Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 January 1919 — THE DOLT [ARTICLE]

THE DOLT

By ARLINE A. MACDONALD.

(Copyright. 1W», by Mecluie ’ Syndicate.) . 1 If Richard Doe had not been a peor dolt he would never have been a good soldier. At least, so Richard himself exr, pressed it In a letter that Abe Walton,' the town clerk, received back home from “somewhere in-France.’*" ” The young soldier had been the recipient of a number of congratulatory missives consequent upon a published account of his acts of heroism and daring on the western front. And the youth had read them modestly and Lad penned a solitary reply to Abe Walton at Kensington, knowing that Abe would take it in turn to the respective villagers. And Abe did. Now young Doe had never borne an enviable name in <he village. Tall and handsome, he regularly joined the “hangers on” about the general store, working at nothing, and giving but , little promise of ever doing anything else. He made a fit subject for the gossips, of which there were many. Nevertheless, Richard Doe was alwaya conscious that he possessed certain latent qualities which ought to be made patent. They needed only a time “Of tiTaTtobring but~fheir grTf and pli- ~ ability. And the time came, and Ruth Walton was responsible for It. Ruth Was the only daughter of Abe Walton, *and a teacher in the village "school. She was a tall, slender girl, scarcely out of her teens, whose face was one of those quite as striking for its character as its beauty. She admired Doe, liked him for his sympathetic understanding of his fellow "human beings, his sense of the dramatic, his untrammeiedWlow" of words, which were the best perquisites of his friendship for a girl in her profession. Once he had reproved her for overdancing and had brusquely turned from Tom Whitney’s proffered cigarette case. It was at the supper table that Ruth had said: “Dick lacks the ‘pep’ that characterizes the-modern young man. He does not smoke, he does not dance. He’s too handsome to work. He’s a dolt.” One day, in desperation, Doe decided that he would force the attention of the-village upon his taleirt. He whiskered something into the ear ot Abe Walton, who had already given the youth a big corner in his own heart. The next morning he dropped quitly out of the village and the tongues of the gossips wagged furiously. Mrs. H , who never meddled with anyone’s affairs, reminded the neighbors that a year before she "had said that Richard Doe would disappear some day and would turn up later in a penitentiary. “As for Abe Walton,’’ she declared, “he has yielded his energy to the hypnotic Influence of tiiat loafer scalawag.” It was true that Doe’s departure gave Abe more energy. He quickly got a contract from a New York journalist for the erection of a pretentious stucco mansion on the knoll adjoining his own homestead. Time passed quickly at Kensington. June came and the robins piped their sweetest lay, and the odor of the rose and the honeysuckle stole through screened chamber windows. At the close of a balmy afternoon Ruth Walton sat alone in her own boudoir reading a war storywhich, appeared in .the newspaper. Suddenly she remembered that there was a dance that' evening in the pavlMon.She arose, rubbed her face, which seemed drawn and bloodless, and hastened below to prepare the evening meal. - v The dance had never seemed so pretty and overcrowded. Nell Whitney, in a flurry of excitement, made some complimentary remarks about Ruth’s dress. “Richard Doe is here,” she. said. “And oh. isn’t it dreadful, Ruth,” she gasped, “his left arm' has been shot off.'” This was too much for Ruth. In the ' stupor which almost held her brain in thrall she heard a faint “Where’*. Ruth?” as she tottered to the road that led to Kensington knoll. Her hands wavered; her knees shook at footsteps she knew only too well. 1 “Go! Go back, Richard 1” she screamed. “Forgive me. I can’t hear to look at you. Ypur armshe gasped. “It Isn’t as bad as you think, Ruth,” catching her arm and trying to comfort her. “See"’ ' ’ Deliberately he unbuttoned his frock, disclosing a whole arm suspended in a •ling. “Force pf habit,” he laughed as he buttoned his chat this time with Jhe arm outside. His joviality lapsed** her* to a steady calm. A thrill of pleasure surmounted her being as once again he took her hand. A fresh June zephyr swept the fragrant. pine across the knoll, where, sitting against the open sky, a stately mansion bathed in a flood of .silvery moonlight, A "It’s yours, Ruth. I did it for you,” he whispered. A solitary tear of Joy stood on the, cheek of the girl, who Md Jier face on the breast of the man who some months before she. had consigned to the scrap heap of character failures. Gently he lifted her Mad. pushed back her loose tresses from her faca and reverently kissed her. * Somewhere among the deeper shadows of a lilac bush a pair of eyesf overstrained and anxious, Mt up with eirtldIsh delight, and a middy face broadened into one protracted- smile. “Looks like there’ll be a wonderful big time in Kensington some said| Abe Walton. -■ - ■■■