A SHORT STORY.

Thames Star, Volume LVII, Issue 15160, 22 February 1922, Page 7

A SHORT STORY.

THE FEUD. (BY GEORGE M. SANDERS.) The devotion of mother and s'or. was a by-word up and down the Coast, most especially in the little fishing hamlet where the two had their dwelling, in a diminutive detached, cottage. It stood in a small rough garden of struggling shrubs and grass, with a wide shingled patty that moved in a straight line from the door to the rickety gate ; outside the gate the path sloped down to meet the road that mounted sharply from he hamlet. The cottage had been built for the gaunt-eyed, helpless . mother under the supervision of the equally gaunt-eyed son, and when it was finished they lived there, for the most part lonely, much envied for their independence and much discussed for their attachment. The widow, Emma Triggs, might have been seventy, her son James- might have been forty, but there was little in their cadaverous faces and deep sunken eyes to betray how many seasons those dark eyes had watched come and go.

James did all the housework that was done in the furniture-crowded rooms and three times a week rushed up by the short cut to buy provisions at the shop on the top of the hill. Every sunny day he carefully tucked his mother into a cumbersome Bath chair, and pushed or pulled her up the Hill, or along the rough road that lay between the whitewashed cottages and the sea. He never questioned his mother’s right to take charge of his life, and she did it thoroughly and without scruple, until it seemed as though half of her will, had found habitation in the slight nervous person of her son. When first they had cdme to live in the dove, certain wordly-wise matrons with marriageable daughters were attracted by the cottage and the snug income, -but no feminine charm had succeeded in winning James from his mother’s watchful care, and there was a phophbcy among the fishermen that the two —mother and son—would lose the light of their dark eyes at the same time, and fill one deep grave.

On a sunny spring morning a group of bare-armed women, gossiping as they spread their wellwashed clothes on the cliff grass at the end of the hamlet, paused to watch the approach of the Bath chair over the unev.en road. “That Emma Triggs can talk till she’s blue,” said' a buxom matron with conviction, “but us women know that it’s not natural nor healthy for a man never to haeve glances and what not at us. My days, but "he’ll make it up when she’s gone. I wish it might "be my Rose that he’ll fancy, that I do.” A rebellious!, healthy-looking girl tossed her head defiantly. “When I have a man it will.be one with a sap, not a dry one like J arnes, with it all drawled off. And that old Emma—she wouldn’t lef a body rest—come back from the grave she would, afraid lest 'any girl should enjoy the spending of, her bit of money.” An old crone cackled toothlessly as she- clawed at a few clothes in a bucket. “Reckon she won’t have no power from the grave—a wisht power from there. And once her great. eyes are filled with dust —James can take you, or who he’s a mind to, sap or no sap. rlenty of sappy lads there are in fhe cove but none but he with a . sure bit to live on.” “-Think on that now, Rose, and don’t be talking too free,” said the matron, as she glanced approvingly at her daughter. “Hates me she do,’ said the girl smiling, “ever since she saw me and James coming down the hill and having a bit of a laugh together, and he’s been scared of me ever since, hardly so much as lifts his eyes. .That’s no sort of a man is it?”

The matron slowly put her crooked finger inside her cotton “blouse and thoughtfully scratched herself. “You’ll stand a good chance,” she began, but her. daughter, with a petulant exclamation, picked, up her empty basket and stalked away as the rumbling Bath chair came into the group. “Well, James,” said the matron, in a high pitched voice, “and when will you be thinking of taking on with’ a maid?”

James giggled feebly. A metallic sound, hardly resembling a laugh came from Mrs. Triggs’ lips; her sunken dark eyes glared as “if tiny fires had been set in their depths. “He wants none of such,” she said quickly; “got me, he has, and a boy’s best friend is his mother.” “That’s all well enough, but blood’s blood for all you say —and what’s going to happen when you are stiff -and cold, Emma Triggs? Won’t the poor worm want a bit

of life then 1 You might as well help him' in a choosing now —he’ll do it alter, sure as the sea’s salt.” Mrs. Triggs glared about at the laughing faces, and tried to find a crushing and fitting reply." “Nasty .old draught just here, James,” she said at last, “we had best be getting along home.” As the Bath chair bumped and rattled over the road, she turned to watch her son’s face, and spoke again. “I tell you James, there’s not a woman for miles around that wouldn’t jump at you. Not that you’d be much to content any, you so spare and all, but its my money they clamour after. Bessie Hoskin was thinking of her own maid, Rose when she spoke—l saw it in her face plain. I chn’t bear to think of her living in my house"' and playing capers with my boy—no.” James taking deep breaths and pushing manfully, grinned acknowledgment. “You’re not a fool,” she went on confidently; “the way I’ve brought ■you up I don’t believe you could be now,- not if you were beset by the minxes ever so.” But, this confidence did not support Mrs. Triggs throughout the day. She could not entirely disiniss the words of the matron, Bessie Hoskin. In the evenihg passing uneasily from room to room with the aid of her crutch sticks, she made a great decision.

“I’ll tell you, James,” she said, looking around the sitting-room crowded with knick-knacks that reflected her personality. “I mean to have my photo took; it's not been done for this twelve year, not sijnc© this house has been "built. And there shall be one of them fn every room, and a big one —as big as life—on the wall there.” She pointed to the very middle of the wall. “You /always take well,” said her son, rubbing his hands delightedly. The small photographs were certainly successful, but the expensive life-sized enlargement in its dark oak frame was little short of marvellous. The eyes, looking out- unflinchingly, followed every movement of those who were brought to admire it, the half-smilng lips varied » with every mood of the spec ometimes cruel, butt mostly mocking. There was much talk about this enlargement. Even Bessie Hoskin stifled her pride and found herself with open mouth gaping in awe into the inscrutable eyes of the portrait. “It’s as like as life,” said Mrs. Hoskin, in, a whisper, turning to the living face beside her. “Aye, my James won’t lack a bit of company now when I’ve gone away up over the hill,” said the ‘'mother', swaying rapturously on her ' cruteh sticks. “Gome in here, he wili, and there 1 shall he watching and ready to help same ’as ever.” / (To be Continued.)