Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 85, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 January 1919 — Nort of Fifty-Three [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Nort of Fifty-Three

Ccmri&t LITTI&.BSXWN

SYNOPSIS. r . . CHAPTER I—The story opens In the town of Granville. Ontario, where Mies Hasel "Weir is employed as a stenographer tn the office of Harrington and Bush. She is engaged to Jack Barrow. a young real estate agent, and the wedding day is set. While walking with him one Sunday they meet Mr. Bush, Hazel's employer, who for the first time seems to notice her attractiveness. Shortly afterward, at his request, she becomes his private stenographer. After three, months Mr. Bush proposes marriage, which Hazel declines, and after a stormy scene in the office Hazel leaves her employment, Mr. Bush wamlpg her he would make her sorry for refusing him. j CHAPTER ll—Bush makes an effort, by a gift of flowers, to compromise Hazel tn 'the minds of her friends. She returns them. The next day Bush is thrown from his horse and fatally hurt.- He sends for Hazel, who refuses to see .him before he dies. Three days afterward it is announced that he left a legacy of $5,000 to Hazel, “in reparation for any wrong I may have done her.” Hazel recognizes at once what construction will be put upon the words. Bush had his revenge. CHAPTER lll—Jack Barrow, in a fit of lealous rage, demands from Hazel an explanation of Bush's action. Hazel’s pride la hurt,* and she refuses. The engagement is broken and Hazel determines to leave Granville. She sees an advertisement for a school teacher at Cariboo Meadows. British Columbia, and secures the situation. , Through the .night Hazel dozed fitfully, waking out of uneasy sleep te He staring, wide-eyed; Into the dark, <very nerve in her body taut, her mind active. Grief and anger

toy turns mastered her, and at day--break she rose, heavy-lidded arid physically weary. | The first thing upon which her gaze •lighted was the crumpled photo in its •battered frame; and, sitting on the jslde of her bed, she -laughed at the sudden fury in which she had destroyed it; but there was no mirth In her laughter. She gathered up the bits of broken glass and the bent frame, and put them in a drawer, dressed herself, and went down to breakfast. She was too (deeply engrossed In her owjj troubles [to notice or care whether any subtle change was becoming manifest in»the attitude of her fellow boarders. The 'worst, she felt sure, had already overjtaken her. She had a little time to spare, and that time she devoted to making up « package of Barrow’s ring and a few [other trinkets which he had given her. ‘This she addressed to his office and jposted while on her way to work. She got through the day somehow, struggling against thoughts that would persist in creeping Into her mind and •tirrlng up emotions tliat she was determined to hold In check. Work, she Knew, was her only salvation. Ahd so she got through the Week. Saturday evening came, and she went home, dreading Sunday’s Idleness, with its memories. The people at Mrs. Stout’s establishment, she plainly saw, were growing a trifle shy of her. She had never been on terms of Intimacy with any of them during her stay there, hence their attitude troubled little after the first supersensitiveness iwore off. But her own friends, girls with whom she had played in the plna-fore-and-plgtail stages of her youth, young men who had paid court to her until Jack Barrow monopolized her — •he did not know how they stood. She had seen none of them since Bush launched his last bolt. Barrow she had passed on the street just once, gud when he lifted his hat distantly, she looked straight ahead, and ignored him. Whether she hurt him as much as she did herself by the cut direct would be hard to" say. When Sunday noon arrived, and the phone had failed to call her once, and not one of all her friends had dropped In, Hazel twisted her chair so that she could stare -at the image of herself In the mirror. “You’re in a fair way to become a panlah, it seems,” she said bitterly. **What have you done, I wonder, that you’ve lost your lover, and that Alice •nd May and Hortense and all the rest of them keep away from you? Noth-ing—-not a thing—except that your looks attracted a man, and the man threw stones jvhen he couldn’t have his way. Oh,' well, what’s the difference? You’ve got two good hands, and you’re not afraid of work.” "* She walked out to Granville park " after luncheon, and found a seat on a shaded bench beside the lake. People passed and repassed—couples, youngsters. old people, children. It made

aer lonely beyond measure. She had never been Isolated among her own kind before. ▲ group of young people came sauntering along the path. Hazel looked up as they neared her, chattering to each other. Maud Steele and Bud Wells, and —why, she knew every one of the party. Hazel caught her breath as they eame abreast, not over ten feet away. The three young men raided their hats self-consciously. “Hello, Hazel!” the girl said. But they passed on. It seemed to Hazel that tliey quickened their pace a trifle. It made her grit her teeth in resentful anger. Ten minutes later, she left the park and caught a car home. Once In her room she broke down. "Oh, Til go mad If I stay here and this sort of thing goes on!” she cried forlornly. | A sudden thought struck her. 1 “Why should I stay here?” she said aloud. “Why"? What’s to keep me here? I can make my living anywhere.” “But, no,” she asserted passionately, "I won’t run away. That would be running away, and I haven’t anything to be ashamed of. I will not run.” Still the Idea kept recurring to her. It promised relief from the hurt of averted faces and coolness where she had a right to expect sympathy and friendship. i The legal, notice of the bequest was mailed to her. She tore up the letter and threw s lt In the fire as If it were some poisonous thing. The Idea of accepting his money stirred her to perfect frenzy. If she could have poured the whole miserable tale into some sympathetic ear she would have felt better, and each day would have seemed less hard. But there was no such ear. Her friends kept away. Saturday of the second week her pay envelope contained a brief notice that thd flrm no longer required her services. There was no explanation, only perfunctory regrets; and, truth to tell, Hazel cared little to know the real cause. Any one of a number of reasons might have been sufficient. But she realized how those who knew her would take it, what cause they would ascribe. It did not matter, though. The very worst, she reasoned, could not be so bad as what had already happened—could be no more disagreeable than the things she had endured in the past two weeks. Losing i a position was a trifle. But it «et I her thinking again. She stopped at a news stand and bought the evening papers. Up in the top rack of the stand the big heads of an assorted lot of Western papers , caught her eye. She bought two or three on the impulse of the moment, | without any definite purpose except i to look them over out of mere curiosity. With these tucked under her arm, she turned into the boardingi house gate, ran up the steps, and, upon opening the door, her ears were glad- ■ dened by the first friendly voice she had heard —it seemed to her—4n ages, a voice withal that she had least expected to hear. A short, plump woman rushed out of the parlor, and precipitated herself bodily upon Hazel. “Kitty Ryan! Where In the wide, wide world did you come from?” Hazel cried. “From the United States and everywhere,” Miss Ryan replied. “Take me 'tip to your , room, dear, where we can talk our heads off. “And, furthermore, Hazle, Hl be pleased to have you address me qs Mrs. Brooks, my dear young woman,” the plump lady laughed, as she settled herself in a chair in Hazel’s room. “So you’re married?” Hazel said. “I am that,” Mrs. Kitty responded emphatically, “to the best boy that ever drew breath. And so should you be, dear girl. I don’t see how you’ve escaped so long—a good-looking girl like you. The boys were always crazy after you. There’s nothing like having a good man to take care of you, dear.” “Heaven save me from them!” Hazel answered bitterly. “If you've got one you’re lucky. I can’t sefe them as anything but self-centered, arrogant, treacherous brutes.!’ “Lord bless us —it’s worse than I thought!” Kitty jumped up and threw her arms aroufid Hazel. “There, there—don’t waste a tear on them. I know all about it. I came over to see you just as soon as some of the girls—nasty little cats they are; a woman’s always meaner than a man, dear—just as soon as they gave me an inkling of how things were going with you. Pshaw! The world’s full of good, decent fellows —and you’ve got one coming.” “If you’d had my experience of the last two weeks you’d sing a different tune,” Hazel vehemently declared. “I *hate—l—” ' And then phe gave way, and indulged In the luxury of turning herself loose on Kitty’s shoulder. Presently she was able to wipe her eyes and relate the whole story from the Sunday Mr. Bush stopped and spoke to her in the park down to that evening. Kitty nodded understandlngly. “But the girls have handed it to you worse than the men, Hazel,” she observed sagely. “Jack Barrow was just plain crazy jealous, and a man like that can’t help acting as he did. YouYe

really fortunate, I think, because you’d not be really happy with a man like that. But the girls that you and I grew up with—they should have stood by you, knowing you as they did; yet you see they were ready to think the worst of you. They nearly always do when there’s a man In the case. That’s a weakness of our sex, dear. Well, you aren’t working. Gome and stay with me. Hubby’s got a two-year contract with the World Advertising company. We’ll be located here that long at least. Come and stay with us.” “Oh, no, I couldn’t think of that, Kitty!” Hasel faltered. "You know Pd love to, and it’s awfully good of you, but I think I’m' just about ready to go away from Granville.” “Well, come and stop with us till you do go,” Kitty Insisted. * “We are going to take a furnished cottage for a while. Though, between you and me, dear, knowing people as I do, I can’t blame you for wanting to be where their nasty tongues can’t wound you.” But Hazel was obdurate. She would not Inflict herself on the one friend she had left. And Kitty, after a short talk, berated her affectionately for her Independence and rose to go. "For,” said she, “I didn’t get hold of this thing till Addle Horton called at the hotel this afternoon, and I didn’t stop to think that It was near teatime, but came straight here. Jlmmle’ll think Eve eloped. So ta-ta. I’ll come out tomorrow about two. I have to confab with a house agent in the forenoon. By-by.” Hazel sat down and actually smiled when Kitty was gone. Somehow a grievous burden had fallen off her mind. Likewise, by some psychological quirk, the Idea of leaving Granville and making her home elsewhere no longer struck her as running away under fire. She felt that she could adventure forth among strangers in a strange country with a better heart, knowing that Kitty Brooks would put a swift quietus on any gossip that came her way. So that Hazel went down to the dinero BE CONTINUED.)

[?]iung Herself Across the Bed and Sobbed Hysterically Into a Pillow.