Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 40, Number 61, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 April 1908 — THEY WERE INTERRUPTED [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THEY WERE INTERRUPTED

The pretty girl with the fluffy pink gown rose from her chair With a

bright and cordial smile, so bright, indeed, that most persons would have been suspicious of it. “How do you do, Mr. Hardtack,” she said with all the sweetness a woman usually bestows on her victim before she plays him. “You are acquainted with Mr. Onthespot, are you 1 not?” The young man who had just advanced through the portieres and the other young ! man who rose protestlngly from his chair before the Are, close to chair in which had j sat the pretty girl, eyed each othe* with polite dislike. “I-^-er —possibly l we have met,” admitted Mr. Hardtack, sitting down stiffly by a table with an air of its being merely a temporary seat till the first caller should go. “Delighted to meet you!” said

“Don’t Mention It.” Mr - Onthespot, with the firm attitude of one who declines to admit any previous acquaintance whatsoever. “Why, I thought you both were at Helen’s house party!” exclaimed the pretty girl, reprovingly. Mr. Onthespot politely swung his chair around from the fire before he entirely banished his lowering brow. “So we were,” he confessed. “Names slip one’s mind so. But Ido remem- , her your face now, Hardtack! Pardon me!”

“Don’t mention It!" said the young man by the table. “I’ve tried to get down here to see you before, Miss Jones,” continued Mr. Hardtack. “It’s too bad,” murmured the pretty girl, abstractedly. “You are so popular, Mr. Hardtack —so many engagements!” “Oh, not at all! ” protested the young man. “You —you are looking as blooming as ever,” he added with the awkwardness that comes from having to speak before an unsympathetic listener, yet with the doggedness of determination. “More so!” put in the young man by the fire, victoriously. “Impossible!” triumphed the young man by the table. “It—it was so nice of you to remember me,” she .offered as oil on the troubled waters. “Oh, I always do that,” said the young man by the table, settling back in his chair. “You see, you’re not the sort of girl one could forget if one wanted to.” The young man by the fire crossed one knee over the other and stared up at the picture molding as if nothing on earth interested him. “Too bad we haven’t a fourth,” said Mr. Hardtack; “we could have a game of bridge.” "I,” sharply said the young man by the fire, coming down from the picture molding with a thud, “am quite content just as we are—were —that is, are, I mean! Too bad you are bored Hardtack.” “Oh, Mr. Hardtack did not mean that,” said the pretty girl, hastily., "It—it was so nice of you to come. Have you been well all winter?” “I’ve had a little cold,” explained Mr. Hardtack. “Beyond that my health has been very satisfactory. I idways take care of a cold in time, don’t you, Miss Jones?” “Oh, dear me, yes,” answered the pretty girl, absent-mindedly. “When I was a child,” went on Mr. Hardtack, firmly, while the young man by the fire frowned at his clasped fingers, “I used to have such dreadful colds that my mother was afraid I’d have lung fever every winter. Many a night has she sat up with me.” “How sweet of her!” said the pretty girl. “Have you seen Bob and Jessie lately?” “I dined there,” said Mr. Hardtack, "last Thursday—no, it was last Wednesday, I am sure, because it was the day my new dress clothes were due, and I remember It was 5:30 before the boy brought them—no, It was Thursday, after all. I was at another dinner Wednesday night How stupid of me to mix things so! Yes, I saw Bob and Jessie last Thursday night!”

There was silence. Then Mr. Hardtack, with a glare at Mr. Onthespot, rose. "I have another call to make,” he said. "I must be going.” As the outer door closed on Mr. Hardtack Mr. Onthespot swung his chair and the pretty girl's around facing the fire again and deftly swung them a little nearer to each other than they had been before. “Thank heaven be cleared out!” he said, savagely. "Now, maybe you can answer that most important of all Questions which 1 had Just naked when be butted In! And say yes, won't you?"—Chicago Daily News.