Book V -- Cuzak's Boys

V-I

I told Antonia I would come back, but life
intervened, and it was twenty years before
I kept my promise. I heard of her from
time to time; that she married, very soon
after I last saw her, a young Bohemian,
a cousin of Anton Jelinek; that they were
poor, and had a large family. Once when I
was abroad I went into Bohemia, and from
Prague I sent Antonia some photographs of
her native village. Months afterward came
a letter from her, telling me the names and
ages of her many children, but little else;
signed, "Your old friend, Antonia Cuzak."
When I met Tiny Soderball in Salt Lake, she
told me that Antonia had not "done very
well"; that her husband was not a man of
much force, and she had had a hard life. Per-
haps it was cowardice that kept me away so
long. My business took me West several
times every year, and it was always in the

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v?