After Twenty Years

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 360, 2 April 1903, Page 8

After Twenty Years

By William Wendham.

M\J. GILLESPIE, was distinctly old-fashioned. "Old-fashioned and out of date and irritable and cranky, by Genrgp. sir." said he to himself as lie watched the bin? flames struggle unsuccessfully to.leap into something tike cheerfulness. "Even my fire won't burn. I've jawed every man in the office to-day, quarreled with every cilent 1 ii-.ve seen, bullied the.janitor and spent the intervening time in hating myself. I guess Eastman is right. I ought to take a vacation, and.see if I can't get into some sort of harmony with things in general." What was it all worth, anyway—these days and nights of toil? To be sure, he was successful, far beyond the measure that comes to the nverage man, his reputation was high in the profession—the greatest cases came to him. and he generally won them. His name stood high in the community, and honors on the bench or in political life waited him at any time he would accept them. But these things he-Id no fascination for.him. For 20 years Jii.s life had been centered in this old-fashioned back office. He had enjoyed no social life and little companionship with his fellows, excepting his relations with his partners, his clients and his opponents in the courtroom. He trembled to think of the result should he lose interest in his work. And yet it had not been always so. Nor was be by nature designed for a life apart from his fellows. In his younger days he had 'been a prince of good fellows, and had numbered his friends by the score. But th'-i was before the broken chapter in his life, and that broken chapter had changed ail the rest of the ■tory. He thought as he tried to coax some warmth cut of the grate how different it all might have been. He arose and locked the door leading to the outer office, aud then he went to the old-fashioned safe, and, unlocking a drawer, took from it an old dagiierrr.type. Going back to his seat, he contemplated the portrait long and earnestly. .Tr was She free of a beautiful, high-s-plrited, impetuous girl.

This wrts the face which had caused the broken chapter. As he looked at the. old d-guerroty.pe his features softened and he lived over again the old days when all the horizon was rosecolored. This was away back when he was a boy. lie was accounted n smart boy and was making strides in his profession, and every effort and every ambition was centered upon Amy Lester. She liked hi:n. ton —there was no doubt of that. Kven now. at a distance of 20 rears and with the keenest knowledge of men and affairs, he did not doubt that rhe loved him in the old days. They h-;d been youthful sweethearts and hr.:i buitLall the air castles of two lives u?.»n a united future. Then came the f:r':;z on Fumter and the pall to arms i y President Lincoln. The blood of the major quickened a little even at This dV.ir.ce of a quarter of a century .-..« he recollected the thrill with which thai call had been received. A deiirions month or two and he had found himself at the front. There rolled before the memory of the major all the excitement, the dangers, the deprivations, the heroisms of those dreadful four years; his steady advancement until he was mustered out a ntajor of volunteers. The perspiration rolled from his face as he remembered his homecom'ng and fouud that Amy had plighted her troth to another—one far richer than he and the choice of her fanr'y. He had never asked her to marry hia. He had always supposed it to be understood. They had wrftten continually, and altho'ugh her letters had grown more formal he had been so engrossed in his soldierly profession that he had scarcely had the" time to wonder what the cause was. So the full knowledge of the truth, when he arrived home, nearly took him off his feet. His great pride kept him from doing anything to prevent her marriage, even had it been possible, and 30 she had faded from his life, and with her all the joy and all the hope he had ever cherished. Then followed the weary years in the profession to which he had turned. A knock aroused the dreamer, and hastily stuffing the picture in his pocket he opened the door. It was a card- from one of his most profitable clients, for whom he had recently won a hardly-contested lawsuit. "Show him iu, :r grunted th» major, grudgingly. Accordingly in bustled Peter Vandelmeier. prosperous, pushing, selfcomplacent, but apparently somewhat worried. "You have got to get possession of that Fletcher property, that's all there la to it, major," said Vandelmeier, as he seated himself and mopped his brow. "Oh, I know you are not a Sheriff or a marshal or anything of that kind," he went on, as he observed the major's rising ire, "but what good will our decision do us unless we get possession of the property? There is a funny condition down there. A chit of a girl—grandchild of old man Fletcher—is in possession, and she .seems to be too much for the officers. They have failed utterly to get her out and have about given it up as a bad job. We- have but two more days, according to the verdict. Now, I want yon to go to Cherrydale yourself. You will hare all the officers you want, but they are frightened and need somebody to direct them. Name your own fee, of course, but you've got to go. You know how important it is to our general plan that we get possession." The result was that Maj. Gillespie j

round bints, .f the next afi•.■.-..■.•> : ;.; the depot of the little town of Cherrydale, some 40 miles from home. After making- some inquiries at the country tavern he decided to beg-in operations at once, so as to end the disagreeable task as soon as possible, and was driven to the Fletcher homestead on the outskirts of the town. He went to ge.t the lay of the land andi left the officers sent with him, at the tavern. He found an old-fashioned country place—a big-, homelike house surrounded with great trees in the midst of a farm of great natural beauty, rolling meadows and fruitful fields traversed by a rippling brook. In response to the knocker a grim old woman opened the front door far enough to let the major see that it was fastened with a chain inside, and in response to his request to see Miss Fletcher was told to wait on the porch and she would see him there. As the major stood smiling at the crude attempt to thwart the edict of the law, and inwardly fuming at the trivinl necessity for taking him so far from his snug bachelor apartments, the door opened and immediately he heard the chain rattle Into place again. Turning, he lifted his hat to the girlish figure in the doorway. It was a perfect. type of budding womanhood, the major noted briefly, just before his eyes rested on her face. Then with a start the hat dropped from his hand and he grasped the railing for support. "Amy!" he gasped, his hand seeking his brow with a gesture of bewilderment. For there before him in the flesh stood Amy Lester, the sweetheart of his boy.bood, just as she had looked on the day he had left her to go to the war. Not a day older, not a feature changed! And he knew she had died these ten years ago. Had he lost his mind? Had paresis overtaken him in the prime of life? He stood transfixed, with trembling limbs and staring eyes. "Amy Fletcher, if you please, sir," replied the young woman, with some spirit. "And what is your business here, may I ask?" "I must beg your pardon," said he, with courtly grace. "You reminded me so strongly of an old and very dear friend."

"You were a friend of mamma's, then?" inquired the girl. "Her name was Amy Lester." "Yes; she was once a very dear friend of mine," replied the major, gravely. • The girl, who had been standing defiantly, with eyes flashing, softened visibly. "Oh, I'm so glad you came. I'm in the most dreadful trouble, and they are trying to take the old place away from me; but they won't do it. I'll never let.them. I'll die first. Grandpa told me never to let them do it, and that they had no right, and I won't. But it's so hard for a girl who don't know anything about business or law or anything to combat all those men. I need a friend. Indeed I do, and if you were a friend of mamma's you will be my friend; I know you will. You will help me, won't you? You are so big and strong. And you know all about these horrid business things; I know you do. And—and you—you are kind —and honest; I know you are. Tell me—tell me what to do." "Tell me all about it," ha said, with a tremor in his voice. They sat down on the rustic bench together—and the major's tall, soldierly figure thrilled as It had not for 20 years, and he could not realize that it was not the other woman—the woman of 20 years ago—who was seated beside him, as sh% had been so often in the old days. She told him her pathetic story—how she had been left an orphan to her grandfather's care, and how he had died a year ago in the midst of a quarrel with a big land syndicate that sought to acquire his property, and had told her that the negotiations had not been closed, although some papers had passed. He warned her never to yield possession of the property. Then there had been lawsuits, and now they were trying to eject her from the house in which she was born and to deprive her of all she had in the world. further into the matter, the major learned many things that had puzzled him during the trial of the case involving the property, and discovered how a great injustice had been wrought. "Do not be afraid," said he, rising abruptly. "You will be harassed no more." He went straight back to the city, and there was an interview with Vandelmeier—the stormiest, it is said, that ever occurred in the major's oldfashioned back room—and the result was that certain checks bearing the major'* signature passed to Yandelrueier and the deed to the" Fletcher "stat? parsed to Amy Fletcher. There was the glow of long-deferred youth on his face and the agility of a bey in his soldierly carriage as he sprang up the steps with the deeds in his pocket. She did not entertain him on the veranda this time, and before the day was over she invited him to en-" joy a short season <>n the estate he had saved for her—she did not know at what cost. He remembered Eastman's admonition that he needed a vacation, and he decided to spend it.

. There really is no need of telling the rest of this s-.ory, for the major was in the very prime of life, despite his iron-gray hair, for a life of moderation and regularity had left him in perfect health, and she had been drawn to him from the first by that subtle attraction always felt by daughters for the unsuccessful suitor for the mother's hand. As for the major, he never could realize that it was not his Amy of old to whom he was paying court. It might be added that after the wedding the major, greatly to the delight of his partners, abandoned the oldfashioned office and the firm moved into palatial quarters in the newest building in the city.