Newspaper Page Text
mmtm&!mtimmrW'w ''-
she was strangely reserved and de
pressed. In her secret soul Ada knew
that she was desperately distressed
and unhappy.
She wandered about the pretty
home garden lost in subdued reflec
tion. She shunned her girl friends.
Her sisters wondered if she were ill
and her mother, noticing the discon
fa tinuance of visits of Arnold, probed
w the problem in h'er womaiily way and
expected daily to receive the sobbing
confession of the disappointed love
victim.
"You've got to come!" cried her
small brother, Tom, disturbing Ada's
mournful reverie as she sat gaziqg
at nothingness from a seat on a gar
den bench.
, "Come where!" inquired Ada, with
lack-luster eyes and wearied voice.
"To the barn. Havent you no
ticed? We've been three days get
ting up a show. Say, sis, it's just
grand. Program and all that. Come
along, you've got to be a audience."
Ada smiled wanly as she allowed
Tom and a neighbor's little girl to
pull her along to. the rear of the
grounds. Outside it was a packing
box bearing the legend: "Show ad
mission two cents." An urchin with
some paper squares before him and
a little pile of coppers, in a business-
' like way handed Ada a "ticket," as
he debbud it and the change for a
nickel. Ada entered the show and
sat down on a board stretched across
three kegs. About a dozen children
were riotously discussing what lay
behind the shawl, tacked up as a cur
tain before an improvised stage.
Ada sat fumbling her ticket of ad
mission in her nervous fingers. She
had no heart for entertainment or
jollity. Her glance chanced to fall to
fthe ticket in question, reading: "Ad-
mit One." Then as she turned it over
she uttered a sharp cry, arose to her
feet and hastened outside. She
sought out her brother. To a gaping
group of urchins who stood outside
the charmed circle, bemoaning the
lack of the precipus two cents that
1 would admit them to a wonderland
of cljarm and novelty, she pounced
upon Tom.
He was dilating upon the "pro
gram" about to commence with true
showmanlike fervor and exaggera
tion. She checked him by clutching
at his arm, her face so pale, her eyes
s.0 glowing that Tom stared, half
frightened.
"Tom," she challenged sharply,
"where did you get the papers to
make these 'tickets,' as you call
them?"
"It was an old letter I found under
the hat rack," replied Tom, inno
cently. "Right near the shelf where
the folks put their letters to be
mailed. I thought some one had
thrown it away."
Ada uttered a postive groan. It
was unmaidenlike, perhaps, but she
could not restrain the expression.
The crumpled ticket clutched in her
hand, she hurried from the' garden.
She was glad to reach the wild
stretch of woods half a mile distant.
She reached the river where the little
skiff sue often used was beached.
"Oh, to be alone, all alone to
think, just think, and cry my heart
out!" she moaned, and once adrift
she started to do that, allowing the
frail bark to drift as it listed.
Alas! for blurred sight and reckless
abandonment to grief! The boat
struck a rock, overturned, and Ada
with a shock and a scream went un
der the surface of the water. Then
a blank, and finally restored con
sciousness to find herself lying on
the grassy bank of the stream, a
man's coat folded up under her head
and its owner kneeling by her side,
chafing her cold wet hands and gaz
ing dubiously upon her.
"I I fell overboard" she uttered
faintly, and then sat up and dumbly
stared at her rescuer Arnold Leith.
"I was fortunate to be near at
hand," he spoke, a certain constraint
in his tones.
Ada was wavering from the fright
and shock of her misadventure.
tffefc4agefett
atfcaafc
