Identified by His Corns

An Old Lady's Tale

by Mary Kyle Dallas

“It was a most peculiar thing,” said the old lady, taking out her knitting—“altogether quite a singular story; it proves one thing, my dear, and that is that witnesses are not always to be relied upon. People perjure themselves quite unconsciously at every trial, I feel quite confident. Now our butler Ralph, a very good old man, identified Uncle ——. Wait a minute, I think I’d better tell it from the beginning.

“I was sitting on the porch one June evening waiting for my lover. Our house was close upon the Jersey shore, and I could see the ferry below which he would cross to come to me. I’ve no doubt I felt quite as romantic as though that ferry boat I waited for had been a gondola and my porch a balcony in Venice. I was very happy that night—I think I would have been wicked had I felt otherwise;— the pet of my old uncle—rich and, they said, pretty, and in the most perfect health; betrothed, too, to the man I loved from my soul, for I was no cold girl to choose calmly between my suitors and give my hand to the heaviest rent-roll or the handsomest face. I had all that women prize most, and it is no wonder I was glad.

“That night not a shadow lay upon my heart, and yet, as I tripped down the garden path to meet Charlie, the time between those happy hours and great grief could have been counted in moments.

“Charlie was never so gay as I. He used to say that I was his sunbeam and that he came to me to chase the clouds from his heart. He said so that evening.

“‘For I’ve been sad today,’ he said; ‘and had I been a child or a woman should have cried, I am sure.’