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Show If The House ft They if Wanted By MYRA CURTIS LANE 6. U14. Waatarn Nwppr Ualoa.) OMIEY couldn't get It the Wards couldn't that old-fashioned little house on the outskirts of the town. They had liked It at first glimpse of it but they couldn't get it The Cravens, rich meut dealers, got it What business busi-ness had the Cravens with the little old-fashioned bouse? Craven explained to Ward one day on the train. But first about the house. It wus a hundred years old. It hud one of those old-fashioned gardens gar-dens that one dreams about and hardly hard-ly ever sees. And it had that atmosphere atmos-phere of all the previous occupants that made it what It was. It was the generations that had been born there, loved there, married, and passed on that gave It its unique feeling which the Cravens could never understand. Then what business had they taking tak-ing it away from the Wards? The Wards were Just too late.' They had In these days of bouse scarcity they had to take a little yellow bungalow nearly opposite the old house. A staring star-ing thing with a lot of sparse grass growing about It Not a privet hedge. Not a flower or tree. Drab, ugly. Mrs. Ward cried when they bought the bungalow after Craven had laughed Ward out of the little old-fashioned house. "It's Just too dreadful for words," said little Mrs. Ward, "that the Cravens Cra-vens should have that dear little house which we want so much and they can never appreciate. And we've got to have this hideous b-b-bungalow." "Cheer up," said Ward. "Perhaps he'll die." "Oh, I wish he would I" snapped Mrs. Ward viciously. "Or maybe he'll get tired of the place. I can't for the life of me see why a man like Craven, who deala in meats and looka It should want a little place like that." "I Just know they'll never get tired of it," sobbed Mrs. Ward. "I m-roet Mrs. Craven on the street today and she told me she adored the little house Just to spite me. There was such a malicious look on her face when she told me." The winter passed. Once a gleam of hope came to the Wards when Craven Cra-ven was reported dangerously HI with pneumonia. How they watched the doctor's car I They had really reached the stage of wanting Craven to die. But he got well. And then, when he had begun to commute again, he explained ex-plained to Ward on the train : "Queer little place, more like a working man's home than a gentleman's, gentle-man's, Ward. But I've Just been waltf Ing for building costs to fall before pulling it down. It's going te be the best Investment In this town, that cor ner. I'm going to build a gentleman's home there." Ward repeated this to his horrified wife. And a few weeks later carts arrived ar-rived with sand and cement workmen began the demolition. It was hideous to see the little house being pulled relentlessly re-lentlessly to pieces. It was hideous to see the little garden smothered under heaps of sand. Bit by bit, timber by Umber, the old house was taken down. And In Its place a glaring monstrosity of a "gen- tleman'i house" began to arise. At last, when It was clear that nothing noth-ing could save the little house, Mrs. Ward collapsed. She was ill for days, and she was only the shadow t herself her-self when she came downstair again. "Dear, let's get out of here," she said. "Sell the bungalowf "Yes. I shall never be happy here. Resides I haven't told you, but " Ward folded her In his arms tenderly ten-derly when she told him. It was a solemn and sacred moment for them. "But wherever we go we shall take with us the memories of the house we wanted and can never have," said Ward. "What was there about that little house that meant so much to us?" "The atmosphere, the sense of the people who had lived and died there." "I suppose in the beginning It was just an ordinary house? Those people peo-ple had to make it what It became. Listen, dear, Tve got an Idea I don't know what youll think of It. Suppose we Just stayed here and made this bungalow like the little house with a garden, and children. Don't you think, loving each other, we could T" "1 I think we could," answered his wife gently. "Because It Is the people peo-ple who make their houses, Isn't UP |
