—l do not Back and forth ebbs this ceaseless tide, but from what diversified sources it has come, and to what it is going, I know not In a few days he came in again, and I wrote for him a few words, a pitifully brief message: “I am going to the Philippines. You have made it impossible that I should live here, and I carp not whether I live elsewhere or not A worthless life is best offered up on the altar of my country’s service, and mine will be only another name to add to the list of poor devils already killed by pestilence or the bullet of h Tagalo.” There was nothing else, only his name. It was quite time that I should be replaced with a new pen. I had outlived my usefulness —but I continued to be overlooked and many a day find night have I lain there quietly on the desk by the window and thought of that brave fellow, off there, fighting where no glory could ever be his, crawling through tropical undergrowth and searching out the treacherous foe —to be finally wasted and killed by insidious disease —denied even the honor, doubtful, perhaps, of dying by the hand of the enemy. It was only the other day. I know the brilliant bloom had just burst from the beds in front of my window, and great crystal drops from the fountain were blown by the madcap breezes of the spring when my soldier came in and stood near me. He had returned, and there was a happy light in his eye, a flush beneath the rich bronze tinting of his cheek. Evidently his enlistment and service had done him no harm. He gave one quick glance across the rainbow brightness that crossed and recrossed the velvet greenness of the turf outside, grasping me, his old friend, he wrote hastily: “Dear Mabelle —I have come home for good. My time is up, and I have great news for you, for while out there, fighting natives and sickness, and dreaming of you—my fortune here was being made. Something I had done in the old life —journalism—it seems attracted the attention of the great ones in power, where formerly I was almost an unknown quantity. So that I returned to find the struggle ended and a sure place waiting for me, at a salary that seems marvelous, almost. At least it will suffice for all of us, and your dear ones shall never know want while I live. I have written this to your old address and am not quite sure where I shall find you. A line will bring me to your side; and dear —let it be soon, please.” My heart sang with his for joy and I was glad that it was spring, glad the grass was soft and green, the flowers bright and the birds singing. For somewhere, up In the branches of the great elms, some birds were riotously chanting a greeting to all things new and beautiful. The next day—yes, it was only the next day—she came again, but how changed! More beautiful, if anything, but something subtle had departed from her personality and had been replaced by another something that I could not define, but only feel. And she, too, lifted me and presently she wrote: _

“Dear Jack —Dearer now, because impossible by my own wickedness. Your letter came to me last night, after following me about all day. I am glad you have come back and that you were not killed out there, as I was afraid you would be. I have watched the papers and my heart has, aphea; but Jack, dearest Jack,! have gone and spoiled all the beautiful happiness that life had in store for me —on the eve of its appearance. Last month I married —married for the gold I have needed so much —and for them —a man I did not love, a man who is old enough my father —and who—is not like you, Jack. And in less than two weeks, only two weeks ago—and it seems a Bf etime to me—they were both gone—gone, Jack, to where they could never ..want what I had sold my soul and Jour love for. Mother went suddenly. Father just failed and then—he was gone. They held out their hands to me,’ he said to me, one day—and he went to them. I have forged my chains, beautiful fetters they are, of solid gold and' jewelled—but they burn into my flesh like Are, and they bind till, from /ery agony, I must groan. Pity me. Jack. If you are unhappy what must I be? Oh, wait for me—wait for me— Jack, perhaps—he is older than l—and perhaps some time —Forgive me. Jack, and forget me. —Mabelle." I turned and looked out across- the velvet green. Through its cool treeshaded walls the throngs still surged, yeach heart knowing its own burden, oaifrying it silently and cursing or pWying as was its nature. Xhe fountain sparkled in the sunlight- the flowers held their cups to catch its spray, great trees bent their heads as the fleecy clouds rolled above them; and only the song of the birds was wholly happy. #