People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 December 1892 — TWO NEW YEAR'S EVES [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

TWO NEW YEAR'S EVES

ECEMBER thir-ty-first, 18—, will be remembered in some portions of the west, a* one of the coldest, stormiest days of an exceptionally cold winter. I have good reasons to remember it, for on that day I came very near losing my life* as the result of my own foolhardiness. The day before I arrived at the little frontier town of S , where I had business, proposing to drive thence next day to H , forty miles distant, where I intended to spend New Year’s day with fiends whom I had not seen tor several years. I had confidently expected to reach H without difficulty and surprise my friends—who had always made it a custom to usher in the New Year with much jolly ceremony—by appearing in their midst late on New Year’s eve. I was, therefore, 'much vexed, when I arose in the morning, to find that a heavy snow had fallen during the night, and that the weather had turned much colder, with • heavy wind blowing from the north. Nevertheless, 1 was fully resolved to go, providing I could find anyone who was willing to undertake the drive. But there was no regular stage line, and no one 'seemed willing to trust himself and his team to the possible chances of a hard “nor’wester,” and, after trying several places without success, < returned to the hotel in a very disagreeable mood. As I was expressing my disgust to the landlord, withwhom I was well acquainted, a man whom I had noticed on the train the evening before, and who was now sitting by the stove reading, looked up and remarked: “I fancy we are in the same fix; I am very anxious to get to H myself, tut there t vseems to be no chance of getting away from here.” “Perhaps,” I suggested, intending to be humorous, “perhaps we might buy «team and go anyway.” This brought the stranger to his feet. “I don’t know whether you would be willing or not, or whether we could get a team; but why not try to get one *to go with, on the understanding that we pay for any damage done to the morses or conveyance—or pay a fair t>rice for the animals in case they not pull through alive?” • “The very thing!” I agreed. “We lean try, anyway.” The landlord and others tried to dissuade us t from our purpose, but we Were firm, and the result was that in a ishort time we secured a team of horses '«nd a cutter, leaving with the landlord • deposit sufficient to cover their value •

in case we did not return them in good condition; and. in a half hour or so, we were on our way to H , well bundled in robes and furs, and feeling quite cheerful over the prospect of reaching’ H after all The first twelve or thirteen miles of •str route was over a good road, and, m we glided along at a merry* 9 pace, I had opportunity to take note of my companion’s appearance. He was a tall, large man, well-built and quite handsome, though not extraordinarily so. What impressed me most was his manner. He had a firm, decided, rather slow way of speaking, and his eyes met mine honestly and fearlessly whenever I looked at him. His words carried conviction with them and his straightforward manner gave me the impression that my companion, who had registered as “H. A. Brown, New York,” was a man of truth* and honor who every word he said and on fvhom one could depend in an emergency. Beyond this and the fact that he was a stranger in that part of the country, 1 learned nothing. I found him well-informed, a gentleman, and an agreeable traveling companion, and that was sufficient

AIT went well until early in the afternoon, when we came to several miles of bad road, over which we were compelled to drive with the utmost care, despite our impatience. To add to the discomfort of the situation, it was becoming colder, and the wind, into the teeth of which we were driving, was blowing t at a fearful rate. Both of us began to feel the cold keenly, and the prospect of darkness coming on soon, and finding us on a strange road, and, so far as we knew, twenty miles from anywhere, did not tend to enliven our spirits. Mile after mile we urged the tired horses along, until it seemed as if they must drop from fatigue; colder and more fiercely blew the wind down the> narrow, high-walled canyon, until I became so chilled that Mr. Brown had to take the reins. Soon dusk began to gather. By this time I found < had frosted my face and hands severely, and was becoming .numb all over. It required- much urging from my companion to keep me from falling into that sleep which intense cold superinduces, and which is nearly always fatal. Finally Mr. Brown drew rein. “These horses can’t go another mile. We shall have to do something,” he said. “We cannot keep on going.” He had hardly spoken when he added: “Oh! thank God! there’s a light!” I /must have been pretty badly frozen, for, though Mr. Brown said afterwards he talked to me as we passed on to the house where he saw the light, I knew no more until several hours later I found myself on a bunk in a rude, one-room cabin, with Mr. Brown and another man, apparently the cabin’s owner, standing over me. “Good!” said the stranger. “I thought he wasn’t too far gone to pull through all right.” For which 1 was duly thankful, and so expressed myself. Later in the evening, as Mr. Brown and oar host sat by the fire, smoking silently, I lay idly watching them, and was suddenly struck with a certain similarity in their appearance. They were about the same size and build, had the same color of hair and eyes, and, though our host wore a thick beard, which Mr. Brown did not. I fancied I detected a certain facial resemblance. Both men, too, had a decided, positive way of speaking, and wasted no words.

Suddenly Mr. Brown drew out his watch and looked at it. “A quarter of twelve,” he remarxed, gravefy— almost sadly, I thought. I noticed our host cast a quick, keen glance at the other’s face. Then Mr. Brown continued, looking dreamily into the roaring flames in the big open fireplace: "I don’t know why I should become confidential or communicative; it is not my way. But to-night, the eve of the New Year, is the saddest night of the year, for me; and there has never an old year died, in the last eleven, that has not found me longing for human companionship and sympathy. If I had neither I should go mad, I think.” He paused for a few moments, and seemed lost in painful thought. Then .he continued: “Twelve years ago to-night, I became a criminal and an undeclared perjurer. No, you need not look incredulous; it is true. Shall Igo on?”

“Yea,” said the other man, and I thought he seemed oddly eager for the rest ot the story, and deeply interested in it “Twelve years ago, there was. in a certain city in Ohio, one of the happiest families that ever lived. To-day they are scattered far and near, and 1 am the cause of it “My father and mother were both living then, and on Christmas and New Year’s there was always a merry gathering of children and grandchildren at the old home. There were five children of us—three girls, all married, my younger brother, Sidney, and myself. “That year we were all gathered as usual under the home roof for the last time, as it happened. “I need not make a long story of it .On New Year’s eve it was discovered that a certain sum of money that had been in the safe at my father’s office was missing—money that had been left there toy safe-keeping by a friend, who called for it late in the afternoon; father leaving the house and going down to the office with him to get it “That the money had been taken there was no doubt and when my father learned that Sidney had locked

the safe and left the office last that forenoon, he was terribly shocked. Sidney, like many impulsive, kind-heart-ed, affectionate lads, was a bit wild, and, somehow, it seemed natural that suspicion should pass by me, the sober, steady one, and attach to him, the headstrong and thoughtless. My fathmu did not know that I, on whose and integrity of all parsons he most depended, was the real thief—that I had gambled and speculated until exposure and ruin stared me in the face; and in a moment of weakness I had stooped to common theft to hide my tracks. “Sidney did not come home to dinner that evening, and we saw nothing of him until nearly twelve o’clock, when he came in somewhat flushed with champagne. My father drew him into the library, and in the tactless way riien of much honor and family pride often have asked him about the missing money. Of course Sidney knew nothing of it, and said so. If he had suspicions, he was not the«one to tell them; and the result was that therd ’ was a scene, in the midst of which Sidney kissed his mother and sisters and left the house. He has never entered it since, and stayed in the city only long enough to say good-by to his sweetheart—a dear, lovely girl, who was nearly-broken-hearted. She has never married, but is still waiting for Sidney to return and clear himself.

“Soon after that my mother died of a broken heart. Sidney was her youngest, and dearest I think my father is a sad, old man—older than his years, by far, and broken with sorrow. “Since that night I have known no peace. I left home soon after and have been wandering ever since; but the thought of my double crime has pursued me mercilessly, until, sometimes, I have been almost insane. For nine of these years I haye been seeking almost incessantly for some trace of Sidney, but to no purpose. On New Year’s nights his face haunts me; I see it as it looked when he went out of the door, leaving home and friends and ail that makes life worth living behind. “He is npt dead—something tells me so. I shall find him yet, I know. I only pray it may be soon. I have made a fortune out of the money I—stole* it is all for Sidney, when I find him. Do you—do you think that when I find him and he learns what is in store for him —and that back in Ohio the girl he swore never to see again until he had a clear name to offer her is still waiting for him—he will feel like forgiving and trying to forget?” I could not understand the man to thus unbosom himself to strangers: and there was an appealing weakness in his tone, as he finished, that contrasted markedly wi.h his strong personality. I looked at him wonderingly, as he sat with his face bowed in his hands. The other man rose, and staggered over to where his guest sat. “I know he will—l know it!” he said, chokingly. “And I knew you’d come, sometime—Harry!” Brown started to his feet with a wild cry: “Sid! Sid!” And there, in the little miner’s cabin, out in the wilderness, with the storm JiowMng outside, the New Year and I witnessed as glad a reunion as either of us ever saw. R. L. Kcwgjnnc.

“SID! SID !”