Jasper County Democrat, Volume 10, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 August 1907 — With Tessa As Proxy. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

With Tessa As Proxy.

By JEROME SPRAGUE

Copyrighted, 1907, by Homer Sprague,

“Tessa,” said Miss Mason, with decision, “you are not making that lied properly.” ... T essa, tucking In the sheet of the doll’s bed, raised limpid. Inquiring eyes. “I told you I wanted hospital corners.” Tessa wavered, curled a small red lip and overflowed. "Don’t cry—oh, Tessa, don’t cry!” Miss Mason expostulated as the small pink, aproned atom flung herself at full length on the floor. ¥ Tessa did not move. “Well, I shall have to let Mary Brannlgan do it,” said Miss Mason. Mary Brannlgan and Tessa Votoldl being sworn rivals In tbe affections of the settlement teacher, tbe small Ital lan raised a calculating eye. Mary, every red curl bobbing, every freckle radiant, already had hold of one comer of the Infinitesimal sheet. Then Mary pulled and Tessa pulled. "Perhaps you’d better let Tessa finish It, Mary,” said the teacher weakly, Mary blazed wrathfully. “Aw, she don't know bow!” “Oh, well,” Miss Mason sighed, “see If you can make it, Mary. Tessa can watch you and tell you If you don’t do It properly.” Tessa, sobbing a soft accompaniment to Mary’s bedmaking, squealed suddenly: “She’s gotta the hem out-a side.” “Oh, Mary,” said Miss Mason reproachfully, “I thought you could do It" “An’ I can," said Mary, “but *1 won’t,” and straightway, like a small fury, she tore the bed to pieces and flung the mattress on the floor. The twenty small girls of the little housekeepers’ class looked at the teach er with expectant eyes. “Oh, Mary!” quavered Miss Mason. She felt unequal to discipline. It was

very hot, and the room was close, and the children had been restless and fussy all the morning. —» “Oh, Mary,” she quavered again as a young man In a panama hat and round clerical collar poked his head In at the window. “Can't you and the little girls come over and have lunch with my boys In the parish office?” he asked. A sigh of blissful anticipation issued from twenty throats. “They have been so naughty!” Miss Mason hesitated. “I don't know whether I should let them.” Twenty pairs of eyes reproached her, and the young rector said, “No one ought to be naughty on such a day.” “Well, if you will promise to be very good,” Miss Mason finally decided. And, like lion and lamb. Tessa and Maty led a decorous procession. The young rector’s class in woodcaning were having sandwiches and cake and lemonade, provided by the ladies of the parish. There was a big pitcher of lemonade, and the ice tinkled deliciously as the biggest boy filled twenty glasses for the twenty little girls. The young rector, beaming with enthusiasm, sat down beside the little settlement teacher. “It’s lovely work. Miss Mason,” he said. Marlon shook her head. “Oh, no, It Isn’t,” she said; ‘it’s horrid. They are so ungrateful. I wish I was out on a hotel porch In my best linen frock, with my hair marcelled and with the waves beating a soothing accompaniment to the conversation of some intelligent masculine.” With a twinkle in bis eye, the young rector asked, “Can’t I Masquerade as an Intelligent masculine?” “Oh,” Miss Mason conceded, “yon might. But I’m not dressed for the part. Shirt waists and serge skirts and jtan shoes, and dusty ones at that”— khe poked out a small- foot In a shabby Bhoe—“are not the attire of attractiveness. We planted Vegetables in the school garden all the morning—beans and things—ufatil we were grubby." “I don’t believe you would be really happy on that hotel porch,” the young rector as he sat on the edge of his desk and looked down at her. “I should! I want to be care free and frivolous—and to forget the problems of the suffering and the sole

merged people. I want to go where every one ia clean and the air ia pore and where I can breathe.” As she caught her breath abarply be bent over her with a sudden tender light In hla eyes. * ’ '*

"Poor little woman!” he murmured. , “Don’t pity me,” Miss Mason said, with flaming cheeks, “but i do like pretty things. Why, lam a different creature in my pink dimity. You’ve never seen me In It, have you?” He smiled down at her Indulgently. “No,” he said slowly, “but I saw you once In an old white linen that had been torn and trampled, and you held in your arms ,a little child that you had saved—and you were beautiful”— “Oh, that was Tessa,” Miss Mason •aid quickly, “the morning the fire engine horses ran aw r ay. It was a wonder wp weren’t both killed.” “I saw you for the first time, and I knew then that I had found what I had been looking for all my life." Her startled eyes read the meaning in his. “Oh, no, no,” she protested, “I am not good enough. I am vain and frivolous—and I long for the fleshpots,” He went on steadily. “I have seen you since then every day teaching your little girls to be tidy and sweet and good, and i have wondered at your bravery—when you might be in luxury, cool and comfortable.” “So might you,” she reminded him. “How many men of your talent and Influence would have chosen a downtown church?” “Oh, that,” he put It away lightly, “I like it, and I am a man—but not many women would do It.” “Don’t,” she said tremulously; “don’t praise me.” And she rose and went to meet Tessa, who was coming toward her, sobbing. “Oh, Tessa! Crying again?” It was discovered after some questioning that Tessa’s conscience was hurting her. She was sorry, she whispered, that she had been bad. “Poor baby!” Miss Mason crooned as she gathered the small culprit In her arms. “Dear heart!” And the wet cheek lay against her own. As thfcy sat In the alcove the stained glass window of the parish office made a background of sapphire light, against which Miss Mason’s fair hair shone like a halo. Tessa, smiling and forgiven, lay with her limpid eyes shut The rector, still seated on the comer of his desk, looked at the pair with thoughtful eyes. “Do you really think you would be happy on the hotel porch?” he probed. “It would be cool,” Miss Mason said wistfully, “but I should miss the love,” and her eyes went toward the children playing peacefully at the end of the room. “Whose love?’ he asked boldly. Tessa’s eyes opened sleepily. “I love-a yon!” she murmured fervently. Tbe eyes of the rector held the eyes of the little teacher masterfully. “You say it like that!” he commanded. “Oh, I—l can’t,” she breathed, all pink and white and tremulous, “but Tessa shall be—my proxy!”

“I LOVE-A YOU," SHE MURMURED FERVENTLY.