PAST MASTERS 143

Produced and Edited by Terry Walker from short stories in magazines, newspapers and other sources, and all in the Life + 70 years public domain.

11 November 2023

Contents

1: The Idol's Eye / "Sapper"

2: The Desire of the Moth / Alice C. Tomholt

3: Miss Cameron's Art Sale / Charlotte Rosalys Jones

4: The Exit of Anse Dugmore / Irvin S. Cobb

5: The Third Partner / Edward S. Sorenson

6: The Forgers / Arthur B. Reeve

7: The Orange Trees / H. Bedford-Jones

8: La Haute Finance / Richard Marsh

9: The Film That Was Never Shown / "Sapper"

10: Mr. Truesdale Tells the Truth / Ellis Parker Butler

11: Pink Tulips / Ethel Lina White

12: A Memorable Night / Anna Katharine Green

13: The Suicide and the Saint / Ethel Lina White

14: To Whom This May Come / Edward Bellamy

15: Derelict / Gilbert Parker

16: The Papuan Paddle / H. de Vere Stacpoole

17: Hell in Hidden Valley / King Saxon

18: The Wedding Guest / Joseph A. Altsheler

19: The Planter at Castle Reef / Captain Frederick Moore

___________________

1: The Idol's Eye

"Sapper"

H. C. McNeile, 1888-1937

The Strand Magazine, Dec 1919

The Popular Magazine, 7 Sep 1920

H. C. McNeile

A little-known crime story from the creator of "Bull-dog" Drummond, Ronald Standish and others.

"PERSONALLY I don't consider there's a word of truth  in the whole thing," said Denton dogmatically. "All this mystery and spook stunt was. started by hysterical old women, and has been kept alive by professional knaves, who fill their pockets at the expense of fools."

He drained his port, and glared round the table as if challenging any one to dispute his assertion.

"There was a silly old aunt of mine," he continued, thrusting his heavy-featured face forward, "who bought a house down Camberley way two or three years ago. Admirable house: just suited the old lady. Special room facing south for the canaries and parrots, and all that sort of thing." He helped himself to another glass of port. "She hadn't been in the house a fortnight before the servants gave notice. They weren't going to stop on, they said, in a house where noises were heard at strange hours of the night, and where the clothes were snatched off the cook's bed. So the old thing wrote to me—I was managing her affairs for her— and asked what she should do. I told her that 'd come down and deal with the noises, and that if any one started pulling my bedclothes off he'd get a thick ear for his trouble."

Denton laughed, and leaning back in his chair, thrust his hands into his trousers pockets. "Of course there were noises," he continued. "Show me any house— especially an old one— where there ain't noises at night. The stairs creaked— stairs always do; boards in the passages contracted a bit and made a noise— boards always do. And as for the cook's bedclothes, having once seen the cook, I didn't wonder they came off in the night. She must have weighed twenty stone, and nothing less than full-size double sheets could have been expected to remain tucked in. But do you suppose it was any good pointing these things out to the old dear? Not on your life! All she said to me was: 'Harry, my boy, there are agencies at work in this world of which we have no knowledge. You may not be able to deal them; some of us can. And it is written in the Book that they are Evil.'

Again Denton laughed coarsely. "Twaddie! Bunkum! The only agent that she felt was the house agent, who was charmed at the prospect of a second commission so soon."

"She moved, did she?" said Lethbridge, our host.

"Of course she did," jeered Denton. "And the last I heard of the house was that it had been taken by a retired grocer with a large family who were perfectly happy there." He thumped his fist on the table. "The whole thing is entirely imagination. If you sit at the end of a dark passage when the moon is throwing fantastic shadows and imagine hard enough that you're going to see a ghost, you probably will At least, you'll fancy you see something. But that's not a ghost. There's nothing really there. You might as well say that the figures you see in a dream are real."

"Which raises a very big question, doesn't it?" said Mansfrey thoughtfully. He was a quiet man, with spectacles, who had so far taken little part in the conversation. "Even granted that what you say is correct, and I do not dispute it, you cannot dismiss imagination in quite the same manner as you do a dream. It may well be that half the so-called ghosts which people see or hear are merely imagination; but the result on the people is the same as if they were there in reality." His blue eyes were fixed on Denton mildly, and he blinked once or twice, "It takes all sorts to make a world, and every one is not sə completely devoid of imagination as you are, Denton."

"I don't know that I am completely devoid of imagination," said Denton. "I can see as far into a brick wall as most men, where a business proposition is concerned. But if you mean that I'm never likely to see a ghost, you're quite right." He was staring at Mansfrey, and his face was a little flushed. It struck me as he sat there, half sprawling over the table, what a coarse animal he was. And yet rumor had it that he was very popular with a certain type of woman.

Mansfrey sipped his port, and a slight smile played round his lips. Lethbridge noticed it and made a movement as if to join the ladies. For Mansfrey's smile was deliberately provocative and Denton was not a congenial companion if provoked— especially after three glasses of port. His voice, loud enough at ordinary times, became louder; the bully in him, which was never far from the surface, flared out. '

"Ghosts," said Mansfrey gently, "are the least of the results of imagination. Even if you did see one, Denton, I don't expect it would worry you much." His mild blue eyes were again fixed on the other man. "It is not that manifestation of the power of mind that I was particularly thinking of."

Denton gave a sneering laugh. "Then what was it?" he asked. "Trying to walk between two lamp-posts and finding there was only one?"

"Personally," answered Mansfrey, "I have never suffered that way." Lethbridge looked at me uncomfortably, but Mansfrey was speaking again. "It was the power of mind over matter with regard to bodily ailments that I was thinking of."

"Good heavens," joinei Denton, "you don't mean to say that you're a Christian Scientist?"

"Up to a point, certainly," answered the other. "If it is possible, and we know an indisputable proof that it is, for a man to deliberately decide to die when there is nothing the matter with him, and, having come to that decision to sit down on the ground and put it into effect— surely the contrary must be still more feasible. For in the case of the native who dies, his mind.is acting against nature; in the case of the man who tries to cure himself his mind is acting with nature."

"Those natives who die in that manner have always been seen by somebody else's brother-in-law," answered Denton. "I'll believe it, Mansfrey, when I see it for myself."

"I doubt if you would," said Mansfrey. "You'd say the man was malingering even when he was in his coffin."

Once again I glanced at Lethbridge. It almost seemed as if Mansfrey, usually the mildest of men, was deliberately going out of his way to annoy Denton.

"And I suppose," he continued after a pause, "that you absolutely disbelieve in the ill luck that goes with certain houses and other inanimate objects— such as the Maga diamond, for instance."

"Absolutely," answered Denton, "And if I had the money I would pay a thousand pounds to any. one who would prove me wrong " Then he laughed. "I thought you were reputed to be a scientist, Mansfrey! Funny sort of science; isn't it? Do you honestly mean to tell me that you believe a bit of carbon, like the Maga diamond, has the power to bring bad luck to its owner?"

"The last four owners have died violent deaths," remarked Mansfrey quietly.

Denton snorted. "Coincidence," he cried. "Good heavens, man, you're talking like a hysterical nursemaid!"

"When up against the standard of pure knowledge," returned Mansfrey mildly, "quite a number of people talk like hysterical nursemaids. When one reflects how little one knows, and how much there is to be known, l sometimes wonder why even the cleverest man ever speaks at all He started fumbling in his waistcoat pocket. "But talking of the Maga diamond, I've got something here that might interest you."

He produced a little chamois leather bag, and untied the string that kept it closed. Then before our astonished gaze he tipped out on to the tablecloth what appeared to be a large ruby. It was a cut stone, and in the light it glowed and scintillated with a thousand red flames.

"Pretty thing, isn't it?" said Mansfrey.

"My dear fellow," cried Lethbridge, leaning forward, "is it real? If so, it must be worth a fortune. I'm some judge of precious stones, but I've never dreamed of anything to approach that."

"Glass," laughed its owner. "A particularly beautiful tint of red glass. No— it's not a historic jewel that I've got here, Lethbridge, but something which bears on what we have been discussing. His mild eyes ence more sought Denton's face. 'This piece of glass, so the story runs, was originally the eye of an idol in one of the most sacred shrines in Lhasa. The Tibetans, as you know, are a very religious race—and this particular idol was apparently the big noise among all their gods. Some young fools, on a shooting trip, managed to get to Lhasa—no mean feat incidentally in itself; and not content with that, they violated this most sacred temple and stole the eye of the god."

Denton gave a shout of laughter. 'Good lads!" he cried. "That's the stuff to give the troops,"

Mansfrey looked at him gravely. "They were discovered by the priests," he continued, "and had to run for their lives. All quite usual, you see; the good old historic story of fiction. Even the curse comes in, so as not to spoil the sequence. I, of course, have only heard it fifteenth hand, but I give it to you as I got it. The thing is harmless, unless allowed to remain in the hand or up against a man's bare flesh for a certain length of time, How long I don't know. The sailor I got it from was a bit vague himself— all he wanted to do was to get rid of it as quickly as he could. But if, so the yarn goes, it remains for this necessary period of time in a man's hand or up against him somewhere— the man dies."

Denton spoke with amusement. "And do you believe that twaddle?" he demanded.

"I don't know," said Mansfrey slowly. "There are one or two very strange stories about it." He prodded the glass gently with his finger, and the ruby lights shivered and danced till it looked as if it was on fire. "A Danish sailor stole it from the man who sold it to me, on the voyage home. He was an enormously powerful, healthy fellow, but he was found dead the next morning with the thing inside his shirt. My sailor friend got it from a Chinaman in Chefoo. The chink's assistant had recently stolen it out of his master's shop. He had been found dead with it in his hand, and the chink was frightened." Mansfrey smiled, and put the bit of glass back in its bag. "Just two yarns of many, and they're all the same. Anybody who holds it, or lets it touch him for too long, dies. And dies to all appearances a natural death."

"And you really believe that twaddle?" said Denton again, even more offensively than before.

Mansfrey shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know whether I do or don't," he answered. "I myself have tested the thing; and as far as I can see, it is just a piece of ordinary red glass. But—" Again he shrugged his shoulders, and then replaced the leather bag in his pocket.

"Do you mean to say that you've been too frightened to hold the thing in your hand and prove that it's rot?" cried Denton. He turned to Lethbridge. "Well, I'm damned! And in the twentieth century. Chuck the bauble over here, Mansfrey. I'll sleep with it in my hand to-night, and give it back to you to-morrow morning at breakfast."

But Mansfrey shook his head. "Oh! no, Denton," he said, "most certainly not. If anything did happen, I should never forgive myself,"

The opposition only served to make Denton more determined than ever, and more objectionably rude into the bargain. Personally, I had been surprised at Mansfrey carrying such a thing about with him—it did-not fit in with what I knew of the man at all; but I was even more surprised at his reluctance to allow Denton to have it. It was preposterous that he could really believe there was any danger to be feared from holding a piece of colored glass in one's hand, and yet for five or ten minutes he remained obdurate.

Then, suddenly, he gave in. "Very well, Denton," he remarked, "you shall have it. But don't say I didn't warn you."

Denton laughed. "If your preposterous stories were to be believed, and came true in my case, I gather I shouldn't be in a condition to say much. But my ghost shall come and haunt you, Mansfrey. I'll pull off your bedclothes, and rattle chains in the passages—"

We all laughed, and shortly after Lethbridge rose. As he got to the door he paused and looked at ws doubtful. "Of course, it's all rot, and only a joke— but I think we might as well postpone telling the ladies until Denton gives it back to-morrow at breakfast. My wife is such a nervous woman, don't you know. Probably come running along to your room, Denton, every half hour to see that you're still snoring."

Denton gave. one of his usual bellows, and in a few minutes we had all settled down to bridge.

ii

IT WAS Denton himself who insisted on his hand being tied up with a pocket handkerchief. The four of us were standing, talking, in his room before turning in; in fact, Mansfrey had already completed the first part of his toilet by donning a smoking jacket of striking design.

"Bring out your bally bit of glass, my boy," boomed Denton jovially, "and put it right there." He held out a hand like a leg of mutton. "Then I'll close my fist, and afterward you tie my hand with a handkerchief, so that I can't open it in the night."

But the idol's eye was not immediately forthcoming. "I tell you candidly, Denton," said Mansfrey, "I wish you'd give it up. I don't believe myself that there is anything in it, but somehow—" His eyes were blinking very fast behind his spectacles; he seemed the picture of frightened indecision,

Denton laughed and clapped him on the back; and to be clapped on the back by Denton is rather like being kicked by a mule. I have had experience of both, and I know."

"You funny little man," he cried, and prepared to do it again, until Mansfrey discreetly withdrew out of range. "You funny little man, blinking away there like a startled owl. You know, Lethbridge, I do really believe that he fancies there's something in his blessed old glass eye from Lhasa. Give it to me, you silly ass," he said to Mansfrey. "I'll show you." To say that Denton's speech was thick would be to exaggerate, but as I sat on the edge of his dressing table smoking a cigarette, I could not help recalling that, though Lethbridge and I had each had one whisky 'and soda during the evening, while Mansfrey had drunk only plain vichy, the tantalus was nearly empty when we came to bed. He was, in fact, in a condition when, for peace all round, it was better not to annoy him.

Apparently the same idea had struck Lethbridge, for he turned to Mansfrey and nodded his head. "Give it to him, old boy, and let's get to bed. I'm damned tired."

"Very well," answered Mansfrey. "PI get it. It is in my waistcoat pocket."

Slowly, almost reluctantly, he left the room, and went along the passage to his "own. While we waited, Denton got into his pajamas, and by the time Mansfrey returned, he was already in bed.

"Here it is," said Mansfrey, holding out the little bag. "But I wish you wouldn't, Denton."

"Oh, to hell with you and your wishes!" said Denton irritably, stretching out his hand. "Put it there, little man, put it there."

The piece of glass rolled out of the bag, and lay for a moment glittering scarlet in Denton's huge palm. Then his fingers closed over it, and Lethbridge tied a handkerchief round his fist.

"Tl give it back to you at breakfast, Mansfrey," he said, turning over on his side. *And you can prepare to be roasted, my lad, properly roasted. Good night, you fellows; turn out the light, one of you, as you go."

I closed the door behind me and strolled toward my own room. It was next to Mansfrey's, and I stopped for a moment talking to him

"What a great animal that fellow is," I remarked.

He did not reply at once, and I glanced at him. He was standing quite still, with his pale-blue eyes fixed on Denton's room, from which already I fancied I heard the snores of the heavy sleeper.

"Animal is not a bad description of him," he answered thoughtfully.

He stepped inside his door and closed it, and it was only as I switched off my own light that it struck me that Mansfrey's eyes had never blinked as he stood looking at Denton's door. And blinking was a chronic affliction of his.

I seemed only to have been asleep a few minutes when I was awakened by the light being switched on. Lethbridge was standing by my bed, looking white and shaken.

"My God, man!" he said, as I blinked up at him. "He's dead."

"Who is?" I cried, foolishly sitting up in bed.

"Why, Denton," he answered, and the whole thing came back to my mind.

"Denton dead!" I looked at him horror-struck. "He can't be, man; there must be some mistake."

"I wish to God there was," he answered hoarsely. '"Mansfrey's with him now— almost off his head."

I reached for my dressing gown, and glanced at the time. It was just half past four.

"I'll never forgive myself," he went on, as I searched for my slippers. "That fool story of Mansírey's made a sort of impression on me, and I couldn't sleep. After a while I got out of bed and went to Denton's room. I listened outside, and you know how he used to snore. There wasn't a sound; absolute silence." He wiped his forehead with a shaking hand. "I don't know— but I got uneasy. 1 opened the door and went in. Still not a sound. Then I switched on the light." Lethbridge shuddered. "There he was, lying in bed, absolutely motionless. I went over to him, and put my hand on his heart. Not a movement; he was dead a—"

I stared at him speechlessly and then together we went toward Denton's room. The door was ajar, and as we pushed it open Mansfrey, who was bending over the dead man, turned his white stricken face toward us.

"Not a trace of life," he whispered. "Not a trace." He ran his hands through his hair, blinking at us despairingly. "What a fool I was, what an utter fool to show him that thing!"

"Oh, rot, man!" said Lethbridge roughly. "It can't have been that damned bit of red glass. He's dead now, poor fellow, but he was a gross liver, and there's no getting away from the fact that he drank too much last night. Probably heart failure."

But Mansfrey only shook his head, and stared miserably out of the window to where the first faint streaks of dawn were showing in the sky.

"The point is what we're going to do now," went on Lethbridge. He held up the hand holding the idol's eye, and then let it fall again with a shudder.

"Ring up a doctor at once," said Mansfrey. "He's dead, but you must send for one."

"Yes," said Lethbridge slowly. "I suppose we must. Er— the only thing is—  er"— he looked awkwardly from Mansgrey to me— "this— er— bit of glass. You know what local people are, and the sort of things that— er— may be said. I mean it will be a little hard to account for the poor fellow being found dead with this bauble in his - hand, all tied up like this. The papers will get hold of it, and we'll have a crowd of confounded reporters buzzing round, trying to nose out a story."

Mansfrey blinked at him in silence. "You suggest," he said at length, "that we should take it out of his hand."

"I do," said Lethbridge eagerly. "After all, the poor chap's dead, and we've got the living to consider. It's bad enough having a death in the house at all; it'll be perfectly awful if it's turned into a nine-days' newspaper wonder. I mean it isn't as if there was any question of foul play," he glanced apologetically at Mansfrey; "we all of us are equally concerned, and it cam only be a very strange and gruesome coincidence. What do you say, Mayhew?"

"I quite agree," I answered. At the time I was engaged in a big deal, and I was certainly not anxious for notoriety— even of a reflected nature— in the papers. "I suggest that we remove the stone and that we destroy it forthwith by smashing it to pieces and throwing the bits in the pond."

Lethbridge gave a sigh of relief, and started to unfasten the handkerchief. "One moment," interrupted Mansfrey. ^With all due regard for both your interests, my case is not quite the same as yours. We are not all equally concerned. The thing is mine: I gave it to him." He blinked at us apologetically. "I've got to think of the years to come, when the momentary unpleasantness will be forgotten, and you two—almost unconsciously—may begin to wonder whether it was a coincidence." He silenced our quick expressions of denial with a smile. "You may," he said, "and I prefer net to risk it. And so I will only agree to your proposal on one condition, and that is that one or other of you send the thing to some good analytical chemist and have it tested. I know that it is glass; I want you to know it, too."

"Right," said Lethbridge, who would willingly have promised anything, so long as he was allowed to remove the glass eye. "I quite see your point of view, Mansfrey." He was busy untying the knot in the handkerchief. "Perhaps Mayhew will take it up to-morrow to town with him, when he goes."

At length the handkerchief was removed, and with obvious distaste Lethbridge forced back the fingers. There lay the glass— clouded a little by the moisture of the dead man's hand— but still glittering with its devilish red light. Then suddenly the arm relaxed and the idol's eye rolled on to the carpet.

"My God!" `said Lethbridge hoarsely.

"Put the vile thing away, Mansfrey, and let's send for a doctor."

"The bag is on my table," he answered. "I'll put it in." With his handkerchief he picked the thing up and carried it out of the room.

Lethbridge turned to me. "I don't often drink at this hour of the night," he said, "but when I've rung up the doctor I'm going to open a bottle of brandy. I want it."

We tidied up the clothes, and with a last look at the great body lying motionless on the bed, we went out softly, locking the door behind us.

An hour later the doctor came and made his examination. By this time, of course, the whole house knew, and there was no question of any more sleep, The women had forgathered in Mrs. Lethbridge's room, and we three men waited for the doctor downstairs. He came, after only a short time in the dead man's room, and helped himself to a cup of tea,

"Tt may be necessary," he said, "to hold a post-mortem, You say that he was perfectly fit last night?"

"Perfectly," said Lethbridge.

"Forgive my putting the question," continued the doctor, ''but did he have much to drink last night?"

"He was always a very heavy drinker and eater," answered Lethbridge, and both Mansfrey and I,nodded in agreement.

"So I should have imagined," commented the doctor. "I have no doubt in my mind that, though he looked a strong, healthy man, we shall find he was pretty rotten inside. Brought on by over-indulgence, you know. He was essentially the type that becomes liable to fits later in life. Most unpleasant for you, Mr. Lethbridge. I'll do everything I can to spare you unnecessary inconvenience. But I'm afraid we shall have to have a post-mortem. You see there's no obvious cause of death,"

Lethbridge saw him to the door, and shortly after we heard his car drive off.

"May Heaven be praised," said Lethbridge, coming back into the room, "that we took that glass thing out of his hand 'and that we didn't mention it to the women last night." He sat down and wiped his forehead. Chuck that brandy over, Mansfrey; I want another."

Thus ended the tragic house party. At nine o'clock I left for town, with the idol's eye in my pocket. I took it to a chemist and asked him to submit it to any tests he liked, and tell me what it was. Later in the evening I called for it, and he handed it back across the counter.

"As far as I can see, sir," he remarked, "it is simply a piece of ordinary red glass, of not the slightest value save for its rather peculiar shape."

I thanked him and took it home with me. The next day I returned it to Mansfrey with a brief note containing the chemist's report, and a suggestion that he should drop it into the Thames.

Lethbridge sent me a cutting from the local paper giving an account of the inquest and the result of the post-mortem.

"Death from natural causes," was the verdict, and gmadually, in the stress of reconstructing a business which had suffered badly during the war, the matter passed from my head. Occasionally the strange coincidence came back to my mind and worried me; occasionally I even wondered whether, indeed, there was some deadly power in that piece of red glass; whether in a far-off Tibetan temple strange priests, performing their sinister rites round a sightless idol, kept count in some mysterious way of their god's revenge. Then I would laugh to myself and recall the doctor's words when he had made his brief examination of Denton: "We shall find he was pretty rotten inside."

And so, but for a strange freak of fate, the matter would have ended and passed into the limbo of forgotten things. Instead of which— but the devil of it all is, I don't know what to do.

Two days ago I wandered casually into Jones' curio shop just off the Strand. At times I have picked up quite good bits of stuff there, and I frequently drop in on chance of a bargain.

"I've got the very thing for you, Mr. Mayhew," he said as soon as he saw me. "A couple of bits of old Sheffield. Just wait while I get them."

He disappeared into the back of the shop and left me alone. I strolled round looking at his stuff, and in one corner I found a peculiarly ugly carved table, standing on three gimcrack legs. Ordinarily I should merely have shuddered and passed on; but something made me stop and look at it a little more closely. Its proud designer, presumably in order to finish it off tastefully, had cut four holes in the top, and into these four holes he had placed four pieces of colored glass—yellow, blue, green, and red. Mechanically I touched them, and to my surprise I found the red one was loose. Still quite mechanically I worked it about, and finally took it out.

A minute later Jones found me staring dazedly at something in my hand, which even in the dim light of the shop glowed and scintillated like a giant ruby.

"Here are those two bits of plate, Mr. Mayhew," he remarked. Then he saw what I had in my hand and glanced at the table. "Don't worry about that. It's been loose ever since I got it. I must seccotine it in some day."

"Tell me, Mr. Jones," I endeavored to speak quite calmly, "where did you get this from?"

"What, that table? A Mr. Mansfrey asked me to try and sell it for him months ago; you know, the gentleman who's just written that book on poisons. Not that I've, got any hope of obliging him, for it's a horrible-looking thing, I think."

A thousand wild thoughts were rushing through my brain as I stood there, with the dealer watching me curiously. If that bit of red glass came out of a table, it had never adorned an idol's face in Tibet. And as it had come out of a table, it proved that Mansfrey had lied. Why?

"I will take that table," I said to the astounded dealer, "I'll give you five pounds for it. Send it round at once."

"Shall I put that red thing in, sir?" he asked.

"No," I answered. "I'll keep this. Send it round as it is." I strode out of the shop and into the Strand. Why had Mansfrey gone to the trouble of inventing that long tissue of falsehood? Why? The question rang ceaselessly through my brain; I could think of nothing else. Quite clearly the events of that fatal night came back to me, and the episode which before had seemed a coincidence suddenly took a very much more sinister turn. Why should a writer on poisons and an able, clever man— I had heard of Mansfrey's new book— take the trouble to lie steadily throughout an evening, unless he had some object in view? Why should he have brought the bit of glass down with him at all, unless he had determined beforehand to tell this lie? And suddenly I stood stock-still, to the fury of an oncoming taxi; it was Mansfrey who had started the subject of the supernatural before the ladies left us after dinner. Why?

I turned into my club, and sat down to try and puzzle things out. And the more I thought of it the less I liked it. I had had the bit of glass analyzed by a chemist, true; but for the first time it struck me as a significant fact that there had been a period of over five hours, after the thing had been taken from Denton's hand, during which it had been in Mansfrey's possession. At the time I had not thought of it— after such a tragedy one does not think of trifles. Now, it no longer seemed a trifle. In fact, everything took on a new significance. The time Mansfrey had taken to get it from his room had not seemed unduly long while we were waiting; but Denton, completely undressed, had got into bed before Mansfrey returned. And then the careful way in which he had picked the glass up afterward with a handkerchief.

At length I rose and, going to a table, wrote a note to Mansfrey asking him to come round and see me at my flat. He came last night— and, as I said before, I don't know what to do.

Straight in front of him, as he came into the room, I had placed the table. The hole for the red glass was empty; the piece itself was in the center of the mantlepiece. He stopped abruptly and stared at the little table; then he turned, and the gleaming red thing in front of the clock caught his eyes. Then he looked at me, blinking placidly, with a faint smile on his face.

"I didn't know you knew Jones," he said, sinking into.an easy-chair and lighting a cigarette.

"I should like an explanation, Mansfrey," I remarked sternly.

"What of? Denton's death? My dear fellow— surely it was quite obvious from the first. I killed him." He still blinked at me with his mild blue eyes.

"You killed him!" I almost shouted.

"Hush, hush!" He held up a deprecating hand. "Not so loud, please. Of course I killed him, as I had always intended to do. He was one of the type of carrion who was not fit to live. He seduced my sister, and when I ultimately found her, after he had tired of her, she was on the streets." For a moment he had ceased blinking; then he went on again quite calmly. "But why should I weary you with personal history? Is there anything else you'd like to know?"

"A lot," I said. "Of course, your reason is a big extenuating circumstance, and, undoubtedly, Denton was a blackguardly cad— but that does not excuse you, Mansfrey, for murdering him."

"I absolutely disagree," he returned gently. "The law would have given me no redress, so I had to make my own."

"Of course," I said after a pause, "I shall have to tell Scotland Yard. I mean, I can't possibly condone such a thing as that."

He smiled peacefully and shook his head. "I don't think I would if I was you," he murmured. "Who was it who begged Denton not to take the idol's eye in his hand"— he glanced at the glass on the mantelpiece— "it bore a striking resemblance to that thing you've got there, now I come to look at it. But, who was it? Why, me. Who overruled me? Well— neither you nor Lethbridge backed me up, anyway. Who was it who suggested removing it before the doctor came? I think I am right in saying it was Lethbridge. Who insisted on a chemical analysis? I did. Who had it carried out? You, and I have the chemist's report in my desk. What was the result of the post-mortem and the coroner's inquest? Death from natural causes; no trace of poison." He blinked on placidly. "Oh, no, my friend, I don't quite see you going to Scotland Yard. In the extremely improbable event of that august body not regarding you as a lunatic, you would inevitably, and Lethbridge, also, be regarded as my accomplices in the matter, You see, between you, in all innocence, you compromised yourselves very awkwardly— very awkwardly, indeed."

"How did you kil him?" I demanded grimly.

"A rare and little-known poison," he answered. "You'll find something about it in my new book, Probably the most deadly in the world, for it leaves no trace. It kills by shock, which induces heart failure, I dipped that glass— er— I mean the idol's eye which is so like that bit of glass— into a solution of the poison before putting it in his hand. Then the next morning I dipped it in another solution. You considerately left it with me for some hours— a minute was all I required. From experiments I have carried out on animals, I should think he died in about half an hour. Er— good night."

The door closed behind him, and I sat staring at the red bauble glittering in the light, Then in a fit of rage I took it to the window, and hurled it into the street below. It broke into a thousand fragments, and Mansfrey— who had just left the front door— looked up and smiled. "Er— good night," he called, and I could imagine those blue eyes blinking mildly.

And the devil of it all is, as I mentioned previously— I don't know what to do.

______________

2: The Desire of the Moth

Alice C. Tomholt

1887-1949

Weekly Times (Melbourne) 3 July 1915

Australian short story writer who produced numerous stories and some verse over 20 years, mostly for the "Weekly Times" newspaper.

STANFORD was a scamp— a handsome, well-set-up scamp, with an undoubted attractiveness of manner that enabled him to go on his Will o' the Wisp existence with a certain elusive success that, to his optimistic nature, was entirely satisfying.

This world is a vaporous jest at best,

Tossed off by the gods in laughter,

he was fond of quoting. And harbored no afterthought of those who had helped him enjoy "the jest"— and suffered for it.

His employment, when lowness of funds, and the lack of an easier mode of obtaining them, forced him to indulge in any, was of that heterogeneous nature to which an educated ne'er do-well usually resorts. Lately, since Melbourne was an uncomfortable place on account of the war and several "affairs" which had made it too warm for him, he had taken to travel ling through the scattered country districts as an agent for minor firms of little repute.

And it was while riding, late one afternoon, along the gum-fringed, deserted roads to Gulla Gulla that the accident happened.

It was a big black fiery brute of a horse, hired from a hotel in a neighboring township, on which he was mounted. His horsemanship was not of the best. The canny, beast soon realised it, threw him heavily, and galloped back home.

Ghastly, and blood-stained of face, James Carson, spiritual guardian to the Church of England section of Gulla Gulla, found him still, lying unconscious on the little-used road, when driving home about half an hour later, after a long and tiring round of back-country calls. He drove him as gently as possible to his own house, about a mile along the road.

It was next morning before Stanford opened his eyes in full consciousness, and stared dazedly .about the small bright room in which he lay. It was  redolent- of the sweetness of late honeysuckle clambering about the open window, and was undoubtedly the room of a girl. Its walls, furniture and hangings were white; its few pictures .delicate,, dainty in their, aesthetic choice.  Great pink roses sprawled over the big rush mat on the floor to match those on the light bed cover. Behind, the leaded glass doors of a business-like combined bookcase and writing desk, set over near the window, books were packed tightly and neatly. And looking at the small table, at the head of the bed, Stanford's queer, golden-tinted eyes smiled lazily: almost cynically, at the green bowl of clove pinks, exhaling breath, spicy and sweet, amongst the cool green of maiden-hair. But a sudden sharp pain smothered the smile, and, raising his hand to his head, he felt the bandage— and remembered.

"At any rate," he muttered, with characteristic philosophy, and a half whimsical, half-satirical grimace, "I seem to have landed in a soft place— so what matters?"

Then he looked toward the open door with quick interest. Someone was coming down the narrow hall, hushing the sound of her softly singing voice, as she approached the room in which he lay.

"Say!" he shouted impatiently greedy for attention now that he was awake. 'Where the devil am I?"

A girl appeared in the doorway, enveloped in a big business-like check apron. A broad shaft of sunlight from the open: window glowed warmly on her rather pale face, and gilded anew the golden glory of her yellow hair.

"I— I mean," stammered Stanford, staring at her as if she were an apparition, "w-where in the name of heaven am I?"

She laughed, stepped out of the shaft of sunlight, and stood at the head of the bed.

"Which will I tell you first?" she asked, with a whimsical twist of mouth and gleam of blue eyes: "where the devil you are, or where in the name of heaven you are?"

Stanford grinned, appreciatively. "Suppose, since you're looking so mighty like an angel in that check apron, I'd better ask the reverent way," he replied with mock humility.

"Well, since you ask so reverently," she mimicked, "I'll tell you. You're in Gulla Gulla rectory, my brother's place. He found you lying on the road in rather a bad way, and brought you along here for me to nurse. Which was awfully silly of him," she added, laughing, "because I knew about as much as a baby about that kind of thing." Then her face grew grave. "We thought of sending for the doctor at first, you looked so— ghastly. But the nearest one lives nine miles from here, and you wanted rather immediate attention, so Jim and I just managed things. Here he is now," she added, brightening again as a gate clanged, and heavy footsteps came up the path and down the hall. And her chin dimpled. "For goodness sake don't ask him where the devil you are, or he'll die of shock."

But the man who entered the room at the sound of her voice looked too big and broad and altogether "great" in his rather shabby clerical garb to die of shock over such a small profanity as that. He came in with breezy cheeriness and hospitality, and seated his big form on the edge of the bed.

"Mighty glad you're awake," he said, extending his hand cordially as the girl slipped quietly from the room. "You had a pretty severe tumble, you know. Was a good deal scared about you, though didn't let Stella guess."

But Stanford was staring at him speechlessly. He still felt a bit weak and dazed. "Say," he muttered presently, "Aren't you Jim Carson, the fellow we used to call St. James, at Wesley, about ten years ago?"

"That's me," said the other, surprised into rather unclerical grammar. "But— er— who the dickens are you? Know your eyes somehow, but can't for the life of me place you."

"Ron Stanford," said the man on the bed.

"Ron Stanford!" Carson gasped in credulously, and stared. "Lord, man." he added after a pause, "you have changed. I would not have known you!"

Stanford laughed uncertainly, a bit shamefacedly before the amazed candor of the straight, dark eyes. "Yes. I have changed," he admitted. "It's the life. But it's great running up against you like this!" he added lightly. "And it was jolly good of you an' your sister to— er— to manage things for me. But now that I'm all right.  I suppose I can get along to the hotel or somewhere?"

"Rot!" snapped Carson, forcefully.

"You'll go dippy if you start hopping around with a head like that! What's to prevent you from staying on here till you get steady again?"

"Thanks," mutterer Stanford with a genuine gratitude unusual with him. "But— er— what about this room? Isn't it your sister's?"

"Yes," laughed the other, cheerfully, "and the only room in the house that's worth calling a bedroom; that's why we put you in here. But Stel doesn't mind your using it in the least. She sleeps most nights in a tent in the orchard, close to mine. Uses this more for a writing den than anything else— writes bits of stories and things for the papers, you know. Plucky little kid"— his strong face softened as he spoke; "she insisted on coming up here to manage things for me. There're not many sisters who would do that for an old crony of a brother— leave all the gaieties of the city and everything.  And it's been pretty awful up here lately with the bush fires and no rain. She says she is just staying on to get some local color or something for a book she's starting. But I know bet ter. I'm away such a lot that It must be mighty dull for her, and I'll be only too glad for her to have your company for a while."

Stanford grinned. "You wouldn't if you knew me," he replied, rather brutally.

Carson looked close into the queerly colored, cynical eyes for a moment— and understood. "Sorry, old chap," he said simply, after a significant pause. "But it's never too late to buck up... I reckon I'll trust my sister in your company."

The cynicism left Stanford's eyes. "Thanks , Saint James," he grinned, his voice a bit husky. "Your way was always a— er— a jolly good way of making a chap heartily ashamed of himself."

"Saint James" laughed quietly and called his sister who, on being told of the old school acquaintance, immediately and with charming frankness, included herself in the friendship. And that, from a girl of Stella Carson's type, was not a thing that any sane man would want to run away from. Stanford soon found himself agreeing quite cheerfully to stay with them until he was quite fit to "get a move on." He was not the kind of man to throw aside any good thing that the gods placed in his path. Even when, after a couple of days' complete rest, he had recovered quite sufficiently to get a move on, he aped semi-convalescence— and lingered. He found the new environment on which he had stumbled mightily attractive after the atmosphere in which he had lived since he had begun to, as he inwardly expressed it, make a mess of his life; and the easy friendship between Stella and himself ripened rapidly during their long hours together while Jim was away, conscientiously and popularly fulfilling his duties to his scattered, and adoring flock. He proved cheerful and desirable company for the girl in the sultry heat of the long autumn days.

And not idle company either, since, determinedly sweeping aside all her laughing protests, he insisted on helping her with her numerous duties, so that they could sit longer in the cool shade of the heavy-laden apple trees at the end of the orchard, he amusing her with many queer stories of his Will o' the Wisp existence, and she telling him in return of her plans and her hopes in regard to her writing. Occasionally, at his urgent request, she read him a story of the opening chapters of her hook, all unconsciously revealing to him her healthy, wholesome outlook on life, and the general sweetness of her personality.

At those times Stanford felt— a cad. On the Saturday afternoon, after an exceptionally busy morning in the kitchen, during which he proved himself an adept in the culinary art of beating butter and sugar to a cream, the whipping of eggs to a frothy bubbliness, the mixing of icing, and sundry other helpful tasks with which she entrusted him. Stella allowed him, "as a special favor in reward for his usefulness," to accompany her on her daily visit to her pet protégée, an old, withered, cheerful little mite of a woman who was usually bedridden with rheumatism.

It proved a happy inspiration, for his breezy flow of tales and war news delighted the old soul almost out of herself, and made her wish aloud that "he'd come again along o' Miss Stella, because he reminded her, turruble, of her own fine strappin' son who had gone," she declared proudly, "to fight for his country, with the first contingent."

Stella's blue eyes smiled very sweetly at Stanford as they left the tiny cottage and started briskly for home. "You were awfully good to entertain the poor old soul like that," she said gratefully. "Somehow, I didn't think you'd have any time for— that kind of thing."

"Neither did I!" he laughed frankly. "It must have been you who inspired me, my Lady Star Eyes. But who is this son she was talking about?" he added curiously. "Isn't it his duty to be here, looking after her, instead of— over there?"

"It was through her that he went," the girl explained. "Tho' he did all he could to hide it from her, her keen old eyes soon saw how desperately he was fighting between his duty to her and his duty to his country. She insisted on his going; and never was a soldier prouder of his mother, and never a mother prouder of her soldier when Tom Pritchard went down to Melbourne and came back in his khaki to say good-bye, just before his departure for the front." The girl's eyes glowed proudly. "That's the kind of man, the kind of mother, who will help to save us women and children from falling in to the hands of those"— she shuddered — "those Germans!"

Stanford walked on a bit more briskly.

"Why don't you go?" she ventured, a little diffidently, presently.

"I?" Stanford laughed lightly, but a bit uncertainly, before the question in her eyes. "Oh, I like comfort above all things, and it would be all so beastly uncomfortable in trenches an' all that— over there."

Stella looked at him a moment, a slight frown wrinkling her brow— and was silent.

THE NEXT morning, at her request, he accompanied her to "Saint James' " little wooden church, in which was to be offered up a special prayer for peace. He had not entered a church for more years than he cared to re member. He was awkward, foolish, in finding the places in the small, prayer-book she lent him, and cursed it under his breath, fearing she might notice. But, if she did, she was tactful enough not to show it.

A subtle barrier of restraint had sprung up between them since their conversation on the way home the previous afternoon. And he cast many furtive glances at her now as she sat beside him, her soft hair fluffing goldenly beneath her shady hat, a rapt sweet expression on her rather pale face, and in her soft proud eyes as she and the other members of the congregation listened with adoring attention to her brother's simple sermon on the urgent necessity for courage and faith during the present troubled times; the necessity for self-denial, charity to those in want, and earnest prayer for the safety of the brave fellows who had gone out into the seething turmoil over the water, to sacrifice their lives, if necessary, to protect their country and their people from falling into the hands of a relentless enemy. And watching her, the latent good in Stanford's heart was worshipping her with a reverence that he had never felt for any woman, Apart from that mother who might have made a better man of him— had she lived. Suddenly, almost irresistibly, he wanted to take the small gloved hand clasped about her prayerbook, and press it close to his lips; Wanted to take her whole slim body into his arms, and tell her that— he loved her!

His rather dissipated face grew pale and tense about the mouth as he realised it. Then his lips twisted in a ghastly smile. God, what a mockery— his loving her! What a hopeless farce! Despite her proximity now, she was as far removed from him as a star— and as unattainable.

Stella— a star. That was what her name signified. Stella— a star.

"The desire of the moth," he muttered aloud. "The desire of the moth for the star." And laughed.

She looked at him, surprised for a moment, and then dismayed at the unusually haggard lines of his face.

"Do you feel ill?" she whispered, regardless of church etiquette.

"No," he murmured, with a sickly attempt at an apologetic grin. "My thoughts were wandering— that's all."

Then, suddenly his attention was directed to "Saint James's" earnest voice, low-toned and vibrant with enthusiasm:—

"And if they who go out to fight for us, to face, perhaps meet, death for us, do their duty as Kitchener and we would have them do it, I am sure, in the sight of God and in the sight of His people, any stains that may have blackened the pages of their past lives will be wiped out by the glory of their deeds, so that they, free men, will be able to start their books of life anew with clean pages before and behind them."

There was more; but that was all Stanford heard. Those few words seemed to have penetrated his brain in letters of fire that would never be obliterated.

Both Stella and he were subdued as they left the comparative coolness of the church for the heated atmosphere outside,

"Can we go a long way home— round by the creek or somewhere?" he suggested hesitatingly, as they started for home. "I— I am going tomorrow, and would like to have a talk With you— now."

And in quick response to the unusual earnestness of his manner, she turned in silence toward "the long way home."

They were both silent until they reached the creek, dry and parched, after the long rainless season. Then Stanford demanded abruptly:

"Do you believe what Jim said a while ago about men who go to fight for us coming back— free men, if they do only their duty, and come out of it alive?"

She turned her blue eyes to his in surprise. "Of course," she said simply; "it sounded too reasonable— too right, coming from Jim's lips, to disbelieve. I think that if they go thro' those— those horrors bravely and with honor, they would be forgiven anything— by anybody. Don't you think so, too?"

He stopped suddenly in the shade, of the big blackwood 'neath which they were passing.

"Listen!" he said, Staring down at her startled face, grim of chin and desperate of eye. "I— I'm a rotter, have pretty well always been a rotter— the worst of rotters. If I went and did my duty, and— came back, would I be forgiven anything— by anybody?"

"Of course," said Stella. "Why not?"

"And would I be fit to—love you?"

"To— to love me?" she stammered, helplessly.

"Yes!" he snapped fiercely. "You with your high code of honor and things. Jim knows that I have been a rotter. I told him when I first came here. Perhaps, who knows? he meant that for me— that what he said. It— it was mighty good of him if he did. But I suppose," bitterly, "it was too good to be true, really. No matter what I did— now, I wouldn't be fit to love you, would I?"

She was silent, her pale face averted.

"Would I?" he persisted, stubbornly.

She turned to him then, and perhaps, with the acute keenness of her sensitive nature, saw in the desperate eyes the man he might have been, and the man he still could be if what

"Saint James" said was true.

She laid her hand on his arm and looked up into his face.

"I don't quite know— yet," she said softly. "But— suppose you try?"

He drew his breath in sharply. The haggard lines left his face.

"You— you would— wait?" he stammered, with a sudden wild joy that refused to be smothered.

"Yes," she replied, looking far ahead into the vista of the uncertain future with blue eyes a little dim. "I will wait."

__________________

3: Miss Cameron's Art Sale.

Charlotte Rosalys Jones

In: The Hypnotic Experiment of Dr. Reeves, and other stories, 1894

I can find out nothing about this author, other than a slim volume of just 5 short stories, less than 13,000 words in all,  published by Bliss, Sands and Foster, London, in 1894.

KATHERINE CAMERON was spending her third winter in Paris. The first year she had led a quiet, uneventful student's life. The second season she launched out a little into society as represented by the English and American colonies, and now she was spoken of as that "clever and rich Miss Cameron," whom the English-speaking residents remembered to have seen at various musicales the year before.

On her return from America, with the reputation of added wealth, she found herself invited everywhere. Everyone wondered that she did not marry, for she was a young woman whom men admired apart from her money and accomplishments. But although she went out a great deal, and was usually surrounded by a little court of struggling tenors and impecunious titles, she seemed unmoved by all the attention she received, and apparently was not even greatly amused.

The truth was, Katherine Cameron, being a clever girl, had seen through the artificiality of it all, and still could not bear to give up the illusion she had cherished all her life, that she should find her real sphere in the society she would meet in Paris; it might be among her own country people, but they would be broadened by travel and study until all desirable and agreeable qualities would be blended into a harmonious whole.

When she decided to pass the winter with her aunt, Mrs. Montgomery, it was with the sweet hope that she should be able to realise her dreams of a little "Salon"— a revival of that delightful French institution and formulated on the same lines, but having American cleverness and adaptability added to it. It seemed feasible. Mrs. Montgomery had lived in Paris for years, and she knew all the resident society people, the rest of the "floating population" were usually provided with letters of introduction to her. Her "Tuesdays At Home" were delightful functions. Katherine Cameron had great respect for her aunt's discrimination, which often seemed prophetic, and caused uninitiated people to wonder how Mrs. Montgomery happened to have "taken up" some artist or singer who afterwards became famous.

Still Katherine was not entirely satisfied. Men liked her, but thought her cold; at any rate, she never fulfilled any promise of a flirtation that her agreeable manners might suggest. Women said she was ambitious, that she would only marry some distinguished foreigner, and yet Miss Cameron, who sometimes used forcible expressions, had been heard to say, "She would marry a 'Hottentot' if she loved him." She was honestly trying to get some good out of her surroundings, and was perfectly willing to fall in love, or to gratify her intellectual tastes, just as it might happen. Up to this time, however, she had been distinctly heart-whole, and aside from an occasional charming man or woman whom she met in society, or the interesting art students whom she knew (and liked best of all), it seemed to her clear and practical mind that there was a great deal of "padding," as she expressed it.

She resented, as a patriotic American woman of culture and refinement, that the so-called "exclusive" circles in the American quarter accepted some of the families who would not occupy conspicuous positions in their own free and enlightened country. She could not help comparing certain wealthy young society women with a clever but poor friend of hers, whose artistic talent had been recognized by her own warm-hearted Southern townspeople, who had contributed a sufficient sum to send Miss Paterson abroad, confident that her brush would one day repay them. The two young women had met at the studio of a common friend, and Miss Cameron, who professed to know nothing of art, had asked such intelligent questions of the young student that Miss Paterson, with a woman's quick intuition, had surmised that her fashionable countrywoman had a more artistic nature than she admitted. A friendship was begun, and Katherine Cameron became the confidante and admirer of the rising young artist.

Just now she has returned from a musicale at the hotel of one of the famous teachers, and she is describing it to Miss Paterson, who has come in for a chat and a quiet cup of tea.

"It makes me so indignant," she is saying, "when I think what an impression we must make on intelligent French people. Why this afternoon, at Madame de la Harpe's, it was simply one medley of disputing mothers and jealous pupils. Madame herself is so distinctly a lady, that when two irate mothers appealed to her as to which of their daughters should sing first, she shrugged her shoulders in true French fashion and said, 'They will both sing many times; they will sing so well that it will be doubtless required'— a diplomatic answer! She knew her audience, and felt that a programme of twenty-three numbers could not admit of many encores in one afternoon. I noticed she did not deviate from the original plan. Then that vulgar Mrs. Booth, from somewhere out west, who has the gorgeous apartment, and the family of extremely pretty daughters, asked me if I would join their French class. 'We have an actor, M. de Valle, to teach us,' she said, 'he is just splendid— so handsome and so polite; only he will make us congregate verbs.' To my horror, Mr. Vincent, of the English Embassy, who is so coldly critical of everything American, overheard her, and I saw him trying to suppress a smile, which made me indignant, so I impulsively replied, 'I shall be charmed, Mrs. Booth— so kind of you to ask me.' And now I shall have to extricate myself from that situation, for, although I have a certain appreciation of the ludicrous, I cannot sacrifice one night of every week, even to show Mr. Vincent that I despise his criticism."

"But I have rather thought Mr. Vincent one of your admirers," Miss Paterson returns.

"Admirer? He sees in me a young person who will not be apt to make any very ridiculous blunders, and as he has to appear occasionally, being in the diplomatic service, he talks to me as a sort of compromise between the tourist element and his own fixed aristocracy. I love to shock him. Why, to-day, he said, in that deliberate tone he employs when he wishes to be particularly patronizing, 'I suppose you go in for all sorts of things, Miss Cameron. I hear you are artistic, and know the Latin Quarter better than this side of the river. When do you get it all in?' I told him to behold a young person positively unique in Paris— one who was actively pursuing nothing. And then he actually remarked that 'in an age where all the young women were running mad with fads it was refreshing to find one so confessedly idle.' He aggravates me so that I always lose my head, and get the worst of the argument. But here I am talking away, and forgetting that I am to hear all about you and your plans."

Miss Cameron soon proved that she could listen as well as talk, for she was most attentive while Miss Paterson told her about a letter which she had received that day, and which had disturbed her not a little. In the midst of their displeasure both girls saw the ludicrous side of it, for it was nothing less than a letter from Miss Paterson's townspeople forbidding her marriage to the penniless young sculptor with whom she had fallen in love.

"What impertinence!" Miss Cameron remarks; "talk about the tyranny of European courts! Here you are, an orphan, without a relative in the world to restrain you, and these people fancy they own you, and can control your liberty just because they have furnished you with funds which they ought to know will be returned to them."

"But there is a moral obligation," Miss Paterson replied. "I shall send them back every penny of their money as soon as possible, and I shall always feel a debt of gratitude which no pecuniary remuneration can cover."

"Little saint!" Miss Cameron exclaims, but she respects her brave little countrywoman all the more, because she is so visibly distressed at the situation.

"Let us go over the facts," adds Miss Cameron. "Here they are briefly: A number of your townspeople, seeing in you evidences of talent, raised a sum of money and sent you to Paris two years ago. Two of these people selected your masters (fortunately they made no mistake there); you have worked faithfully and conscientiously, and have accomplished more than most art students do in twice the time. This year two of your studies have been in the Salon, one of them was bought by a Frenchman of critical taste; and you have a number of charming saleable studies, besides your large picture of the garden-party intended for next year's Salon, in which festive scene your humble servant poses as the hostess serving tea to a group of fin-de-siècle society people. You are sure to make a hit with that, so many of the figures are actual portraits, and Paris dotes on personalities. It is conceded that merit no longer wins, but to be 'received' one must be a friend of some member of the jury, or paint the people whose vanity moves them to pull some wire, so that they may gaze down from the Salon walls upon an inquisitive and envious public."

"And in this case can I count on you or some of your admirers to pull the wires, Katherine?" Miss Paterson mischievously asks.

"Yes; that picture shall hang 'on the line,' even if I have to lobby for it; but you know all the artists think it splendidly treated," said Miss Cameron.

"I hoped it would be received this year, but, do you know, I have been considering all day whether I had better not sell it now, and send back as much money as I can raise immediately; for I intend to marry Edgar McDowald, with the benediction of my patrons if possible— without it if necessary," emphatically declares Miss Paterson.

"And I shall aid and abet you, especially if you intend to show them that 'love laughs at locksmiths'— and creditors. But, seriously, why not have an art sale? I am off to a musicale at that extraordinary Mrs. Smyth's (formerly spelt with an i), who begins every Monday morning sending letters, followed during the week by three-cornered notes marked 'pressée,' in which she 'begges' her dear friend, whoever it may be, to run in Saturday afternoon, and casually remarks that some 'celebrated musicien' will perform. The joke is they usually do, and we all find ourselves there once or twice a season. To-night the American Minister has promised to be present, and I shall profit by the occasion to invite everyone to your studio next week to see some charming studies which will be for sale."

Miss Paterson knew Miss Cameron's influence, and felt that she was quite safe in letting her friend have her way; so after talking over the details they separated.

That evening Miss Cameron succeeded in quietly scattering the information through the crowded rooms that a very charming friend of hers, the Miss Paterson, who occasionally received with her, would have a little private art sale the following week. Among the attentive listeners was Mr. Vincent, who casually asked if Miss Paterson had finished her Salon picture which she had described to him.

"She has," Miss Cameron replied, and suddenly added, "And you know, Mr. Vincent, I cannot offer my friend money, nor would she sell me so important a picture as her large one, for she would think I did it to help her; now, I want to ask you, as the person she would think of as being the last one connected with me (here Mr. Vincent smiled a rather melancholy but affirmative smile), to buy two of her studies for me in some other name. I can easily dispose of them as presents, and she will never be the wiser."

"Miss Cameron's wishes are my commands. I will call on Miss Paterson before Wednesday, and on the day when the exhibition takes place, you can be sure that at least two pictures will be marked 'Sold.'"

"That will give a business-like air to the whole arrangement, Mr. Vincent, and suggest to any possible buyers that other equally attractive studies are for sale. This must be a profound secret. Do you promise?"

"Certainly," Mr. Vincent replied, and Miss Cameron knew she could trust him.

"He is really very likeable, when one sees him alone," Miss Cameron soliloquizes; and then she reflects that it is decidedly her fault that she does not see Mr. Vincent more frequently in his best light; she remembers various occasions when she has made their duet a trio by addressing some third person, thus preventing a possible tête-à-tête.

The afternoon selected by Miss Paterson arrived, and as Miss Cameron alighted from her coupé in the humble street where art and poor students hold sway, she remarked with pleasure a goodly line of private carriages, and knew that her scheme had succeeded, and that Miss Paterson was the fashion— at least of the hour. The question was, Would they buy her pictures? And then she added to herself, "They must be sold, even if I have to find other agents, and buy them all in." But the loyal girl might have spared herself any anxiety. As she entered the room, which was artistically draped and hung with numerous strongly-executed sketches, she saw the magic word "Sold," not only on several of the small studies, but conspicuously placed at the base of the largest canvas, Miss Paterson's salon picture, in which Miss Cameron is the central and principal figure.

"Isn't it too delightful, dear?" Miss Paterson whispers to her. "An Englishman, a friend of Mr. Vincent's, came here with him yesterday, saw my canvas, liked it, asked my price, and actually took it. Mr. Vincent also bought two other studies, and several have gone to-day. Edgar has lost no time. He has disappeared now to cable to my esteemed benefactors, 'Marriage will take place; cheque for full amount on way.' Extravagant of us, I know, and of course it's extremely 'previous,' but we really see our way clear to happiness, and I shall always feel you did it all."

As Miss Cameron shook hands with Mr. Vincent that day she told him that he had been instrumental in making two deserving people happy.

"It was so thoughtful to bring your friend here, who bought the large picture," she says. And then she adds, "Did I ever see him?"

"I think you have seen him," Mr. Vincent replies. Something in his manner betrays him, and Miss Cameron, guessing the truth, impulsively says:

"You bought it yourself, Mr. Vincent."

"Hush!" he softly whispers, with his finger on his lips. "We are fellow-conspirators, and cannot betray each other."

NEXT YEAR, when a great American city gave Edgar McDowald the order for a State monument, the beauty of his designs having distanced all competitors, Parisians remarked that Mrs. Montgomery's discrimination, as regarded celebrities, seemed to have fallen upon her niece.

Mr. and Mrs. McDowald delight in telling of their romantic courtship, and how Miss Cameron's scheme of an art sale brought about their marriage; but Miss Cameron always affirms that its success was not due to her, but to Mr. Vincent's tact in exhibiting that expensive canvas to his friend.

Miss Cameron, being a worldly-wise young woman, tries to feel that Mr. Vincent's motives were wholly generous and disinterested; but if what rumour says is true, Mr. Vincent would do more than that for the charming central figure in Mrs. McDowald's Salon picture, which now looks down from a good position in the library of his own English home, and which never hung "on the line" after all.

__________________

4: The Exit of Anse Dugmore

Irvin S. Cobb

1876-1944

The Saturday Evening Post, 17 Dec 1910

WHEN a Kentucky mountaineer goes to the penitentiary the chances are that he gets sore eyes from the white walls that enclose him, or quick consumption from the thick air that he breathes. It was entirely in accordance with the run of his luck that Anse Dugmore should get them both, the sore eyes first and then the consumption.

There is seldom anything that is picturesque about the man-killer of the mountain country. He is lacking sadly in the romantic aspect and the delightfully studied vernacular with which an inspired school of fiction has invested our Western gun-fighter. No alluring jingle of belted accouterment goes with him, no gift of deadly humor adorns his equally deadly gun-play. He does his killing in an unemotional, unattractive kind of way, with absolutely no regard for costume or setting. Rarely is he a fine figure of a man.

Take Anse Dugmore now. He had a short-waisted, thin body and abnormally long, thin legs, like the shadow a man casts at sunup. He didn't have that steel-gray eye of which we so often read. His eyes weren't of any particular color, and he had a straggly mustache of sandy red and no chin worth mentioning; but he could shoot off a squirrel's head, or a man's, at the distance of a considerable number of yards.

Until he was past thirty he played merely an incidental part in the tribal war that had raged up and down Yellow Banks Creek and its principal tributary, the Pigeon Roost, since long before the Big War. He was getting out timber to be floated down the river on the spring rise when word came to him of an ambuscade that made him the head of his immediate clan and the upholder of his family's honor.

"Yore paw an' yore two brothers was laywaid this mawnin' comin' 'long Yaller Banks togither," was the message brought by a breathless bearer of news. "The wimmenfolks air totin' 'em home now. Talt, he ain't dead yit."

From a dry spot behind a log Anse lifted his rifle and started over the ridge with the long, shambling gait of the born hill-climber that eats up the miles. For this emergency he had been schooled years back when he sat by a wood fire in a cabin of split boards and listened to his crippled-up father reciting the saga of the feud, with the tally of this one killed and that one maimed; for this he had been schooled when he practiced with rifle and revolver until, even as a boy, his aim had become as near an infallible thing as anything human gets to be; for this he had been schooled still more when he rode, armed and watchful, to church or court or election. Its coming found him ready.

Two days he ranged the ridges, watching his chance. The Tranthams were hard to find. They were barricaded in their log-walled strongholds, well guarded in anticipation of expected reprisals, and prepared in due season to come forth and prove by a dozen witnesses, or two dozen if so many should be needed to establish the alibi, that they had no hand in the massacre of the Dugmores.

But two days and nights of still-hunting, of patiently lying in wait behind brush fences, of noiseless, pussy-footed patrolling in likely places, brought the survivor of the decimated Dugmores his chance. He caught Pegleg Trantham riding down Red Bird Creek on a mare-mule. Pegleg was only a distant connection of the main strain of the enemy. It was probable that he had no part in the latest murdering; perhaps doubtful that he had any prior knowledge of the plot. But by his name and his blood-tie he was a Trantham, which was enough.

A writer of the Western school would have found little in this encounter that was really worth while to write about. Above the place of the meeting rose the flank of the mountain, scarred with washes and scantily clothed with stunted trees, so that in patches the soil showed through like the hide of a mangy hound. The creek was swollen by the April rains and ran bank-full through raw, red walls. Old Pegleg came cantering along with his rifle balanced on the sliding withers of his mare-mule, for he rode without a saddle. He was an oldish man and fat for a mountaineer. A ten-year-old nephew rode behind him, with his short arms encircling his uncle's paunch. The old man wore a dirty white shirt with a tabbed bosom; a single shiny white china button held the neckband together at the back. Below the button the shirt billowed open, showing his naked back. His wooden leg stuck straight out to the side, its worn brass tip carrying a blob of red mud, and his good leg dangled down straight, with the trousers hitched half-way up the bare shank and a soiled white-yarn sock falling down into the wrinkled and gaping top of an ancient congress gaiter.

From out of the woods came Anse Dugmore, bareheaded, crusted to his knees with dried mud and wet from the rain that had been dripping down since daybreak. A purpose showed in all the lines of his slouchy frame.

Pegleg jerked his rifle up, but he was hampered by the boy's arms about his middle and by his insecure perch upon the peaks of the slab-sided mule. The man afoot fired before the mounted enemy could swing his gunbarrel into line. The bullet ripped away the lower part of Pegleg's face and grazed the cheek of the crouching youngster behind him. The white-eyed nephew slid head first off the buck-jumping mule and instantly scuttled on all fours into the underbrush. The rifle dropped out of Trantham's hands and he lurched forward on the mule's neck, grabbing out with blind, groping motions. Dugmore stepped two paces forward to free his eyes of the smoke, which eddied back from his gunmuzzle into his face, and fired twice rapidly. The mule was bouncing up and down, sideways, in a mild panic. Pegleg rolled off her, as inert as a sack of grits, and lay face upward in the path, with his arms wide outspread on the mud. The mule galloped off in a restrained and dignified style until she was a hundred yards away, and then, having snorted the smells of burnt powder and fresh blood out of her nostrils, she fell to cropping the young leaves off the wayside bushes, mouthing the tender green shoots on her heavy iron bit contentedly.

For a long minute Anse Dugmore stood in the narrow footpath, listening. Then he slid three new shells into his rifle, and slipping down the bank he crossed the creek on a jam of driftwood and, avoiding the roads that followed the little watercourse, made over the shoulder of the mountain for his cabin, two miles down on the opposite side. When he was gone from sight the nephew of the dead Trantham rolled out of his hiding place and fled up the road, holding one hand to his wounded cheek and whimpering. Presently a gaunt, half-wild boar pig, with his spine arched like the mountains, came sniffing slowly down the hill, pausing frequently to cock his wedge-shaped head aloft and fix a hostile eye on two turkey buzzards that began to swing in narrowing circles over one particular spot on the bank of the creek.

The following day Anse sent word to the sheriff that he would be coming in to give himself up. It would not have been etiquette for the sheriff to come for him. He came in, well guarded on the way by certain of his clan, pleaded self-defense before a friendly county judge and was locked up in a one-cell log jail. His own cousin was the jailer and ministered to him kindly. He avoided passing the single barred window of the jail in the daytime or at night when there was a light behind him, and he expected to "come clear" shortly, as was customary.

But the Tranthams broke the rules of the game. The circuit judge lived half-way across the mountains in a county on the Virginia line; he was not an active partizan of either side in the feud. These Tranthams, disregarding all the ethics, went before this circuit judge and asked him for a change of venue, and got it, which was more; so that instead of being tried in Clayton County— and promptly acquitted— Anse Dugmore was taken to Woodbine County and there lodged in a shiny new brick jail. Things were in process of change in Woodbine. A spur of the railroad had nosed its way up from the lowlands and on through the Gap, and had made Loudon, the county-seat, a division terminal. Strangers from the North had come in, opening up the mountains to mines and sawmills and bringing with them many swarthy foreign laborers. A young man of large hopes and an Eastern college education had started a weekly newspaper and was talking big, in his editorial columns, of a new order of things. The foundation had even been laid for a graded school. Plainly Woodbine County was falling out of touch with the century-old traditions of her sisters to the north and west of her.

In due season, then, Anse Dugmore was brought up on a charge of homicide. The trial lasted less than a day. A jury of strangers heard the stories of Anse himself and of the dead Pegleg's white-eyed nephew. In the early afternoon they came back, a wooden toothpick in each mouth, from the new hotel where they had just had a most satisfying fifty-cent dinner at the expense of the commonwealth, and sentenced the defendant, Anderson Dugmore, to state prison at hard labor for the balance of his natural life.

The sheriff of Woodbine padlocked on Anse's ankles a set of leg irons that had been made by a mountain blacksmith out of log chains and led him to the new depot. It was Anse Dugmore's first ride on a railroad train; also it was the first ride on any train for Wyatt Trantham, head of the other clan, who, having been elected to the legislature while Anse lay in jail, had come over from Clayton, bound for the state capital, to draw his mileage and be a statesman.

It was not in the breed for the victorious Trantham to taunt his hobbled enemy or even to look his way, but he sat just across the aisle from the prisoner so that his ear might catch the jangle of the heavy irons when Dugmore moved in his seat. They all left the train together at the little blue-painted Frankfort station, Trantham turning off at the first crossroads to go where the round dome of the old capitol showed above the water-maple trees, and Dugmore clanking straight ahead, with a string of negroes and boys and the sheriff following along behind him. Under the shadow of a quarried-out hillside a gate opened in a high stone wall to admit him into life membership with a white-and-black-striped brotherhood of shame.

Four years there did the work for the gangling, silent mountaineer. One day, just before the Christmas holidays, the new governor of the state paid a visit to the prison. Only his private secretary came with him. The warden showed them through the cell houses, the workshops, the dining hall and the walled yards. It was a Sunday afternoon; the white prisoners loafed in their stockade, the blacks in theirs. In a corner on the white side, where the thin and skimpy winter sunshine slanted over the stockade wall, Anse Dugmore was squatted; merely a rack of bones enclosed in a shapeless covering of black-and-white stripes. On his close-cropped head and over his cheekbones the skin was stretched so tight it seemed nearly ready to split. His eyes, glassy and bleared with pain, stared ahead of him with a sick man's fixed stare. Inside his convict's cotton shirt his chest was caved away almost to nothing, and from the collarless neckband his neck rose as bony as a plucked fowl's, with great, blue cords in it. Lacking a coverlet to pick, his fingers picked at the skin on his retreating chin.

As the governor stood in an arched doorway watching, the lengthening afternoon shadow edged along and covered the hunkered-down figure by the wall. Anse tottered to his feet, moved a few inches so that he might still be in the sunshine, and settled down again. This small exertion started a cough that threatened to tear him apart. He drew his hand across his mouth and a red stain came away on the knotty knuckles. The warden was a kindly enough man in the ordinary relations of life, but nine years as a tamer of man-beasts in a great stone cage had overlaid his sympathies with a thickening callus.

"One of our lifers that we won't have with us much longer," he said casually, noting that the governor's eyes followed the sick convict. "When the con gets one of these hillbillies he goes mighty fast."

"A mountaineer, then?" said the governor. "What's his name?"

"Dugmore," answered the warden; "sent from Clayton County. One of those Clayton County feud fighters."

The governor nodded understandingly. "What sort of a record has he made here?"

"Oh, fair enough!" said the warden. "Those man-killers from the mountains generally make good prisoners. Funny thing about this fellow, though. All the time he's been here he never, so far as I know, had a message or a visitor or a line of writing from the outside. Nor wrote a letter out himself. Nor made friends with anybody, convict or guard."

"Has he applied for a pardon?" asked the governor.

"Lord, no!" said the warden. "When he was well he just took what was coming to him, the same as he's taking it now. I can look up his record, though, if you'd care to see it, sir."

"I believe I should," said the governor quietly.

A spectacled young wife-murderer, who worked in the prison office on the prison books, got down a book and looked through it until he came to a certain entry on a certain page. The warden was right— so far as the black marks of the prison discipline went, the friendless convict's record showed fair.

"I think," said the young governor to the warden and his secretary when they had moved out of hearing of the convict bookkeeper— "I think I'll give that poor devil a pardon for a Christmas gift. It's no more than a mercy to let him die at home, if he has any home to go to."

"I could have him brought in and let you tell him yourself, sir," volunteered the warden.

"No, no," said the governor quickly. "I don't want to hear that cough again. Nor look on such a wreck," he added.

Two days before Christmas the warden sent to the hospital ward for No. 874. No. 874, that being Anse Dugmore, came shuffling in and kept himself upright by holding with one hand to the door jamb. The warden sat rotund and impressive, in a swivel chair, holding in his hands a folded-up, blue-backed document.

"Dugmore," he said in his best official manner, "when His Excellency, Governor Woodford, was here on Sunday he took notice that your general health was not good. So, of his own accord, he has sent you an unconditional pardon for a Christmas gift, and here it is."

The sick convict's eyes, between their festering lids, fixed on the warden's face and a sudden light flickered in their pale, glazed shallows; but he didn't speak. There was a little pause.

"I said the governor has given you a pardon," repeated the warden, staring hard at him.

"I heered you the fust time," croaked the prisoner in his eaten-out voice. "When kin I go?"

"Is that all you've got to say?" demanded the warden, bristling up.

"I said, when kin I go?" repeated No. 874.

"Go!— you can go now. You can't go too soon to suit me!"

The warden swung his chair around and showed him the broad of his indignant back. When he had filled out certain forms at his desk he shoved a pen into the silent consumptive's fingers and showed him crossly where to make his mark. At a signal from his bent forefinger a negro trusty came forward and took the pardoned man away and helped him put his shrunken limbs into a suit of the prison-made slops, of cheap, black shoddy, with the taint of a jail thick and heavy on it. A deputy warden thrust into Dugmore's hands a railroad ticket and the five dollars that the law requires shall be given to a freed felon. He took them without a word and, still without a word, stepped out of the gate that swung open for him and into a light, spitty snowstorm. With the inbred instinct of the hillsman he swung about and headed for the little, light-blue station at the head of the crooked street. He went slowly, coughing often as the cold air struck into his wasted lungs, and sometimes staggering up against the fences. Through a barred window the wondering warden sourly watched the crawling, tottery figure.

"Damned savage!" he said to himself. "Didn't even say thank you. I'll bet he never had any more feelings or sentiments in his life than a moccasin snake."

Something to the same general effect was expressed a few minutes later by a brakeman who had just helped a wofully feeble passenger aboard the eastbound train and had steered him, staggering and gasping from weakness, to a seat at the forward end of an odorous red-plush day coach.

"Just a bundle of bones held together by a skin," the brakeman was saying to the conductor, "and the smell of the pen all over him. Never said a word to me— just looked at me sort of dumb. Bound for plumb up at the far end of the division, accordin' to the way his ticket reads. I doubt if he lives to get there."

The warden and the brakeman both were wrong. The freed man did live to get there. And it was an emotion which the warden had never suspected that held life in him all that afternoon and through the comfortless night in the packed and noisome day coach, while the fussy, self-sufficient little train went looping, like an overgrown measuring worm, up through the blue grass, around the outlying knobs of the foothills, on and on through the great riven chasm of the gateway into a bleak, bare clutch of undersized mountains. Anse Dugmore had two bad hemorrhages on the way, but he lived.

UNDER THE full moon of a white and flawless night before Christmas, Shem Dugmore's squatty log cabin made a blot on the thin blanket of snow, and inside the one room of the cabin Shem Dugmore sat alone by the daubed-clay hearth, glooming. Hours passed and he hardly moved except to stir the red coals or kick back some ambitious ember of hickory that leaped out upon the uneven floor. Suddenly something heavy fell limply against the locked door, and instantly, all alertness, the shock-headed mountaineer was backed up against the farther wall, out of range of the two windows, with his weapons drawn, silent, ready for what might come. After a minute there was a feeble, faint pecking sound— half knock, half scratch— at the lower part of the door. It might have been a wornout dog or any spent wild creature, but no line of Shem Dugmore's figure relaxed, and under his thick, sandy brows his eyes, in the flickering light, had the greenish shine of an angry cat-animal's.

"Whut is it?" he called. "And whut do you want? Speak out peartly!"

The answer came through the thick planking thinly, in a sort of gasping whine that ended in a chattering cough; but even after Shem's ear caught the words, and even after he recognized the changed but still familiar cadence of the voice, he abated none of his caution. Carefully he unbolted the door, and, drawing it inch by inch slowly ajar, he reached out, exposing only his hand and arm, and drew bodily inside the shell of a man that was fallen, huddled up, against the log door jamb. He dropped the wooden crossbar back into its sockets before he looked a second time at the intruder, who had crawled across the floor and now lay before the wide mouth of the hearth in a choking spell. Shem Dugmore made no move until the fit was over and the sufferer lay quiet.

"How did you git out, Anse?" were the first words he spoke.

The consumptive rolled his head weakly from side to side and swallowed desperately. "Pardoned out— in writin'— yistiddy."

"You air in purty bad shape," said Shem.

"Yes,"— the words came very slowly— "my lungs give out on me— and my eyes. But— but I got here."

"You come jist in time," said his cousin; "this time tomorrer and you wouldn't a' never found me here. I'd 'a' been gone."

"Gone!— gone whar?"

"Well," said Shem slowly, "after you was sent away it seemed like them Tranthams got the upper hand complete. All of our side whut ain't dead— and that's powerful few— is moved off out of the mountings to Winchester, down in the settlemints. I'm 'bout the last, and I'm a-purposin' to slip out tomorrer night while the Tranthams is at their Christmas rackets— they'd layway me too ef—"

"But my wife— did she—"

"I thought maybe you'd heered tell about that whilst you was down yon," said Shem in a dulled wonder. "The fall after you was took away yore woman she went over to the Tranthams. Yes, sir; she took up with the head devil of 'em all— old Wyatt Trantham hisself— and she went to live at his house up on the Yaller Banks."

"Is she— Did she—"

The ex-convict was struggling to his knees. His groping skeletons of hands were right in the hot ashes. The heat cooked the moisture from his sodden garments in little films of vapor and filled the cabin with the reek of the prison dye.

"Did she— did she—"

"Oh, she's been dead quite a spell now," stated Shem. "I would have s'posed you'd 'a' heered that, too, somewhars. She had a kind of a risin' in the breast."

"But my young uns— little Anderson and— and Elviry?"

The sick man was clear up on his knees now, his long arms hanging and his eyes, behind their matted lids, fixed on Shem's impassive face. Could the warden have seen him now, and marked his attitude and his words, he would have known what it was that had brought this dying man back to his own mountain valley with the breath of life still in him. A dumb, unuttered love for the two shock-headed babies he had left behind in the split-board cabin was the one big thing in Anse Dugmore's whole being— bigger even than his sense of allegiance to the feud.

"My young uns, Shem?"

"Wyatt Trantham took 'em and he kep' 'em— he's got 'em both now."

"Does he— does he use 'em kindly?"

"I ain't never heered," said Shem simply. "He never had no young uns of his own, and it mout be he uses 'em well. He's the high sheriff now."

"I was countin' on gittin' to see 'em agin— an buyin 'em some little Chrismus fixin's," the father wheezed. Hopelessness was coming into his rasping whisper. "I reckon it ain't no use to— to be thinkin'— of that there now?"

"No 'arthly use at all," said Shem, with brutal directness. "Ef you had the strength to git thar, the Tranthams would shoot you down like a fice dog."

Anse nodded weakly. He sank down again on the floor, face to the boards, coughing hard. It was the droning voice of his cousin that brought him back from the borders of the coma he had been fighting off for hours.

For, to Shem, the best hater and the poorest fighter of all his cleaned-out clan, had come a great thought. He shook the drowsing man and roused him, and plied him with sips from a dipper of the unhallowed white corn whisky of a mountain still-house. And as he worked over him he told off the tally of the last four years: of the uneven, unmerciful war, ticking off on his blunt finger ends the grim totals of this one ambushed and that one killed in the open, overpowered and beaten under by weight of odds. He told such details as he knew of the theft of the young wife and the young ones, Elvira and little Anderson.

"Anse, did ary Trantham see you a-gittin' here tonight?"

"Nobody— that knowed me— seed me."

"Old Wyatt Trantham, he rid into Manchester this evenin' 'bout fo' o'clock— I seed him passin' over the ridge," went on Shem. "He'll be ridin' back 'long Pigeon Roost some time before mawnin'. He done you a heap o' dirt, Anse."

The prostrate man was listening hard.

"Anse, I got yore old rifle right here in the house. Ef you could git up thar on the mounting, somewhar's alongside the Pigeon Roost trail, you could git him shore. He'll be full of licker comin' back."

And now a seeming marvel was coming to pass, for the caved-in trunk was rising on the pipestem legs and the shaking fingers were outstretched, reaching for something.

Shem stepped lightly to a corner of the cabin and brought forth a rifle and began reloading it afresh from a box of shells.

A WAVERING figure crept across the small stump-dotted "dead'ning"— Anse Dugmore was upon his errand. He dragged the rifle by the barrel, so that its butt made a crooked, broken furrow in the new snow like the trail of a crippled snake. He fell and got up, and fell and rose again. He coughed and up the ridge a ranging dog-fox barked back an answer to his cough.

From out of the slitted door Shem watched him until the scrub oaks at the edge of the clearing swallowed him up. Then Shem fastened himself in and made ready to start his flight to the lowlands that very night.

JUST BELOW the forks of Pigeon Roost Creek the trail that followed its banks widened into a track wide enough for wagon wheels. On one side lay the diminished creek, now filmed over with a glaze of young ice. On the other the mountain rose steeply. Fifteen feet up the bluff side a fallen dead tree projected its rotted, broken roots, like snaggled teeth, from the clayey bank. Behind this tree's trunk, in the snow and half-frozen, half-melted yellow mire, Anse Dugmore was stretched on his face. The barrel of the rifle barely showed itself through the interlacing root ends. It pointed downward and northward toward the broad, moonlit place in the road. Its stock was pressed tightly against Anse Dugmore's fallen-in cheek; the trigger finger of his right hand, fleshless as a joint of cane, was crooked about the trigger guard. A thin stream of blood ran from his mouth and dribbled down his chin and coagulated in a sticky smear upon the gun stock. His lungs, what was left of them, were draining away.

He lay without motion, saving up the last ounce of his life. The cold had crawled up his legs to his hips; he was dead already from the waist down. He no longer coughed, only gasped thickly. He knew that he was about gone; but he knew, too, that he would last, clear-minded and clear-eyed, until High Sheriff Wyatt Trantham came. His brain would last— and his trigger finger.

Then he heard him coming. Up the trail sounded the muffled music of a pacer's hoofs single-footing through the snow, and after that, almost instantly Trantham rode out into sight and loomed larger and larger as he drew steadily near the open place under the bank. He was wavering in the saddle. He drew nearer and nearer, and as he came out on the wide patch of moonlit snow, he pulled the single-footer down to a walk and halted him and began fumbling in the right-hand side of the saddlebags that draped his horse's shoulder.

Up in its covert the rifle barrel moved an inch or two, then steadied and stopped, the bone-sight at its tip resting full on the broad of the drunken rider's breast. The boney finger moved inward from the trigger guard and closed ever so gently about the touchy, hair-filed trigger— then waited.

For the uncertain hand of Trantham, every movement showing plain in the crystal, hard, white moon, was slowly bringing from under the flap of the right-side saddlebag something that was round and smooth and shone with a yellowish glassy light, like a fat flask filled with spirits. And Anse Dugmore waited, being minded now to shoot him as he put the bottle to his lips, and so cheat Trantham of his last drink on earth, as Trantham had cheated him of his liberty and his babies— as Trantham had cheated those babies of the Christmas fixings which the state's five dollars might have bought.

He waited, waited—

THIS WAS NOT the first time the high sheriff had stopped that night on his homeward ride from the tiny county seat, as his befuddlement proclaimed; but halting there in the open, just past the forks of the Pigeon Roost, he was moved by a new idea. He fumbled in the right-hand flap of his saddlebags and brought out a toy drum, round and smooth, with shiny yellow sides. A cheap china doll with painted black ringlets and painted blue eyes followed the drum, and then a torn paper bag, from which small pieces of cheap red-and-green dyed candy sifted out between the sheriff's fumbling fingers and fell into the snow.

Thirty feet away, in the dead leaves matted under the roots of an uptorn dead tree, something moved— something moved; and then there was a sound like a long, deep, gurgling sigh, and another sound like some heavy, lengthy object settling itself down flat upon the snow and the leaves.

The first faint rustle cleared Trantham's brain of the liquor fumes. He jammed the toys and the candy back into the saddlebags and jerked his horse sidewise into the protecting shadow of the bluff, reaching at the same time to the shoulder holster buckled about his body under the unbuttoned overcoat. For a long minute he listened keenly, the drawn pistol in his hand. There was nothing to hear except his own breathing and the breathing of his horse.

"Sho! Some old hawg turnin' over in her bed," he said to the horse, and holstering the pistol he went racking on down Pigeon Roost Creek, with Christmas for Elviry and little Anderson in his saddlebags.

WHEN they found Anse Dugmore in his ambush another snow had fallen on his back and he was slightly more of a skeleton than ever; but the bony finger was still crooked about the trigger, the rusted hammer was back at full cock and there was a dried brownish stain on the gun stock. So, from these facts, his finders were moved to conclude that the freed convict must have bled to death from his lungs before the sheriff ever passed, which they held to be a good thing all round and a lucky thing for the sheriff.

___________________

5: The Third Partner

Edward S. Sorenson

1869-1939

Sydney Mail (NSW), 4 Sep 1907

Edward S Sorenson

DAVE HARDY and Ham Rolin were all-round bush workers; but occasionally, in slack times, they quitted the usual fields of employment and went into camp in the wild game haunts of Bungawalbyn Creek. There they shot ducks for the Sydney market. No change of life could be more complete. It had its disadvantages, its dangers, and hardships: but it was free, adventurous, remunerative, and stimulating to their sporting instincts.

In the heat of summer, in the frost of winter, it was all the same to Dave and Ham. They would tramp over miles of country in sunshine and rain, wade shoulderdeep for hours through weed-covered water, where ugly, ravenous leeches stretched after them like animated indiarubber, to be emptied later from blood-reeking boots. In winter, blue and numbed with cold, their teeth chattering like castanets; in summer, teeming with perspiration in breathless mangroves, crawling within strike of snakes in long grass, stepping out of one swamp with dripping clothes that dried on them before they reached the next. There were buoyant mangrove beds over which they trod to reach the duck ponds, and through which, treading unexpectedly on a weak spot, they often dropped into deep water. The rushes rustled like dry cane leaves, and cut like razor blades, necessitating much time and patience to got through without hurt, and without startling the game.

The game laws were openly infringed in the close season, and on Sundays, they had need of sharp ears and keen sight to kjep out of the clutches of the police. More than once the duck-shooters had shivered for hours in mid-swamp, crouched between bunches of reeds, while the sergeant and his henchmen patrolled the shore. If surprised on land, they threw the game into the grass, and pleasantly inquired, when they met tho hostile party, if it had seen any dingoes or kangaroos in its travels. In one instance they were almost caught near camp. Ham Rolin happened to be carrying a young kangaroo for the dogs. This proved their salvation. When Dave saw the blue coats coming, he just dropped the game and walked on. Ham knelt down, ostensibly to tie his boot-lace, and packed some twenty ducks hurriedly into that marsupial, which had been cut open to lighten it, then skewered it up with a stick. It bulged like a sheep that has just come out of a tank; even Constable X24 remarked that it was a fat macropod for that time of the year; but the trick passed undetected.

The two men had been away from the swamps for eighteen months. Consequently they expected to find them replenished, the game less wild, and big bags waiting them. They were out early, shouldering a canvas dingy, which vas an improvement on their previous methods. It was the shooting season, so the whole phalanx of waterfowl was fair game.

They talked in excited whispers as thjy approached the margin of Reedy Swamp, their biggest and most profitable water. The first day on the marshes is always exciting; business is tempered with pleasure. The cry of the alarming plover on the slopes, the croak of black shags on half-buried logs, the cheery quack-quack of ducks, the flapping of wings, and splashing in distant pools were music to their ears, sounds that had called them in their dreams, had echoed in their waking hours with an insistency that was irresistible. The air seemed fresher, the morn more glorious, in the haunts of the waterfowl, and they felt as some long-caged animal must feel that has got back to its native wilds.

They launched their dingy at the eastern side, where a broad mass of floating reeds, running out past the centre, provided efficient shelter for stalking. Ham stepped to the front and proceeded to fix up a screen  With green bushes, while Dave knelt down to paddle. Just then two quick reports came booming across from the reed bed, followed by the roar of rising wings from the sheltered pools.

'Euchred!' said Dave, watching the coveted bevies winging westw rd, and poising for a, shot when they should circle back.

'I kin guess him in one,' said Ham. 'Big Harry Capp. We 'ad a tussle last time for these swamps, an' if he's on th' job this year, which it looks like he is, I guess we'll just about 'ave to sleep but here with the poultry to get ahead of him. There ain't room for two firms on this lay, an' bein' first on it, I reckon. we've got th' best right to stay. But that sort o' thing don't count much with Big Harry; he'd jump his own father's claim if he couldn't see a better without much lookin' round. He's got no principle, that man. I told him so when he showed his black mug 'ere three year ago.'

'You told Big Harry that?' Dave questioned a twinkle of amusement in his eyes.

'I did.'

'How far was he away from you?'

'Purty near as close as you are.'

Dave measured the distance with his eye. 'How did y' escape?'

'Warn't no danger,' Ham answered. 'Never lifted a finger.'

'Couldn't 'ave heard you,' was Dave's verdict. 'Don't suppose you meant him to.'

'He wanted to join us as third partner, you remember,' Ham went on, ignoring the remark. 'But I couldn't stand him. Then he tried to get us copped for shootin' an' liftin' eggs out o' season, an' him goin' hot lick at it all th' time himself. An' you mind th' time we left our bag under that clump o' tea trees, an' when we come back out o' th' swamp there was only th' tracks of Harry's hobnails there. Must a watched us out, then sneaked up an' collared 'em There's special bad pints in a man that does them sort o' tricks, Dave. He's a p'inter, out an' out, an' if we're goin' to hold our own with him, we got to p'int too. Not as I hold with p'intin'; but I like to see something like fair dealin' on th' other side. I wouldn't like to do him anything extra in bad turns even now if I could help it. He's got th' two finest-lookin' daughters you ever clapped eyes on. Reg'lar make-yer-mouth-water sort.'

Dave chuckled as he quietly swung the double-bladed paddle from side to side.

'I'm constituted a little that was myself,' he said.

'What way?' asked Ham. He had completed his screen; and was kneeling with his back to his mate, peering over it.

'I ken shut my eyes to a lot when the other fellow has pretty daughters an' I want a wife. Kinder levels up things.'

'I ain't sayin' I'm hankerin' after th' feminine gender.' Ham returned. 'You must allow some to a man that's got a family to keep.'

'Specially when me family ain't boys,' added Dave. 'Of course, we ken all sympathise a lot more with a gel. We're built that way,' Ham conceded. 'If they wur boys they could battle with th' rest of us an' help keep th' pot b'ilin'. 'Taint so with gels.'

'How long 'ave you known th' Miss Capps?' asked Dave. 'Only met 'em at the Coraki races last year. There was a ball that night, an' I 'ad th' honour of a swing with one. Maggie, they called her. Real pearl of a dancer. Dressed just lovely, too, in a drop-neck affair with no sleeves. Her sister was something sim'lar. I'll introduce yer to her sister one of these times, when I get better acquainted.'

'It's three years ago, isn't it, since Big Harry wanted to go partners with us?' asked Dave. 'What about it?'

'Seems he was a bit too previous in makin' that proposition,' Dave answered. 'He should 'ave invited you to tea.'

'Why so?'

'Suppose,' said Dave, 'he let on that a partnership this season would be agreeable to him, what would you say to it?'

'He ain't goin' to let on anything of th' sort. That ain't his style,' Ham replied. 'He's jes' goin' to peg away from th' jump to do us bad, or I don't know him. See that smoke? He's thereabout, at th' first hole. Must a dropped quite a heap out o' that mob. One thing, he's bound to be wadin', so we ken donkey-lick him to th' other holes in th' dingy.'

'Don't count your ducks afore they're shot,' Dave advised. 'What do you call that— straight ahead 'tween th' green rushes?'

'Done brown, by gum!' cried Ham, as he sighted Big Harry paddling far ahead in a dinghy like their own. 'Well, it's no use follerin' that. We're too 'cavy-loaded to 'ave a ghost of a show, so we may's well light out full split for th' next place.'

'An' hunt all th' game over here to him?' Dave dissented. 'I know a trick worth two of that. We'll plant 'ere in th' reeds, an' let him do th' beatin'. Them ducks 'ill come back.'

They followed this course, and waited — waited all day, just moving from pool to pool, and getting a shot occasionally.

Big Harry waited too, at the other end. It was a game of patience, played till long after the last duck had left the swamp. The birds had gathered in their thousands in neighbouring swamps, but both parties resisted the temptation, so as not to drive the game back to the other.

At sundown Ham and Dave hid their dingy under a log in the long grass, and started' home. Soon after dusk they heard Big Harry's gun at another swamp. They heard it even after nightfall.

'Must be shootin' whistlers,' Dave surmised. 'Saw some to-day.'

'He knows how many goslins make a pair, that chap,' said Ham. 'Drivin' 'em back now ready for mornin'. But I'll bet you th' best swan on Reedy to a bob-down diver I do him. We'll be out 'ere afore th' magpie's awake.'

'I doubt if we'll steal a march on him, then,' said Dave. 'He'll 'ave a big hurry on to-morrow. You take it from me.'

'Oh. we ken spurt some, too,' Ham declared. 'I'll go alone in th' dinghy, while  you'll dodge round shore for flyin' shots. You'll see me out there, with one eye ready shut so as to save time,, an' th' other layin' along th' barrel at number one hole, waitin' for th' first glimmer to let drive. Th' big chap can't start blazin' 'fore it's light, an' I reckon I ken tell a duck from a turtle on a log 'bout as soon as he can.'

Ham was so excited, and so eager to be first off scratch in the morning, that he had very little sleep that night. He got up so often to look at the time, and made so much noise finding the furniture with his toes and upsetting the bric-a-brac that he kept Dave awake also. Ham explained each time that to lose the start was to lose the day, whereas a little activity and dertermination might have the good effect of forcing the third party to seek fresh haunts. The early shooter saves the worm.

They left camp at 3 o'clock, and at 4 o'clock Ham was afloat, while Dave lay down at the butt of a red gum to wait for daylight. The ducks could be heard in the first pool, and there was another sound that made Ham's pulses quicken, the chatter of wild geese nestling round the margin of the hole. His hands shook as he breathlessly picked his way towards the delicious bird voices. He paused when the nose of the dinghy touched the clear water, and with the gun thrust through the brush screen he waited impatiently for dawn.

When at last he could see across the water he could discern only an odd teal here and there. These were not good enough; neither did a cluster of shovellers on a knob of matted roots tempt him; Hamilton wanted geese this morning. They were bunched on a green carpet at the far end, obscured by a strip of rushes that ran out in front of him.

He was paddling very quietly towards this point, certain of his quarry irom the fine position in which he found himself, when two shots broke the stillness of the grey dawn.

Ham was so disconcerted by the unexpectedness of it that a hundred geese had passed low over his head, and out of range before he had picked up his gun. Over the reeds he had been making for there hovered two thin puffs of white smoke, and as he floated in disappointed idleness the rival dinghy, with bags and rugs lumped in the stern, was launched from the floating bed of decayed vegetation. Big Harry had slept with the mallards.

The next pool was a good way up. They shot out at different points, and a hard race for the prize commenced. There were scattered ducks in plenty along the floating grass and green reeds through which they paddled, but these they ignored, while the packed masses in the clear pools beckoned them. It was to be a race for the front, which meant more game and less work.

Big Harry had a slight lead at the start, but Ham, being lighter laden, and paddling with desperation, crept up inch by inch till the dinghies were level, then slowly forged ahead. Seeing that he must lose, Big Harry raised his gun with the intention of frightening the birds ahead, but suddenly changed his mind, and swinging round emptied both barrels into the stern part of his adversary's dinghy. The heavy duck shot tore through the canvas on both sides level with the waterline. Staggered for a moment by this hostile move, Ham Rolin stopped paddling to stare at the double stream of water that was pouring into his craft.

'Oh-ho!' he said, then. 'Doggerbank a man, will yer? Right! If I'm to sink, by th' duck-billed platypus, you'll sink, too. Here goes.'

There was no more paddling, no further thought of the duck pools. Big Harry had reloaded, and now it became a hot duel between the two. Time after time the opposing guns were discharged at the canvas dingies, each being careful, however, not to hit the occupant.

The crack, crack, of the breech-loaders rumbled like thunder across the broad marshes, smoke hung like a fogbank between them, hundreds of ducks circled over and around them unheeded. Splinters flew from the light woodwork, the once taut canvas bulged and sagged, and grew narrower as the water poured through the rents.

Ham sank first, up to his chin. Being able to stand, he saved his weapon and ammunition by holding them over his head.

Big Harry, being further out, sank in deep water, and had to swim. He was a fine waterman, and Ham could not but admire him even then as he balanced his gun across his shoulders, and towed three brace of geese on each side of him, with the tips of their wings gripped between his teeth, while liquid drops glistened like a network of diamonds on his black beard. Ham watched him until he had obtained footing, then waded shorewards.

Neither man had spoken a word to the other, yet on each face was a hard grin, while the battle lasted, as though they were merely engaged in a friendly rivalry. Now Rolin chuckled at the humour of it.

'So it come to a fight, did it?' cried Dave, as he stepped out.

'Great naval engagement,' laughed Ham. 'Hear the cannonadin'?'

'Hear it!' said Dave. 'It's scared off everything that ken flap a wing. Nice morning's start you've made of it.'

' 'Twas a grand fight, though,' Ham persisted. 'Both squadrons sunk, an' only th' two admirals escaped.'

'A miserable-lookin' pair of admirals they are!' sneered Dave. He had built that dinghy, and was annoyed. Ham didn't mind the loss of it at all. Big Harry had fared the worse, so he felt triumphant.

'Well, we're afoot again,' he said, 'but we've got th' field to ourselves. That's th' indemnity. Let's 'ave some breakfast, David.'

Later in the day Ham received another surprise.

Maggie Capp, the girl he had danced with, rode up to the camp soon after the pair had returned from the swamps, Dave had ridden into Coraki with the morning's bag. Ham was building a new dinghy.

'Good afternoon, Mr. Rolin.'

'Good afternoon, Miss Capp.'

'Father wants to know if you're hurt?'

' 'Urt!' Ham turned nine colours in two seconds. 'Not a scratch,' he said, uneasily.

'And would you call and see him this evening?'

The question further embarrassed him, yet it engendered a certain sense of victory, 'I suppose he told you all about it?' he queried.

'Yes, he told me;' she answered, pertly. 'You ought to feel proud of yourselves, both of you. You had little enough to go to war over.' She laughed in spite of herself.

'What's he think of it!'

'Oh, he had a great laugh over it when he got home.'

'Oh, he can't be too bad, then. What's he want me for?'

'Well, I suppose he is dissatisfied with the way things are. It's not his fault; he wanted to join interests with you three years ago.'

'You think he wants to renew that proposition?' asked Ham.

'I don't know; perhaps he does.'

Ham stood with his hand on the horse's neck, looking at her. She was a very pretty girl.

'You tell him,' he said, 'that I don't want to be hard on a man that's got a family to keep. He ken come in as third partner if he wants to.'

_________________________

6: The Forgers

Arthur B. Reeve

1880-1936

Pearson's Magazine (US) Sep 1913

Arthur Benjamin Reeve

The first of a dozen or so short stories, later collected and forming an episodic novel of the adventures of Constance Dunlap.

THERE WAS something of the look of the hunted animal brought to bay at last in Carlton Dunlap's face as he let himself into his apartment late one night toward the close of the year.

On his breath was the lingering odor of whisky, yet in his eye and hand none of the effects. He entered quietly, although there was no apparent reason for such excessive caution. Then he locked the door with the utmost care, although there was no apparent reason for caution about that, either.

Even when he had thus barricaded himself, he paused to listen with all the elemental fear of the cave man who dreaded the footsteps of his pursuers. In the dim light of the studio apartment he looked anxiously for the figure of his wife. Constance was not there, as she had been on other nights, uneasily awaiting his return. What was the matter? His hand shook a trifle now as he turned the knob of the bedroom door and pushed it softly open.

She was asleep. He leaned over, not realizing that her every faculty was keenly alive to his presence, that she was acting a part.

"Throw something around yourself, Constance," he whispered hoarsely into her ear, as she moved with a little well-feigned start at being suddenly wakened, "and come into the studio. There is something I must tell you tonight, my dear."

"My dear!" she exclaimed bitterly, now seeming to rouse herself with an effort and pretending to put back a stray wisp of her dark hair in order to hide from him the tears that still lingered on her flushed cheeks. "You can say that, Carlton, when it has been every night the same old threadbare excuse of working at the office until midnight?"

She set her face in hard lines, but could not catch his eye.

"Carlton Dunlap," she added in a tone that rasped his very soul, "I am nobody's fool. I may not know much about bookkeeping and accounting, but I can add— and two and two, when the same man but different women compose each two, do not make four, according to my arithmetic, but three, from which,"— she finished almost hysterically the little speech she had prepared, but it seemed to fall flat before the man's curiously altered manner— "from which I shall subtract one."

She burst into tears.

"Listen," he urged, taking her arm gently to lead her to an easy-chair.

"No, no, no!" she cried, now thoroughly aroused, with eyes that again snapped accusation and defiance at him, "don't touch me. Talk to me, if you want to, but don't, don't come near me." She was now facing him, standing in the high-ceilinged "studio," as they called the room where she had kept up in a desultory manner for her own amusement the art studies which had interested her before her marriage. "What is it that you want to say? The other nights you said nothing at all. Have you at last thought up an excuse? I hope it is at least a clever one."

"Constance," he remonstrated, looking fearfully about. Instinctively she felt that her accusation was unjust. Not even that had dulled the hunted look in his face. "Perhaps— perhaps if it were that of which you suspect me, we could patch it up. I don't know. But, Constance, I— I must leave for the west on the first train in the morning." He did not pause to notice her startled look, but raced on. "I have worked every night this week trying to straighten out those accounts of mine by the first of the year and— and I can't do it. An expert begins on them in a couple of days. You must call up the office to-morrow and tell them that I am ill, tell them anything. I must get at least a day or two start before they—"

"Carlton," she interrupted, "what is the matter? What have you—"

She checked herself in surprise. He had been fumbling in his pocket and now laid down a pile of green and yellow banknotes on the table.

"I have scraped together every last cent I can spare," he continued, talking jerkily to suppress his emotion. "They cannot take those away from you, Constance. And— when I am settled— in a new life," he swallowed hard and averted his eyes further from her startled gaze, "under a new name, somewhere, if you have just a little spot in your heart that still responds to me, I— I— no, it is too much even to hope. Constance, the accounts will not come out right because I am—  I am an embezzler."

He bit off the word viciously and then sank his head into his hands and bowed it to a depth that alone could express his shame.

Why did she not say something, do something? Some women would have fainted. Some would have denounced him. But she stood there and he dared not look up to read what was written in her face. He felt alone, all alone, with every man's hand against him, he who had never in all his life felt so or had done anything to make him feel so before. He groaned as the sweat of his mental and physical agony poured coldly out on his forehead. All that he knew was that she was standing there, silent, looking him through and through, as cold as a statue. Was she the personification of justice? Was this but a foretaste of the ostracism of the world?

"When we were first married, Constance," he began sadly, "I was only a clerk for Green & Co., at two thousand a year. We talked it over. I stayed and in time became cashier at five thousand. But you know as well as I that five thousand does not meet the social obligations laid on us by our position in the circle in which we are forced to move."

His voice had become cold and hard, but he did not allow himself to be betrayed into adding, as he might well have done in justice to himself, that to her even a thousand dollars a month would have been only a beginning. It was not that she had be accustomed to so much in the station of life from which he had taken her. The plain fact was that New York had had an over-tonic effect on her.

"You were not a nagging woman, Constance," he went on in a somewhat softened tone. "In fact you have been a good wife; you have never thrown it up to me that I was unable to make good to the degree of many of our friends in purely commercial lines. All you have ever said is the truth. A banking house pays low for its brains. My God!" he cried stiffening out in the chair and clenching his fists, "it pays low for its temptations, too."

There had been nothing in the world Carlton would not have given to make happy the woman who stood now, leaning on the table in cold silence, with averted head, regarding neither him nor the pile of greenbacks.

"Hundreds of thousands of dollars passed through my hands every week," he resumed. "That business owed me for my care of it. It was taking the best in me and in return was not paying what other businesses paid for the best in other men. When a man gets thinking that way, with a woman whom he loves as I love you— something happens."

He paused in the bitterness of his thoughts. She moved as if to speak. "No, no," he interrupted. "Hear me out first. All I asked was a chance to employ a little of the money that I saw about me— not to take it, but to employ it for a little while, a few days, perhaps only a few hours. Money breeds money. Why should I not use some of this idle money to pay me what I ought to have?

"When Mr. Green was away last summer I heard some inside news about a certain stock, go it happened that I began to juggle the accounts. It is too long a story to tell how I did it. Anybody in my position could have done it— for a time. It would not interest you anyhow. But I did it. The first venture was successful. Also the spending of the money was very successful, in its way. That was the money that took us to the fashionable hotel in Atlantic City where we met so many people. Instead of helping me, it got me in deeper.

"When the profit from this first deal was spent there was nothing to do but to repeat what I had done successfully before. I could not quit now. I tried again, a little hypothecation of some bonds. Stocks went down. I had made a bad bet and five thousand dollars was wiped out, a whole year's salary. I tried again, and wiped out five thousand more. I was at my wits' end. I have borrowed under fictitious names, used names of obscure persons as borrowers, have put up dummy security. It was possible because I controlled the audits. But it has done no good. The losses have far outbalanced the winnings and to-day I am in for twenty-five thousand dollars."

She was watching him now with dilating eyes as the horror of the situation was burned into her soul. He raced on, afraid to pause lest she should interrupt him.

"Mr. Green has been talked into introducing scientific management and a new system into the business by a certified public accountant, an expert in installing systems and discovering irregularities. Here I am, faced by certain exposure," he went on, pacing the floor and looking everywhere but at her face. "What should I do? Borrow? It is useless. I have no security that anyone would accept.

"There is just one thing left." He lowered his voice until it almost sank into a hoarse whisper. "I must cut loose. I have scraped together what I can and I have borrowed on my life insurance. Here on the table is all that I can spare.

"To-night, the last night, I have worked frantically in a vain hope that something, some way would at last turn up. It has not. There is no other way out. In despair I have put this off until the last moment. But I have thought of nothing else for a week. Good God, Constance, I have reached the mental state where even intoxicants fail to intoxicate."

He dropped back again into the deep chair and sank his head again on his hands. He groaned as he thought of the agony of packing a bag and slinking for the Western express through the crowds at the railroad terminal.

STILL CONSTANCE was silent. Through her mind was running the single thought that she had misjudged him. There had been no other woman in the case. As he spoke, there came flooding into her heart the sudden realization of the truth. He had done it for her.

It was a rude and bitter awakening after the past months when the increased income, with no questions asked, had made her feel that they were advancing. She passed her hands over her eyes, but there it was still, not a dream but a harsh reality. If she could only have gone back and undone it! But what was done, was done, She was amazed at herself. It was not horror of the deed that sent an icy shudder over her. It was horror of exposure.

He had done it for her. Over and over again that thought raced through her mind. She steeled herself at last to speak. She hardly knew what was in her own mind, what the conflicting, surging emotions of her own heart meant.

"And so, you are leaving me what is left, leaving me in disgrace, and you are going to do the best you can to get away safely. You want me to tell one last lie for you."

There was an unnatural hollowness in her voice which he did not understand, but which out him to the quick. He had killed love. He was alone. He knew it. With a final effort he tried to moisten his parched lips to answer. At last, in a husky voice, he managed to say, "Yes."

But with all his power of will he could not look at her.

"Carlton Dunlap," she cried, leaning both hands for support on the table, bending over and at last forcing him to look her in the eyes, "do you know what I think of you? I think you are a damned coward. There!"

Instead of tears and recriminations, instead of the conventional "How could you do it?" instead of burning denunciation of him for ruining her life, he read something else in her face. What was it?

"Coward?" he repeated slowly. "What would you have me do— take you with me?"

She tossed her head contemptuously.

"Stay and face it?" he hazarded again.

"Is there no other way?" she asked, still leaning forward with her eyes fixed on his. "Think! Is there no way that you could avoid discovery just for a time? Carlton, you— we are cornered. Is there no desperate chance?"

He shook his head sadly.

Her eyes wandered momentarily about the studio, until they rested on an easel. On it stood a water color on which she had been working, trying to put into it some of the feeling which she would never have put into words for him. On the walls of the apartment were pen and ink sketches, scores of little things which she had done for her own amusement. She bit her lip as an idea flashed through her mind.

He shook his head again mournfully.

"Somewhere," she said slowly, "I have read that clever forgers use water colors and pen and ink like regular artists. Think— think! Is there no way that we— that I could forge a check that would give us breathing space, perhaps rescue us?"

Carlton leaned over the table toward her, fascinated. He placed both his hands on hers. They were icy, but she did not withdraw them.

For an instant they looked into each other's eyes, an instant, and then they understood. They were partners in crime, amateurs perhaps, but partners as they had been in honesty.

It was a new idea that she had suggested to him. Why should he not act on it? Why hesitate? Why stop at it? He was already an embezzler. Why not add a new crime to the list? As he looked into her eyes he felt a new strength. Together they could do it. Hers was the brain that had conceived the way out. She had the will, the compelling power to carry the thing through. He would throw himself on her intuition, her brain, her skill, her daring.

On his desk in the corner, where often until far into the night he had worked on the huge ruled sheets of paper covered with figures of the firm's accounts, he saw two goose-necked vials, one of lemon-colored liquid, the other of raspberry color. One was of tartaric acid, the other of chloride of lime. It was an ordinary ink eradicator. Near the bottles lay a rod of glass with a curious tip, an ink eraser made of finely spun glass threads which scraped away the surface of the paper more delicately than any other tool that had been devised. There were the materials for his, their rehabilitation if they were placed in his wife's deft artist fingers. Here was all the chemistry and artistry of forgery at hand.

"Yes," he answered eagerly, "there is a way, Constance. Together we can do it."

There was no time for tenderness between them now. It was cold, hard fact and they understood each other too well to stop for endearments.

Far into the night they sat up and discussed the way in which they would go about the crime. They practised with erasers and with brush and water color on the protective coloring tint on some canceled checks of his own. Carlton must get a check of a firm in town, a check that bore a genuine signature. In it they would make such trifling changes in the body as would attract no attention in passing, yet would yield a substantial sum toward wiping out Carlton's unfortunate deficit.

Late as he had worked the night before, nervous and shaky as he felt after the sleepless hours of planning their new life, Carlton was the first at the office in the morning. His hand trembled as he ran through the huge batch of mail already left at the first delivery. He paused as he came to one letter with the name "W. J. Reynolds co." on it.

Here was a check in payment of a small bill, he knew. It was from a firm which habitually kept hundreds of thousands on deposit at the Gorham Bank. It fitted the case admirably. He slit open the letter. There, neatly folded, was the check:

It flashed over him in a moment what to do. Twenty-five thousand would just about cover his shortage. The Reynolds firm was a big one, doing big transactions. He slipped the check into his pocket. The check might have been stolen in the mail. Why not?

The journey uptown was most excruciatingly long, in spite of the fact that he had met no one he knew either at the office or outside. At last he arrived home, to find Constance waiting anxiously.

"Did you get a check?" she asked, hardly waiting for his reply. "Let me see it. Give it to me."

The coolness with which she went about it amazed him. "It has the amount punched on it with a check punch," she observed as she ran her quick eye over it while he explained his plan. "We'll have to fill up some of those holes made by the punch."

"I know the kind they used," he answered. "I'll get one and a desk check from the Gorham. You do the artistic work, my dear. My knowledge of check punches, watermarks, and paper will furnish the rest. I'll be back directly. Don't forget to call up the office a little before the time I usually arrive there and tell them I am ill."

With her light-fingered touch she worked feverishly, partly with the liquid ink eradicator, but mostly with the spun-glass eraser. First she rubbed out the cents after the written figure "Twenty-five." Carefully with a blunt instrument she smoothed down the roughened surface of the paper so that the ink would not run in the fibers and blot. Over and over she practised writing the "Thousand" in a hand like that on the check. She already had the capital "T" in "Twenty" as a guide. During the night in practising she had found that in raising checks only seven capital letters were used— O in one, T in two, three, ten, and thousand, F in four and five, S in six and seven, E in eight, N in nine and H in hundred.

At last even her practice satisfied her. Then with a coolness born only of desperation she wrote in the words, "Thousand 00/100." When she had done it she stopped to wonder at herself. She was amazed and perhaps a little frightened at how readily she adapted herself to the crime of forgery. She did not know that it was one of the few crimes in which women had proved themselves most proficient, though she felt her own proficiency and native ability for copying.

Again the eraser came into play to remove the cents after the figure "25." A comma and three zeros following it were inserted, followed by a new "00/100." The signature was left untouched.

Erasing the name of "Green & Co.," presented greater difficulties, but it was accomplished with as little loss of the protective coloring on the surface of the check as possible. Then after the "Pay to the order of" she wrote in, as her husband had directed, "The Carlton Realty Co."

Next came the water color to restore the protective tint where the glass eraser and the acids had removed it. There was much delicate matching of tints and careful painting in with a fine camel's hair brush, until at last the color of those parts where there had been an erasure was apparently as good as any other part.

Of course, under the microscope there could have been seen the angry crisscrossing of the fibers of the paper due to the harsh action of the acids and the glass eraser. Still, painting the whole thing over with a little resinous liquid somewhat restored the glaze to the paper, at least sufficiently to satisfy a cursory glance of the naked eye.

There remained the difficulty of the protective punch marks. There they were, a star cut out of the check itself, a dollar sign and 25 followed by another star.

She was still admiring her handiwork, giving it here and there a light little fillip with the brush and comparing this check with some of those which had been practised on last night, to see whether she had made any improvement in her technique of forgery, when Carlton returned with the punch and the blank checks on the Gorham Bank.

From one of the blank checks he punched out a number of little stars until there was one which in watermark and scroll work corresponded precisely with that punched out in the original check.

Constance, whose fingers had long been accustomed to fine work, fitted in the little star after the $25, then took it out, moistened the edges ever so lightly with glue on the end of a toothpick, and pasted it back again. A hot iron completed the work of making the edges smooth and unless a rather powerful glass had been used no one could have seen the pasted-in insertion after the $25.

Careful not to deviate the fraction of a hair's breadth from the alignment Carlton took the punch, added three 0's, and a star after the 25, making it $25,000. Finally the whole thing was again ironed to give it the smoothness of an original. Here at last was the completed work, the first product of their combined skill in crime:

How completely people may change, even within a few hours, was well illustrated as they stood side by side and regarded their work with as much pride as if it had been the result of their honest efforts of years. They were now pen and brush crooks of the first caliber, had reduced forgery to a fine art and demonstrated what an amateur might do. For, although they did not know it, nearly half the fifteen millions or so lost by forgeries every year was the work of amateurs such as they.

The next problem was presenting the check for collection. Of course Carlton could not put it through his own bank, unless he wanted to leave a blazed trail straight to himself. Only a colossal bluff would do, and in a city where only colossal bluffs succeed it was not so impossible as might have been first imagined.

Luncheon over, they sauntered casually into a high-class office building on Broadway where there were offices to rent. The agent was duly impressed by the couple who talked of their large real estate dealings. Where he might have been thoroughly suspicious of a man and might have asked many embarrassing but perfectly proper questions, he accepted the woman without a murmur. At her suggestion he even consented to take his new tenants around to the Uptown Bank and introduce them. They made an excellent impression by a first cash deposit of the money Carlton had thrown down on the table the night before. A check for the first month's rent more than mollified the agent and talk of a big deal that was just being signed up to-day duly impressed the bank.

The next problem was to get the forged check certified. That, also, proved a very simple matter. Any one can walk into a bank and get a check for $25,000 certified, while if he appears, a stranger, before the window of the paying teller to cash a check for twenty-five dollars he would almost be thrown out of the bank. Banks will certify at a glance practically any check that looks right, but they pass on the responsibility of cashing them. Thus before the close of banking hours Dunlap was able to deposit in his new bank the check certified by the Gorham.

Twenty-four hours must elapse before he could draw against the check which he had deposited. He did not propose to waste that time, so that the next day found him at Green & Co.'s, feeling much better. Really he had come prepared now to straighten out the books, knowing that in a few hours he could make good.

The first hesitation due to the newness of the game had worn off by this time. Nothing at all of an alarming nature had happened. The new month had already begun and as most firms have their accounts balanced only once a month, he had, he reasoned, nearly the entire four weeks in which to operate.

Conscience was dulled in Constance, also, and she was now busy with ink eraser, the water colors, and other paraphernalia in a wholesale raising of checks, mostly for amounts smaller than that in the first attempt.

"We are taking big chances, anyway," she urged him. "Why quit yet? A few days more and we may land something worth while."

The next day he excused himself from the office for a while and presented himself at his new bank with a sheaf of new checks which she had raised, all certified, and totaling some thousands more.

His own check for twenty-five thousand was now honored. The relief which he felt was tremendous after the weeks of grueling anxiety. At once he hurried to a broker's and placed an order for the stocks he had used on which to borrow. He could now replace everything in the safe, straighten out the books, could make everything look right to the systematizer, could blame any apparent irregularity on his old system. Even ignorance was better than dishonesty.

Constance, meanwhile, had installed herself in the little office they had hired, as stenographer and secretary. Once having embarked on the hazardous enterprise she showed no disposition to give it up yet An office boy was hired and introduced at the bank.

The mythical realty company prospered, at least if prosperity is measured merely by the bank book. In less than a week the skilful pen and brush of Constance had secured them a balance, after straightening out Carlton's debts, that came well up to a hundred thousand dollars, mostly in small checks, some with genuine signatures and amounts altered, others complete forgeries.

As they went deeper and deeper, Constance began to feel the truth of their situation. It was she who was really at the helm in this enterprise. It had been her idea; the execution of it had been mainly her work; Carlton had furnished merely the business knowledge that she did not possess. The more she thought of it during the hours in the little office while he was at work downtown, the more uneasy did she become.

What if he should betray himself in some way? She was sure of herself. But she was almost afraid to let him go out of her sight. She felt a sinking sensation every time he mentioned any of the happenings in the banking house. Could he be trusted alone not to betray himself when the first hint of discovery of something wrong came?

It was now near the middle of the month. It would not pay to wait until the end. Some one of the many firms whose checks they had forged might have its book balanced at any time now. From day to day small amounts in cash had already been withdrawn until they were twenty thousand dollars to the good. They planned to draw out thirty thousand now at one time. That would give them fifty thousand, roughly half of their forgeries.

The check was written and the office boy was started to the bank with it. Carlton followed him at a distance, as he had on other occasions, ready to note the first sign of trouble as the boy waited at the teller's window. At last the boy was at the head of the line. He had passed the check in and his satchel was lying open, with voracious maw, on the ledge below the wicket for the greedy feeding of stacks of bills. Why did the teller not raise the wicket and shove out the money in a coveted pile? Carlton seemed to feel that something was wrong. The line lengthened and those at the end of the queue began to grow restive at the delay. One of the bank's officers walked down and spoke to the boy.

Carlton waited no longer. The game was up. He rushed from his coign of observation, out of the bank building, and dashed into a telephone booth.

"Quick, Constance," he shouted over the wire, "leave everything. They are holding up our check. They have discovered something. Take a cab and drive slowly around the square. You will find me waiting for you at the north end."

That night the newspapers were full of the story. There was the whole thing, exaggerated, distorted, multiplied, until they had become swindlers of millions instead of thousands. But nevertheless it was their story. There was only one grain of consolation. It was in the last paragraph of the news item, and read: "There seems to be no trace of the man and woman who worked this clever swindle. As if by a telepathic message they have vanished at just the time when their whole house of cards collapsed."

They removed every vestige of their work from the apartment. Everything was destroyed. Constance even began a new water color so that that might suggest that she had not laid aside her painting.

They had played for a big stake and lost. But the twenty thousand dollars was something. Now the great problem was to conceal it and themselves. They had lost, yet if ever before they loved, it was as nothing to what it was now that they had tasted together the bitter and the sweet of their mutual crime.

Carlton went down to the office the next day, just as before. The anxious hours that his wife had previously spent thinking whether he might betray himself by some slip were comparative safety as contrasted with the uncertainty of the hours now. But the first day after the alarm of the discovery passed off all right. Carlton even discussed the case, his case, with those in the office, commented on it, condemned the swindlers, and carried it off, he felt proud to say, as well as Constance herself might have done had she been in his place.

Another day passed. His account of the first day, reassuring as it had been to her, did not lessen the anxiety. Yet never before had they seemed to be bound together by such ties as knitted their very souls in this crisis. She tried with a devotion that was touching to impart to him some of her own strength to ward off detection.

It was the afternoon of the second day that a man who gave the name of Drummond called and presented a card of the Reynolds Company.

"Have you ever been paid a little bill of twenty-five dollars by our company?" he asked.

Down in his heart Carlton knew that this man was a detective. "I can't say without looking it up," he replied.

Carlton touched a button and an assistant appeared. Something outside himself seemed to nerve him up, as he asked: "Look up our account with Reynolds, and see if we have been paid— what is it?— a bill for twenty-five dollars. Do you recall it?"

"Yes, I recall it," replied the assistant. "No, Mr. Dunlap, I don't think it has been paid. It is a small matter, but we sent them a duplicate bill yesterday. I thought the original must have gone astray."

Carlton cursed him inwardly for sending the bill. But then, he reasoned, it was only a question of time, after all, when the forgery would be discovered.

Drummond dropped into a half-confidential, half-quizzing tone. "I thought not. Somewhere along the line that check has been stolen and raised to twenty-five thousand dollars," he remarked.

"Is that so?" gasped Carlton, trying hard to show just the right amount of surprise and not too much. "Is that so?"

"No doubt you have read in the papers of this clever realty company swindle? Well, it seems to have been part of that."

"I am sure that we shall be glad to do all in our power to cooperate with Reynolds," put in Dunlap.

"I thought you would," commented Drummond dryly. "I may as well tell you that I fear some one has been tampering with your mail."

"Tampering with our mail?" repeated Dunlap, aghast. "Impossible."

"Nothing is impossible until it is proved so," answered Drummond, looking him straight in the eyes. Carlton did not flinch. He felt a new power within himself, gained during the past few days of new association with Constance. For her he could face anything.

But when Drummond was gone he felt as he had on the night when he had finally realized that he could never cover up the deficit in his books. With an almost superhuman effort he gripped himself. Interminably the hours of the rest of the day dragged on.

That night he sank limp into a chair on his return home. "A man named Drummond was in the office to-day, my dear," he said. "Some one in the office sent Reynolds a duplicate bill, and they know about the check."

"Well?"

"I wonder if they suspect me?"

"If you act like that, they won't suspect. They'll arrest," she commented sarcastically.

He had braced up again into his new self at her words. But there was again that sinking sensation in her heart, as she realized that it was, after all, herself on whom he depended, that it was she who had been the will, even though he had been the intellect of their enterprise. She could not overcome the feeling that, if only their positions could be reversed, the thing might even yet be carried through.

Drummond appeared again at the office the next day. There was no concealment about him now. He said frankly that he was from the Burr Detective Agency, whose business it was to guard the banks against forgeries.

"The pen work, or, as we detectives call it, the penning," he remarked, "in the case of that check is especially good. It shows rare skill. But the pitfalls in this forgery game are so many that, in avoiding one, a forger, ever so clever, falls into another."

Carlton felt the polite third degree, as he proceeded: "Nowadays the forger has science to contend with, too. The microscope and camera may come in a little too late to be of practical use in preventing the forger from getting his money at first, but they come in very neatly later in catching him. What the naked eye cannot see in this check they reveal. Besides, a little iodine vapor brings out the original 'Green & Co.' on it.

"We have found out also that the protective coloring was restored by water color. That was easy. Where the paper was scratched and the sizing taken off, it has been painted with a resinous substance to restore the glaze, to the eye. Well, a little alcohol takes that off, too. Oh, the amateur forger may be the most dangerous kind, because the professional regularly follows the same line, leaves tracks, has associates, but," he concluded impressively, "all are caught sooner or later— sooner or later."

Dunlap managed to maintain his outward composure admirably. Still the little lifting of the curtain on the hidden mysteries of the new detective art produced its effect. They were getting closer, and Dunlap knew it, as Drummond intended he should. And, as in every crisis, he turned naturally to Constance. Never had she meant so much to him as now.

That night as he entered the apartment he happened to glance behind him. In the shadow down the street a man dodged quickly behind a tree. The thing gave him a start. He was being watched.

"There is just one thing left," he cried excitedly as he hurried upstairs with the news. "We must both disappear this time."

Constance took it very calmly. "But we must not go together," she added quickly, her fertile mind, as ever, hitting directly on a plan of action. "If we separate, they will be less likely to trace us, for they will never think we would do that."

It was evident that the words were being forced out by the conflict of common sense and deep emotion. "Perhaps it will be best for you to stick to your original idea of going west. I shall go to one of the winter resorts. We shall communicate only through the personal column of the Star. Sign yourself Weston. I shall sign Easton."

The words fell on Carlton with his new and deeper love for her like a death sentence. It had never entered his mind that they were to be separated now. Dissolve their partnership in crime? To him it seemed as if they had just begun to live since that night when they had at last understood each other. And it had come to this— separation.

"A man can always shift for himself better if he has no impediments," she said, speaking rapidly as if to bolster up her own resolution. "A woman is always an impediment in a crisis like this."

In her face he saw what he had never seen before. There was love in it that would sacrifice everything. She was sending him away from her, not to save herself but to save him. Vainly he attempted to protest. She placed her finger on his lips. Never before had he felt such over-powering love for her. And yet she held him in check in spite of himself.

"Take enough to last a few months," she added hastily. "Give me the rest. I can hide it and take care of myself. Even if they trace me I can get off. A woman can always do that more easily than a man. Don't worry about me. Go somewhere, start a new life. If it takes years, I will wait. Let me know where you are. We can find some way in which I can come back into your life. No, no,"— Carlton had caught her passionately in his arms— "even that cannot weaken me. The die is cast. We must go."

She tore herself away from him and fled into her room, where, with set face and ashen lips, she stuffed article after article into her grip. With a heavy heart Carlton did the same. The bottom had dropped out of everything, yet try as he would to reason it out, he could find no other solution but hers. To stay was out of the question, if indeed it was not already too late to run. To go together was equally out of the question. Constance had shown that. "Seek the woman," was the first rule of the police.

As they left the apartment they could see a man across the street following them closely. They were shadowed. In despair Carlton turned toward his wife. A sudden idea had flashed over her. There were two taxicabs at the station on the corner.

"I will take the first," she whispered. "Take the second and follow me. Then he cannot trace us."

They were off, leaving the baffled shadow only time to take the numbers of the cab. Constance had thought of that. She stopped and Carlton joined her. After a short walk they took another cab.

He looked at her inquiringly, but she said nothing. In her eyes he saw the same fire that blazed when she had asked him if there was no way to avoid discovery and had suggested it herself in the forgery. He reached over and caressed her hand. She did not withdraw it, but her averted eyes told that she could not trust even herself too far.

As they stood before the gateway to the steps that led down into the long under-river tunnel which was to swallow them so soon and project them, each into a new life, hundreds, perhaps thousands of miles apart, Carlton realized as never before what it all had meant. He had loved her through all the years, but never with the wild love of the past two weeks. Now there was nothing but blackness and blankness. He felt as though the hand of fate was tearing out his wildly beating heart.

She tried to smile at him bravely. She understood. For a moment she looked at him in the old way and all the pent-up love that would have, that had done and dared everything for him struggled in her rapidly rising and falling breast.

It was now or never. She knew it, the supreme effort. One word or look too many from her and all would be lost. She flung her arms about him and kissed him. "Remember— one week from to-day— a personal— in the star," she panted.

She literally tore herself from his arms, gathered up her grip, and was gone.

A week passed. The quiet little woman at the Oceanview House was still as much a mystery to the other guests as when she arrived, travel-stained and worn with the repressed emotion of her sacrifice. She had appeared to show no interest in anything, to take her meals mechanically, to stay most of the time in her room, never to enter into any of the recreations of the famous winter resort.

Only once a day did she betray the slightest concern about anything around her. That was when the New York papers arrived. Then she was always first at the news-stand, and the boy handed out to her, as a matter of habit, the star. Yet no one ever saw her read it. Directly afterward she would retire to her room. There she would pore over the first page, reading and rereading every personal in it. Sometimes she would try reading them backward and transposing the words, as if the message they contained might be in the form of a cryptograph.

The strain and the suspense began to show on her. Day after day passed, until it was nearly two weeks since the parting in New York. Day after day she grew more worn by worry and fear. What had happened?

In desperation she herself wired a personal to the paper: "Weston. Write me at the Oceanview. Easton."

For three days she waited for an answer. Then she wired the personal again. Still there was no reply and no hint of reply. Had they captured him? Or was he so closely pursued that he did not dare to reply even in the cryptic manner on which they had agreed!

She took the file of papers which she kept and again ran through the personals, even going back to the very day after they had separated. Perhaps she had missed one, though she knew that she could not have done so, for she had looked at them a hundred times. Where was he? Why did he not answer her message in some way? No one had followed her. Were they centering their efforts on capturing him?

She haunted the news-stand in the lobby of the beautifully appointed hotel. Her desire to read newspapers grew. She read everything.

It was just two weeks since they had left New York on their separate journeys when, on the evening of another newsless day, she was passing the news-stand. From force of habit she glanced at an early edition of an evening paper.

The big black type of the heading caught her eye:

NOTED FORGER A SUICIDE

With a little shriek, half-suppressed, she seized the paper. It was Carlton. There was his name. He had shot himself in a room in a hotel in St. Louis. She ran her eye down the column, hardly able to read. In heavier type than the rest was the letter they had found on him:

MY DEAREST CONSTANCE,

When you read this I, who have wronged and deceived you beyond words, will be where I can no longer hurt you. Forgive me, for by this act I am a confessed embezzler and forger. I could not face you and tell you of the double life I was leading. So I have sent you away and have gone away myself— and may the Lord have mercy on the soul of

Your devoted husband,

CARLTON DUNLAP.

Over and over again she read the words, as she clutched at the edge of the news-stand to keep from fainting— "wronged and deceived you," "the double life I was leading." What did he mean? Had he, after all, been concealing something else from her? Had there really been another woman?

Suddenly the truth flashed over her. Tracked and almost overtaken, lacking her hand which had guided him, he had seen no other way out. And in his last act he had shouldered it all on himself, had shielded her nobly from the penalty, had opened wide for her the only door of escape.

___________________

7: The Orange Trees

H. Bedford-Jones

1887-1949

Short Stories,  June 10, 1942

Henry James O'Brien Bedford-Jones

MESA and desert and mountain, sunblistered sand and rock,

A cruel and grim horizon, a naked, barbaric land!

"Hunger and thirst and torment give birth to a fighting stock;

Here is your strength, my people! Conquer—and understand."

The first of a series of stories under the general heading "This Country of Ours", which celebrated aspects of the USA in the wake of Pearl Harbour.

OF A CHILL spring afternoon, Don Diego sat hugging the sunlight on the western side of the pueblo, at the crest of the precipitous rock face. He described a moving figure, a boy running, among the piñon trees of the hill slopes against the sun. He saw other moving shapes among the trees— boys, animals, timber-cutters, all in swift motion, all heading this way. He turned and whistled shrilly. A drum took up the alarm with rapid beats. The hoarse voice of Dark Sky, governor of the pueblo, lifted in quick orders.

The pueblo, built on a high rocky outcrop along the Pecos River, hummed like a beehive. Men lugged out bows, axes, arrows to the outer walls. Nimbly the squaws and children formed water-lines, to the river eastward and to the creek westward, sending a line of pots up to the huddled structures above. The outer walls were cleared, the piles of stones and boulders were increased. The frantic haste was deft and orderly; life was at stake.

Don Diego watched it all with a soldier's appreciation. From the running boy, still afar off, came a shrill and quavering cry:

"Four strangers coming!"

Don Diego repeated the words. The hubbub died down but the work went on. Old Dark Sky clambered along to where Don Diego sat. The governor stood up against the skyline and shouted; the boy made reply. Dark Sky called to the people:

"Four strangers coming from the west; no more. Let three scouts go forth to make sure, and a runner to bring back word."

The hurried work continued, as scouts and runner started forth. Don Diego smiled and fingered the pointed beard that covered his hollow cheeks. Like these people, he too could now breathe freely once more. It was not a war-party, merely four strangers. He, too, had a life to lose, or the remnants of one.

He had been here going on two years; he, Diego Benalcasar, left among these kindly people to die, when Coronado's company reached the Pecos Valley. They had long ago gone, ebbing back into Mexico; he remained, forgotten and supposedly dead. He must die, of course; he knew this. The splendid dry, thin air of New Mexico, or San Felipe as it was then named, had bettered the crises of his lung trouble; he was brown, thin, outwardly healed by the blessed sunlight. But the coughing grew worse at times, and his lungs bled badly.

His fathers had been among the chivalry of Granada. He was not the only Moor who came to the New World with Spanish armies; but he was a Moor of pure Arab blood, white as the Spaniards themselves. It was 1540 when Coronado left him here; close to two years, he thought vaguely. He kept no count of time.

He had a new name now. They called him Ironheart, because of the cuirass he no longer wore, the first iron they had seen. It suited him ill, this quiet man of tender spirit.

The boy, still running headlong, was close beneath the height, and poured forth more information. Dark Sky turned.

"No alarm!" he called. "Four strangers, burdened; one is a woman."

He left his high perch. The pueblo fell quiet, the water-bearers ceased work, the weapons were taken under cover again. Diego sat gazing at the fields of cotton and corn, and out at the high hills of naked rock, and the dim peaks to the north his comrades had named Sangre de Cristo, because of the red sunlight on their snow at morning and night.

How he had hated this country when he came! High country of mesa and cedar and pifion tree, bleak rock stabbing the blue skies; harsh, dread country, except for the little valleys like this one. No gold, no fabled Seven Cities of Quivera; only savage raiding redskin tribes to south and west, and here the peaceful pueblo people, unused to war, tilling the soil. A crude, barbarian land, uncivilized as its people, almost untouched by man.

Within the past few months, however, he had subtly changed about all this. Even in the primeval untouched rock and sand and cactus wilderness, there was a certain naked grandeur. And the sun held life, even more than the sun of Andalusia.

The wild game was glorious—beaver and turkey, deer and bison, small fowl abundant. A glutton would die of sheer delight, here!

Diego turned, at a scuff of moccasins on the stones. Up beside him in the warmth was clambering Isabella, daughter of the old governor. He had named her thus when first he came to this pueblo on the Pecos River, before he picked up the language.

She was an ugly woman, squat and powerful, with a quick laugh and a lively intelligence, and was the best maker of pottery in the whole place. These people who elected their own rulers were a friendly folk, with much leaning to arts and crafts.

Isabella's eyes danced at the white man. She produced a little black pot that held her only valuables, and fell to work, She was stringing the wingbones of wild turkeys into a necklace; bones saved up for years until now she had a hundred or more, graduated and beautifully rubbed into a high white polish. When finished, Diego knew that this necklace would be a veritable treasure in redskin eyes.

She called something to the approaching boy, who was her son, and laughed happily.

"He did well," said Diego. She nodded.

"So I told him. For reward, he shall be permitted to look upon the gods. Only vigilance can protect us from war-parties of Apache or Navajoa or Comanche!"

"The gods? I've never seen them," said Diego, curious.

"They are not to be shown," Isabella rejoined curtly. "Any more than your god, the one you tell us about."

"The king of all the gods," said Diego. He was no monk; he took religion lightly, he whose fathers had prayed to Allah. But he knew these people took theirs so seriously that it entered into all their life and actions and thought, so he was grave about it. "That's why he wears a crown."

"What is a crown?" she demanded, instantly eager.

HE TRIED to make her understand. He even scratched the rude shape of a crown with his knife in the clay of her black treasure-pot.

"I see," she exclaimed. "It is his medicine. If you could look upon your god, and.inhale the smoke of the medicine fire, you would be cured. That is how we are cured, but our gods would not help you. What is your god like?"

"Oh, like a man, like me!"

"How do you know, if you have never seen him?"

The priests, the medicine men, knew; this made sense to her. Suddenly Diego laughed and reached into the pocket of his tattered jerkin.

"Ha! I found something today for you, something I brought from Mexico! I kept it because it was curious, and found it today among my things. The ancient people in Mexico made it, as you make your pots. Such things ate picked up everywhere in the fields."

He handed her a little head, slightly over an inch long, of pottery. More correctly it was a face, the back of the head being quite flat. It was one of the curious little portraits in pottery found everywhere in Mexico, then and in later ages, whose use or provenance, except as portraits, have never been learned. The singular thing about this one was that it showed the face of a man with one eye, the other eye being gone in a scar.

Isabella eyed it in vast admiration, questioned him excitedly about it, and drank in all he said. She declared it must have been a god; she could not get the idea out of her head. That struck him as amusing— a one-eyed god! Evidently, the notion of a portrait in clay was new and fascinating to her. Clay-working was her business; she was an artist at it, but her work was strictly utilitarian.

So absorbed was she that she even paid no attention to what was going on. The scouts had gone forth, a runner came back. These four visitors were from another pueblo. Diego could not get the name of it; to his ears it sounded like Marcos—San Marcos, he called it. They were the last survivors of that pueblo, destroyed by the Navajoas. They sought shelter and refuge here, bringing their gods. The woman was the daughter of their dead chief.

Isabella woke up, when the four came into sight, and Diego questioned her. That pueblo? Far away to the south and west, a journey of days and days, almost as far as Acoma. Shelter these people? No, no! If the Navajoas were in pursuit, that would be impossible; it would bring the savage Navajoas upon Pecos with fire and sword! Isabella scurried away, to join the other women in talk, taking with her as a present the little one-eyed Aztec head.

Diego, curious, went down to the creek and crossed it, to see the four refugees. That was destiny pulling at him. They were coming near, accompanied by the boys and dogs and scouts; three men who bore bundles and arms, weary, travelworn, morose with despair. And, wonder of wonders in redskin eyes, a woman lightly burdened when by rights she should have borne the weight of all four packs! A woman tali and straight and lithe, with necklaces of shell and turquoise and stone beads; not a child, not a mother of children, but a woman fearless with youth and looking forth from brave, calm eyes. It was she who led the others.

Diego, thoughtful, had filled his waterbottle at the spring. As the four approached he stepped out and smiled, and offered it to the woman. She drank, handed it to the others, then stared at him in startled amazement; a white man! The boys sent up a babble of talk that gave explanation. She had heard of these strange white men. She stood staring, and let the others go on; and Diego gave her look for look, himself startled by her air of nobility, by the singular beauty of her proud, fine features.

"You are welcome," he said. She understood, and smiled.

"But you are not the governor?" Her words, of a different dialect, were hard to follow at first. He caught her meaning, and was delighted. Clever woman!

"No, I am not the governor; whether he will welcome you, remains to be seen. Come, you are safe. You shall rest and eat. Does danger follow you?"

"Yes," she said simply. This was bad, he knew, for her hopes.

They went on together, overtook the others, and halted at the creek. The people of the pueblo came out to meet them, led by the governor; men and women crowding curiously at the edge of the cornfield.

THERE was was no oratory, no idle chatter; only an avid but startled suspense and curiosity, a deep gravity. Here was an issue of life or death at decision. Everything was life or death to these people, but the Navajoas meant death, in hideous form.

The three men who had arrived laid down their burdens and talked. They told of how San Marcos, once more populous than this pueblo of Pecos, had dwindled in people and wealth until it became an empty hulk; and of how a final attack by Navajoas had been repulsed, but at frightful cost. Then sickness had come to finish the wretched folk. These four, hearing that a war-party of Navajoas were coming, fled. Then the woman spoke.

"I am Bright Sun; after I was born, the first thing my mother saw was the morning sun. My father was governor of San Marcos till he died. I have brought my people here and our gods, to ask that we may join your pueblo. We have seen Navajoa smokes behind us."

That was all; grimly eloquent, proudly significant. At her gesture, one of the three men unrolled a bundle and laid bare their gods. All three men covered their heads in shame and silence, but she remained erect and defiant.

Diego craned to see these gods. To display them thus, meant that they were desecrated and abandoned, that they were offered as a sacrifice to the strong gods of this pueblo. He saw three stones a foot long, ovals, with eyes and nose and mouth rudely fashioned at one end. Doubtless they were centuries old, sacred fetiches dating from the beginnings of the now empty and deserted pueblo.

The three men were stout fellows, well armed, versed in war; they should be a welcome addition to the hundred-odd people here, who knew little of warfare. At a gesture from Dark Sky, the three stone gods were covered again.

"If the Navajoas follow you," said the governor shrewdly, "to send you away will not save us from their blood-lust, But to take you into our company is for all the people to decide. Come and rest, drink, eat; tonight we hold council and speak with our gods."

With a rush, the refugees were made welcome, tongues chattering eagerly. Diego caught the eye of Bright Sun and held out his hand to her, and led her up the steep trail. At the crest, she paused. Now she could see over the outcrop of shaggy rock to the wide vale of the Pecos on the other side, with its trees and cultivated fields; her weary eye brightened and her tired features smoothed, and a smile touched her lips as she spoke.

"How good it is, all this country! This, and ours, and the country of the other pueblo peoples! Yet everyone who is living, must some day die—"

SHE broke off, and went on with him.

Diego led her to the little stone-walled habitation that was his own; it was larger than the others, for he could not cramp himself in the tiny places where these people curled. She drank again, refused food, and dropped upon the soft deerskin; almost at once, she was asleep.

Diego unfastened her high, stout moccasins; padded as they were against the sharp rocks, they were worn and cut to ribbons. He sought the hovel of the governor, and took out his knife, a thing which these people coveted ardently.

"Give me fresh moccasins for her," he said. "I buy them with this."

Two other men were crowded in beside Dark Sky. Grunts broke from them all; grunts of instant refusal. They were kind of heart, these peaceful red men, and very pitiful; they, too, had suffered from raiding scalp-hunters. Dark Sky refused the knife, and issued him moccasins from the common store for the woman. Diego took them back and left them beside her. He looked at her face as she lay in exhausted slumber, and went out thoughtfully. A magnificent creature, he thought; strange, the way she had spoken about this country!

"She seems to admire it," he thought, and shrugged. "What would these people say if they could see Andalusia, and the orange groves of Granada! Yet to them, perhaps it seems as lovely as Granada does to me— who will never see it again, And that odd sentence —everyone who is living, must some day die. True, of course; perhaps I misunderstood her. She's well named. She's as far above all these people, here and elsewhere, as the sun is above the earth!"

That evening Diego was permitted to attend the council of the elders, in the big kiva underground; his wisdom and help had been of great aid to these men, for he tried to repay their kindness in various ways, and they held him in high regard. He did not speak, for he was not asked, nor was there any need.

"Take them in, and be damned to the Navajoas!" he interpreted the general sentiment to himself, and smiled. The medicine man so advised in almost identical words, and the vote of the council was unanimous. Later, in private, Dark Sky rather anxiously asked him to speak.

"Well done," said Diego. "Your gods are strong. You can do still better. Send out boys in parties of three, relieving each other every few days, to keep a watch against any enemies—not close by, but at a distance. Navajoas will come by the water, by springs and wells; not a hard matter to watch. And there is something else."

He unfastened his knife and sheath, and laid it down.

"I have a sword. Why should I carry this always, when it can be of use to so many? Take it for the use of all, that it may be shared by my friends alike."

It was such things as this that had endeared him to these red men. And the advice was sound; the governor followed it at once. The Navajoas were days and weeks away from their own country. They might raid and attack swiftly, or they might lurk somewhere about for a long time, to Jull their victims into security. A watch was essential, therefore.

Next morning Diego was out in the sunlight, shaping an arrow-shaft, when a bad spell of coughing seized him, bringing up bright blood, racking him terribly. As he sat resting, Isabella came to him, anxiety in her usually merry eyes, bringing a pot of water. He drank gratefully.

"I shall cure you, Ironheart!" she exclaimed. "The medicine man is going to help me. I have found the way!"

"You are kind," he said, and thought little more of it. He felt there was no cure.

These next days wrapped him in joyous amazement and wonder, because of the woman from the San Marcos pueblo. Rested and refreshed, she was a new creature, both to him and to the folk around. She was his own kind, yet far above him in every way, as he admitted to himself; she was of the pueblo folk, yet not of them. Her nobility, her breadth of vision, her splendid springing spirit, left him breathless and awed; none the less, he knew with a wrench at his heart that he, Don Diego Benalcasar, loved this woman of dusky skin.

They spent much time together, in the cotton field, in the corn patches, out along the winding Pecos and on the high mesas, though any climbing wearied him terribly. Always he found in her something new and amazing. She was not like so many, resenting hardships and toil. Instead, she gloried in everything, chiefly in the land itself, even in the bare naked ridges of rock.

"Magnificent, all of it!" she would say in an ecstasy of emotion, a very rare quality among these redskins, who took everything for granted. "This rock is hard, resistant, conquering all things except wind and water! And this river, making the green things grow, corn for our hunger, cotton for our backs—this sunlight that makes the yucca grow in the hot empty sand! The yucca, whose fiber makes our baskets and strong nets! Why, everything in this country is wonderful!"

Diego told her of Granada, of the olive groves, of the orange trees, the most beautiful country in the whole world.

"Then why did you leave it?" she flashed out at him.

"Because my people lost it," he said sadly. "They became soft, enervated, unlike the hardy desert warriors who first came and seized it."

"You stand convicted out of your own mouth," said she. Or, in her actual words, "You are bitten by your own rattlesnake, brother. From what you say, yours is a soft country where beauty grows with little toil or labor. That is deceptive, like the little gray rattlesnake who makes no noise. Such a country breeds soft folk. Look at my people! We are hard, we work all day; we are tough. Even the Comanches cannot destroy us. Why? Because we are of this country, firm like the rocks!"

"Yet your own pueblo and your people are no more," he reminded her. She did not flinch.

"True. Everyone who is living must some day die," she said calmly. "All my people must some day pass, all my race; who will have this country then? Perhaps your people. But they must be of rock and fire, they must love a hard life; they, like wind and water, must be able to conquer this naked rock!"

Diego was shaken, as her words opened his mind. He gradually found himself sharing her feelings; he beheld all this land in a new light, a truer light. Doomed to see his own people nevermore, he found new values in everything around him; here, gold was dross but an edge of steel meant food and living.

She told him strange legends of her ancient race, misty beliefs half lost in long ages; how their ancestors had come out of west or east, she was not sure which, but always down—they had lived in high places; they and their gods alike were of the mountains. They were different from other Indians because they lived together and tilled the soil; their social sense was an inheritance from the dim past. So was the fact that they lived on the tops of rocky eminences, not huddling in hidden cliffdwellings like the cave people.

Everything that was living, must some day die— these words held no bitterness or sadness. They merely expressed an inevitable fact of nature to be accepted with intelligence. Diego found this so impressive that he came to look upon it as a deep teaching. He made no secret of his own situation to her, and she nodded quietly.

"Yes, I know. Word reached us last year about the white men and their strange beasts, and how one of them remained at this pueblo to die. That is why we came here, rather than go to Acoma or elsewhere. I was curious. Yes, you must die, brother; death is in your eyes."

He met her calm, wise look and smiled; he had no whining sorrow for himself.

"Well, that is a pity, Bright Sky, I have never met a woman like you. Together, we might make beautiful places in this country, even more beautiful than the places your people make." He pointed to the terraces and cornfields. "The oranges of which I told you— why, we might plant them here! We might grow the golden fruit; anything is possible to you and me working together! We were made for each other, to accomplish things, to love and live greatly!"

"Yes, that is quite true." Her calm words surprised and confounded him. A strange love-making! "But you must die, as I must. What of that? Are you a savage Apache, who sees in death only the end of everything?"

She threw out a hand toward the green expanses along the river, then her hand fell upon his and rested there.

"Death is nothing to fear. The corn dies and is renewed. The leaves die and spring again. We die, and meet once more in the land of the spirit, a strong and glorious country like this of ours, where the gods never hide their faces. Yes; here or there, we shall plant the orange trees you tell about..."

Not for the first time nor the last, her wisdom startled him beyond words; he lifted her brown fingers to his lips, and strength flowed into him from her, and knowledge.

It broke upon him thus suddenly; she was one with him, she loved him! This was why she opened her heart to him with words and thoughts her people could not comprehend. That he kissed her fingers amused her, brought laughter to her eyes; but there was no laughter when he put his hands on her arms and bent his forehead to her left shoulder, in the custom of her people, and touched her cheek with his. She did the same, and murmured at his ear:

"Together, yes! And we shall not forget to plant the orange trees...."

Love, like death, was a simple thing here, taken for granted and accepted without astonishment, like the sunlight or the rain.

During all this time there came no word of any alarm from the guards on the mesa crests watching the trails and waterholes; and as it was the season of the buffalo run, a party of hunters went out.

Luckily a dozen hunters from the Tesuque pueblo happened past on the same errand, and forces were joined. To kill the shaggy bison afoot, with bow and spear, was easier for many than for few.

But destiny, as it chanced, was plotting at other things than buffalo.

EARLY one evening Isabella, daughter of the governor, came to the little stone-walled room at the south end of the pueblo, where Diego and Bright Sun sat eating. She saluted them, hands to shoulders, and then put into Diego's hand a bit of leather folded about something. Her dancing eyes were alight and radiant.

"You must not look at it now!" she warned. him. "It is your god, the king of the gods. The medicine man is ready and waiting for you in the kiva of ceremony. Go to him, and you will be cured."

"I? Cured?" demanded Diego.  He glanced at Bright Sun, who nodded.

"Yes; she is right. I know all about it. Go."

Diego grimaced and assented. Isabella gtunted happily.

"The ancient god you gave me had only one eye; so I have made your god without a nose. A god has no need of a nose. Perhaps the luck is better if the god is not complete. But you must only look at it when the medicine man tells you and sings to heal you."

Purely to please her, because there was nothing inviting about this curative rite, Diego complied and went to the kiva where such ceremonies were held.

He went down the ladder to the first landing, and found the medicine man waiting. Below, a fire was going and an aromatic smoke wreathing up. Diego stripped, and with his guide went on down to what he mentally termed the torturechamber. He seated himself before the fire, purified himself with water, and the medicine man sat with his drum across the little round chamber and began his chants of healing.

It lasted a long time, far into the night. Diego found the smoke difficult to endure, yet it was not hard on his lungs; at a certain point, the priest ordered him to set his god in front of the little fire and to look upon his steadily. Diego unwrapped the object he had brought and examined it as he set it beside the fireglow.

It was a crude little man-effigy, with rudimentary arms and legs and a queer head. It was of clay, baked hard like a pot, unpainted; the only semblance of a face lay in three tiny holes for eyes and mouth, pricked with the end of a bone awl. Then he looked again, with sudden affectionate comprehension of the kindly Isabella's art. That queer thing about the head—why, it was made to represent a crown! This was what she had meant; the king of the gods!

Almost unconsciously Diego crossed himself. Emotion stirred in him, as he gazed upon this minute clay image. What was this thing, after all? Not what careless eyes told, but what the woman who made it had intended—the intent was the thing, the creative effort in her heart. It was not a little blob of clay; it was an image of the Lord God.

Diego crossed himself again, and his head bowed, and long unuttered prayers came to his lips, while the medicine-man drummed and sang. And, far above in the pueblo, a boy runner came panting in with word of a Navajoa war-party on the way; but no one dared enter the kiva or disturb a sacred rite with this news.

Not until he crawled out in the early morning hours, stiff and smoke-rimed and half dead with aromatic fumes, did Diego learn that the Navajoas were coming, still distant but probably arriving by next evening.

He got out his steel cuirass, wiped off the grease that kept it and his sword from rusting, and buckled it on. Bright Sun helped him. He looked down ruefully at it.

"Once I filled it; now I'm like a kernel rattling in a nut!" he said whimsically. "Well, l rattle to some purpose, at least! And when there's no more fear of foes, and all is quiet here, you and I will think again about those orange trees. We can send down to the south into Mexico and get some seeds...."

WITH morning, satisfied that he could still employ his long-unused arms, he sat in the council chamber and listened to the report of a second runner. The party of Navajoas were in unusual strength and would arrive here late in the afternoon.

"Now let me advise you, brothers," said Diego, "for war is my business. The moon is at full and comes up early. These raiders ate sufficient to cause frightful havoc and take many scalps; they plan to take you by surprise, thinking that panic will give them an easy victory. Is this so? They will attack by moonlight."

The governor and the old men assented. Diego went on, shrewdly.

"Therefore, go into the cornfields as usual, returning at sunset. Let them think their presence is unsuspected. They will attack at the north slope, where the wall of rock has crumbled and left an unguarded path. With those three valiant men of the San Marcos pueblo, I will hide there among the great rocks below and attack them when they climb; you can then spring out from hiding above and use your bows. Have you sent to warn the hunters?"

Yes, this had been done at the first alarm, runners going out to bring back the big hunting party whose absence left the defenders sadly thinned in numbers. Whether or not the hunters could get back by this evening was a different matter.

Diego's plan was adopted, though with some hesitation; it was not pleasant to go out into the cornfields when Navajoas might leap into sight at any instant. The three men of San Marcos were delighted by the plan; they asked nothing better than to die killing these wild bestial raiders who had destroyed their home and people.

The day wore on. Quietly and unostentatiously the supplies of water were replenished, the preparations were made along the walls, while parties worked as usual in the cornfields or gathering 'piñon nuts, which were now ripe, or trapping up the river. Scouts reported hourly on the approach of the enemy, who drifted like shadows across the sunlight, little dreaming that their every move was noted.

Toward sunset Diego was incredulous to hear that the Navajoas were actually here, on the long western slopes; he could see not a sign of them or any living thing among the pifion trees. The people came in from the fields and river. The life of the pueblo continued as usual. The three men of San Marcos, weapons ready, stone axes in hand, one by one secreted themselves among the tangle of rocks below the crumbled cliff-side at the north end. Diego waited for darkness, lest the glint of his steel cuirass betray him.

He sat with Bright Sun, watching the sunset. She was calm as usual; beside them sat Isabella, dancing eyes anxious as she watched her husband and son making ready arrows and rocks along the walls; she was stringing her turkey-bone necklace, and in the little black pot lay the one-eyed Aztec head, which she regarded as a great treasure.

"I shall hide all this," she said, indicating beads and pot, "when darkness falls, so that if the worst happens, the Navajoas will never get these things! I know of a hole under one of the houses where it will be safe."

Diego smiled. "Then put this with it." He extended something wrapped in skin. "It is the image of the king of the gods; it is safer than if I keep it."

Isabella nodded sagely and stowed it away in the little black jar. The sun was gone under the western slopes; she rose and departed. Diego looked at Bright Sun, inquiringly.

"You will keep safely under cover? Remember, I can't plant those orange trees without your help!"

She laughed a little, nodding.

"Yes, yes! But the women must fight like the men; there are no cowards here, Ironheart. A strange thing, this metal!" She touched. his cuirass and his sword. "Iron! They named you for it. Well, you say the rain and sunlight eat it away faster than a rock, so it is a poor name. I shall give you a new name, the word you applied to those trees—"

"Naranja," he said, laughing. "Or, in the language of my Arabic ancestors, naranj. So that's my mame, eh? A good omen! Well, time to go."

He bent his head to her shoulder, and she to his; and the gathering darkness below enfolded him.

Finding a niche among the big rocks below, Diego esconced himself, bared his stout blade, and waited; the moon, almost at full, was already up, but this western slope of the rocky ridge would be in deep shadow for a long while. All the better for the raiders, hoping to rush this entire pueblo, catch it off guard, and sweep into an orgy of murder, like savage dogs in a rabbit-warren.

Diego could hear nothing. His three men understood that they were to await word from him; he could not even hear them breathe, yet they were somewhere close.

He thought of Bright Sun, above; he had thought of her all along. That was why he had proposed this plan— to keep the danger away from those up above, if possible. Neither he nor the three men of San Marcos had any illusions about it, but he trusted that the steel cuirass would save him from the worst. And he had taught the pueblo men to use shields of tough hide on wooden frames; a great thing for them to learn, since the chief missiles used in this fighting were arrows, until it came to hand-to-hand work.

Time passed. Moonlight silvered the western slopes, and ran radiant fingers along the crest of the pueblo above. Coyotes howled insane mouthings at the moon, jabbering cries like the shrieks of lost souls— or were they coyotes? The half-wild dogs of the pueblo burst into furious threats of repartee, and quieted again.

Nothing moved, nothing showed. Diego tensed abruptly, and gathered his muscles, his fingers gripping on the rough wirewound hilt of his sword. He felt something. Then, with no warning, with only a wild heart-leap, he was aware of something that flitted past through the shadows. Something else. The scrape of a moccasin on stone— then they were all around, halfnaked dark shapes armed with bow and club and spear—

He uprose with a yell and drove his sword into the closest shape. Yell upon yell split the darkness asunder, and were re-echoed from the height above. The three men of San Marcos leaped erect and swung their stone-headed axes. All about were the Navajoas. Along the walls above embers were blown into a blaze that caught piles of dry corn-husks and flamed high, lighting the scene.

No time to think, no time to plan— it was a furious struggle, breast to breast, enemies pressing thickly on the four men here. Stones and arrows pelted from above on foe and friend alike. Bowstrings hummed and twanged. A stone axe hammered on Diego's cuirass, but his bright sword slit the throat of the wielder.

Caught in their own surprise-trap, the Navajoas scattered and died from sight; a few hurt warriors battled savagely on in blind fury. One of the San Marcos men stood leaning against a huge rock, a spear through his body; arrows tore into him, and he moved not. A second leaped high, clawing at the shaft transfixing his throat. The third was slugging it out with a wounded Navajoa, axe against axe; he dies of a flitting arrow, as his edged axe shattered the painted face and head.

A fit of coughing seized upon Diego.

He doubled up, blood on his lips. Two of the agile red men were upon him, as he staggered for the path up the hill, realizing that he was alone. An arrow struck his corselet and shivered against it. His blade dtove at the nearer redskin with a lunge to the heart; the axe of the other struck him from the side and dazed him. The Navajoa leaped in to finish it, and Diego, still coughing, slashed him across the eyes, then ran him through the body.

A sharp stab of pain in his hip, a thudding shock, and he dropped from sight among the high rocks.

Scattered out, the furious wild men showered bitter shafts upon the defendets above. Five or six of them were climbing at another point, bursting suddenly over the crest of the pueblo wall, their axes and spears strewing death and panic among the women and defenders. Others clambered up to join them.

Many of the raiders lay dead or dying among the rocks below. Even so, plenty remained to burst in upon the defenders with a ferocity whose appalling fury struck the pueblo folk with terror and panic. Others came up and over. Squaws and children were speared or axed as they ran or fought. The whole south corner of the pueblo was breached or taken.

Then it was that the panting, gasping hunters, swelled by the Tesuque men, came along the ridge and took the assailants in rear.

Agile among these hillside rocks, knowing every foot of the ground by heart, they slew as never had the gentle pueblo men slain before. No mercy was asked or given. Of that entire war-party, only a scattered few reached the foot of the slope again, to flee homeward to their own place.

Navajoa skins, it is said, made notable medicine drums both here and at Tesuque for a generation or two afterward.

The cries and wailings of stricken mourners drifted shrilly upon the night. Among others who had journeyed forth to the ghost-land, Isabella of the dancing eyes lay cold and stiff on the upper parapet. Beside her sat Bright Sun, unmoving, but smiling in the moonlight, her fingers gtipped upon a feathered shaft that protruded from her heart.

When the sad folk came down among the rocks below the trail their cries of grief rose more keenly, then ceased. The feeble voice of Diego was guiding them to him; they came, but could do nothing to aid him. Two arrows had drained the blood out of him; he was all gray and white in the moonlight that by now had crept over the ridge. He looked up as Dark Sky loomed above him, and spoke.

"Bright Sun? She is unhurt?"

The old governor covered his face.

"She is with my daughter. They have gone together."

Diego understood. He coughed, and wiped blood from his lips, and his hand fell.

"Everything that is living— must some day die," he said faintly. His chin dropped on his chest, wearily. "Together; God is kind. We shall plant— the orange trees—"

His head jerked, and he said no more.

So the golden fruit was not planted— at least in the valley of the Pecos.

But, four hundred years later, heavy rains washed out a ditch in the pueblo of the people, long abandoned. The little black pot of Isabella, broken now, was brought to light. Still within it were the necklace of turkey wingbones, and the queer effigy of clay that was really an image of the king of the gods, and the portrait of the one-eyed Aztec.

And these now belong to people of the new race, who like wind and water, had conquered the naked rock and won all this country of the sun by labor of their hands, and had planted therein orange trees of the spirit.

________________

8: La Haute Finance

Richard Marsh

1857-1915

The Windsor Magazine, Feb 1902

Richard Bernard Heldmann

"BY JOVE! I believe it could be done!"

Mr. Rodney Railton took the cigarette out of his mouth and sent a puff of smoke into the air.

"I believe it could, by Jove!"

Another puff of smoke.

"I'll write to Mac."

He drew a sheet of paper towards him and penned the following:—

"DEAR ALEC,—Can you give me some dinner to-night? Wire me if you have a crowd. I shall be in the House till four. Have something to propose which will make your hair stand up.

"Yours, R. R."

This he addressed "Alexander Macmathers, Esq., 27, Campden Hill Mansions." As he went downstairs he gave the note to the commissionaire, with instructions that it should be delivered at once by hand.

That night Mr. Railton dined with Mr. Macmathers. The party consisted of three, the two gentlemen and a lady— Mrs. Macmathers, in fact. Mr. Macmathers was an American— a Southerner— rather tall and weedy, with a heavy, drooping moustache, like his hair, raven black. He was not talkative. His demeanour gave a wrong impression of the man—the impression that he was not a man of action. As a matter of fact, he was a man of action before all things else. He was not rich, as riches go, but certainly he was not poor. His temperament was cosmopolitan, and his profession Jack-of-all-trades. Wherever there was money to be made, he was there. Sometimes, it must be confessed, he was there, too, when there was money to be lost, His wife was English— keen and clever. Her chief weakness was that she would persist in looking on existence as a gigantic lark. When she was most serious she regarded life least au sérieux.

Mr. Railton, who had invited himself to dinner, was a hybrid— German mother, English father. He was quite a young man— say thirty. His host was perhaps ten, his hostess five years older than himself. He was a stockjobber— ostensibly in the Erie market. All that he had he had made, for he had, as a boy, found himself the situation of a clerk. But his clerkly days were long since gone. No one anything like his age had a better reputation in the House; it was stated by those who had best reason to know that he had never once been left, and few had a larger credit. Lately he had wandered outside his markets to indulge in little operations in what he called La Haute Finance. In these Mr. Macmathers had been his partner more than once, and in him he had found just the man he wished to find.

When they had finished dinner, the lady withdrew, and the gentlemen were left alone.

"Well," observed Mr. Macmathers, "what's going to make my hair stand up?"

Mr. Railton stroked his chin as he leaned both his elbows on the board.

"Of course, Mac, I can depend on you. I'm just giving myself away. It's no good my asking you to observe strict confidence, for, if you won't come in, from the mere fact of your knowing it the thing's just busted up, that's all."

"Sounds like a mystery-of-blood-to-thee-I'll-now-unfold sort of thing."

"I don't know about mystery, but there'll be plenty of blood."

Mr. Railton stopped short and looked at his friend.

"Blood, eh? I say, Rodney, think before you speak."

"I have thought. I thought I'd play the game alone. But it's too big a game for one."

"Well, if you have thought, out with it, or be silent evermore."

"You know Plumline, the dramatist?"

"I know he's an ass."

"Ass or no ass, it's from him I got the idea."

"Good Heavens! No wonder it smells of blood."

"He's got an idea for a new play, and he came to me to get some local colouring. I'll just tell you the plot— he was obliged to tell it me, or I couldn't have given him the help he wanted."

"Is it essential? I have enough of Plumline's plots when I see them on the stage."

"It is essential. You will see."

Mr. Railton got up, lighted a cigar, and stood before the fireplace. When he had brought the cigar into good going order he unfolded Mr. Plumline's plot.

"I'm not going to bore you. I'm just going to touch upon that part which gave me my idea. There's a girl who dreams of boundless wealth— a clever girl, you understand."

"Girls who dream of boundless wealth sometimes are clever," murmured his friend. Perhaps he had his wife in his mind's eye.

"She is wooed and won by a financier. Not wooed and won by a tale of love, but by the exposition of an idea."

"That's rather new— for Plumline."

"The financier has an idea for obtaining the boundless wealth of which she only dreams."

"And the idea?"

"Is the bringing about of a war between France and Germany."

"Great snakes!" The cigarette dropped from between Mr. Macmather's lips. He carefully picked it up again. "That's not a bad idea— for Plumline."

"It's my idea as well. In the play it fails. The financier comes to grief. I shouldn't fail. There's just that difference."

Mr. Macmathers regarded his friend in silence before he spoke again.

"Railton, might I ask you to enlarge upon your meaning? I want to see which of us two is drunk."

"In the play the man has a big bear account— the biggest upon record. I need hardly tell you that a war between France and Germany would mean falling markets. Supposing we were able to calculate with certainty the exact moment of the outbreak— arrange it, in fact— we might realise wealth beyond the dreams of avarice— hundreds of thousands of millions, if we chose."

"I suppose you're joking?"

"How?"

"That's what I want to know— how."

"It does sound, at first hearing, like a joke, to suppose that a couple of mere outsiders can, at their own sweet will and pleasure, stir up a war between two Great Powers."

"A joke is a mild way of describing it, my friend."

"Alec, would you mind asking Mrs. Macmathers to form a third on this occasion?"

Mr. Macmathers eyed his friend for a moment, then got up and left the room. When he returned his wife was with him. It was to the lady Mr. Railton addressed himself.

"Mrs. Macmathers, would you like to be possessed of wealth compared to which the wealth of the Vanderbilts, the Rothschilds, the Mackays, the Goulds, would shrink into insignificance?"

"Why, certainly."

It was a peculiarity of the lady's that, while she was English, she affected what she supposed to be American idioms.

"Would you stick at a little to obtain it?"

"Certainly not."

"It would be worth one's while to run a considerable risk."

"I guess."

"Mrs. Macmathers, I want to go a bear, a large bear, to win, say— I want to put it modestly— a hundred millions."

"Pounds?"

"Pounds."

It is to be feared that Mrs. Macmathers whistled.

"Figures large," she said.

"All the world knows that war is inevitable between France and Germany."

"Proceed."

"I want to arrange that it shall break out at the moment when it best suits me."

"I guess you're a modest man," she said.

Her husband smiled.

"If you consider for a moment, it would not be so difficult as it first appears. It requires but a spark to set the fire burning. There is at least one party in France to whom war would mean the achievement of all their most cherished dreams. It is long odds that a war would bring some M. Quelquechose to the front with a rush. He will be at least untried. And, of late years, it is the untried men who have the people's confidence in France. A few resolute men, my dear Mrs. Macmathers, have only to kick up a shindy on the Alsatian borders— Europe will be roused, in the middle of the night, by the roaring of the flames of war."

There was a pause. Mrs. Macmathers got up and began to pace the room.

"It's a big order," she said.

"Allowing the feasibility of your proposition, I conclude that you have some observations to make upon it from a moral point of view. It requires them, my friend."

Mr. Macmathers said this with a certain dryness.

"Moral point of view be hanged! It could be argued, mind, and defended; but I prefer to say candidly, the moral point of view be hanged!"

"Has it not occurred to you to think that the next Franco-German war may mean the annihilation of one of the parties concerned?"

"You mistake the position. I should have nothing to do with the war. I should merely arrange the date for its commencement. With or without me they would fight."

"You would merely consign two or three hundred thousand men to die at the moment which would best suit your pocket."

"There is that way of looking at it, no doubt. But you will allow me to remind you that you considered the possibility of creating a corner in corn without making unpleasant allusions to the fact that it might have meant starvation to thousands."

The lady interposed.

"Mr. Railton, leaving all that sort of thing alone, what is it that you propose?"

"The details have still to be filled in. Broadly I propose to arrange a series of collisions with the German frontier authorities. I propose to get them boomed by the Parisian Press. I propose to give some M. Quelquechose his chance."

"It's the biggest order ever I heard."

"Not so big as it sounds. Start to-morrow, and I believe that we should be within measureable distance of war next week. Properly managed, I will at least guarantee that all the Stock Exchanges of Europe go down with a run."

"If the thing hangs fire, how about carrying over?"

"Settle. No carrying over for me. I will undertake that there is a sufficient margin of profit. Every account we will do a fresh bear until the trick is made. Unless I am mistaken, the trick will be made with a rapidity of which you appear to have no conception."

"It is like a dream of the Arabian nights," the lady said.

"Before the actual reality the Arabian nights pale their ineffectual fires. It is a chance which no man ever had before, which no man may ever have again. I don't think, Macmathers, we ought to let it slip."

They did not let it slip.

ii

MR. RAILTON was acquainted with a certain French gentleman who rejoiced in the name— according to his own account— of M. Hippolyte de Vrai-Castille. The name did not sound exactly French— M. de Vrai-Castille threw light on this by explaining that his family came originally from Spain. But, on the other hand, it must be allowed that the name did not sound exactly Spanish, either. London appeared to be this gentleman's permanent place of residence. Political reasons— so he stated— rendered it advisable that he should not appear too prominently upon his— theoretically— beloved boulevards. Journalism— always following this gentleman's account of himself— was the profession to which he devoted the flood-tide of his powers. The particular journal or journals which were rendered famous by the productions of his pen were rather difficult to discover—there appeared to be political reasons, too, for that.

"The man is an all-round bad lot." This was what Mr. Railton said when speaking of this gentleman to Mr. and Mrs. Macmathers. "A type of scoundrel only produced by France. Just the man we want."

"Flattering," observed his friend. "You are going to introduce us to high company."

Mr. Railton entertained this gentleman to dinner in a private room at the Hotel Continental. M. de Vrai-Castille did not seem to know exactly what to make of it. Nothing in his chance acquaintance with Mr. Railton had given him cause to suppose that the Englishman regarded him as a respectable man, and this sudden invitation to fraternise took him a little aback. Possibly he was taken still more aback before the evening closed. Conversation languished during the meal; but when it was over— and the waiters gone— Mr. Railton became very conversational indeed.

"Look here, What's-your-name"— this was how Mr. Railton addressed M. de Vrai-Castille— "I know very little about you, but I know enough to suspect that you have nothing in the world excepting what you steal."

"M. Railton is pleased to have his little jest."

If it was a jest, it was not one, judging from the expression of M. de Vrai-Castille's countenance which he entirely relished.

"What would you say if I presented you with ten thousand pounds?"

"I should say–"

What he said need not be recorded, but M. de Vrai-Castille used some very bad language indeed, expressive of the satisfaction with which the gift would be received.

"And suppose I should hint at your becoming possessed of another hundred thousand pounds to back it?"

"Pardon me, M. Railton, but is it murder? If so, I would say frankly at once that I have always resolved that in those sort of transactions I would take no hand."

"Stuff and nonsense! It is nothing of the kind! You say you are a politician. Well, I want you to pose as a patriot— a French patriot, you understand."

Mr. Railton's eyes twinkled. M. de Vrai-Castille grinned in reply.

"The profession is overcrowded," he murmured, with a deprecatory movement of his hands.

"Not on the lines I mean to work it. Did you lose any relatives in the war?"

"It depends."

"I feel sure you did. And at this moment the bodies of those patriots are sepultured in Alsatian soil. I want you to dig them up again."

"Mon Dieu! Ce charmant homme!"

"I want you to form a league for the recovery of the remains of those noble spirits who died for their native land, and whose bones now lie interred in what was France, but which now, alas! is France no more. I want you to go in for this bone recovery business as far as possible on a wholesale scale."

"Ciel! Maintenant j'ai trouvé un homme extraordinaire!"

"You will find no difficulty in obtaining the permission of the necessary authorities sanctioning your schemes; but at the very last moment, owing to some stated informality, the German brigands will interfere even at the edge of the already open grave; patriot bones will be dishonoured, France will be shamed in the face of all the world."

"And then?"

"The great heart of France is a patient heart, my friend, but even France will not stand that. There will be war."

"And then?"

"On the day on which war is declared, one hundred thousand pounds will be paid to you in cash."

"And supposing there is no war?"

"Should France prefer to cower beneath her shame, you shall still receive ten thousand pounds."

iii

THE FOLLOWING extract is from the Times' Parisian correspondence—

"The party of La Revanche is taking a new departure. I am in a position to state that certain gentlemen are putting their heads together. A league is being formed for the recovery of the bodies of various patriots who are at present asleep in Alsace. I have my own reasons for asserting that some remarkable proceedings may be expected soon. No man knows better than myself that there is nothing some Frenchmen will not do."

On the same day there appeared in La Patrie a really touching article. It was the story of two brothers—one was, the other was not; in life they had been together, but in death they were divided. Both alike had fought for their native land. One returned— désolé!— to Paris. The other stayed behind. He still stayed behind. It appeared that he was buried in Alsace, in a nameless grave! But they had vowed, these two, that they would share all things— among the rest, that sleep which even patriots must know, the unending sleep of death. "It is said," said the article in conclusion, "that that nameless grave, in what was France, will soon know none— or two!" It appeared that the surviving brother was going for that "nameless grave" on the principle of double or quits.

The story appeared, with variations, in a considerable number of journals. The Daily Telegraph had an amusing allusion to the fondness displayed by certain Frenchmen for their relatives— dead, for the "bones" of their fathers. But no one was at all prepared for the events which followed.

One morning the various money articles alluded to heavy sales which had been effected the day before, "apparently by a party of outside speculators." In particular heavy bear operations were reported from Berlin. Later in the day the evening papers came out with telegrams referring to "disturbances" at a place called Pont-sur-Leaune. Pont-sur-Leaune is a little Alsatian hamlet. The next day the tale was in everybody's mouth. Certain misguided but well-meaning Frenchmen had been "shot down" by the German authorities. Particulars had not yet come to hand, but it appeared, according to the information from Paris, that a party of Frenchmen had journeyed to Alsace with the intention of recovering the bodies of relatives who had been killed in the war; on the very edge of the open graves German soldiers had shot them down. Telegrams from Berlin stated that a party of body-snatchers had been caught in the very act of plying their nefarious trade; no mention of shooting came from there. Although the story was doubted in the City, it had its effect on the markets— prices fell. It was soon seen, too, that the bears were at it again. Foreign telegrams showed that their influence was being felt all round; very heavy bear raids were again reported from Berlin. Markets became unsettled, with a downward tendency, and closing prices were the worst of the day.

Matters were not improved by the news of the morrow. A Frenchman had been shot— his name was Hippolyte de Vrai-Castille, and a manifesto from his friends had already appeared in Paris. According to this, they had been betrayed by the German authorities. They had received permission from those authorities to take the bodies of certain of their relatives and lay them in French soil. While they were acting on this permission they were suddenly attacked by German soldiers, and he, their leader, that patriot soul, Hippolyte de Vrai-Castille, was dead. But there was worse than that. They had prepared flags in which to wrap the bodies of the dead. Those flags— emblems of France— had been seized by the rude German soldiers, torn into fragments, trampled in the dust. The excitement in Paris appeared to be intense. All that day there was a falling market.

The next day's papers were full of contradictory telegrams. From Berlin the affair was pooh-poohed. The story of permission having been accorded by the authorities was pure fiction—there had been a scuffle in which a man had been killed, probably by his own friends— the tale of the dishonoured flags was the invention of an imaginative brain. But these contradictions were for the most part frantically contradicted by the Parisian Press. There was a man in Paris who had actually figured on the scene. He had caught M. de Vrai-Castille in his arms as he fell, he had been stained by his heart's blood, his cheek had been torn open by the bullet which killed his friend. Next his heart he at that moment carried portions of the flags— emblems of France!— which had been subjected to such shame.

But it was on the following day that the situation first took a definitely serious shape. Placards appeared on every dead wall in Paris, small bills were thrust under every citizen's door— on the bills and placards were printed the same words. They were signed "Quelquechose." They pointed out that France owed her present degradation— like all her other degradations— to her Government. The nation was once more insulted; the Army was once more betrayed; the national flag had been trampled on again, as it had been trampled on before. Under a strong Government these things could not be, but under a Government of cowards–! Let France but breathe the word, "La Grande Nation" would exist once more. Let the Army but make a sign, there would be "La Grande Armée" as of yore.

That night there was a scene in the Chamber. M. de Caragnac— à propos des botte— made a truly remarkable speech. He declared that permission had been given to these men. He produced documentary evidence to that effect. He protested that these men— true citizens of France!— had been the victims of a "Prussian" plot. As to the outrage to the national flag, had it been perpetrated, say, in Tonkin, "cannons would be belching forth their thunders now." But in Alsace— "this brave Government dare only turn to the smiters the other cheek." In the galleries they cheered him to the echo. On the tribune there was something like a free fight. When the last telegrams were despatched to London, Paris appeared to be approaching a state of riot.

The next day there burst a thunderbolt. Five men had been detained by the German authorities. They had escaped— had been detected in the act of flight— had been shot at while running. Two of them had been killed. A third had been fatally wounded. The news— flavoured to taste— was shouted from the roofs of the houses. Paris indulged in one of its periodical fits of madness. The condition of the troops bore a strong family likeness to mutiny. And in the morning Europe was electrified by the news that a revolution had been effected in the small hours of the morning, that the Chambers had been dissolved, and that with the Army were the issues of peace and war.

ON the day of the declaration of the war between France and Germany— that heavy-laden day— an individual called on Mr. Rodney Railton whose appearance caused that gentleman to experience a slight sensation of surprise.

"De Vrai-Castille! I was wondering if you had left any instructions as to whom I was to pay that hundred thousand pounds. I thought that you were dead."

"Monsieur mistakes. My name is Henri Kerchrist, a name not unknown in my native Finistère. M. Hippolyte de Vrai-Castille is dead. I saw him die. It was to me he directed that you should pay that hundred thousand pounds."

As he made these observations, possibly owing to some local weakness, "Henri Kerchrist" winked the other eye.

_________________

9: The Film That Was Never Shown

H. C. McNeile ("Sapper")

The Strand Magazine Dec 1922

Journal (Adelaide) 6 March 1923

So far as I can tell, this story has not been collected in any volume of "Sapper's" short stories.

THE TRADE SHOW was just over. The leading man and the leading lady, having watched themselves for two hours on the screen, had appeared before the audience in the flesh. The producer had come on to the stage and bowed. And finally the man who had expended well over forty thousand pounds on the production came on and bowed also. At each separate rise of the curtain renewed applause broke out from the audience.

There was no doubt that "Loaded Dice," in spite of its somewhat melodramatic name, was something distinctly out of the ordinary. Hardly a dissentient voice was to be heard amongst the hundreds of critical spectators who had been invited to the Alhambra to see the first public Exhibition. Actors, authors, film-stars, and— most critical of all— other producers agreed that "Loaded Dice" was an exceptionally fine film, brilliantly acted and lavishly staged. Carlton Bellairs, the leading mail and a London actor-manager of note, had fully sustained his great reputation in a strong emotional part; Sylvaine Lankester, the leading lady, had supported him with her usual consummate ability. And quite up to their standard had been John Drage, who was the third of the principals.

The action of the film had revolved round these three. Not for one moment had the interest flagged through the whole six reels. A few side issues had been introduced principally for the purpose of showing some wonderful photographs of Italian and Egyptian scenery: but only a few. The film required no padding.

Right from the start it led steadily and inexorably to the final clash between the two men for the possession of the girl. One knew it was coming, and yet— so good was the story— one never wanted to get on quicker; to skip, as one might say in book parlance. And when it finally came it held one breathless, principally because of the marvellous acting. To write it may render it banal; its very essential lay in the unspoken horror and tragedy of the scene. Carlton Bellairs, of course, was acting the part of the hero, Hubert Maiden, and Sylvaine played the girl, Mary Maxwell; John Drage, the other principal, was in popular phraseology, the villain, Edward Latford. And the final scene took place in Mary's villa at Florence.

She was seated with Hubert Maiden on a sofa in the draw room, thinking that at long last their troubles were over. Edward Latford had, as they thought, been finally disposed of, and she had just promised to marry Hubert. And after a while he had risen and pressed the bell for the butler to bring tea. They were secure; they were in love; everything was wonderful. And in that mood they waited for the tea, while we who looked on, keyed up with excitement, waited too. At last the door opened; doubtless the butler bringing tea. The happy couple on the sofa moved decorously apart, and even as they did so a shadow was thrown on the wall— shadow which they could not see but which we could. It was the shadow of an arm outstretched a little, and a revolver was in the hand. Slowly the shadow moved forward until the body appeared, and then, finally, the man himself.

Still the pair on the sofa waited in blissful ignorance; but only we knew that it was not the butler, but Edward Latford. And on his face there blazed a look of fanatical hate. Suddenly he swung round the door, and they saw him. For a moment they held the position, and we had time to see the superb acting of all three. Speechless horror by the girl; a momentary indecision by the hero before he flung himself at the villain: blazing fury by the villain.  Then the villain fired, and the hero pitched forward on his face. The scene faded out, and then showed again to let us see that the villain had turned his revolver on his own head and committed suicide.

Such, in brief, was the climax up to which a very remarkable film led. I have no intention of telling many more of the story; when "Loaded Dice" is released in due course the public may see it for themselves. But it has been necessary to give this one scene, in order to make dear the extraordinary statement which was made to me that evening by a wild-eyed man in a little restaurant in Soho. I still cannot make up my mind as to whether his story was the truth or not, though some day, if I am in Italy with time to spare, I may test it. Certain it is that this man knew all that there was to be known of the inside of the film business; that he had either acted himself, or, at any rate, worked in some capacity in a studio admits of no doubt. I know sufficient of the game myself to feel assured of that. But whether he was what he said he was or whether he was partially demented and had imagined it, I know not. Those who are interested can read on and judge for themselves.

The audience was thinning out when I first saw him. Little knots of people stood about discussing the film, and in the centre of one group stood Sylvaine Lankester, receiving the congratulations she richly deserved.

"Magnificent, by dear," said one woman, and a general murmur of assent followed— a murmur which was broken by a harsh, discordant laugh, which made every one swing round hurriedly. It was the man whom I had noticed as I left my stall, a man with blazing eyes. His clothes were somewhat shabby, and I had wondered casually when I first saw him how he had got in to the trade show. But now he stood on the edge of the group which surrounded Sylvaine Lankester, and stared at her mockingly.

"Magnificent!" he sneered. "Why, you were rotten. Rotten, I tell you, Sylvaine Lankester. What did you want to register fear for— fear and horror— as Edward Latford come round the door? Blank, I know, blank ammunition was in the revolver. And the fool producer told you to show fear. But supposing it hadn't been blank, Sylvaine Lankester? Supposing that film had been the truth, what then?"

Instinctively the girl recoiled from him, and someone in the group muttered, "He's mad; the man's mad." But even if he heard he took no heed; his eyes were still fixed on the actress who had played the part of Mary Maxwell. "You wouldn't have shown fear then, Sylvaine Lankester— not if you were such a woman as Mary. You would have shown a steady courage, a supreme indifference, a blazing contempt."

"Extremely interesting," drawled a man standing by. "And may one ask how you happen to know all this?"

"Because that is what Mary Maxwell did show," answered the stranger, quietly. "Courage, indifference, contempt— but not fear. A thousand times no; not fear."

Without another word he turned and walked away, leaving the people in the group staring after him open-mouthed. What on earth had he meant—"That is what Mary Maxwell did show?"

And then in a moment or two, with a few significant shrugs of their shoulders, they dismissed the matter from their minds. Obviously a lunatic, was the general comment, and lunatics are not very interesting. But I, who had heard it all, was not so sure. To me it had seemed as if there was a ring of sincerity underlying the wild words— a ring of truth. And on the spur of the moment I hurried after him.

I overtook him outside the Empire, and touched him on the shoulder. He swung round and stared at me with eyes full of hostility, and for a moment I regretted my hasty impulse.

"What do you want?" he snapped, don't know you." His collar was frayed, his coat was ragged, but there was an indefinable something about his face, now that I saw him close to, which made me determined to go on with it in spite of his uncompromising attitude. The difficulty lay in what line to take with him. I felt that the barest hint of charity would freeze him up like an oyster: there was a strange, fierce pride in those sombre eyes of his. And then I had a sudden inspiration.

"I'm an author of sorts." I said quietly, "and I was in the Alhambra a few minutes ago. I heard what you said to Miss Lankester, and I think, if I may say so, that you were wrong. No woman would show anything but fear in such circumstances."

For a moment he stared at me with a faint, half contemptuous smile on his face.

"Yon think so," he remarked. "Well, it's you who are wrong— just a Sylvaine Lankester was wrong. And if you care to supply me with a little dinner to-night— I regret that on 3½d, I cannot offer to act as host myself— I will prove to you that you are wrong."

"Certainly," I answered at once. 'I shall be delighted if you'll dine with me. Shall we say 8 o'clock at Bordini's Restaurant in Greek street?"

"Would it inconvenience you greatly to make it a little earlier?" he said. "Since yesterday at midday I'm afraid I haven't had very much to eat."

"Good Lord! My dear fellow," I cried aghast, "any time you like. Shall we say 7—or 6.30?"

"Six-thirty," he answered, promptly. "Bordini's! I know it."

With a quick nod he was gone, leaving me staring after him a little foolishly. Was the man a fraud, or had he really got some strange story hidden in his mind? I strolled towards the club, still wondering.

Ii

Promptly at 6.30 I turned through the swing doors of the restaurant to find him sitting at one of the tables inside. I suggested a cocktail, which he refused, and under my breath I cursed myself for a fool. One does not offer cocktails to men who haven't fed for 30 hours or more. Instead I ordered dinner at once, with a pint of the Chianti for which Bordini's is famous. And then for the next half hour I watched one of the most pathetic sights in the world— a gentleman who is starving, with food before him. For the man was a gentleman all right— his hands alone were sufficient to prove it. And he was trying to eat as a gentleman eats, while at the time hunger— stark hunger— was gnawing at him. And I wondered what he'd had even so recently as midday the day before.

But at last he finished, and with another flagon of Chianti between us, and a cigarette alight in his mouth, he leaned back in his chair and stared at me with a gleam of mocking humour in his eyes.

"And now I suppose I must pay for my dinner," he remarked.

"Damn it!" I said, a little stiffly, "it was you who suggested it. If you look at it that way, please, consider the matter ended, and we'll go."

"Forgive me!" He leaned across the table. "I'm a sarcastic brute, though I wasn't once. But there are some people ,my friend, for whom nothing ever seems to go right in this world. Maybe it's their own fault-maybe it isn't. Incidentally, the cause doesn't make much odds— it's the effect that counts." He broke off abruptly. "How did you like that film to-day?"

"Very much," I answered. "Very much indeed."

He nodded thoughtfully. "I wrote it."

"You did what? I said, staring at him in surprise. "I wrote it. I wrote the scenario, and I played in the original film."

"But surely,"  I cried, "that was an original production this afternoon? It was announced as such."

"Parts of it were original; parts of it had never been done before. But parts of it had; I suppose half of it had— quite half. And that half I have seen once on the screen. There's just one copy of it in existence to-day."

"But do these people who produced 'Loaded Dice' know about it?" I asked.

"I don't know if they do or not,' he answered. "And it doesn't make much odds, because it will never be shown."

"What part did you play?" I asked.

"Hubert Maiden, he remarked, quietly. "The part taken by Carlton Bellaire this afternoon."

I preserved a discreet silence. I could hardly see this lean, cadaverous , down-at-heels man in the character as it had been created for me by Bellairs.

"Yes— I placed the part of Hubert Maiden," he continued, after a while. "But that's the end of the story. I'll begin at the beginning."

He refilled his glass and lit another cigarette.

"I don't know if you're interested in the film business. I am, or rather"— and be smiled faintly— "I was. Right from the very start the immense possibilities of the moving picture impressed me. Even in those days when the standard consisted of a one-reel play which gave you a headache to look at, I had visualized in my own mind something of the perfection which you can see to-day. And I went into the show heart and soul. I acted a bit, and I did a certain amount of producing— you'll remember that this was in the days before a producer, if he knew his job, could command almost any salary he liked to ask— and in my spare time I wrote one or two scenarios. I didn't attach myself to any particular company; I was just a freelance. And though I say it myself, my name was fairly well known in the industry. What that name is doesn't make much odds; it's forgotten to-day."

He paused a moment to press out his cigarette. "One day in London the agent of a certain Italian firm approached me with an offer to produce their new film for them in Italy. They wanted an English producer, as the film was an English film, and most of the artists were English also. They offered me what in those days was quite a considerable sum. To-day a producer would laugh in your face if you mentioned such a figure. However, it was good enough for me, and I accepted. I read the scenario going out to Italy, and was ready to begin work as soon as I arrived. It was just an ordinary straightforward English story, the adaptation of a novel— and I've only mentioned it because I said I'd start at the beginning. That film was the beginning of my acquaintance with— well, shall we call her Mary Maxwell? She was one of the English actresses engaged by the firm, and I fell in love with her the first moment I saw her."

Again he smiled faintly as he looked at me.

"I'm not going to bore you with lovers rhapsodies," he continued. "I'm only going to say that she was then, and has remained ever since, the loveliest girl I have ever seen. She made one catch one's breath with the wonder of her, and she was utterly and absolutely unspoiled. She was so immeasurably more lovely than Sylvaine Lankester that any comparison even would be ludicrous. And somewhat naturally I was not the only man who had noticed the fact. Love has a knack of quickening- up one s powers of observation, and I hadn't been in that studio for two days before I realized that one of the Italian actors in the cast— Palo Cimetti by name— was in love with her, too. A film studio, as you probably know, is a fairly free-and-easy place, and sometimes for hours on end actors and actresses will be sitting about doing nothing, while other scenes in which they do not appear are being taken. Only the producer is busy the whole time, and often it was as much as I could do to concentrate on my job. when I knew that Mary and the Italian were not in the studio where I could see them. I used to imagine things; I used to grow almost made with jealousy; once I let down a complete scene because my mind was wandering.

"Not that I had the slightest right to be jealous; beyond talking to her as a producer I had hardly said two words to Mary since I had arrived. As far as I knew I was than nothing to her; but men in the condition I was in are not over-logical. Certain it was that she gave the Italian not the slightest encouragement— at any rate in public, though his attitude to her very soon became obvious to everybody. He followed her about like a dog, he brought her flowers and chocolates, and his eyes used to follow her wherever she was.

"God! how I hated that man. though I did my best not to show it. But he knew— right from the beginning he knew— and he hated me just as bitterly.

"And then one day came the first flareup between me and him. He was a good actor— a very good actor— and he was fully aware of the fact. In addition, he was laying lead— by-the-way, I don't think I mentioned that Mary was also playing lead. And he was fully aware of that fact also. On this particular occasion we were doing a close-up of him alone. In a corner of the studio was Mary talking to some one, and in the middle of the shot her laugh rang out suddenly. And Cimetti looked across at her. It was an unpardonable thing to do, and he knew it, even before I stopped the camera.

" 'Again, please.' I said. 'And kindly pay attention.'

"He said nothing; there was nothing he could say, but for the first time m my life I realized the meaning of the phrase to have murder in one's eyes. There was murder in Cimetti's eyes as he looked at me.

"And then very soon afterwards matters came to a head. What took me upstairs past the dressing room I don't know, but as I rounded a corner, I saw Mary struggling in Cimetti's arms. They were standing in the passage outside her room, and he was trying to kiss her, while she was pushing him away with both hands. It was enough for me; I hit him on the point of the jaw with every atom of strength I could put into it. And he crabbed; like a log, hitting his head against the wall as he fell, and then— well, my friend, it's difficult to say how these things happen— I found Mary in my arms, and this time she didn't struggle. Instead she save me her lips— her wonderful mouth— to kiss."

He said the words almost under his breath, and then for a while sat motionless, staring across the little restaurant thick with the blue haze of tobacco smoke. In his eyes was a look of dumb, hopeless longing; he was back in the past with his memories. For the moment I was forgotten; nothing lived, nothing counted with the man opposite save the touch of a woman's lips on his.

"What is it that Goethe says somewhere?" he continued after a while. " 'There are many echoes but few voices.' There's only been one voice in my life, and that voice there was no misunderstanding. My love for that girl dwarfed everything else, and when I found that it was the same with her the whole world just changed. You're a stranger to me, and I don t really know why I'm telling you all this, except that you've given me a dinner. I don't know whether you've been in love and— what is far more wonderful— been loved as I was. But if you have, then you will know that I do not exaggerate when I say that no heaven of imagination can give anything quite so marvellous if it lasts, and no hell anything quite so agonizing if it ceases. Time heals the wound a little, but it's always there, my friend, it's always there."

Thoughtfully, he lit another cigarette.

"However, I'm not here to bore you with a dissertation of love. Let us go back for a moment to where I was standing in the passage with Mary in my arms. Cimetti was forgotten, and then some movement on his part reminded us of his presence. I looked down and saw him, and for a second my heart stood still. He was crouching back against the wall, with every tooth in his bead bared in a snarl, and a long stiletto half-pulled from his pocket. But it was his eyes that fascinated me. They were gleaming with such a frenzy of diabolical hatred that for a moment I thought the man was a maniac. And then, even as he saw me looking at him over Mary's shoulder, the madness faded and was replaced by an expressionless mask. So quickly did he control him self that, when I came to think about it afterwards, I wondered if I hadn't made a mistake. Some trick of the light, perhaps, in the passage. He stood up, muttered a word or two of apology to Mary, and walked away. And she shuddered in my arms.

" 'He frightens me,' she whispered, and I soothed her and comforted her till she forgot him.

"And now I must get on. You're wondering, maybe, when the film you saw this afternoon comes in. Well, it comes in very soon. I told you, didn't I, that I had written the scenario of 'Loaded Dice, 'and I had taken it with me to Italy to polish it up and round off one or two edges. And one night I read it to Mary. She was immensely struck with it— as you saw for yourself to-day, it made a good film— and she at once suggested to me that I should offer the scenario to the firm we were then working with. Further, she suggested that she and I should play joint lead if the directors agreed. And then we sat together seeing visions and dreaming dream of the future. How we would stagger the film industry with our consummate. acting; how we should leave this small firm we were with and go over to America where the big money lies; above all, how we would get married. We'd do it before we took the Egyptian part of the film, we decided. It wouldn't mean long to wait; the present production was nearly over. Another six weeks, perhaps two months, would see us through all the Italian interiors of 'Loaded Dice,' and then— marriage. Of course, I need hardly tell you that no film is taken in the actual order in which it is shown. All the scenes of any one place are taken at the same time, and later, when the film is finally joined together, they are put into the proper sequence.

"So we dreamed that night, and next day we could scarcely believe our eyes when it seemed as if all the dreams were coming true. The firm jumped at the scenario, and bought it from me on the spot. At first they wanted me to produce it, but Mary pleaded and argued. She was insistent that I should play lead with her, and when the directors discovered that we were engaged, they agreed with true Southern gallantry. I'd played lead before, of course, with English companies.

"There was an American producer— quite a well-known man—in Rome at the time, and they engaged him in my place. And then we came to the question of casting the various parts. First and foremost came Edward Latford— the part taken by John Drage to-day. Unanimously they decided on Cimetti, and Mary and I looked at one another. We didn't want him in the cast at all, but there was no possible way of dispensing with him. He was under contract— the firm would have had to pay his salary in any case, and he was a first-class actor. To the directors the choice was obvious, so obvious that to protest against it would have been an impossibility. For, after all, what could we have said? That we didn't like him! Likes and dislikes ire common in the film world as elsewhere— perhaps commoner. And, to do the man justice, I had to admit to myself that I had no fault to find with his behaviour since Mary and I had become engaged. He had been constantly polite and courteous, and had been one of the first to congratulate me on my good fortune. And so the wheel of fate took another relentless turn towards the inevitable end."

He rested his elbows on the table and stared at me with sombre eyes.

"I suppose you've guessed that end already," he went on slowly. "Sometimes now, when I look back on the weeks that followed, I nearly go mad. When I realize that all through those wonderful days every beat of the clock was just one second nearer the end, my brain seems almost bursting. If only one could have known; if only one could have had some premonition of what was to happen. And yet, perhaps, it was better so. It would have done no good— it would have only made my Mary miserable and unhappy had she been frightened with vague fears of impending danger. Because by the very nature of the thing it was inevitable; you see, it was a part of the film itself. And so I, who wrote the film, am responsible for killing the woman I loved."

His hands were clenching and unclenching, and the sweat was glistening -on his forehead.

"I killed her, man— I killed her; just as surely, just as inevitably, as that devil Cimetti, who actually fired the shot. Listen carefully— for there's not much more to tell.

"You remember the scene, don't you— the climax of the film— where Hubert Maiden and Mary Maxwell, having rung the bell for the butler, sit waiting on the sofa, and then Edward Latford enters instead: the scene about which I spoke to Sylvaine Lankester this afternoon. It was almost the last scene to be taken before we left and went to Egypt, and though it's so long ago I can recall every detail of that morning.

"Everybody was in the best of spirits— excited over going to Egypt. And as for me— well, you can imagine my feelings. In two days I was going to marry Mary. And as we sat a little apart from the others on the sofa which was to be used in the scene I felt almost dazed with the wonder of it. A carpenter was putting a finishing touch on the door; the photographer was fixing up lights. But at (last we were ready and the producer took charge.

" 'Now we'll run through this scene,' he began. 'Cimetti—are you ready?'

Cimetti, who had just appeared, stepped forward and bowed to Mary. 'You'll open the ! door slowly,' went on the producer, 'and then you'll stretch out your hand with the revolver in it so that only the shadow is seen by the camera. Try that.'

"Cimetti tried it, and the lights had to be adjusted because there was a double shadow. And all this time Mary and I sat on the sofa, just utterly happy because we were near one another. The actual entrance, you see, was a separate scene into which we didn't come. At last we heard the camera turning, and we watched Cimetti come round the door, the revolver in his hand. It was a good entrance, splendid; it couldn't have been done better, and Mary congratulated him. Again he bowed, but for the first time a vague  shot through me. It seemed to me there was a smouldering look in his eyes, as if— But I hadn't time to worry.  It was Mary's turn now, and mine. First, Cimetti alone; then Mary and I; then all three of us together in the great scene.

" 'Get up," said the producer, 'showing fear and horror. And you,' he said to me, 'make one step forward as if to get in front of her.'

"We tried it once, and it seemed to me as if a mocking smile had shown for a moment on Cimetti's face. But when that scene was over it was his turn to come and congratulate Mary.

'Fine!' said the producer. 'Now for the last one.'

"The cameras were adjusted, the lights were moved, and Cimetti stayed with us, talking.

" 'To-morrow is it— or the next day?' he asked. 'And a honeymoon in Egypt. How delightful— how romantic!'

"The smile glinted again, and once more a dreadful fear shot through me; a presentment of some awful danger. And yet— what danger could there be? Here—in a film studio, surrounded by people.

"And now the producer was ready, and we ran through the final scene. We faced Cimetti, whose back was towards the camera, and on his lips the smile still lingered.

" 'Hold it like that," said the producer, 'and when I shout "Now," you will fire, Cimetti, and you,' he said to me, 'pitch forward, on your face.'

"And so we ran through it— once, twice, and still Cimetti smiled.

" 'That's bully.' The producer was rubbing his hands together. 'I think, Miss Maxwell,' he went on, 'that as he falls you had better ,say, "Oh God!" as you go on your knees beside him. Camera ready? Right; let's get on with it.' "

The man opposite drew a deep breath.

"And that was the end. The next few seconds are a little blurred in my mind. The camera started, and. with it the smile faded from Cimetti's face, to be replaced by the same look of diabolical hatred that I had seen that day weeks before when I had knocked him down. Only Mary and I could see it; but I think she knew as well as I did that it was no pretence this time. I think she knew as well as I did that the revolver was loaded.

" 'Great!' I heard the producer's voice as if from a great distance. And then it came. Simultaneous with the 'Now' there was the crack of a revolver. I felt something sear through me; there was a roaring is my ears, and I knew nothing more."

He paused and lit a cigarette with a hand that trembled a little.

"And if the camera man had not gone on mechanically turning the handle, it would have ended there. I should not have said what I did to Miss Lankester to-day, for my Mary was told to show fear, too. But the photographer, dazed by what had happened, went on winding automatically. And the police took the result.

"I saw it six months later when I came out of hospital— still more dead than alive. And when I saw it I wished that Cimetti's aim had been truer in my case. I saw myself facing him: I saw Mary standing beside me. And then, my friend— for camera doesn't lie— I saw the scene played as it should have been— not as the producer thought it should have been. It was Mary who tried to step in front of me, even as he fired. And then— she didn't say 'Oh, God!' and fall beside me. No; she faced Cimetti for the half second in which she lived with contempt, indifference, and indomitable courage. Of fear there was no trace— no vestige.

"And that was the way that Mary died. I think he shot her through the heart, and she fell on top of me as I lay at her feet, covering me with her dear arms. Then the devil shot himself."

He fell silent, and was silent too; there seemed to be nothing to say.

"I don't think now that I shall be long in joining her," he went on after a while. "My money is gone: I've dropped out of sight in the film world— and I'm not strong. Cimetti's bullet did that for me, though it failed to kill me, as I would have wished. And Mary— my Mary is calling me to go to her. She wants our honeymoon in Egypt. I think I should have gone before, but I heard our film— Mary's and mine— had been sold to another company, and I wanted to see it before I met Mary again. You see, I must tell her how they've done it; she'll be interested."

And with that he was gone. He seemed to me as if he had seen some one in the street that he knew, but when I followed him to the door he was walking rapidly towards Shaftesbury avenue alone. And yet was he alone— or was he talking to some one who walked at his side— some one I could not see? The street lamps play strange tricks with one's sight, and maybe it was just my imagination.

It was Fordini himself who looked at me significantly as I paid my bill.

"He always leaves like that— quite suddenly," he said. "Just as if some one had passed the door whom he wanted to overtake. And often the street is empty at the time."

And then he tapped his head.

I wonder; some day, when I have time, I shall make it my business to find out.

__________________

10: Mr. Truesdale Tells the Truth

Ellis Parker Butler

1869-1937

Blue Book, Dec 1915

Ellis Parker Butler

MR. TRUESDALE came down to breakfast in fine spirits, and as he entered the dining room he clapped his hands briskly, pinched little Ellen's cheek, tweaked little Joe's hair, and kissed Mrs. Truesdale with a resounding smack. He was a small man and not usually demonstrative; in fact, he was considerably afraid of his wife, who was a large, weepy woman with a double chin, but the news that had come to Mr. Truesdale the day before was enough to make him feel jubilantly brave. He had learned that Mrs. Truesdale was one of the heirs of the great Hamlin estate, and that if O'Leary Hamlin suit ended satisfactorily, Mrs. Truesdale would come in for the pretty sum of twenty-five thousand dollars.

"Good morning, everybody!" he exclaimed as he took his seat and opened his napkin. "This is a fine, large morning."

Maggie, the maid, brought in the appetizing platter of ham and eggs. She spoke to Mr. Truesdale.

"Mr. Bibber is at the back door, sir,' she said. "He says may he speak to you a minute. I told him I didn't know was you in or not, but I'd see.'

A shade of annoyance crossed Mr. Truesdale's face.

"No, I won't see him," he said. "You tell him I'm not in— do you understand? Tell him I've gone to town already."

"Edward!" said Mrs. Truesdale.

"What, my dear?" asked Mr. Truesdale meekly.

"The children!" said Mrs. Truesdale, frowning.

Mr. Truesdale looked at the children. They seemed to be all right. They were not putting their oatmeal in their drinking water.

"The children!" repeated Mrs. Truesdale. "What will they think? How can I raise them to be truthful man and woman if they hear you say such things?"

"But, my dear—" began.

"No, not 'But, my dear,'" said Mrs. Truesdale. "There is no excuse for ever telling anything but the plain out-and-out truth, and you know it, Edward Truesdale. I tell the truth. Don't I always tell you the truth?"

Mr. Truesdale could not deny it. She told him the plainest, most unpleasant truths on all occasions. When he bought a new hat she would, for instance, tell him it made him look like a monkey.

"Yes, my dear," said Mr. Truesdale meekly. "But—"

"Not one but, Edward Truesdale!"  said his wife firmly. "You can tell the truth if you choose, and you owe it to your children, to society, to morality and to me to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. See that you do!"

"Yes, my dear," said Mr. Truesdale.

"You give me your word?"

"Yes, Mary," he said. Mrs. Truesdale spoke again.

"I'm going to town to-day," she said. "I see Blitherwaite is advertising those Montenegrin gowns, like the one Mrs. Phillips has. I think one would be very becoming to me, don't you?"

Mr. Truesdale drew a long breath.

"No. No, I don't," he gasped at last.

"What!" ejaculated Mrs. Truesdale. "Why don't you?"

"I— I think they are too young for you," said poor Mr. Truesdale miserably. "I— I think you are too old for them."

Mrs. Truesdale's jaw fell. She stared.

"Too old!" she exclaimed. "Edward! Do you think I am growing old?"

"You are growing older every day, of course, my dear," said Mr. Truesdale gently. "We all are."

"But I don't show it, do I, Edward," pleaded Mrs. Truesdale. "I don't look as old as— as Mrs. Pibbidy, do I?"

"N—" Mr. Truesdale began; and then he took a firm grip on himself. "Yes, my dear," he said, firmly, "you do, I think, although I have not seen you together for some weeks, you look older than Mrs. Pibbidy. The last time I saw you together you did look older than she, considerably older."

"Edward!"

"There is more gray in your hair," said poor Mr. Truesdale, "and you seem to have more wrinkles. I don't mind it in the least, Mary, but the truth—"

MRS. TRUESDALE'S bosom rose and fell violently. Her face became contorted into a hideous mask. Her lower lip trembled like jelly in an earthquake. With a sudden loud gurgle of woe she threw her arms on the table and buried her face in them and sobbed. Mr. Truesdale went to her and put his hand on her shoulder, but she pushed him violently away. The two children began to howl. Mr. Truesdale glanced at his watch, and dashed for the door. He had just time to make his train. He hurried down the street.

"Ho, Truesdale!" a voice hailed him, and Mr. Truesdale looked up to see Mr. Gartner, his employer, drawing up to the curb in his big automobile.

"Get in here," said Mr. Gartner, "and I'll take you to town. I'll get you there before the train could. Fine morning for a ride."

Mr. Truesdale climbed in beside Mr: Gartner, and the car leaped forward.

"O'Leary is coming in to-day on that O'Leary-Hamlin matter," said Mr. Gartner as they spun along. "He's the most impatient man I ever knew. He wants me to turn over the papers to him to-day. That's nonsense. If he gets them and goes ahead he'll lose. If he takes the case out of my hands he'll lose anyhow. I want to hold him off until next week, so I can have time to get the Bates affidavit from Chicago. When he comes in, tell him the papers are not ready yet, will you?"

"I can't tell him that," said Mr. Truesdale.

"You what?" cried Mr. Gartner.

"I can't tell him that," said Mr. Truesdale again. "It would not be the truth."

"But it is to win the case for him," said Mr. Gartner. "He's a crazy, hot-headed fellow. Tell him that important matters prevented me from making out the papers."

"I can't. It wouldn't be the truth," said Mr. Truesdale.

Mr. Gartner looked at Mr. Truesdale suspiciously. "All right," he said. "If you feel that way, I can fix it. I'II tear up the papers. You can tell him they were destroyed. —Oh, pshaw!"

A policeman had stepped into the middle of the street and was holding up his hand. Mr. Gartner halted his car.

"What's wrong, Officer?" he asked with pretended innocence.

"You're goin' about thirty miles an hour; that's what's the matter," said the policeman.

"That's nonsense!" said Mr. Gartner. "I was not going over fifteen miles. How fast was I going, Truesdale?"

"I— I had my eye on the speedometer," said. Mr. Truesdale.

"There!" said Mr. Gartner triumphantly. "And what did that show?"

"Thirty-five miles," said Mr, Truesdale is an agony of spirit, "A— a little over thirty-five miles."

"I'II go with you to the magistrate's," said the policeman, and he climbed into the car. Mr. Gartner was exceedingly silent. The magistrate was not, of course, in court at this early hour, and they were obliged to wait for him. Mr. Gartner paid his fine. It was twenty minutes after nine when they climbed into the car again. Suddenly Mr, Gartner laughed.

"I'm on! I understand!" he said jovially. "It's a good joke on me, picking you up to-day of all days. How much was it for?"

"How much was what for?" asked Mr. Truesdale, puzzled.

"Why, the bet," said Mr. Gartner. "Its a bet, isn't it? You bet some one you could tell the whole truth for a full day, didn't you? It's all right, Truesdale. Hope you win it."

"It's— it's not a bet," said Mr. Truesdale. "It's nothing of that sort. I'm going to tell the truth— always. A man should always tell it."

Mr, Gartner stopped the car suddenly. He looked at Mr. Truesdale as one would look at some impossible animal curiosity. His face hardened.

"Quite right!" he said. "Quite right, Truesdale. I agree with you. But business is very slack. I have to cut down expenses where I can. You can have until the first of the month, Truesdale."

"The first of the month?" said poor Mr. Truesdale.

"To find another position," said Mr. Gartner. He started the car. "And I'll give you a good letter of recommendation. I'll say you always tell the truth. Keep it up, Truesdale. Stick to the absolute truth and you'll get somewhere."

THERE was something sinister in the inflection he gave the word somewhere, but Mr. Truesdale was not as distressed as he might have been, for he knew where he could get another position without trouble. Hillbreadth & Simmons, a rival concern, had already approached him, seeking to secure his services. He was sorry to be discharged, but he went up to the Gartner offices in a troubled but not depressed state of mind. In an hour or so Mr. O'Leary entered the office.

"Gartner in?" asked Mr. O'Leary.

"He's in," said Mr. Truesdale, "but he does not want to see you. He asked me to tell you the papers in your case had been destroyed, and that new ones would not be ready for a week."

"Destroyed!" said Mr. O'Leary. "How did that happen?"

"Mr. Gartner tore them up."

"He did, did he?" said Mr. O'Leary angrily. "Didn't he know I was coming in for them?"

"That was why he tore them up," said Mr. Truesdale. "He tore them up so I could truthfully say they were destroyed."

Mr. O'Leary uttered a cry of rage. He leaped over the small barrier and made straight for Mr. Gartner's door. Mr. Truesdale heard the angry words of the two men; he heard Mr. O'Leary take the case out of Mr. Gartner's hands; he heard Mr. Gartner tell Mr. O'Leary he was an idiot to think of doing such a thing, and then he saw Mr. O'Leary come from Mr. Gartner's room and rush to the elevator. The next moment Mr. Gartner came from his room and walked straight up to Mr. Truesdale. He grasped Mr. Truesdale by the back of the neck and ran him to the office door, ran him down the corridor and threw him down the marble stairs.

FEW moments later Mr. Truesdale entered the offices of Hillbreadth & Simmons. He was hatless and scarred and sore in forty-eight places. He had lost Mrs. Truesdale's chance of ever receiving the twenty-five thousand dollars from the Hamlin estate, and he had been thrown bodily out of his position, but he had still some life left. He asked to see Mr. Hillbreadth. Mr. Hillbreadth came out immediately.

"Hel-lo, Truesdale!" he exclaimed, as he saw Mr. Truesdale's disheveled condition. "What happened to you? Fall off a street car?"

"No," said Mr. Truesdale. "Mr. Gartner threw me down stairs."

Mr. Hillbreadth's eyes showed the greedy look of a man about to profit by another's mistake. He knew Mr. Truesdale's worth.

"Good!" he exclaimed. "Good! And you're willing to take up the offer I made you awhile ago? Fine! You can come right in and get into the harness. Gartner is a hot-headed fellow; I wonder you have stood his overbearing ways so long. He pushed you farther than patience could stand, eh?"

"No," said Mr. Truesdale. "He threw me down stairs because I told the truth."

Mr. Hillbreadth laughed.

"Told him to his face, eh?" he said. "Surprised the over-bearing fellow, I'II warrant. What did you tell him?"

"I did not tell him anything," said Mr. Truesdale, beginning to perspire freely. "I told one of his clients the truth."

"How's that?" asked Mr. Hillbreadth, frowning.

"I told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth," said Mr. Truesdale. "The client asked me some questions, and I told him the exact, undeviating truth. I mean to tell nothing but the truth as long as I live."

"I see!" said Mr. Hillbreadth coldly. "You mean to tell the exact truth. And quite right, Truesdale— George Washington and so forth. Well, I congratulate you. It is splendid. It-is nothing less than splendid."

Mr. Hillbreadth turned away.

"But— but the position you spoke of ?" asked Mr. Truesdale, anxiously.

"Sorry," said Mr. Hillbreadth. "Just happened to think that Simmons hired a man yesterday. Have to excuse me— very busy to-day."

HE ENTERED his office and closed the door. Mr. Truesdale hesitated and then turned away. He entered a dairy lunch room and took a seat at a table. He was very hungry. He had had a strenuous forenoon. He ordered corned-beef hash, with a poached egg on top, a bowl of crackers and milk, a piece of apple pie and a cup of coffee. The waitress punched a check and placed it beside his plate. Mr. Truesdale glanced at it and continued eating, but he turned very red in the face. He remembered that he had given Mrs. Truesdale every cent he had had with him the night before. He had intended to draw a few dollars before he left the office for lunch, but being thrown down stairs had interfered with this. He did not have a cent in his pocket. The man across the table from him had a face that seemed familiar. Mr. Truesdale ventured to speak:

"Excuse me, sir," he said, "but your face seems very familiar. I wonder—I wonder if you would do me a favor?"

The man looked at Mr. Truesdale.

"That's right," he said, "your face is familiar to me, too— Now, wait! I know! I met you in Mr. Gartner's office. My name is Hepthorp. I'm with Wittmar, Griggs & Co. What can I do for you?"

"I came in here and ordered lunch," said Mr. Truesdale, "and— and I don't happen to have a cent with me. If you could let me have—"

"Why, certainly!" exclaimed Mr. Hepthorp. "Ina minute! Pd lend any man that works for Gartner anything he wanted at any time."

Mr. Truesdale cleared his throat.

"I— I ought to tell you," he said, "I'm not with Mr. Gartner any longer."

"That so?" said Mr. Hepthorp suspiciously. "Who are you with now?"

"I'm— I'm not with anybody," said Mr. Truesdale truthfully, and Mr. Hepthorp clapped his hand on his pocket suddenly and looked annoyed.

"Pshaw!" he exclaimed. "Now, that's a shame! I thought I had brought some money with me, but I haven't a cent more than enough to pay my own check. You know how it is, old man. I'd let you have it in a minute if I had it, but—"

He rose hastily and left the lunch room. Mr. Truesdale saw him have a five-dollar bill changed at the cashier's window and saw him pocket the change.

THERE was but one thing left for Mr. Truesdale to do. He left his watch and chain at the cashier's window and went out upon the street. For a minute he stood like one dazed, and then he remembered that he had no hat, and that his wife had said she meant to do some shopping at Blitherwaite's. He might catch her there. His luck seemed to have turned at last, for he found Mrs, Truesdale in the Ladies' Dresses Department. He told her the truth, and she listened contemptuously.

"Very well, Edward," she said, when he had ended. "Go and pick out your hat. When you have selected it I will let you have the money to pay for it. If I am not here I will be at the ribbon counter. You should be able to get an excellent hat for a dollar."

Mr. Truesdale was in no position to complain. He stole away to the Men's Hat Department and selected a dollar hat, and returned to find Mrs. Truesdale. She was no longer in the Ladies' Dresses Department, and he followed her to the ribbon counter. She was having a sharp controversy with a salesgirl regarding a certain piece of ribbon, but her purse lay on the counter. Mr. Truesdale knew the purse— he had given it to Mrs. Truesdale. It was a blue leather purse with a gilt chain handle. Mrs. Truesdale and the salesgirl moved to the far end of the counter, around the end, and were hidden by the intervening shelving. Mr. Truesdale took up the purse, opened it and extracted a dollar. He closed the purse and replaced it on the counter and felt a heavy hand on his shoulder.

"Not a word!" said the store detective grimly. "Keep still and come with me.

With his other hand, the detective picked up the fatal blue purse.

"To the rear of the store!" he ordered, and Mr. Truesdale marched. It seemed, when he reached it, that the store had a Cell Department as well as others. The detective drew Mr. Truesdale into the cell.

"Now then!" he said. "What have you got to say for yourself?"

Mr. Truesdale remained mute. He was overcome by his emotions.

"Come, now!" ordered the detective. "What have you got to say? Speak up, and see that you tell the truth."

Mr. Truesdale shivered as he heard the words. He hid his face in his hands and sobbed like a child. Then he poured forth what seemed to the detective an incoherent story of being thrown down stairs, of pawning his watch, of telling the truth in spite of everything. The detective remarked that all that was too thin, and when Mr. Truesdale further explained that his wife had sent him to buy a hat, and had told him to return for the money, and that he had merely taken a dollar from his own wife's purse, the detective laughed.

"You send for my wife, then," pleaded Mr. Truesdale. "My wife is at the ribbon counter. A big woman. Her name is Truesdale. And she knows Mr. Ripplington, the store manager. Send for her and for Mr. Ripplington."

"I'll go for them," said the detective.

MR. TRUESDALE seemed to have been in the cell— if it may be called a cell— for hours when he heard the key turn in the lock, and Mr. Ripplington, Mrs. Truesdale and the detective entered. With a shock of pained surprise Mr. Truesdale noticed, the very first thing, that Mrs. Truesdale carried in her hand the red leather pocket book she always carried when she did not carry the blue purse.

"Mr. Truesdale?" queried Mr. Ripplington. "I am sorry this affair happened. Mrs. Truesdale has explained it entirely. She has corroborated everything you told our detective here— everything. Of course— ahem!— we have to be a little careful in these matters— strange things happen. Of course there can be no doubt that it was Mrs. Truesdale's purse you took the money from— no doubt whatever. Guth, have you the purse?"

The detective took the blue leather purse from his pocket.

"This is your purse, Mrs. Truesdale?" asked Mr. Ripplington.

Mrs. Truesdale took the purse. She looked at the exterior of it. She opened the purse and looked at the contents. They were all utterly strange to her. This purse was lined with red moiré; her purse was lined with brown. Her purse was, as she knew, at home in the upper drawer of her dresser. She snapped the purse shut and looked Mr. Ripplington squarely in the eye.

"Of course this is my purse!" said Mrs. Edward Truesdale.

_________________

11: Pink Tulips

Ethel Lina White

1879-1944

The Windsor Magazine, April 1922

E-book: Roy Glashan's Library, 26 July 2023

Ethel Lina White

"I BELIEVE in fairies. I— I've seen them!"

"I'm sure you have."

Edgar Nelson responded conventionally, while his eyes said plainly, "Little liar!" At the same time he was conscious that Fay Pearson spoke with intention to irritate rather than to deceive.

"Of orthodox type, I suppose?" he asked drily. "Butterfly wings, gauzy skirts, and silver wands?"

"No. Not a bit like that. You mustn't believe all you read, even if it's in the financial papers. This is what happened. I was sticking the peas, when I felt suddenly that someone was watching me. You know the feeling?"

"No."

"Ah, you're not psychic! I looked up and saw the most extraordinary little man. He wore an absurd brown cap and a tight brown suit with silly little splashes of white. He had beady brown eyes, a beaky nose, and a snappy mouth. I saw him as plainly as I see you."

Something in her eye made Nelson glance sharply at his white spats and brown suit, which, with silent but eloquent voice, rose up and called a good tailor blessed. But his nose was Roman, his eyes were compelling, and his mouth denoted strong character. He did not in the least resemble her ridiculous fairy."

"Yet, all the same, you stung him for the three wishes?"

"Rather. In classic style I hailed him: 'Fairy! The wishes are on you!' But he only gave me one. You could see he was one of the stingies by the set of his lips."

Nelson tightened his own firm mouth.

"Not at all. You were on the make— 'something for nothing.' I consider you got most generous treatment. You can't expect pre-War conditions even in Fairyland."

"I suppose not. Besides, now I think of it, he looked like a business fairy. Business would spoil a fairy's temper, wouldn't it, cheating and haggling all day?"

Nelson's face, which had grown dark, suddenly brightened, as though he beheld the exact spot where the rainbow ended.

"Your sad story reminds me of one of my own. I once saw a fairy."

"You couldn't; you're not psychic."

Fay spoke sharply, for she alone knew of the countless times he had proved unresponsive when she had willed him to look up at her casement window.

"What was your fairy like?" she asked grudgingly.

"Beautiful. An exquisite, if reduced, edition of woman. No one could mistake her for a man. Golden hair, rose-petal cheeks, violet eyes."

"What did she wear?"

"Skirts, gauzy yet adequate. A womanly toilette— Parisian in its simplicity. My fairy had a dash of Eve, and knew that her mission was to attract."

"H'm! Did the attractive fairy grant you a wish?"

"No."

"There you are! She resembled the attractive type of woman who takes all and gives nothing."

"Pardon me, I addressed my fairy in terms of business, which is the most courteous language that I know. 'Madam, with reference to your esteemed wish, I beg that you will allow it to mature until your further convenience.' "

"And did she understand all that?"

"Naturally. In Fairyland they understand fair dealing, truth, and honour, and business is merely the prose of all that."

"She should meet my little brown business fairy. What colour was her dress?"

Nelson's severe face was irradiated by his smile.

"Pink."

"That's Mrs. Lemon's favourite colour— my boss, you know. Good morning!"

FAY, who was breeched and booted as befitted Mrs. Lemon's gardener, covered the path with steps twice as long as her natural stride, just to show what a fine man she was. But she pulled the sacking from her frames with unnecessary vigour.

The frames were full of cuttings of pink geraniums, for Mrs. Lemon had a passion for pink. There were rose silken curtains at her windows, and she sorrowed for her late husband in mourning of the deepest pink.

Fay did not like her employer, because she treated her gardener as a man in every respect but one. She expected her to grow flowers exactly like those unnatural beauties printed on the covers of the packets of seeds, to have a back which never ached, and no delicate feelings over worms. On the other hand, she paid her the salary which corresponded to these handicaps of sex.

"Gardener!"

Fay turned at her employer's clear voice. She studied her as she came down the path.

Mrs. Lemon was sufficiently young and pretty to awake desire in the heart of a man. In every respect she corresponded to Nelson's description of his fairy.

Blue eyes, pink cheeks— one slightly pinker than the other, for the widow was careless— and a frock which might have been cut out of a sunrise, double width and on the cross.

"What vegetables for to-day, madam? Sea-kale or purple sprouting broccoli?"

"Again? Why is there never any choice?"

"Season." Fay played her useful trump. "I can't give you peas in April."

Each looked warily at the other. Nina Lemon knew little about a garden, and Fay only a little more. She had previously been on the land, and had acquired her present post through the misrepresentation of a kindly but unmoral friend who put her plight before the eternal truth.

But, with prayer and fasting and unstinted labour. Fay was learning more every day. The garden was no longer a job to be held down, but a passion. She loved its every season— loved it in all weathers, loved its weeds as well as its fruits. In short, loved it.

Of late, her dread of dismissal was sharpened with foreboding. Owing to the unfortunate fact of common ancestry, Nina Lemon was showing a streak of Adam and was reading books on gardening. As her knowledge was theoretical, she knew what results to expect, while Fay, who was practical, knew that those good things only happened in the books.

The widow's blue eyes rested on the central bed of tulip.

"Gardener, I hope those tulips will be out by Sunday. I've week-end visitors."

"Certainly, madam."

"I hope I shall not be disappointed again!"

She turned away, once more mollified by the exquisite order of her garden. Fay drew a sigh of relief. She had her orders. Pink tulips by Sunday. And that was that.

AS she gave her lawn its first cutting for the season, she thought of fairies. She wished fervently that they were true— useful little green and brown men who would swing from that tree and, in return for a bowl of porridge, mow the grass while she slept.

She had introduced the topic merely as a fanciful offence to the prejudices of the matter-of-fact Nelson, who always wore creased trousers and white spats, carried a creased Times, and caught the nine-fifteen. He angered her by the disapproval in his eye and the chill in his voice.

"Why does he look at me as if I'd cut down the cherry tree and was lying good and hard? I've never been rude to him until to-day. Guess the cap fitted for that brown fairy. Wish he was the grass! There— and there!"

NELSON caught his train that morning, but only by an acrobatic feat. He had lingered, snared by the young golden-brown foliage of the oaks against the blue sky and the foam of cherry-blossom. He might give the impression of having been flattened in a letter-press and afterwards smoke-dried, but there was the stir in his heart and the quiver of his pulse which trembled to life every year with the green tip of the first snowdrop.

He was feeling the response to the Spring— hearing the fluting of Pan as prelude to the Big Adventure.

And still Romance passed him by. Every December, after a successful business audit, he smoked out the Old Year and welcomed in the New— alone.

There was the usual reason for his composite nature. As the son of a sugar broker and a dark-eyed girl who wrote sonnets, he was the battle-ground of two opposing personalities. If father were evident on the strong surface current, the undertow was pure mother.

HE returned that evening to the tick, but in a state of nervous irritation. He wanted— something.

As usual, he shed his business armour and, incredibly loose in an old velvet smoking-jacket and ancient slippers, he strolled into his beloved garden.

It was a gracious spot, mellowed by time. with quaint grass-plots and flagged pathways, their cracks cemented with tiny rock flowers. The perennials which made it a jungle of old-fashioned blooms were still tidy cropped clumps, but the apple-blossom was out in pink and white snow, and the grass starred with daffodils.

It was perfect, yet incomplete. When God made the Garden, He created someone to walk there, and then someone else.

The worst of it was that Nelson always expected so much. No girl fitted his fancy. He wanted some white stray from the past— some gracious lady of powder and patches, who once had actually paced between these same hedges of clipped yew. At this point Reason asserted herself and told Nelson the only remedy of marriage.

Pipe in mouth, he strolled into the lane, grappling with the situation. Narrowed down, he only knew two women, and those but slightly, owing to his hermit-like seclusion— the pretty pink widow and the gardening girl.

He shook his head at the thought of Fay. He did not like her appearance. She always wore big boots, a smock, and a slouched hat pulled down over her eyes. She would have been an easy model for a beginner to draw, because she showed so few features— just a chin and mouth and part of a nose. One couldn't fall in love with that.

Moreover, as a real gardener himself, he judged her by her works and found them evil. He had seen some of her first failures on the rubbish heap— boxes of pathetic seedlings, whose stems, through over-long exposure under glass, had been drawn out to white threads. On the evidence of those slaughtered innocents, he held her the equivalent of a baby-farmer.

So he strolled along, thinking solely of the pretty pink widow. He resolved to call at The Beeches on the next Sunday. The tender green of the hawthorn hedges was blurred to vague grey, and upon the sharpened air stole a faint perfume of primroses. He felt sopped through with pleasing melancholy.

He passed the thatched cottage where Fay lodged, oblivious to the dim white figure, with unbound hair, who leaned out of her lattice.

Fay, relaxing after her labours, was also responsive to the twilight spell. Putting off her boyhood with her boots, she was yearning, like Juliet, to write a name in the stars, only, as yet, the name was unknown. She dreamed of someone splendid and romantic— quite different to a man who wore white spats and caught the nine-fifteen.

Yet, as Nelson stopped to light his pipe she studied his face with sudden interest. He had good eyes and a finely-cut mouth. At that moment he looked a man one could grow to like. Besides, he was the only man she knew. She almost wished he did not dislike her so thoroughly....

And so to bed.

SHE WAS up with the dawn to inspect the tulip bed, for the widow wished for pink tulips by Sunday, and Fay had rather less control over the sun than over her mowing machine. To her joy, there were numerous splits in each pale-green calyx, according to time-table.

Suddenly her smile vanished.

"White! Yes, every one. Like pink sugar-almonds when you've sucked them. In mercy's name, what shall I do?"

Nelson, who was enjoying his first pipe in his dew-spangled garden, was arrested by the sound of sobs. It was a shock to discover the gardener, her head buried on the top bar of the gate, crying into her sleeve like a Victorian maiden.

"Can I help?" he asked awkwardly.

"No." Fay raised streaming eyes. "Nobody can help me. You see, Canute couldn't!"

"Couldn't what?"

"Reverse the course of Nature, and you can't, either. He couldn't turn back the tide, and you can't turn white tulips into pink!"

"So that's the trouble." He walked inside and inspected the bed. "Yes, they're white, sure enough. Look up your order! It may be the florist's funeral."

"That makes no difference. She wanted pink tulips by Sunday, and if there are none, I'll be fired. And— and I do love the garden so!"

"Yes— as a woman loves the bird on her hat. And you water it with the sun on it and give the poor flowers measly sprinkles just to draw their roots to the surface. And prune ramblers instead of cutting out. And give foul feeders, like roses, nothing but water. Oh, yes, I dare say you do love the garden! Umph!"

The last exclamation is what Nelson actually uttered, but in it he managed to embody the drift of the other sentences. Because he was a real gardener, he hardened his heart.

"Sounds to me like a fairy's job. Didn't you vow you'd seen one? Better get him to make delivery of his wish."

__________________

12: A Memorable Night

Anna Katharine Green

1846-1935

Short Stories, Jan 1892

Mrs. Charles Rohlfs

I AM A YOUNG PHYSICIAN of limited practice and great ambition. At the time of the incidents I am about to relate, my office was in a respectable house in Twenty-fourth Street, New York City, and was shared, greatly to my own pleasure and convenience, by a clever young German whose acquaintance I had made in the hospital, and to whom I had become, in the one short year in which we had practised together, most unreasonably attached. I say unreasonably, because it was a liking for which I could not account even to myself, as he was neither especially prepossessing in appearance nor gifted with any too great amiability of character. He was, however, a brilliant theorist and an unquestionably trustworthy practitioner, and for these reasons probably I entertained for him a profound respect, and as I have already said a hearty and spontaneous affection.

As our specialties were the same, and as, moreover, they were of a nature which did not call for night-work, we usually spent the evening together. But once I failed to join him at the office, and it is of this night I have to tell.

I had been over to Orange, for my heart was sore over the quarrel I had had with Dora, and I was resolved to make one final effort towards reconciliation. But alas for my hopes, she was not at home; and, what was worse, I soon learned that she was going to sail the next morning for Europe. This news, coming as it did without warning, affected me seriously, for I knew if she escaped from my influence at this time, I should certainly lose her forever; for the gentleman concerning whom we had quarrelled, was a much better match for her than I, and almost equally in love. However, her father, who had always been my friend, did not look upon this same gentleman's advantages with as favorable an eye as she did, and when he heard I was in the house, he came hurrying into my presence, with excitement written in every line of his fine face.

"Ah, Dick, my boy," he exclaimed joyfully, "how opportune this is! I was wishing you would come, for, do you know, Appleby has taken passage on board the same steamer as Dora, and if he and she cross together, they will certainly come to an understanding, and that will not be fair to you, or pleasing to me; and I do not care who knows it!"

I gave him one look and sank, quite overwhelmed, into the seat nearest me. Appleby was the name of my rival, and I quite agreed with her father that thetête-à-têtes afforded by an ocean voyage would surely put an end to the hopes which I had so long and secretly cherished.

"Does she know he is going? Did she encourage him?" I stammered.

But the old man answered genially: "Oh, she knows, but I cannot say anything positive about her having encouraged him. The fact is, Dick, she still holds a soft place in her heart for you, and if you were going to be of the party—"

"Well?"

"I think you would come off conqueror yet."

"Then I will be of the party," I cried. "It is only six now, and I can be in New York by seven. That gives me five hours before midnight, time enough in which to arrange my plans, see Richter, and make everything ready for sailing in the morning."

"Dick, you are a trump!" exclaimed the gratified father. "You have a spirit I like, and if Dora does not like it too, then I am mistaken in her good sense. But can you leave your patients?"

"Just now I have but one patient who is in anything like a critical condition," I replied, "and her case Richter understands almost as well as I do myself. I will have to see her this evening of course and explain, but there is time for that if I go now. The steamer sails at nine?"

"Precisely."

"Do not tell Dora that I expect to be there; let her be surprised. Dear girl, she is quite well, I hope?"

"Yes, very well; only going over with her aunt to do some shopping. A poor outlook for a struggling physician, you think. Well, I don't know about that; she is just the kind of a girl to go from one extreme to another. If she once loves you she will not care any longer about Paris fashions."

"She shall love me," I cried, and left him in a great hurry, to catch the first train for Hoboken.

It seemed wild, this scheme, but I determined to pursue it. I loved Dora too much to lose her, and if three weeks' absence would procure me the happiness of my life, why should I hesitate to avail myself of the proffered opportunity. I rode on air as the express I had taken shot from station to station, and by the time I had arrived at Christopher Street Ferry my plans were all laid and my time disposed of till midnight.

It was therefore with no laggard step I hurried to my office, nor was it with any ordinary feelings of impatience that I found Richter out; for this was not his usual hour for absenting himself and I had much to tell him and many advices to give. It was the first balk I had received and I was fuming over it, when I saw what looked like a package of books lying on the table before me, and though it was addressed to my partner, I was about to take it up, when I heard my name uttered in a tremulous tone, and turning, saw a man standing in the doorway, who, the moment I met his eye, advanced into the room and said:

"O doctor, I have been waiting for you an hour. Mrs. Warner has been taken very bad, sir, and she prays that you will not delay a moment before coming to her. It is something serious I fear, and she may have died already, for she would have no one else but you, and it is now an hour since I left her."

"And who are you?" I asked, for though I knew Mrs. Warner well—she is the patient to whom I have already referred—I did not know her messenger.

"I am a servant in the house where she was taken ill."

"Then she is not at home?"

"No, sir, she is in Second Avenue."

"I am very sorry," I began, "but I have not the time—"

But he interrupted eagerly: "There is a carriage at the door; we thought you might not have your phaeton ready."

I had noticed the carriage.

"Very well," said I. "I will go, but first let me write a line—"

"O sir," the man broke in pleadingly, "do not wait for anything. She is really very bad, and I heard her calling for you as I ran out of the house."

"She had her voice then?" I ventured, somewhat distrustful of the whole thing and yet not knowing how to refuse the man, especially as it was absolutely necessary for me to see Mrs. Warner that night and get her consent to my departure before I could think of making further plans.

So, leaving word for Richter to be sure and wait for me if he came home before I did, I signified to Mrs. Warner's messenger that I was ready to go with him, and immediately took a seat in the carriage which had been provided for me. The man at once jumped up on the box beside the driver, and before I could close the carriage door we were off, riding rapidly down Seventh Avenue.

As we went the thought came, "What if Mrs. Warner will not let me off!" But I dismissed the fear at once, for this patient of mine is an extremely unselfish woman, and if she were not too ill to grasp the situation, would certainly sympathize with the strait I was in and consent to accept Richter's services in place of my own, especially as she knows and trusts him.

When the carriage stopped it was already dark and I could distinguish little of the house I entered, save that it was large and old and did not look like an establishment where a man servant would be likely to be kept.

"Is Mrs. Warner here?" I asked of the man who was slowly getting down from the box.

"Yes, sir," he answered quickly; and I was about to ring the bell before me, when the door opened and a young German girl, courtesying slightly, welcomed me in, saying:

"Mrs. Warner is up-stairs, sir; in the front room, if you please."

Not doubting her, but greatly astonished at the barren aspect of the place I was in, I stumbled up the faintly lighted stairs before me and entered the great front room. It was empty, but through an open door at the other end I heard a voice saying: "He has come, madam"; and anxious to see my patient, whose presence in this desolate house I found it harder and harder to understand, I stepped into the room where she presumably lay.

Alas! for my temerity in doing so; for no sooner had I crossed the threshold than the door by which I had entered closed with a click unlike any I had ever heard before, and when I turned to see what it meant, another click came from the opposite side of the room, and I perceived, with a benumbed sense of wonder, that the one person whose somewhat shadowy figure I had encountered on entering had vanished from the place, and that I was shut up alone in a room without visible means of egress.

This was startling, and hard to believe at first, but after I had tried the door by which I had entered and found it securely locked, and then bounding to the other side of the room, tried the opposite one with the same result, I could not but acknowledge I was caught. What did it mean? Caught, and I was in haste, mad haste. Filling the room with my cries, I shouted for help and a quick release, but my efforts were naturally fruitless, and after exhausting myself in vain I stood still and surveyed, with what equanimity was left me, the appearance of the dreary place in which I had thus suddenly become entrapped.

ii

IT WAS A SMALL square room, and I shall not soon forget with what a foreboding shudder I observed that its four blank walls were literally unbroken by a single window, for this told me that I was in no communication with the street, and that it would be impossible for me to summon help from the outside world. The single gas jet burning in a fixture hanging from the ceiling was the only relief given to the eye in the blank expanse of white wall that surrounded me; while as to furniture, the room could boast of nothing more than an old-fashioned black-walnut table and two chairs, the latter cushioned, but stiff in the back and generally dilapidated in appearance. The only sign of comfort about me was a tray that stood on the table, containing a couple of bottles of wine and two glasses. The bottles were full and the glasses clean, and to add to this appearance of hospitality a box of cigars rested invitingly near, which I could not fail to perceive, even at the first glance, were of the very best brand.

Astonished at these tokens of consideration for my welfare, and confounded by the prospect which they offered of a lengthy stay in this place, I gave another great shout; but to no better purpose than before. Not a voice answered, and not a stir was heard in the house. But there came from without the faint sound of suddenly moving wheels, as if the carriage which I had left standing before the door had slowly rolled away. If this were so, then was I indeed a prisoner, while the moments so necessary to my plans, and perhaps to the securing of my whole future happiness, were flying by like the wind. As I realized this, and my own utter helplessness, I fell into one of the chairs before me in a state of perfect despair. Not that any fears for my life were disturbing me, though one in my situation might well question if he would ever again breathe the open air from which he had been so ingeniously lured. I did not in that first moment of utter downheartedness so much as inquire the reason for the trick which had been played upon me. No, my heart was full of Dora, and I was asking myself if I were destined to lose her after all, and that through no lack of effort on my part, but just because a party of thieves or blackmailers had thought fit to play a game with my liberty.

It could not be; there must be some mistake about it; it was some great joke, or I was the victim of a dream, or suffering from some hideous nightmare. Why, only a half hour before I was in my own office, among my own familiar belongings, and now—But, alas, it was no delusion. Only four blank, whitewashed walls met my inquiring eyes, and though I knocked and knocked again upon the two doors which guarded me on either side, hollow echoes continued to be the only answer I received.

Had the carriage then taken away the two persons I had seen in this house, and was I indeed alone in its great emptiness? The thought made me desperate, but notwithstanding this I was resolved to continue my efforts, for I might be mistaken; there might yet be some being left who would yield to my entreaties if they were backed by something substantial.

Taking out my watch, I laid it on the table; it was just a quarter to eight. Then I emptied my trousers pockets of whatever money they held, and when all was heaped up before me, I could count but twelve dollars, which, together with my studs and a seal ring which I wore, seemed a paltry pittance with which to barter for the liberty of which I had been robbed. But it was all I had with me, and I was willing to part with it at once if only some one would unlock the door and let me go. But how to make known my wishes even if there was any one to listen to them? I had already called in vain, and there was no bell—yes, there was; why had I not seen it before? There was a bell and I sprang to ring it. But just as my hand fell on the cord, I heard a gentle voice behind my back saying in good English, but with a strong foreign accent:

"Put up your money, Mr. Atwater; we do not want your money, only your society. Allow me to beg you to replace both watch and money."

Wheeling about in my double surprise at the presence of this intruder and his unexpected acquaintance with my name, I encountered the smiling glance of a middle-aged man of genteel appearance and courteous manners. He was bowing almost to the ground, and was, as I instantly detected, of German birth and education, a gentleman, and not the blackleg I had every reason to expect to see.

"You have made a slight mistake," he was saying; "it is your society, only your society, that we want."

Astonished at his appearance, and exceedingly irritated by his words, I stepped back as he offered me my watch, and bluntly cried:

"If it is my society only that you want, you have certainly taken very strange means to procure it. A thief could have set no neater trap, and if it is money you want, state your sum and let me go, for my time is valuable and my society likely to be unpleasant."

He gave a shrug with his shoulders that in no wise interfered with his set smile.

"You choose to be facetious," he observed. "I have already remarked that we have no use for your money. Will you sit down? Here is some excellent wine, and if this brand of cigars does not suit you, I will send for another."

"Send for the devil!" I cried, greatly exasperated. "What do you mean by keeping me in this place against my will? Open that door and let me out, or—"

I was ready to spring and he saw it. Smiling more atrociously than ever, he slipped behind the table, and before I could reach him, had quietly drawn a pistol, which he cocked before my eyes.

"You are excited," he remarked, with a suavity that nearly drove me mad. "Now excitement is no aid to good company, and I am determined that none but good company shall be in this room to-night. So if you will be kind enough to calm yourself, Mr. Atwater, you and I may yet enjoy ourselves, but if not—" the action he made was significant, and I felt the cold sweat break out on my forehead through all the heat of my indignation.

But I did not mean to show him that he had intimidated me.

"Excuse me," said I, "and put down your pistol. Though you are making me lose irredeemable time, I will try and control myself enough to give you an opportunity for explaining yourself. Why have you entrapped me into this place?"

"I have already told you," said he, gently laying the pistol before him, but within easy reach of his hand.

"But that is preposterous," I began, fast losing my self-control again. "You do not know me, and if you did—"

"Pardon me, you see I know your name."

Yes, that was true, and the fact set me thinking. How did he know my name? I did not know him, nor did I know this house, or any reason for which I could have been beguiled into it. Was I the victim of a conspiracy, or was the man mad? Looking at him very earnestly, I declared:

"My name is Atwater, and so far you are right, but in learning that much about me you must also have learned that I am neither rich nor influential, nor of any special value to a blackmailer. Why choose me out then for—your society? Why not choose some one who can—talk?"

"I find your conversation very interesting."

Baffled, exasperated almost beyond the power to restrain myself, I shook my fist in his face, notwithstanding I saw his hand fly to his pistol.

"Let me go!" I shrieked. "Let me go out of this place. I have business, I tell you, important business which means everything to me, and which, if I do not attend to it to-night, will be lost to me for ever. Let me go, and I will so far reward you that I will speak to no one of what has taken place here to-night, but go my ways, forgetful of you, forgetful of this house, forgetful of all connected with it."

"You are very good," was his quiet reply, "but this wine has to be drunk." And he calmly poured out a glass, while I drew back in despair. "You do not drink wine?" he queried, holding up the glass he had filled between himself and the light. "It is a pity, for it is of most rare vintage. But perhaps you smoke?"

Sick and disgusted, I found a chair, and sat down in it. If the man were crazy, there was certainly method in his madness. Besides, he had not a crazy eye; there was calm calculation in it and not a little good-nature. Did he simply want to detain me, and if so, did he have a motive it would pay me to fathom before I exerted myself further to insure my release? Answering the wave he made me with his hand by reaching out for the bottle and filling myself a glass, I forced myself to speak more affably as I remarked:

"If the wine must be drunk, we had better be about it, as you cannot mean to detain me more than an hour, whatever reason you may have for wishing my society."

He looked at me inquiringly before answering, then tossing off his glass, he remarked:

"I am sorry, but in an hour a man can scarcely make the acquaintance of another man's exterior."

"Then you mean—"

"To know you thoroughly, if you will be so good; I may never have the opportunity again."

He must be mad; nothing else but mania could account for such words and such actions; and yet, if mad, why was he allowed to enter my presence? The man who brought me here, the woman who received me at the door, had not been mad.

"And I must stay here—" I began.

"Till I am quite satisfied. I am afraid that will take till morning."

I gave a cry of despair, and then in my utter desperation spoke up to him as I would to a man of feeling:

"You don't know what you are doing; you don't know what I shall suffer by any such cruel detention. This night is not like other nights to me. This is a special night in my life, and I need it, I need it, I tell you, to spend as I will. The woman I love"—it seemed horrible to speak of her in this place, but I was wild at my helplessness, and madly hoped I might awake some answering chord in a breast which could not be void of all feeling or he would not have that benevolent look in his eye—"the woman I love," I repeated, "sails for Europe to-morrow. We have quarrelled, but she still cares for me, and if I can sail on the same steamer, we will yet make up and be happy."

"At what time does this steamer start?"

"At nine in the morning."

"Well, you shall leave this house at eight. If you go directly to the steamer you will be in time."

"But—but," I panted, "I have made no arrangements. I shall have to go to my lodgings, write letters, get money. I ought to be there at this moment. Have you no mercy on a man who never did you wrong, and only asks to quit you and forget the precious hour you have made him lose?"

"I am sorry," he said, "it is certainly quite unfortunate, but the door will not be opened before eight. There is really no one in the house to unlock it."

"And do you mean to say," I cried aghast, "that you could not open that door if you would, that you are locked in here as well as I, and that I must remain here till morning, no matter how I feel or you feel?"

"Will you not take a cigar?" he asked.

Then I began to see how useless it was to struggle, and visions of Dora leaning on the steamer rail with that serpent whispering soft entreaties in her ear came rushing before me, till I could have wept in my jealous chagrin.

"It is cruel, base, devilish," I began. "If you had the excuse of wanting money, and took this method of wringing my all from me, I could have patience, but to entrap and keep me here for nothing, when my whole future happiness is trembling in the balance, is the work of a fiend and—" I made a sudden pause, for a strange idea had struck me.

iii

WHAT IF THIS man, these men and this woman, were in league with him whose rivalry I feared, and whom I had intended to supplant on the morrow. It was a wild surmise, but was it any wilder than to believe I was held here for a mere whim, a freak, a joke, as this bowing, smiling man before me would have me believe?

Rising in fresh excitement, I struck my hand on the table. "You want to keep me from going on the steamer," I cried. "That other wretch who loves her has paid you—"

But that other wretch could not know that I was meditating any such unusual scheme, as following him without a full day's warning. I thought of this even before I had finished my sentence, and did not need the blank astonishment in the face of the man before me to convince me that I had given utterance to a foolish accusation. "It would have been some sort of a motive for your actions," I humbly added, as I sank back from my hostile attitude; "now you have none."

I thought he bestowed upon me a look of quiet pity, but if so he soon hid it with his uplifted glass.

"Forget the girl," said he; "I know of a dozen just as pretty."

I was too indignant to answer.

"Women are the bane of life," he now sententiously exclaimed. "They are ever intruding themselves between a man and his comfort, as for instance just now between yourself and this good wine."

I caught up the bottle in sheer desperation.

"Don't talk of them," I cried, "and I will try and drink. I almost wish there was poison in the glass. My death here might bring punishment upon you."

He shook his head, totally unmoved by my passion.

"We deal punishment, not receive it. It would not worry me in the least to leave you lying here upon the floor."

I did not believe this, but I did not stop to weigh the question then; I was too much struck by a word he had used.

"Deal punishment?" I repeated. "Are you punishing me? Is that why I am here?"

He laughed and held out his glass to mine.

"You enjoy being sarcastic," he observed. "Well, it gives a spice to conversation, I own. Talk is apt to be dull without it."

For reply I struck the glass from his hand; it fell and shivered, and he looked for the moment really distressed.

"I had rather you had struck me," he remarked, "for I have an answer for an injury like that; but for a broken glass—" He sighed and looked dolefully at the pieces on the floor.

Mortified and somewhat ashamed, I put down my own glass.

"You should not have exasperated me," I cried, and walked away beyond temptation, to the other side of the room.

His spirits had received a dampener, but in a few minutes he seized upon a cigar and began smoking; as the wreaths curled over his head he began to talk, and this time it was on subjects totally foreign to myself and even to himself. It was good talk; that I recognized, though I hardly listened to what he said. I was asking myself what time it had now got to be, and what was the meaning of my incarceration, till my brain became weary and I could scarcely distinguish the topic he discussed. But he kept on for all my seeming, and indeed real, indifference, kept on hour after hour in a monologue he endeavored to make interesting, and which probably would have been so if the time and occasion had been fit for my enjoying it. As it was, I had no ear for his choicest phrases, his subtlest criticisms, or his most philosophic disquisitions. I was wrapped up in self and my cruel disappointment, and when in a certain access of frenzy I leaped to my feet and took a look at the watch still lying on the table, and saw it was four o'clock in the morning, I gave a bound of final despair, and throwing myself on the floor, gave myself up to the heavy sleep that mercifully came to relieve me.

I was roused by feeling a touch on my breast. Clapping my hand to the spot where I had felt the intruding hand, I discovered that my watch had been returned to my pocket. Drawing it out I first looked at it and then cast my eyes quickly about the room. There was no one with me, and the doors stood open between me and the hall. It was eight o'clock, as my watch had just told me.

That I rushed from the house and took the shortest road to the steamer, goes without saying. I could not cross the ocean with Dora, but I might yet see her and tell her how near I came to giving her my company on that long voyage which now would only serve to further the ends of my rival. But when, after torturing delays on cars and ferry-boats, and incredible efforts to pierce a throng that was equally determined not to be pierced, I at last reached the wharf, it was to behold her, just as I had fancied in my wildest moments, leaning on a rail of the ship and listening, while she abstractedly waved her hand to some friends below, to the words of the man who had never looked so handsome to me or so odious as at this moment of his unconscious triumph. Her father was near her, and from his eager attitude and rapidly wandering gaze I saw that he was watching for me. At last he spied me struggling aboard, and immediately his face lighted up in a way which made me wish he had not thought it necessary to wait for my anticipated meeting with his daughter.

"Ah, Dick, you are late," he began, effusively, as I put foot on deck.

But I waved him back and went at once to Dora.

"Forgive me, pardon me," I incoherently said, as her sweet eyes rose in startled pleasure to mine. "I would have brought you flowers, but I meant to sail with you, Dora, I tried to—but wretches, villains, prevented it and—and—"

"Oh, it does not matter," she said, and then blushed, probably because the words sounded unkind, "I mean—"

But she could not say what she meant, for just then the bell rang for all visitors to leave, and her father came forward, evidently thinking all was right between us, smiled benignantly in her face, gave her a kiss and me a wink and disappeared in the crowd that was now rapidly going ashore.

I felt that I must follow, but I gave her one look and one squeeze of the hand, and then as I saw her glances wander to his face, I groaned in spirit, stammered some words of choking sorrow and was gone, before her embarrassment would let her speak words, which I knew would only add to my grief and make this hasty parting unendurable.

The look of amazement and chagrin with which her father met my reappearance on the dock can easily be imagined.

"Why, Dick," he exclaimed, "aren't you going after all? I thought I could rely on you. Where's your pluck, lad? Scared off by a frown? I wouldn't have believed it, Dick. What if she does frown to-day; she will smile to-morrow."

I shook my head; I could not tell him just then that it was not through any lack of pluck on my part that I had failed him.

When I left the dock I went straight to a restaurant, for I was faint as well as miserable. But my cup of coffee choked me and the rolls and eggs were more than I could face. Rising impatiently, I went out. Was any one more wretched than I that morning and could any one nourish a more bitter grievance? As I strode towards my lodgings I chewed the cud of my disappointment till my wrongs loomed up like mountains and I was seized by a spirit of revenge. Should I let such an interference as I had received go unpunished? No, if the wretch who had detained me was not used to punishment he should receive a specimen of it now and from a man who was no longer a prisoner, and who once aroused did not easily forego his purposes. Turning aside from my former destination, I went immediately to a police-station and when I had entered my complaint was astonished to see that all the officials had grouped about me and were listening to my words with the most startled interest.

"Was the man who came for you a German?" one asked.

I said "Yes."

"And the man who stood guardian over you and entertained you with wine and cigars, was not he a German too?"

I nodded acquiescence and they at once began to whisper together; then one of them advanced to me and said:

"You have not been home, I understand; you had better come."

Astonished by his manner I endeavored to inquire what he meant, but he drew me away, and not till we were within a stone's throw of my office did he say, "You must prepare yourself for a shock. The impertinences you suffered from last night were unpleasant no doubt, but if you had been allowed to return home, you might not now be deploring them in comparative peace and safety."

"What do you mean?"

"That your partner was not as fortunate as yourself. Look up at the house; what do you see there?"

A crowd was what I saw first, but he made me look higher, and then I perceived that the windows of my room, of our room, were shattered and blackened and that part of the casement of one had been blown out.

"A fire!" I shrieked. "Poor Richter was smoking—"

"No, he was not smoking. He had no time for a smoke. An infernal machine burst in that room last night and your friend was its wretched victim."

I never knew why my friend's life was made a sacrifice to the revenge of his fellow-countrymen. Though we had been intimate in the year we had been together, he had never talked to me of his country and I had never seen him in company with one of his own nation. But that he was the victim of some political revenge was apparent, for though it proved impossible to find the man who had detained me, the house was found and ransacked, and amongst other secret things was discovered the model of the machine which had been introduced into our room, and which had proved so fatal to the man it was addressed to. Why men who were so relentless in their purposes towards him should have taken such pains to keep me from sharing his fate, is one of those anomalies in human nature which now and then awake our astonishment. If I had not lost Dora through my detention at their hands I should look back upon that evening with sensations of thankfulness. As it is, I sometimes question if it would not have been better if they had let me take my chances.

HAVE I lost Dora? From a letter I received to-day I begin to think not.

________________

13: The Suicide and the Saint

Ethel Lina White

Australian Town and Country Journal (Sydney) 1 Feb 1911

Surely published in a British magazine first, but I couldn't find a reference. It's quite an early short story.  Her first was published in about 1906.

THREE small daughters of Eve were discussing fig-leaves on their way home from school. Or, rather, two talked while the third listened with all the bitterness of our First Parents as they looked back at the Garden. Like them, she was barred out.

The little girl who held the conversation made stabs and imaginary diagrams in the air, while her face lit up with eagerness. She was the daughter of a famous barrister, and, like her father, knew how to make the best of a thin case.

"Dear, ducky little bows here, that sweet shade of faded rose— it's got a French name you know— and a lace panel down the front— so!"

The other child sniffed. She had fat, golden curls and looked very opulent but she was conscious that her account of her costume for the breaking-up party had been eclipsed by this vivid description.

"H'm! It sounds just like your summer dress done up, Alys," she said, suspiciously. "Now, mine is a new four-guinea dress from Long's."

Alys swiftly shifted her ground.

"What are you going to wear, Juliet?" she asked, swooping down on the silent child in her father's best manner. Juliet's thin cheeks grew scarlet. "I— I don't know!" she stammered. She saw her companions exchange glance of meaning.

"I must hurry home," she continued desperately. "It is nearly four."

As she ran down the avenue she heard a burst of childish laughter behind. Instantly her finger-nails made dints in the palms of her hands. That gurgle of mirth was the thing she dreaded more than lightning or ghosts.

She could not remember the time when she was not a laughing-stock. Grown-ups always had smiled when they saw her, but they did it in a sneaky, half-veiled manner that she had learned to endure. It was , the open, brutal derision of her school-fellows that made her daily martyrdom. She had had seven years of it. Seven years of pure, undiluted misery! All because her mother had the spirit of a pioneer, and instead of experimenting on insensate puddings, muddled in dress, and then lacerated her daughter's soul by forcing her to wear unholy mixtures.

Mrs. Arum-Lake said that her child was just like a wall-flower, because she was so brown, and quaint, and sweet. Everybody else thought she was going to be a wallflower— sure enough!— when she grew up, but meantime only considered her odd.

Juliet's depression did not last long. She had run away instinctively at the first smell of powder like some oft-hunted quarry. In reality, her fortunes  seemed on the mend. It was some time since her mother had broken out badly, and her clothes had been fairly normal. Moreover other children in the school now wore djibbahs, although the articles in question were severely edited edition of her weird sack.

But, best of all, she was going away next term to a convent school where all the pupils were forced to dress alike. How Juliet gloated over the hideous serge uniforms that would be her daily wear for years and years! Marguerite, enthusing over her jewels, was a bad second to her! No one would pick her out among that crowd of girls as an ear-marked child of a cross between a High Arter and a Simple Lifer. She would be merely one bead on a necklace; one pebble on a beach. The glory of it! The world was painted rose-color, and the stars shook hands with the daisies at the mere thought of it.

As Juliet entered the house, she heard her mother's high-pitched voice.

"At least, no one can say my child has been made a martyr to dress!"

Mrs. Arum-Lake was entertaining a crony in the drawing-room, but her conversation could be enjoyed equally well on the front door-mat.

Juliet stopped to listen with apprehension.

"The folly and cruelty of some parents! I could weep when I think how they cram their children's sweet, tender little toes into stiff boots and bury their poor little heads under hot, heavy hats. I, myself— in person— was present at the toilet of a modern baby yesterday. My dear, it wore a corset. A corset! To support its back and protect it from cold, the foolish mother said. I asked her how she dared to usurp the functions of Nature— the universal Mother. Ah, well!  I, at least have considered her demand in this dress for Juliet."

Juliet gasped at the words. Her party-dress! A tremendous lump of the repressed and devitalised Nature in her small frame heaved and expanded at the thought. In an agony of suspense she tore up the stairs and burst into the drawing-room. Her mother— an amber-haired lady in a peacock-blue dress and countless chains looked up and smiled.

"What ah outburst of physical energy!" she exclaimed. "I could sing when a child bursts open a door. Shut it again, Juliet. There's a draught. Don't slam it!" The one breath of spring air was barred out of the stuffy, lily-scented room.

"Would you like to see your new dress, precious?'' asked Mrs. Arum-Lake, groping among layers of white tissue-paper.

At first Juliet thought she was only looking at a portion of the costume that her mother displayed. When she grasped the stunning fact that she was viewing the whole, her heart seemed to contract. This time, her mother had done her very worst. It was mere morsel of clothing— a thin, white silk tunic braided with silver, in a key pattern. Pulled out to its utmost, it did not reach the knee.

"Mother!" Juliet's voice was husky. "I shall show all my legs!"

"The most beautiful part of a child."

Mrs. Arum-Lake looked affectionately at her daughter's knobby knees.

"You will have to, wear silken tights under it as a concession to your schoolmistress's indecent susceptibilities. Now kiss me, and thank me my little Grecian maid!"

"Mother!" Juliet turned white, and when a dark, skinned child throws pale, the result is rather awful. Her mother shrieked at the bilious hue.

"The child's ill!" she cried, ringing the bell. "Nature is speaking her mind as to what she thinks of our modern diet. Perkins, rhubarb, and magnesia for Miss Juliet!"

There was very little Nature left in Juliet by the end of the week. Mental agony and lowering medicines had reduced her to the least state of resistance. At her best, the child was no fighter. Seedy from her birth, she had been moulded like putty by her parent. Her faint protests were never even heard; they were drowned at utterance in her mother's unceasing flow of language.

"l can't wear it! I can't wear it!" Over and over, she sobbed the plaint, to herself. "Can't!" Not "Won't" like a normal naughty child, with healthy notions of rebellion.

Two days before the party, Mrs. Arum-Lake watched her child as she sat in a red pool of setting sunlight. A paper lay on the carpet. Juliet had let it slip from her limp hand and was staring at the flaming sky. Mrs. Arum-Lake glanced at the heavens also, divided it into shades, giving each a name from her paint-box, and then sucked in her breath at the brooding mystery in her child's eyes.

"Something has slipped from the sunset into my darling!" she whispered. "A wonderful gift for me to give my child. The Soul! Hush, the angels are whispering to her!"

She did riot know that even at that moment her child was planning to open the door and set free that soul. Juliet had found the solution to her trouble" in one word. Suicide!

In the paper she had just read was a paragraph, headed "Suicide at Eleven." It related how another morbid miserable child before her, after eating out her heart with jealousy of her baby-brother, had swallowed rat-poison, and for the sum of a few pence attained the dignity of death. Juliet gloated over the details with envious yet sad feelings. She wallowed gloomily in the stricken parents' sorrow and the flowers brought by the child's school mates. She went to bed with sulphur in her milk, brimstone from the Pit in her heart, and under her pillow the death story of one Grace Kemp— suicide, aged eleven.

THE FOLLOWING day a certain Lady Eleanor Jamaica— the daughter of a Duke, and a very great lady in every respect— was driving among the dykes. Suddenly she pulled up short, apparently to admire the scenery.

There was a touch of Holland about its flat grey washes. A brown swollen stream was rolling heavily along its willow-fringed bed. The sole touch of color was given in a sheet of daffodils. But, as the indignant mare knew perfectly well, Lady Jamaica saw none of these things. Her worst enemy could not call her artistic, even as her best friend could not call her beautiful. She was big and weather-beaten, with tomato tints in her complexion and a faint moustache on her upper lip.

She screwed up her eyes in the direction of the river, as if she were doing perspective drawing. Kneeling down on the marshy ground was a small, brown-clad child. As Lady Jamaica watched she scrambled to her feet, crossed herself, and then deliberately waded into the stream. Lady Jamaica threw the reins to the groom, jumped from the cart, cut over the ground, cleared the ditch, grabbed the child, and swung her back on the bank, with the swiftness of a cinematograph film. The child felt horribly light and limp, and seemed to cower in her ladyship's number eight doeskin gloves

"What are you doing, you little idiot?" asked Lady Jamaica angrily, giving her a slight shake. "There's a deep hole just there. You'd have been drowned."

"I know!" answered the child. "Why did you stop me? I was only committing suet-side."

"Good Lord!"

It was a genuine appeal. Lady Jamaica stared at the child with open, startled eyes. One would like to say she saw a pale, pure face like a snowdrop, with great black-ringed eyes— which, by the way, no snowdrop ever had. As a matter of fact, she saw a thin, miserable, brown child, with red-rimmed eyes— crying favors that, color— and knuckle-stained face. She locked so starved and bullied that Lady Jamaica's thoughts flew to the N.S.P.C.C. of which she was president.

"Tell me, little girl," she said gently, "has your mother done anything to you? Yes. What is it?"

"She makes me wear funny clothes, and the other children laugh at me all day— and I want to die!"

"Heavens!" Lady Jamaica appealed again. "I thought only Russian children talked like that," she added, with splendid patriotism. "Tell me all about it!"

Juliet sobbed out the whole story from her poisoned babyhood down to her last mutilated hope. These are big words, but it seemed like that to her. Poor innocent! If she could have heard Lady Jamaica's laughter when anyone came a cropper in the hunting-field, she would have known the folly of making such a confidence.

"I see!" she said, at the end. "Well, you mustn't die. It's very wicked to want to. We'll find a way out."

"You can't," was the hopeless reply. "Only a miracle could save me from wearing that dress, and I'm old enough to know miracles don't happen."

"Then you must be older than the Saints and Apostles," answered Lady. Jamaica.

She was genuinely surprised at herself. She— who smacked her own children at the first hint of insurrection, to be found arguing with a child!

"But I've proved it," went on Juliet. "I turned Catholic, like our washer-lady. I stole nine candles from the larder, and said a Paternoster for each one I burned. A Paternoster is an "Our Father." It's Latting. ''Pater" means "our", and "noster" means "father," you see; But— nothing happened. And I'll kill myself before I wear that dress," and my soul will be lost for ever and ever'"

"Well— I'm—" Although Lady Jamaica stopped in time, it was clear that Juliet would be in aristocratic company.  "Miracles do happen, child!" she said stoutly. "Fairies make them happen. Now, look at me! Don't you think I look just like a fairy?"

Juliet looked intently at the jolly red face and the driving coat, and answered firmly, "NO."

"You ungrateful monkey! Well— I'll tell you my secret, I'm a saint. But I've more magic than Ariel and. Puck, and all that gang, combined. Now, tell me exactly what your party dress is like. Into the cart with you! Suicide is off for to-day."

As they bowled along, Juliet gave a vivid description of the Greek tunic,  every harrowing detail of which was nailed to her memory. It brought back her sorrow so vividly that she shivered, and clung to her companion, when they reached her mother's house.

Lady Jamaica gently disengaged herself, feeling choky "at the pressure of the feeble, clawing little fingers. "Now be a good kiddie! It's coming right. I'm really a saint, and saints work miracles, you know. You must wear whatever your mother tells you to-morrow night, and trust me to help you. Your mother won't be able to scold or keep you from going to that convent. And the children won't laugh at you. You'll be the happiest little girl at the party. Trust me!"

Lady Jamaica rattled off, feeling very blank. It was one thing to make splendid promises to cheer up a child's heart, and another to make them good. She bit her nails thoughtfully— a trick for which she daily smacked her children. Fortunately, however, she was a lady of strong common sense, and by immediately discounting all improbable schemes arrived the sooner at a possible solution.

She barred all fantastic notions that might entail consequences on herself or the child. To forcibly kidnap the youngster for the date of the party or to appeal to the generosity of the other children was ridiculous. To argue with Mrs. Arum. Lake was merely to court a snub. To ask the schoolmistress to postpone the party until the next term was to lay that good lady open to criticism.

It was a hard nut to crack, but Lady Jamaica had excellent teeth. Before she reached the stables her mind was made up. She climbed the stairs to the nursery. A fight was in progress, so she sat down like a good sportsman,, and watched with interest, until the better man won.

There were three children— all healthy and rough, and without a nerve in their bodies. They were called Tom, Dick, and Harry. Dick, by the way, was a girl, and the roughest and noisiest of the batch.

When the noise had subsided, Lady Jamaica put the question to her offspring. It was anything but a proper suggestion, but it was received with loud acclamations. She left the room, feeling that she had conquered the Opposition, and that the path was clear for instant operations.

"Fair, play!"she said.  "I couldn't let down my own, even for the sake of that poor mite."

THE WHOLE of the next day, Juliet lived in a fevered dream. She looked  forward to the hour of dressing with mingled feelings of apprehension and excitement. Yet, in spite of her doubtful moments, on the whole she trusted in the powers of the red-faced lady in the dog-cart, who called herself a saint. Her heart was entirely full of confidence when the washing was over, and in scanty petticoats and with cold, mottled arms she ran into her mother's room at the maternal call.

Upon the bed lay something in tissue paper.

Her dress.

Juliet's heart beat fast as the wrappings were laid aside. Now for a glorious transformation! Now for a mother's astonishment and defeat! Now for the rout of the material at the invasion of magic! Room for the miracle!

The dress was shaken out, and with it all the life died out of Juliet's face. She bit her tongue in her disappointment. It was the Greek tunic. No miracle had happened. Her saint was an impostor. She had played her false. She stood, mute and frozen, while her petticoats were drawn off and the tights coaxed on. She was almost dead to feeling when at last she saw herself in the long glass. A pathetic little figure-of-fun in the white tunic, silver bay leaves filleted round her head, and silver braids criss-crossed round her thin little shanks.

The numbness lasted all through the drive, but when she had reached the Assembly Rooms and had left her wrappings in the cloak-room, her casing of ice suddenly fell away at the sound of a two-step and the chatter of children's voices.

She clung to the maid's hand in an agony of shyness. How could she enter that big electric-lit room? How could she run the gauntlet of scornful eyes? How could she show her legs to the public?

The maid gave her a kindly push and shot her through the doorway. The room seemed full of smart people, for the party was a large one, including the outside children who attended the dancing classes with their parents and friends. Juliet stood still for a dreadful moment. She thought that a howl of laughter had greeted her appearance. She hardly dared raise her eyes as she bitterly reviled the saint who had cheated her out of that kindly brown stream and the glory of suicide.

Then she noticed that a school-fellow was standing near her. It was the child with the fat golden curls— Em Miller— and she looked more opulent than ever in a frilly blue silk dress. Juliet gave her a look of heart-felt envy, as she waited for the inevitable chuckle of derision. To her surprise, none came. Em looked at her sourly, and with something that seemed curiously like jealousy. As Juliet blinked with surprise, Alys— the barrister's daughter— ran up in all the glory of her done-up dress.

"Have this with me, Juliet," she said. "There aren't half enough boys."

With spinning head, Juliet pranced off with her partner. On such occasions she danced with the teachers only, as none of her schoolfellows had the courage to foot it with such a little guy. She jigged away merrily— a queer feeling in her mind. Something had happened. Was it a miracle? This was totally different from the reception she had expected.

Alys, who by virtue of her conversational skill was a power in the school, was most affable.

"So you've one of those sweet dresses," she observed, as they stopped, panting. "But Juliet, my dear," she added, with a remembrance of her mother when the famous barrister golfed, "Why don't you pad your calves?"

Juliet did not reply. She was studying the room.

Three white figures went rollicking by, bucking and plunging like young colts! Short, white Grecian tunics gave free play to their splendid rounded limbs as they jumped in the dance. They were Tom, Dick and Harry— the children of Lady Jamaica and the grand-children of the Duke of Peppercorn. Nor did the wonder end there. There were a few other white tunics to be seen in the room, all of which were worn by the pupils who were considered the cream of the dancing class.

Juliet forgot about the miracle. She only knew that she was no longer a pariah and a butt. She was among the Elect. This was her last party and she was going to enjoy it. Now she knew what legs were for. They were made for dancing— not to be looked at. Splendid things, legs!

IS IT tame to have to explain the stage-management of a modern miracle? Why relate how Lady Jamaica disposed of her children's healthy objections to making fools of themselves by that artful suggestion, "Wouldn't you like to go to the party dressed in bathing costumes?"

Why describe her mortified feelings as she saw the sailor suits; and Liberty  smock deposed in favor of these circus trappings? Why touch on the diplomacy that caused the costumes to be hurriedly made by the gossipy dressmaker, whose clientele copied the great lady in every respect?

At all events, she was repaid with interest as she watched a happy-faced child footing it gaily among the dancers with wrinkled, white-silk legs. Once Juliet looked up, and saw the jolly red face beam at her with the benevolent pleasure of an old-world saint.

Her ladyship's satin gown was torn from musical chairs. She had barged one of the masters so hard that he had forgotten she was a woman, and had floored her, to her pure and simple joy.

As she smiled, her head was encircled by a rakish ring that had escaped from its moorings. It might have been the extra plait that her maid pinned on nightly.....

Or it might have been a halo.

______________

14: To Whom This May Come

Edward Bellamy

1850-1898

Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, Feb 1889

A lost world tale. Bellamy, an American lawyer turned journalist, wrote a number of tales, notably  "Looking Backwards",  a "Utopia" novel.

IT is now about a year since I took passage at Calcutta in the ship Adelaide for New York. We had baffling weather till New Amsterdam Island was sighted, where we took a new point of departure. Three days later, a terrible gale struck us. Four days we flew before it, whither, no one knew, for neither sun, moon, nor stars were at any time visible, and we could take no observation. Toward midnight of the fourth day, the glare of lightning revealed the Adelaide in a hopeless position, close in upon a low-lying shore, and driving straight toward it. All around and astern far out to sea was such a maze of rocks and shoals that it was a miracle we had come so far. Presently the ship struck, and almost instantly went to pieces, so great was the violence of the sea. I gave myself up for lost, and was indeed already past the worst of drowning, when I was recalled to consciousness by being thrown with a tremendous shock upon the beach. I had just strength enough to drag myself above the reach of the waves, and then I fell down and knew no more.

When I awoke, the storm was over. The sun, already halfway up the sky, had dried my clothing, and renewed the vigor of my bruised and aching limbs. On sea or shore I saw no vestige of my ship or my companions, of whom I appeared the sole survivor. I was not, however, alone. A group of persons, apparently the inhabitants of the country, stood near, observing me with looks of friendliness which at once freed me from apprehension as to my treatment at their hands. They were a white and handsome people, evidently of a high order of civilization, though I recognized in them the traits of no race with which I was familiar.

Seeing that it was evidently their idea of etiquette to leave it to strangers to open conversation, I addressed them in English, but failed to elicit any response beyond deprecating smiles. I then accosted them successively in the French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, and Portuguese tongues, but with no better results. I began to be very much puzzled as to what could possibly be the nationality of a white and evidently civilized race to which no one of the tongues of the great seafaring nations was intelligible. The oddest thing of all was the unbroken silence with which they contemplated my efforts to open communication with them. It was as if they were agreed not to give me a clue to their language by even a whisper; for while they regarded one another with looks of smiling intelligence, they did not once open their lips. But if this behavior suggested that they were amusing themselves at my expense, that presumption was negatived by the unmistakable friendliness and sympathy which their whole bearing expressed.

A most extraordinary conjecture occurred to me. Could it be that these strange people were dumb? Such a freak of nature as an entire race thus afflicted had never indeed been heard of, but who could say what wonders the unexplored vasts of the great Southern Ocean might thus far have hid from human ken? Now, among the scraps of useless information which lumbered my mind was an acquaintance with the deaf-and-dumb alphabet and forthwith I began to spell out with my fingers some of the phrases I had already uttered to so little effect. My resort to the sign language overcame the last remnant of gravity in the already profusely smiling group. The small boys now rolled on the ground in convulsions of mirth, while the grave and reverend seniors, who had hitherto kept them in check, were fain momentarily to avert their faces, and I could see their bodies shaking with laughter. The greatest clown in the world never received a more flattering tribute to his powers to amuse than had been called forth by mine to make myself understood. Naturally, however, I was not flattered, but on the contrary entirely discomfited. Angry I could not well be, for the deprecating manner in which all, excepting of course the boys, yielded to their perception of the ridiculous, and the distress they showed at their failure in self-control, made me seem the aggressor. It was as if they were very sorry for me, and ready to put themselves wholly at my service, if I would only refrain from reducing them to a state of disability by being so exquisitely absurd. Certainly this evidently amiable race had a very embarrassing way of receiving strangers.

Just at this moment, when my bewilderment was fast verging on exasperation, relief came. The circle opened, and a little elderly man, who had evidently come in haste, confronted me, and, bowing very politely, addressed me in English. His voice was the most pitiable abortion of a voice I had ever heard. While having all the defects in articulation of a child's who is just beginning to talk, it was not even a child's in strength of tone, being in fact a mere alternation of squeaks and whispers inaudible a rod away. With some difficulty I was, however, able to follow him pretty nearly.

"As the official interpreter," he said, "I extend you a cordial welcome to these islands. I was sent for as soon as you were discovered, but being at some distance, I was unable to arrive until this moment. I regret this, as my presence would have saved you embarrassment. My countrymen desire me to intercede with you to pardon the wholly involuntary and uncontrollable mirth provoked by your attempts to communicate with them. You see, they understood you perfectly well, but could not answer you."

"Merciful heavens!" I exclaimed, horrified to find my surmise correct; "can it be that they are all thus afflicted? Is it possible that you are the only man among them who has the power of speech?"

Again it appeared that, quite unintentionally, I had said something excruciatingly funny; for at my speech there arose a sound of gentle laughter from the group, now augmented to quite an assemblage, which drowned the plashing of the waves on the beach at our feet. Even the interpreter smiled.

"Do they think it so amusing to be dumb?" I asked.

"They find it very amusing," replied the interpreter, "that their inability to speak should be regarded by any one as an affliction; for it is by the voluntary disuse of the organs of articulation that they have lost the power of speech, and, as a consequence, the ability even to understand speech."

"But," said I, somewhat puzzled by this statement, "didn't you just tell me that they understood me, though they could not reply, and are they not laughing now at what I just said?"

"It is you they understood, not your words," answered the interpreter. "Our speech now is gibberish to them, as unintelligible in itself as the growling of animals; but they know what we are saying, because they know our thoughts. You must know that these are the islands of the mind-readers."

Such were the circumstances of my introduction to this extraordinary people. The official interpreter being charged by virtue of his office with the first entertainment of shipwrecked members of the talking nations, I became his guest, and passed a number of days under his roof before going out to any considerable extent among the people. My first impression had been the somewhat oppressive one that the power to read the thoughts of others could be possessed only by beings of a superior order to man. It was the first effort of the interpreter to disabuse me of this notion. It appeared from his account that the experience of the mind-readers was a case simply of a slight acceleration, from special causes, of the course of universal human evolution, which in time was destined to lead to the disuse of speech and the substitution of direct mental vision on the part of all races. This rapid evolution of these islanders was accounted for by their peculiar origin and circumstances.

Some three centuries before Christ, one of the Parthian kings of Persia, of the dynasty of the Arsacidae, undertook a persecution of the sooth-sayers and magicians in his realms. These people were credited with supernatural powers by popular prejudice, but in fact were merely persons of special gifts in the way of hypnotizing, mind-reading, thought transference, and such arts, which they exercised for their own gain.

Too much in awe of the soothsayers to do them outright violence, the king resolved to banish them, and to this end put them, with their families, on ships and sent them to Ceylon. When, however, the fleet was in the neighborhood of that island, a great storm scattered it, and one of the ships, after being driven for many days before the tempest, was wrecked upon one of an archipelago of uninhabited islands far to the south, where the survivors settled. Naturally, the posterity of the parents possessed of such peculiar gifts had developed extraordinary psychical powers.

Having set before them the end of evolving a new and advanced order of humanity, they had aided the development of these powers by a rigid system of stirpiculture. The result was that, after a few centuries, mind-reading became so general that language fell into disuse as a means of communicating ideas. For many generations the power of speech still remained voluntary, but gradually the vocal organs had become atrophied, and for several hundred years the power of articulation had been wholly lost. Infants for a few months after birth did, indeed, still emit inarticulate cries, but at an age when in less advanced races these cries began to be articulate, the children of the mind-readers developed the power of direct vision, and ceased to attempt to use the voice.

The fact that the existence of the mind-readers had never been found out by the rest of the world was explained by two considerations. In the first place, the group of islands was small, and occupied a corner of the Indian Ocean quite out of the ordinary track of ships. In the second place, the approach to the islands was rendered so desperately perilous by terrible currents, and the maze of outlying rocks and shoals, that it was next to impossible for any ship to touch their shores save as a wreck. No ship at least had ever done so in the two thousand years since the mind-readers' own arrival, and the Adelaide had made the one hundred and twenty-third such wreck.

Apart from motives of humanity, the mind-readers made strenuous efforts to rescue shipwrecked persons, for from them alone, through the interpreters, could they obtain information of the outside world. Little enough this proved when, as often happened, the sole survivor of the shipwreck was some ignorant sailor, who had no news to communicate beyond the latest varieties of fore-castle blasphemy. My hosts gratefully assured me that, as a person of some little education, they considered me a veritable godsend. No less a task was mine than to relate to them the history of the world for the past two centuries, and often did I wish, for their sakes, that I had made a more exact study of it.

It is solely for the purpose of communicating with shipwrecked strangers of the talking nations that the office of the interpreters exists. When, as from time to time happens, a child is born with some powers of articulation, he is set apart, and trained to talk in the interpreters' college. Of course the partial atrophy of the vocal organs, from which even the best interpreters suffer, renders many of the sounds of language impossible for them. None, for instance, can pronounce v, f; or s; and as to the sound represented by th, it is five generations since the last interpreter lived who could utter it. But for the occasional inter-marriage of shipwrecked strangers with the islanders, it is probable that the supply of interpreters would have long ere this quite failed.

I imagine that the very unpleasant sensations which followed the realization that I was among people who, while inscrutable to me, knew my every thought, were very much what any one would have experienced in the same case. They were very comparable to the panic which accidental nudity causes a person among races whose custom it is to conceal the figure with drapery. I wanted to run away and hide myself. If I analyzed my feeling, it did not seem to arise so much from the consciousness of any particularly heinous secrets, as from the knowledge of a swarm of fatuous, ill-natured, and unseemly thoughts and half thoughts concerning those around me, and concerning myself, which it was insuperable that any person should peruse in however benevolent a spirit. But while my chagrin and distress on this account were at first intense, they were also very short-lived, for almost immediately I discovered that the very knowledge that my mind was overlooked by others operated to check thoughts that might be painful to them, and that, too, without more effort of the will than a kindly person exerts to check the utterance of disagreeable remarks. As a very few lessons in the elements of courtesy cures a decent person of inconsiderate speaking, so a brief experience among the mind-readers went far in my case to check inconsiderate thinking. It must not be supposed, however, that courtesy among the mind-readers prevents them from thinking pointedly and freely concerning one another upon serious occasions, any more than the finest courtesy among the talking races restrains them from speaking to one another with entire plainness whenit it is desirable to do so. Indeed, among the mind-readers, politeness never can extend to the point of insincerity, as among talking nations, seeing that it is always one another's real and inmost thought that they read. I may fitly mention here, though it was not till later that I fully understood why it must necessarily be so, that one need feel far less chagrin at the complete revelation of his weaknesses to a mind-reader than at the slightest betrayal of them to one of another race. For the very reason that the mind-reader reads all your thoughts, particular thoughts are judged with reference to the general tenor of thought. Your characteristic and habitual frame of mind is what he takes account of. No one need fear being misjudged by a mind-reader on account of sentiments or emotions which are not representative of the real character or general attitude. Justice may, indeed, be said to be a necessary consequence of mind-reading.

As regards the interpreter himself, the instinct of courtesy was not long needed to check wanton or offensive thoughts. In all my life before, I had been very slow to form friendships, but before I had been three days in the company of this stranger of a strange race, I had become enthusiastically devoted to him. It was impossible not to be. The peculiar joy of friendship is the sense of being understood by our friend as we are not by others, and yet of being loved in spite of the understanding. Now here was one whose every word testified to a knowledge of my secret thoughts and motives which the oldest and nearest of my former friends had never, and could never, have approximated. Had such a knowledge bred in him contempt of me, I should neither have blamed him nor been at all surprised. Judge, then, whether the cordial friendliness which he showed was likely to leave me indifferent.

Imagine my incredulity when he informed me that our friendship was not based upon more than ordinary mutual suitability of temperaments. The faculty of mind-reading, he explained, brought minds so close together, and so heightened sympathy, that the lowest order of friendship between mind-readers implied a mutual delight such as only rare friends enjoyed among other races. He assured me that later on, when I came to know others of his race, I should find, by the far greater intensity of sympathy and affection I should conceive for some of them, how true this saying was.

It may be inquired how, on beginning to mingle with the mind-readers in general, I managed to communicate with them, seeing that, while they could read my thoughts, they could not, like the interpreter, respond to them by speech. I must here explain that, while these people have no use for a spoken language, a written language is needful for purposes of record. They consequently all know how to write. Do they, then, write Persian? Luckily for me, no. It appears that, for a long period after mind-reading was fully developed, not only was spoken language disused, but also written, no records whatever having been kept during this period. The delight of the people in the newly found power of direct mind-to-mind vision, whereby pictures of the total mental state were communicated, instead of the imperfect descriptions of single thoughts which words at best could give, induced an invincible distaste for the laborious impotence of language.

When, however, the first intellectual intoxication had, after several generations, somewhat sobered down, it was recognized that records of the past were desirable, and that the despised medium of words was needful to preserve it. Persian had meanwhile been wholly forgotten. In order to avoid the prodigious task of inventing a complete new language, the institution of the interpreters was now set up, with the idea of acquiring through them a knowledge of some of the languages of the outside world from the mariners wrecked on the islands.

Owing to the fact that most of the castaway ships were English, a better knowledge of that tongue was acquired than of any other, and it was adopted as the written language of the people. As a rule, my acquaintances wrote slowly and laboriously, and yet the fact that they knew exactly what was in my mind rendered their responses so apt that, in my conversations with the slowest speller of them all, the interchange of thought was as rapid and incomparably more accurate and satisfactory than the fastest talkers attain to.

It was but a very short time after I had begun to extend my acquaintance among the mind-readers before I discovered how truly the interpreter had told me I should find others to whom, on account of greater natural congeniality, I should become more strongly attached than I had been to him. This was in no wise, however, because I loved him less, but them more. I would fain write particularly of some of these beloved friends, comrades of my heart, from whom I first learned the undreamed-of possibilities of human friendship, and how ravishing the satisfactions of sympathy may be. Who, among those who may read this, has not known that sense of a gulf fixed between soul and soul which mocks love! Who has not felt that loneliness which oppresses the heart that loves it best! Think no longer that this gulf is eternally fixed, or is any necessity of human nature. It has no existence for the race of our fellow-men which I describe, and by that fact we may be assured that eventually it will be bridged also for us. Like the touch of shoulder to shoulder, like the clasping of hands, is the contact of their minds and their sensation of sympathy.

I say that I would fain speak more particularly of some of my friends, but waning strength forbids, and moreover, now that I think of it, another consideration would render any comparison of their characters rather confusing than instructive to a reader. This is the fact that, in common with the rest of the mind-readers, they had no names. Every one had, indeed, an arbitrary sign for his designation in records, but it has no sound value. A register of these names is kept, so they can at any time be ascertained, but it is very common to meet persons who have forgotten titles which are used solely for biographical and official purposes. For social intercourse names are of course superfluous, for these people accost one another merely by a mental act of attention, and refer to third persons by transferring their mental pictures,— something as dumb persons might by means of photographs. Something so, I say, for in the pictures of one another's personalities which the mind-readers conceive, the physical aspect, as might be expected with people who directly contemplate each other's minds and hearts, is a subordinate element.

I have already told how my first qualms of morbid self-consciousness at knowing that my mind was an open book to all around me disappeared as I learned that the very completeness of the disclosure of my thoughts and motives was a guarantee that I would be judged with a fairness and a sympathy such as even self-judgment cannot pretend to, affected as that is by so many subtle reactions. The assurance of being so judged by every one might well seem an inestimable privilege to one accustomed to a world in which not even the tenderest love is any pledge of comprehension, and yet I soon discovered that open-mindedness had a still greater profit than this. How shall I describe the delightful exhilaration of moral health and cleanness, the breezy oxygenated mental condition, which resulted from the consciousness that I had absolutely nothing concealed! Truly I may say that I enjoyed myself. I think surely that no one needs to have had my marvelous experience to sympathize with this portion of it. Are we not all ready to agree that this having a curtained chamber where we may go to grovel, out of the sight of our fellows, troubled only by a vague apprehension that God may look over the top, is the most demoralizing incident in the human condition? It is the existence within the soul of this secure refuge of lies which has always been the despair of the saint and the exultation of the knave. It is the foul cellar which taints the whole house above, be it never so fine.

What stronger testimony could there be to the instinctive consciousness that concealment is debauching, and openness our only cure, than the world-old conviction of the virtue of confession for the soul, and that the uttermost exposing of one's worst and foulest is the first step toward moral health? The wickedest man, if he could but somehow attain to writhe himself inside out as to his soul, so that its full sickness could be seen, would feel ready for a new life. Nevertheless, owing to the utter impotence of the words to convey mental conditions in their totality, or to give other than mere distortions of them, confession is, we must needs admit, but a mockery of that longing for self-revelation to which it testifies. But think what health and soundness there must be for souls among a people who see in every face a conscience which, unlike their own, they cannot sophisticate, who confess one another with a glance, and shrive with a smile! Ah, friends, let me now predict, though ages may elapse before the slow event shall justify me, that in no way will the mutual vision of minds, when at last it shall be perfected, so enhance the blessedness of mankind as by rending the veil of self, and leaving no spot of darkness in the mind for lies to hide in. Then shall the soul no longer be a coal smoking among ashes, but a star in a crystal sphere.

From what I have said of the delights which friendship among the mind-readers derives from the perfection of the mental rapport, it may be imagined how intoxicating must be the experience when one of the friends is a woman, and the subtle attractions and correspondences of sex touch with passion the intellectual sympathy. With my first venturing into society I had begun, to their extreme amusement, to fall in love with the women right and left. In the perfect frankness which is the condition of all intercourse among this people, these adorable women told me that what I felt was only friendship, which was a very good thing, but wholly different from love, as I should well know if I were beloved. It was difficult to believe that the melting emotions which I had experienced in their company were the result merely of the friendly and kindly attitude of their minds toward mine; but when I found that I was affected in the same way by every gracious woman I met, I had to make up my mind that they must be right about it, and that I should have to adapt myself to a world in which, friendship being a passion, love must needs be nothing less than rapture.

The homely proverb, "Every Jack has his Gill," may, I suppose, be taken to mean that for all men there are certain women expressly suited by mental and moral as well as by physical constitution. It is a thought painful, rather than cheering, that this may be the truth, so altogether do the chances preponderate against the ability of these elect ones to recognize each other even if they meet, seeing that speech is so inadequate and so misleading a medium of self-revelation. But among the mind-readers, the search for one's ideal mate is a quest reasonably sure of being crowned with success, and no one dreams of wedding unless it be; for so to do, they consider, would be to throw away the choicest blessing of life, and not alone to wrong themselves and their unfound mates, but likewise those whom they themselves and those undiscovered mates might wed. Therefore, passionate pilgrims, they go from isle to isle till they find each other, and, as the population of the islands is but small, the pilgrimage is not often long.

When I met her first we were in company, and I was struck by the sudden stir and the looks of touched and smiling interest with which all around turned and regarded us, the women with moistened eyes. They had read her thought when she saw me, but this I did not know, neither what was the custom in these matters, till afterward. But I knew, from the moment she first fixed her eyes on me, and I felt her mind brooding upon mine, how truly I had been told by those other women that the feeling with which they had inspired me was not love.

With people who become acquainted at a glance, and old friends in an hour, wooing is naturally not a long process. Indeed, it may be said that between lovers among mind-readers there is no wooing, but merely recognition. The day after we met, she became mine.

Perhaps I cannot better illustrate how subordinate the merely physical element is in the impression which mind-readers form of their friends than by mentioning an incident that occurred some months after our union. This was my discovery, wholly by accident, that my love, in whose society I had almost constantly been, had not the least idea what was the color of my eyes, or whether my hair and complexion were light or dark. Of course, as soon as I asked her the question, she read the answer in my mind, but she admitted that she had previously had no distinct impression on those points. On the other hand, if in the blackest midnight I should come to her, she would not need to ask who the comer was. It is by the mind, not the eye, that these people know one another. It is really only in their relations to soulless and inanimate things that they need eyes at all.

It must not be supposed that their disregard of one another's bodily aspect grows out of any ascetic sentiment. It is merely a necessary consequence of their power of directly apprehending mind, that whenever mind is closely associated with matter the latter is comparatively neglected on account of the greater interest of the former, suffering as lesser things always do when placed in immediate contrast with greater. Art is with them confined to the inanimate, the human form having, for the reason mentioned, ceased to inspire the artist. It will be naturally and quite correctly inferred that among such a race physical beauty is not the important factor in human fortune and felicity that it elsewhere is. The absolute openness of their minds and hearts to one another makes their happiness far more dependent on the moral and mental qualities of their companions than upon their physical. A genial temperament, a wide-grasping, godlike intellect, a poet soul, are incomparably more fascinating to them than the most dazzling combination conceivable of mere bodily graces.

A woman of mind and heart has no more need of beauty to win love in these islands than a beauty elsewhere of mind or heart. I should mention here, perhaps, that this race, which makes so little account of physical beauty, is itself a singularly handsome one. This is owing doubtless in part to the absolute compatibility of temperaments in all the marriages, and partly also to the reaction upon the body of a state of ideal mental and moral health and placidity.

Not being myself a mind-reader, the fact that my love was rarely beautiful in form and face had doubtless no little part in attracting my devotion. This, of course, she knew, as she knew all my thoughts, and, knowing my limitations, tolerated and forgave the element of sensuousness in my passion. But if it must have seemed to her so little worthy in comparison with the high spiritual communion which her race know as love, to me it became, by virtue of her almost superhuman relation to me, an ecstasy more ravishing surely than any lover of my race tasted before. The ache at the heart of the intensest love is the impotence of words to make it perfectly understood to its object. But my passion was without this pang, for my heart was absolutely open to her I loved. Lovers may imagine, but I cannot describe, the ecstatic thrill of communion into which this consciousness transformed every tender emotion. As I considered what mutual love must be where both parties are mind-readers, I realized the high communion which my sweet companion had sacrificed for me. She might indeed comprehend her lover and his love for her, but the higher satisfaction of knowing that she was comprehended by him and her love understood, she had foregone. For that I should ever attain the power of mind-reading was out of the question, the faculty never having been developed in a single lifetime.

Why my inability should move my dear companion to such depths of pity I was not able fully to understand until I learned that mind-reading is chiefly held desirable, not for the knowledge of others which it gives its possessors, but for the self-knowledge which is its reflex effect. Of all they see in the minds of others, that which concerns them most is the reflection of themselves, the photographs of their own characters. The most obvious consequence of the self-knowledge thus forced upon them is to render them alike incapable of self-conceit or self-depreciation. Every one must needs always think of himself as he is, being no more able to do otherwise than is a man in a hall of mirrors to cherish delusions as to his personal appearance.

But self-knowledge means to the mind-readers much more than this,— nothing less, indeed, than a shifting of the sense of identity. When a man sees himself in a mirror, he is compelled to distinguish between the bodily self he sees and his real self, which is within and unseen. When in turn the mind-reader comes to see the mental and moral self reflected in other minds as in mirrors, the same thing happens. He is compelled to distinguish between this mental and moral self which has been made objective to him, and can be contemplated by him as impartially as if it were another's, from the inner ego which still remains subjective, unseen, and indefinable. In this inner ego the mind-readers recognize the essential identity and being, the noumenal self, the core of the soul, and the true hiding of its eternal life, to which the mind as well as the body is but the garment of a day.

The effect of such a philosophy as this— which, indeed, with the mind-readers is rather an instinctive consciousness than a philosophy— must obviously be to impart a sense of wonderful superiority to the vicissitudes of this earthly state, and a singular serenity in the midst of the haps and mishaps which threaten or befall the personality. They did indeed appear to me, as I never dreamed men could attain to be, lords of themselves.

It was because I might not hope to attain this enfranchisement from the false ego of the apparent self, without which life seemed to her race scarcely worth living, that my love so pitied me.

But I must hasten on, leaving a thousand things unsaid, to relate the lamentable catastrophe to which it is owing that, instead of being still a resident of those blessed islands, in the full enjoyment of that intimate and ravishing companionship which by contrast would forever dim the pleasures of all other human society, I recall the bright picture as a memory under other skies.

Among a people who are compelled by the very constitution of their minds to put themselves in the places of others, the sympathy which is the inevitable consequence of perfect comprehension renders envy, hatred, and uncharitableness impossible. But of course there are people less genially constituted than others, and these are necessarily the objects of a certain distaste on the part of associates. Now, owing to the unhindered impact of minds upon one another, the anguish of persons so regarded, despite the tenderest consideration of those about them, is so great that they beg the grace of exile, that, being out of the way, people may think less frequently upon them. There are numerous small islets, scarcely more than rocks, lying to the north of the archipelago, and on these the unfortunates are permitted to live. Only one lives on each islet, as they cannot endure each other even as well as the more happily constituted can endure them. From time to time supplies of food are taken to them, and of course, any time they wish to take the risk, they are permitted to return to society.

Now, as I have said, the fact which, even more than their out-of-the-way location, makes the islands of the mind-readers unapproachable, is the violence with which the great antarctic current, owing probably to some configuration of the ocean bed, together with the innumerable rocks and shoals, flows through and about the archipelago.

Ships making the islands from the southward are caught by this current and drawn among the rocks, to their almost certain destruction; while, owing to the violence with which the current sets to the north, it is not possible to approach at all from that direction, or at least it has never been accomplished. Indeed, so powerful are the currents that even the boats which cross the narrow straits between the main islands and the islets of the unfortunate, to carry the latter their supplies, are ferried over by cables, not trusting to oar or sail.

The brother of my love had charge of one of the boats engaged in this transportation, and, being desirous of visiting the islets, I accepted an invitation to accompany him on one of his trips. I know nothing of how the accident happened, but in the fiercest part of the current of one of the straits we parted from the cable and were swept out to sea. There was no question of stemming the boiling current, our utmost endeavors barely sufficing to avoid being dashed to pieces on the rocks. From the first, there was no hope of our winning back to the land, and so swiftly did we drift that by noon— the accident having befallen in the morning— the islands, which are low-lying, had sunk beneath the southwestern horizon.

Among these mind-readers, distance is not an insuperable obstacle to the transfer of thought. My companion was in communication with our friends, and from time to time conveyed to me messages of anguish from my dear love; for, being well aware of the nature of the currents and the unapproachableness of the islands, those we had left behind, as well as we ourselves, knew well we should see each other's faces no more. For five days we continued to drift to the northwest, in no danger of starvation, owing to our lading of provisions, but constrained to unintermitting watch and ward by the roughness of the weather. On the fifth day my companion died from exposure and exhaustion. He died very quietly,— indeed, with great appearance of relief. The life of the mind-readers while yet they are in the body is so largely spiritual that the idea of an existence wholly so, which seems vague and chill to us, suggests to them a state only slightly more refined than they already know on earth.

After that I suppose I must have fallen into an unconscious state, from which I roused to find myself on an American ship bound for New York, surrounded by people whose only means of communicating with one another is to keep up while together a constant clatter of hissing, guttural, and explosive noises, eked out by all manner of facial contortions and bodily gestures. I frequently find myself staring open-mouthed at those who address me, too much struck by their grotesque appearance to bethink myself of replying.

I find that I shall not live out the voyage, and I do not care to. From my experience of the people on the ship, I can judge how I should fare on land amid the stunning Babel of a nation of talkers. And my friends,— God bless them! how lonely I should feel in their very presence! Nay, what satisfaction or consolation, what but bitter mockery could I ever more find in such human sympathy and companionship as suffice others and once sufficed me,— I who have seen and known what I have seen and known! Ah, yes, doubtless it is far better I should die; but the knowledge of the things that I have seen I feel should not perish with me. For hope's sake, men should not miss the glimpse of the higher, sun-bathed reaches of the upward path they plod. So thinking, I have written out some account of my wonderful experience, though briefer far, by reason of my weakness, than fits the greatness of the matter. The captain seems an honest, well-meaning man, and to him I shall confide the narrative, charging him, on touching shore to see it safely in the hands of some one who will bring it to the world's ear.

NOTE.—The extent of my own connection with the foregoing document is sufficiently indicated by the author himself in the final paragraph.

—E.B.

________________

15: Derelict

Gilbert Parker

1862-1932

In: Cumner's Son and other South Seas Folk, 1904

Sir Gilbert Parker

Gilbert Parker was a Canadian novelist, sometime Australian newspaperman, and British politician. He was elevated to Baronet in the Coronation Honours of 1902.

HE WAS very drunk; and because of that Victoria Lindley, barmaid at O'Fallen's, was angry— not at him but at O'Fallen, who had given him the liquor.

She knew more about him than any one else. The first time she saw him he was not sober. She had left the bar-room empty; and when she came back he was there with others who had dropped in, evidently attracted by his unusual appearance— he wore an eyeglass— and he had been saying something whimsically audacious to Dicky Merritt, who, slapping him on the shoulder, had asked him to have a swizzle.

Dicky Merritt had a ripe sense of humour, and he was the first to grin. This was followed by loud laughs from others, and these laughs went out where the dust lay a foot thick and soft like precipitated velvet, and hurrying over the street, waked the Postmaster and roused the Little Milliner, who at once came to their doors. Catching sight of each other, they nodded, and blushed, and nodded again; and then the Postmaster, neglecting the business of the country, went upon his own business into the private sitting-room of the Little Milliner; for those wandering laughs from O'Fallen's had done the work set for them by the high powers.

Over in the hot bar-room the man with the eye-glass was being frankly "intr'juced" to Dicky Merritt and Company, Limited, by Victoria Lindley, who, as hostess of this saloon, was, in his eyes, on a footing of acquaintance. To her he raised his hat with accentuated form, and murmured his name— "Mr. Jones— Mr. Jones." Forthwith, that there might be no possible unpleasantness— for even such hostesses have their duties of tact— she politely introduced him as Mr. Jones.

He had been a man of innumerable occupations— nothing long: caretaker of tanks, rabbit-trapper, boundary-rider, cook at a shearers' camp, and, in due time, he became book-keeper at O'Fallen's. That was due to Vic. Mr. Jones wrote a very fine hand— not in the least like a business man—  when he was moderately sober, and he also had an exceedingly caustic wit when he chose to use it. He used it once upon O'Fallen, who was a rough, mannerless creature, with a good enough heart, but easily irritated by the man with the eye-glass, whose superior intellect and manner, even when drunk, were too noticeable. He would never have employed him were it not for Vic, who was worth very much money to him in the course of the year. She was the most important person within a radius of a hundred and fifty miles, not excepting Rembrandt, the owner of Bomba Station, which was twenty miles square, nor the parson at Magari, ninety miles south, by the Ring-Tail Billabong. For both Rembrandt and the parson had, and showed, a respect for her, which might appear startling were it seen in Berkeley Square or the Strand.

When, therefore, O'Fallen came raging into the barroom one morning, with the gentle remark that "he'd roast the tongue of her fancy gent if he didn't get up and git," he did a foolish thing. It was the first time that he had insulted Victoria, and it was the last. She came out white and quiet from behind the bar-counter, and, as he retreated from her into a corner, said: "There is not a man who drinks over this bar, or puts his horse into your shed, who wouldn't give you the lie to that and thrash you as well— you coward!" Her words came on low and steady: "Mr. Jones will go now, of course, but I shall go also."

This awed O'Fallen. To lose Vic was to lose the reputation of his house. He instantly repented, but she turned her shoulder on him, and went into the little hot office, where the book-keeper was, leaving him gesticulating as he swore at himself in the glass behind the bar. When she entered the room she found Mr. Jones sitting rigid on his stool, looking at the open ledger before him. She spoke his name. He nodded ever so slightly, but still looked hard at the book. She knew his history. Once he had told it to her. It happened one day when he had resigned his position as boundary-rider, in which he was practically useless. He had been drinking, and, as he felt for the string of his eye-glass, his fingers caught another thin black cord which protruded slightly from his vest. He drew it out by mistake, and a small gold cross shone for a moment against the faded black coat. His fingers felt for it to lift it to his eye as though it were his eye-glass, but dropped it suddenly. He turned pale for a minute, then caught it as suddenly again, and thrust it into his waistcoat. But Vic had seen, and she had very calm, intelligent eyes, and a vast deal of common sense, though she had only come from out Tibbooburra way. She kept her eyes on him kindly, knowing that he would speak in time. They were alone, for most of the people of Wadgery were away at a picnic. There is always one moment when a man who has a secret, good or bad, fatal or otherwise, feels that he must tell it or die. And Mr. Jones told Vic, and she said what she could, though she knew that a grasp of her firm hands was better than any words; and she was equally sure in her own mind that word and grasp would be of no avail in the end.

She saw that the beginning of the end had come as she looked at him staring at the ledger, yet exactly why she could not tell. She knew that he had been making a fight since he had been book-keeper, and that now he felt that he had lost. She guessed also that he had heard what O'Fallen said to her, and what she had replied.

"You ought not to have offended him," she tried to say severely.

"It had to come," he said with a dry, crackling laugh, and he fastened his eye-glass in his eye. "I wasn't made for this. I could only do one thing, and— " He laughed that peculiar laugh again, got down from the stool, and held out his hand to her.

"What do you intend?" she said. "I'm going, of course. Good-bye!"

"But not at once?" she said very kindly.

"Perhaps not just at once," he answered with a strange smile.

She did not know what to say or do; there are puzzling moments even for a wise woman, and there is nothing wiser than that.

He turned at the door. "God bless you!" he said. Then, as if caught in an act to be atoned for, he hurried out into the street. From the door she watched him till the curtains of dust rose up about him and hid him from sight. When he came back to Wadgery months after he was a terrible wreck; so much so that Vic could hardly look at him at first; and she wished that she had left O'Fallen's as she threatened, and so have no need to furnish any man swizzles. She knew he would never pull himself together now. It was very weak of him, and horrible, but then... When that thirst gets into the blood, and there's something behind the man's life too— as Dicky Merritt said, "It's a case for the little black angels."

Vic would not give him liquor. He got it, however, from other sources. He was too far gone to feel any shame now. His sensibilities were all blunted. One day he babbled over the bar-counter to O'Fallen, desiring greatly that they should be reconciled. To that end he put down the last shilling he had for a swizzle, and was so outrageously offended when O'Fallen refused to take it, that the silver was immediately swept into the till; and very soon, with his eye-glass to his eye, Mr. Jones was drunk.

That was the occasion mentioned in the first sentence of this history, when Vic was very angry.

The bar-room was full. Men were wondering why it was that the Postmaster and the Little Milliner, who went to Magari ten days before, to get married by the parson there, had not returned. While they talked and speculated, the weekly coach from Magari came up slowly to the door, and, strange to say, without a blast from the driver's horn. Dicky Merritt and Company rushed out to ask news of the two truants, and were met with a warning wave of the driver's hand, and a "Sh-h! sh— !" as he motioned towards the inside of the coach. There they found the Postmaster and the Little Milliner mere skeletons, and just alive. They were being cared for by a bushman, who had found them in the plains, delirious and nearly naked. They had got lost, there being no regular road over the plains, and their horse, which they had not tethered properly, had gone large. They had been days without food and water when they were found near the coach-track.

They were carried into O'Fallen's big sitting-room. Dicky brought the doctor, who said that they both would die, and soon. Hours passed. The sufferers at last became sane and conscious, as though they could not go without something being done. The Postmaster lifted a hand to his pocket. Dicky Merritt took out of it a paper. It was the marriage licence. The Little Milliner's eyes were painful to see; she was not dying happy. The Postmaster, too, moved his head from side to side in trouble. He reached over and took her hand. She drew it back, shuddering a little. "The ring! The ring!" she whispered.

"It is lost," he said.

Vic, who was at the woman's head, understood. She stooped, said something in her ear, then in that of the Postmaster, and left the room. When she came back, two minutes later, Mr. Jones was with her. What she had done to him to sober him no one ever knew. But he had a book in his hand, and on the dingy black of his waistcoat there shone a little gold cross. He came to where the two lay. Vic drew from her finger a ring. What then occurred was never forgotten by any who saw it; and you could feel the stillness, it was so great, after a high, sing-song voice said: "Those whom God hath joined let no man put asunder."

The two lying cheek by cheek knew now that they could die in peace.

The sing-song voice rose again in the ceremony of blessing, but suddenly it quavered and broke, the man rose, dropping the prayer-book to the floor, and ran quickly out of the room and into the dust of the street, and on, on into the plains.

"In the name of God, who is he?" said Dicky Merritt to Victoria Lindley.

"He was the Reverend Jones Leverton, of Harford-on-Thames," was her reply.

"Once a priest, always a priest," added Dicky. "He'll never come back," said the girl, tears dropping from her eyes.

And she was right.

________________

16: The Papuan Paddle

H. de Vere Stacpoole

1863-1951

Popular Magazine, 7 Jan 1923

Henry de Vere Stacpoole

THE SUMMER before last, Blades, the manager of the Nicaraguan Trust Company, rented me his cottage at Sonning-on-Thames. If you know Sonning you know a lovely place; can you tell me of anything prettier than the tree-covered reaches, the water meadows, the old river gardens of the Thames below Reading; any place more charming were it not for the river mists and the motor launches?

I paid Blades five guineas a week for the bungalow and he said I could sublet or lend it if I wanted to. I had known Blades some years. He had been mixed up in all sorts of businesses in a great many countries. Starting with tea in Ceylon he had gone on to rubber in Burma; from there he went to New Guinea and from New Guinea to Nicaragua, making money at each remove but never a fortune. Incidentally he was full of stories and the records of strange happenings.

I took the bungalow over on the seventh of June and as he did not want to leave for London till the eighth he stayed on for the night as my guest. Blades had always carried his household goods along with him when he moved, collecting as he went, and the bungalow was a small museum of potbellied idols, inlaid furniture, arms and objects of Eastern art. I honestly detest Eastern things in a Western setting, but I had come to the bungalow for open air so the furniture was of little account; but the chairs were comfortable, and as we sat smoking and yarning that warm June evening with the scents and sounds of the river blowing through the open windows I forgot Blades’ Eastern gods and dragons while listening to an Eastern story.

A stand of Papuan arms and accoutrements started the business. It was fixed by the fireplace opposite the windows and as the evening light shone on these implements of death and destruction a chance remark of mine made Blades turn his head toward them.

“Yes,” he said, “look as if they were stamped out of savagery, don’t they? Modern and civilized arms haven’t the same touch at all. A rifle, though more deadly, hasn’t got ‘killing’ written on it like those parangs and a cannon doesn’t shout murder at you as a stabbing spear does.”

“Maybe it’s Western hypocrisy,” said I, “the hypocrisy that teaches the kindness of Buddha to animals while devouring them, and which camouflages deadliness as you say.”

“No,” replied Blades, “it’s Eastern savagery— ferocity, that is a better word. If I were asked to define the thing that most truly divides the Eastern from the Western man I would say that it was neither color nor religion nor the set of the eyes nor the shape of the face, but just ferocity, a latent ferocity that is hidden under every yellow skin— and I'll tell you something about that.

“When I sold my place in Burma I fell in with a chap named Masters, English in make and name but a cosmopolitan in everything else, the ugliest creature I ever struck, six foot two and as thin as a barber’s pole, but devilish interesting for all that. You meet a lot of men in the world but you meet very few personalities. I’m blessed if I know what a personality really is, but it’s something, seems to me, in the shape of a magnetic fluid. Once you got in touch with Masters you were him, in a way— sort of induced-electricity business; you’d take his color of mind and if he believed in a thing it’s ten to one he’d make you believe in it too. These are the sort of chaps that fascinate women because they believe themselves fascinating. They have faith in themselves, that’s the secret of it maybe, and before I had known him three days he’d fascinated me so that I was drawing money out of the bank to help start an expedition with him in search of a ruby mine in Papua.

“I had never heard of rubies being found in Papua, but Masters had the location of what he swore would prove a better corundum ground than any in Burma. He explained to me just what a ruby was, corundum crystallized in six-sided prisms and that just a twist of Nature’s hand would turn common corundum into rubies or sapphires. There was no mystery, he said, and Burma hadn’t cornered the business by any means; as for the location he had it from a cousin who had died of black-water fever.

“It was up close to the headwaters of a river, the Itang by name, and though the place wasn’t specified on the chart by a pin prick, so to speak, he would have no difficulty in finding it as he was an expert geologist. That was all we had to go on but Masters being what he was, we went.

“There was a little old schooner tied up to the wharves at Rangoon. She’d been a pearler and nosing about for a boat we struck her and found the owner and did a deal, hiring her for six months pay in advance, and we insuring her for the trip. Hefferman was the name of the owner and we told him we were going to hunt for butterflies and orchids in Papua. He was an old pearler, red-nosed old swab, an A-1 boozer but likable, somehow, and he said he’d come along with us and sail the schooner for five dollars a week so’s to get away from the drink, and we took him. He got the crew for us and one morning bright and early we slipped down the Irawadi with the land breeze into the Gulf of Martaban. She was a crazy old tub but she got us safe down through the Straits of Malacca and the Banda Sea, and one morning we dropped the hook off the coast we were after in a sort of natural harbor, protected by reefs, and with the Itang River right before us.

“There was a big stockaded village on the right bank of the river and beyond and on the other side we could see alligators sunning themselves on the mud. Then came the forests and beyond the forests great blue hills all broken and strange looking under a streak of cloud.

“We got ashore and Hefferman came with us. Well we took him, for he could make a shot at the lingo. All along that coast the language changes every few miles— it’s a Tower of Babel lying on its side but there’s one dialect that runs like a skewer through the hundred and fifty others and that’s Ubir. Hefferman could speak Ubir and when we stood there surrounded by the whole of that village we were glad we had him along for they were a tough-looking lot, specially the head man, a chap with a frizzy head, named Klang.

“They examined our rifles and automatic pistols and, when Heff explained that we wanted canoes and a party to go with us to the headwaters of the Itang, Klang nearly tumbled at our feet and offered to lead us and bring along a party of his best men lest we should have any trouble with the people in the interior. We thought ourselves in luck. We didn’t know that the scamp was planning to use us. Up toward the headwaters of the Itang there was a tribe belonging to the Doriri people and headed by a chap named Kwa. Kwa had raided Klang’s village two years before and Klang had been lying low for a chance to return the compliment. Three European gunmen armed with Winchesters and automatics were the chance of his life, for he knew Kwa would open the ball and we’d have to fight.

“We guessed nothing of all that and two days later we started, four canoes, twenty-six Papuans armed to the teeth and us three with an automatic and Winchester apiece. Then came three days paddling, tying up at nights under trees full of flying foxes, till one day a spear eight feet long came sailing out of the blue and the ball began.

“There was no strategy or tactics about Kwa. As we drove the canoes up to the bank where the spear had come from his men came out from the trees into the open and fought. They hadn’t reckoned on automatics but that didn’t stop them. Though they were tumbling dead like ninepins they didn’t care; nor did Klang’s crowd who fought with spears and paddles and teeth and toe nails while we three stood supervising matters and pumping the lead into the beggars, sure of our marks for the fool Doriri chaps had daubed themselves with yellow clay all over their chests and shoulders.

“I don’t know how long that fight lasted, three minutes or ten, but it. was soon over and at the end of it Kwa was a prisoner and the whole of his lot dead or flying. Now I’m coming to the keel of my story and the ferocity business. You see that parang, that half sword sort of thing by that spear with three barbs. Well Klang was holding it in his hand and as Kwa stood before him, a prisoner, suddenly up flew the parang and Kwa’s head went flying.

“Klang danced before the head, then he went on his knees and jeered at it, then he put out his hand to seize it and suddenly, I don’t know how it happened, there was a snap like the snap of a steel spring and a piece was bitten out of his thumb— clean out. Pass us the whisky.”

“Did you find any rubies?” I asked presently.

“No, not an indication.”

We talked of other things and then I went to bed and dreamed that I was by the Itang River in the doubtful company of Klang, a ferocious Papuan with frizzy hair and armed with a parang. I awoke in the dark but did not put my hand out for matches to see the time lest my search might be rewarded by the touch of a woolly head, parted from its context, yet capable of snapping like a dog. Then dismissing such absurd ideas I fell asleep.

ii

ALL THE SAME, Blades’ story remained with me after. he had left and gave the stand of Papuan arms a significance best appreciated at night when the woman servant who looked after me had gone home to the village of Sonning and I was alone— all alone with the silence and my dreams. Then, ceasing writing or laying down a book, I would sometimes allow these things to have their way with me, leading me off like slim afreets to find adventure by the banks of an Eastern river or across those blue hills beyond the paddy fields and Doriri-haunted forests. There was a paddle of dark heavy wood leaning against the stand and evidently one with the other exhibits, and with it I would paddle an imaginary canoe in search of rubies up ever-bending rivers, past alligators sunning themselves, past mangrove shadows haunted by blowgun men, past all dangers and difficulties into the world of sleep.

There was a boathouse on the bank by the bungalow containing a boat and an old Canadian canoe that had seen better days. After breakfast in that splendid weather I would take the boat, a book, tobacco, matches and provisions and push off for a long day in search of something better than rubies— the reed-grown banks by Reading, the dragon-fly haunted backwaters close to Sonning or the bottled beer of Caversham.

Then one morning in the middle of this pleasant life came a bombshell, business that called me to London and would take me a week to settle, and J had asked some friends of mine— and Blades’— Hallam the architect and his wife, to stay a few days and they were due that afternoon. At first I thought of wiring to put them off, then I determined to let them come. The servant woman could look after them in my absence and as they were a fairly newly married couple they could get along without my company.

They came, agreeing to stay till my return and off I went to London.

iii

I RETURNED on July 4th which was a Monday and the Hallams met me with the boat at Reading; it was pleasant to exchange the heat of the railway train for the coolness of the river and as we slipped downstream to Sonning I could not help pitying them having to return to town on the morrow. Hallam said it was absolutely necessary for him to get back. He said he had business of vital importance, but somehow— something about him, something in his manner, expression and voice, told me a different tale.

We reached Sonning at four o’clock and, having stopped at the White Hart for tea, crossed the stream and put into the bungalow boathouse. The Canadian canoe was there and as I was collecting the boat cushions to take them to the locker by the kitchen, glancing at the canoe I saw there was a paddle in it.

Hallam had remained behind with me to collect the things and he told me he had taken the canoe out one day.

“Couldn’t find a paddle,” said he, “so I took that one from the house.”

“Well,” I said, “pick it up and come along. It won’t do to leave it lying there, for it’s one of old Blades’ trophies. I'll carry the cushions.”

“I'd rather not,” said he. “I’ve had an experience with that thing I don’t want repeated. Do you mind, like a good fellow, leaving it where it is?— for to tell you the truth I don’t want to sleep in the same house with it. It sounds like tomfoolery but Ill tell you all about it later on. Meanwhile, like a good fellow, don’t mention the subject to my wife.”

It was the surprise of my life, for of all my friends and acquaintances Hallam was the hardest-headed and the least likely to be an entertainer of fancies. But he was deadly in earnest and I said no more, compromising by shoving the thing up among the rafters where no thief would be likely to find it.

After dinner we sat out on the lawn and smoked, then when his wife had gone off to bed leaving us to our pipes Hallam turned to me.

“I'm going to tell you about that thing now,” he said, “and I don’t want you to laugh at me over it. I’ve never believed in spooks or ghosts but I’ve come to believe in influences— I can’t give it a better term.

“You know Hartley, the wool broker, don’t you? Well, he told me once that some one made him a present of a little Eastern figure, some sort of joss out of a temple and that it brought him bad luck. I laughed at him thinking him a fool; maybe he wasn’t —I don’t know, but during the last few days it has come to me that things may influence us more than we imagine and that evil spirits aren’t all bottled under Solomon’s seal.

“One morning— two days after you left— Kitty and I went down to the boathouse to get the boat out. As I was getting the oars that old birch-bark canoe struck her fancy and she proposed taking it instead of the boat— she had a Canadian canoe of her own when she was a girl and she said she could manage it all right. But there were no paddles. Then she remembered that Eastern paddle by the stand of arms and she said she could manage with it and ran back to the house for it and off we started, Kitty in the stern.

“We got along pretty well, Kitty doing all the work and piloting us at last into that backwater by the big clump of chestnut trees— you know the place I mean— and there we tied up to the bank, Kitty sticking to the canoe with a book while I landed to attack the morning papers and a bottle of beer.

“I put the beer to cool wrapped round with some wet dock leaves and I was in the middle of an article on foreign politics when suddenly a dreadful-looking specter materialized himself out of the gloom of the trees.”

“A spook?”

“Oh, Lord no,” said Hallam. “A post-war professor of proletarianism who’d been sleeping all night in a ditch to judge by the look of him, a big man, twice my size with a big blue under jaw, a dirty flannel shirt and no collar or tie. He called me ‘mate’ and asked for the time, which I gave him, a light which I gave him, and then for some tobacco to light. I gave him the tobacco and he sat down close to me and to windward. I went on reading my paper and trying to think of the spice islands but it was no use. He would talk. He asked for money and I told him I had none about me, which was the truth. ‘But you’ve got beer,’ said he.

“Yes, said I, "I have."

“He put out his hand and grabbed the bottle. I tried to seize it too and failed. Then we were on our feet and next moment I was sitting on the ground half stunned by the smack on the face he’d given me. It got me over the right ear and side of the jaw. It was a nasty swipe but after the first second or two I didn’t feel it. The sight of Kitty who had landed with that infernal paddle in her hand shattered every other earthly consideration. You know what a soft little thing Kitty is—"

I did, a little fluffy-haired dreamy woman with the voice of a dove. “Yes,” I said, “go on.”

“Well, this wasn’t Kitty, it wasn’t a woman, it was ferocity itself. My wife had changed as if at the touch of some horrible magic. You remember the fisherman who let the jinni out of the bottle? Well, that’s how I felt, for the woman I loved had vanished and a specter had taken her place The ruffian did not see her. He had unscrewed the stopper and was drinking from the bottle with his head thrown back when, crying out some words in an unknown tongue, she felled him with a blow of the paddle given with the strength of two men. She had raised the paddle to beat his brains out when I seized her.”

I could see Hallam rub his coat sleeve across his forehead to wipe the sweat away, then he went on.

“She struggled and fought with me like a - wild cat till I got the confounded thing from her hand. Then instantly she came to, stood for a moment as if dazed and became herself again.

“The P. P. was lying where she had felled him but he was beginning to open his eyes so I just bundled her into the canoe and paddled her home.”

“Did you hear any more of the proletarian man?”

“Not a word. He wasn’t a chap to make trouble with the police. But the strange thing is that Kitty did not seem to realize her act or the gravity of it; the demon that cursed thing had inspired her with seemed to have numbed her mind to the fact that she would have killed him had I not intervened—she who would not hurt a fly.”

“Well,” I said, “forget it. There are more things in heaven and earth than we can account for and it’s quite possible that a sensitive nature like that of your wife might, under certain circumstances, fall for a moment into the grip of an influence. I’m glad we have left the beastly thing in the boathouse. I don’t know what on earth men want importing these Eastern atrocities for. They aren’t pleasant to look at and they aren’t safe to touch in more ways than one. You remember the case of that man who brought back the poisoned arrows, an unfortunate housemaid scratched herself with one and died—anyhow I shouldn’t worry my head any more about this thing. Come on into the house and have some whisky.”

The Hallams left next morning and I took up my lonely life again and my work which I had disgracefully neglected. Then one day, when I was out in the boat, passing the White Hart, I saw Santley on the lawn in a basket chair with a drink at his elbow and landed to have a talk.

Santley is a stockbroker, an almost perfect specimen of the old prewar stock-broker from the days when the Kaffir circus was in full swing and income-tax ninepence in the pound; stout, well-groomed, well-dressed, with a flower in his buttonhole. He laid down the Financial Times, over which he had been glancing and we shook hands, then I drew another basket chair close up and we talked of the weather, the river and the doings of Lloyd George.

Funny thing memory is. We had been talking a long time before I recalled the fact that Santley had turned spiritualist. It had been the talk of the club and was an amazing fact—if anything can be amazing these post-war days—considering his appearance and general make-up. Then the paddle rose up in my mind.

“Look here,” I said, leaning forward in my chair, “excuse the question but you have gone in for the medium business, haven’t you?”

“Oh, Lord, no,” said Santley, “I have no psychic powers at all but I am very much interested in the medium business as you call it. I’m a believer, have to be from all I’ve seen of it. But why do you ask?”

I told him the story of the Hallams and he listened without very much apparent interest.

“That’s quite a common experience,” he said when I had finished. “You would be surprised and perhaps shocked to know the cases that are occurring every day of people who fall under influences such as you describe. You go to an auction and buy an antique; if it is not spurious and if it comes down from the bloodstained Middle Ages or the haunted East ten to one it has still clinging to it the spirit of the maker or user, or even, if it is a lethal instrument, the spirit of the victim on whom it has been used.

“I have had many instances come under my notice. Only a few months ago, for instance, I had the case of an old lady who went to a big sale at a house in South Audley Street and bought a snuffbox— an old French snuffbox set with diamonds and enameled with a scene representing shepherdesses and lambs. She took it home and placed it on a table in a boudoir situated off her bedroom; all that night she heard the voices of two men talking and quarreling in the boudoir though she knew for an absolute fact that no one was there and next morning the snuffbox had been moved from the table to a high shelf and two chairs drawn up to either side of a small table by the window just as though two men had been playing at cards. The same thing went on night after night till at last she couldn’t stand it any longer and gave the thing away to a cousin. I was so interested I called on the cousin to ask had there been any developments and found there had not, for there seems to be a curious law that one person may keep a thing like that with perfect impunity and another person may not. It has, of course, to do with the mediumistic qualities of the possessor.”

“Little Mrs. Hallam would have possessed mediumistic qualities then?”

“I think— in fact I’m certain, that she must be highly mediumistic,” replied Santley. “The whole thing is interesting and perhaps the most interesting part of it is the fact that you have found me here to-day.”

“How’s that?” I asked.

“Because I have brought Maythorne, the medium, down here for a few days’ rest and change of air. He’s been nearly killing himself with overwork. Do you call it a coincidence that I chose this of all other places? It is not. We were led here, as surely as I am talking to you, led here for the purpose of psychometrizing that paddle. Testing it, making whatever uneasy spirit that is attached to it talk.”

“Can he do that?” I asked vastly interested.

“Of course he can do it,” replied Santley, “and what’s more he can exorcise if necessary. You will see something worth seeing. Wait here a moment and Ill fetch him out and introduce you to him, if he’s up— he lies in bed pretty late.”

He went into the hotel and in a minute or two returned with Maythorne, a tall, washed-out-looking man with a cigarette and cigarette-stained fingers, a kindly, lovable sort of creature with wandering, dreamy, faraway-looking eyes. We told him the business on hand and he agreed to come over to the bungalow that evening and see if there was anything in it. Then I went off to where I had left the boat and started back for the bungalow. Here I was met by another coincidence in-the form of Blades.

iv

BLADES had run down from London to get some papers from a locked bureau he had left under my care and he said he must get back to town by the five-thirty train.

“Oh, no, you mustn’t,” said I. “You’ve got to stay here the night. This puts a complete cap on the business— this is no coincidence, you’ve been sent.”

He thought I was crazy till I made him sit down while I told him the whole business from start to finish.

Then he said: “I suppose you told Hallam all that yarn about Klang and the history of those Papuan things?”

“Yes,” I said, “I just mentioned it.”

“That would naturally have invested the paddle in Hallam’s eyes with a suggestion of ferocity,” said he.

“I know what you mean,” I replied, “but you are wrong. If there is truth in anything this woman was suddenly possessed by the devil— you know what a level-headed man he is.”

“Yes,” said Blades, “I know him and I know her— it’s curious. Well, we will see what this medium man has to say.”

We had dinner at seven o’clock and at eight Santley and Maythorne arrived, the paddle was fetched from the boathouse and Maythorne seated in the sitting room and in a basket chair took the thing in his hands, held it resting on his knees and fell into what seemed a musing fit.

We sat round watching him in a silence broken only by the far-away dying notes of a banjo from some drifting river craft.

Then he spoke. “There is nothing. Whatever influence may have been attached to it has departed. It is clean.”

“Good Lord,” said Santley, “can it have left it and attached itself to the woman?”

“I do not know,” said Maythorne. “It is possible but I cannot tell unless I could touch the woman or some article belonging to her.”

“Would a hairpin do?” I asked. “She dropped a hairpin and I put it up there on the mantelpiece behind that jar.”

Maythorne nodded and fetching the hairpin which I had carefully preserved for the purpose of pipe cleaning he took it in his hand, sat for a minute or so with closed eyes and then began to speak as if to himself.

“Yes— I see a woman, small, fragile, red-haired and with her and possessing her I see a spirit. The spirit is now asleep. It comes from old and terrible times. It is now asleep but ever ready to wake and break forth against what it considers insult, wrong or injustice. It is the spirit of a tribe— let me think back— oh, I see the spirit seizing her now and filling her with the fire of re venge. She holds a paddle in her hands and she is attacking a man. She has felled him, she would destroy him, but another man seizes her. He is her husband— I can see no more.”

v

WHEN Maythorne and Santley had departed Blades poured himself out a whisky and soda.

“I believe in spiritualism now,” said he. “The medium man was absolutely right. I didn’t tell you before, but the paddle is not Papuan. It’s as innocent of spooks as that siphon. I carved it myself out of some old airplane-propeller wood. It was leaning against those Papuan things but it had nothing to do with them. As for the spirit that has made all this rumpus, don’t you know where it comes from? Think! What was Mrs. Hallam’s maiden name?”

“O’Connor, I believe.”

“Yes,” said Blades. "Kitty O’Connor, one of the O’Connors of Tipperary—and, if you want another exhibition of the spirit, go and hit little Hallam another smack on the face in the presence of his wife.”

Being an Irishman myself this solution of the problem had never occurred to me nor have I ever tried the experiment suggested by Blades. But to any member of the Society for Psychical Research who would care to do so I shall be happy to forward Hallam’s address.

_________________

17: Hell in Hidden Valley

King Saxon

John A. Saxon, 1886-1947

Spicy Western Stories  July 1937

They don't write 'em like this any more

JEFF CORBIN stood up in his stirrups and looked ahead, as his his steel grey gelding, stopped, flared out his nostrils, and sniffed wind. The arroyo down which they had been riding curved slightly to the left and, beyond the turn in the bare, stony gully walls, Jeff could see the dark green of trees,

"Yep, there's water there, pardner," he drawled, stroking the neck of the big horse. " 'Bout time, too. This shore is a dry range." Clipping the cayuse with his chap-covered legs he sent him forward.

When they got around the curve in the arroyo, he reined Smoke in again and looked around. Below him was as pretty a valley as he had ever seen. High hills circled it and the feathery plume of a waterfall plunged from the far side into a deep pool that became a smooth flowing stream farther along, twisting across the valley's floor. Big clumps of cotton-woods grew along the stream banks, and far off to the right Jeff could catch glimpse of the 'dobe walls of a ranch house.

Jeff shook his head slowly in approving wonder.

"Smoke," he said, "if this yere ain't a little bit of heaven, then there ain't no sich place!"

HE was about to spur his gelding down the steep side of the valley toward the ranch house when suddenly he froze like a brazen image. His keen blue eyes narrowed and he leaned forward, resting a sunburned hand on the pommel of his Mexican saddle. Something had moved in the clump of cottonwoods below him, a slight furtive movement that only a trained eye would have detected.

Slipping from the saddle in one fluent movement, Jeff took three steps forward, moving as silently as an Indian in his high horseman's boots; then he stopped and looked again. Now he could make out what it was that had moved it. It was a cowpuncher who lay half hidden in the cottonwood's shade, his eyes riveted on the deep pool that lay beneath him.

"Now what the tarnation...?" muttered Jeff. He drew closer and his eyes went past the lurking, prone figure to the pool, and he gasped.

There, swimming in the clear coolness of the water like some mythical sea beauty, was one of the prettiest girls that Jeff had ever seen .. . and she was naked as the day she was born! The semi-transparent water caressed long slim limbs and a shapely back making them seem too pink and lovely to be true. She swam easily, gracefully for a moment, then rolled over and floated on her back, her face to the sun. Jeff sucked in his breath with admiration.

Her white rounded breasts, reminding him of the Sierras at dawn, broke out of the water as she extended her arms at her sides to balance herself. There was a dry taste in Jeff's mouth that had nothing to do with the dust he had been breathing in all morning. But he remembered himself and averted his eyes and flushed.

After all, if a pretty girl chose to swim in Eve's bathing suit he had no right to.... Then an angry look came into his blue eyes. He had stopped looking as soon as he had realized he was intruding on a woman's privacy but that coyote of a Peeping Tom down there was staring his eyes out and licking his chops for more.

There! The sneaking varmint was on his knees now, edging forward to get a better look!

QUICKLY Jeff stepped back to his horse and lifted his coiled rawhide lariat from his saddle. He shook the loop once; then with a smooth underhand movement he sent it sailing through the air in a Spanish overhang cast. The hondo glittered in the sun for a moment as the loop spun out, before it dropped squarely over the shoulders of the crouching man below. He leaped to his feet with a startled yell and as he did so, Jeff yanked the noose tight, pinioning his arms to his side. Whistling to Smoke to stand steady, Jeff went down the rope toward the man hand over hand, to keep a strain on it.

He could hear sudden excited splashes from the pool as the girl, realizing that she was no longer alone, swam for the bank where her clothes were piled, but he did not look in her direction. His eyes were fixed on the rage contorted face of the big man who was struggling futilely to free his arms from the tight rawhide of the noose. His ten gallon hat had fallen from his head, exposing a low forehead topped by a tangled mass of red hair. His big shoulders were covered by a checked shirt, and a leather vest flapped as he strained his deep chest to release himself.

"You bowlegged rannie!" he yelled at Jeff. "Unhitch me or I'll break you in two!"

Jeff sat on a rack near him, keeping a strain-on the rope with one hand and— starting to roll a cigarette with the other.

"Jes' take it easy, pardner," he drawled. "Since you was takin' such a good look at the lady there, I figger she might want to take a squint at you."

"Why, you mangy, flea-bitten son..!" shouted the big man, then checked himself, looking past Jeff's shoulder. Jeff turned and saw that the girl stood beside him, her blue eyes blazing. She was wearing blue denim overalls tucked into high boots and, since she had thrown on her clothes without drying herself, her white blouse clung wetly to the round swell of her breasts like another skin.

"RED ROSSON!" she cried, her eyes fixed on the big man, "Peeping at me, eh?" She took an angry step forward, "By God, if dad were here..."

"My name's Jeff Corbin, ma'am," said Jeff. "And anything your dad would do to this side winder I'd be glad to do myself." He got to his feet and stepped forward.

"Listen, Joan," said Red Rosson, "I was jes' passin' by and..."

"Passin' by?" snorted Jeff. "You was hiding in the cottonwoods and starin' yer eyes out."

"Well, what of it?" spat Rosson. "I wanted to marry you legal, Joan. Asked ya five or six times but you allus said 'No.' So when I got a chance to see ya and find out what made you so stuck up, I took it." His big mouth curved in an ugly smile. "And I saw plenty! Try and play goody-goody with me again, ya little witch an'...."

The word was hardly out of his mouth when with his left hand Jeff flipped the noose off. Rosson's arms, freeing them. Then before the big man knew what was happening. Jeff stepped in and swung a terrific right hook into his mouth. The blow sent Rosson sprawling backward onto the grass. He lay there half stunned for a moment, before, with a scream of rage, he leaped to his feet, his hands diving down for the six guns that swung at his hips.

"Keep yore hands idle, Rosson," snapped Jeff, a .45 in each hand as he spoke. "Or since you're reaching for them, you might take them out and throw them this way."

A moment Rosson hesitated, glaring, speechless with fury, then he took out his guns and tossed them at Jeff's feet. Jeff picked them up, broke them, and flipped out the shells. He looked at Rosson steadily.

"The next time I see you, Rosson," he said slowly, "I got an idea I'm gonna have to plug you. And since I don't want no one to say you was slow on the draw because you was usin' strange guns, I'm givin' these back to you." He threw them to the big man. "Now vamos, pronto, and don't stop to try and re-load."

Rosson glowered back at him with blasting hate in his eyes. Then without a word he turned on his heel and started up the valley. Jeff watched him for a. moment and was just starting to holster his guns when he saw the big man jerk  his head slightly. Catlike, hardly knowing why he did it, Jeff leaped to one side. From somewhere up the valley a rifle cracked and a bullet whined past his shoulder plumb where his head had been a minute before. With lightning speed his thumbs hooked his six gun hammers and both guns roared at once, whipping lead back at the rifle flash. There was a yell of pain and a swarthy Mexican leaped to his feet from behind a clump of bushes where he had been hiding and started hot-footing it up the valley, clutching his wounded shoulder. Rosson was running also, close at his heels.

"Try to drygulch me, eh?" snarled Jeff and his guns came up again; then he looked at the wide eyed girl and a swift grin lit up his face. "Wal, I'll let em go till next time, like I said," he went on and slipped the guns back into their holsters. "I got an idea that corpses like theirs would poison.the grass around here 'stead of fertilizin' it, anyway."

The girl smiled back at him and put a hand on his arm.

"I'm glad you didn't shoot," she said softly. "And thanks for stopping Rosson from peeping at me. I won't say more than that now, but how about coming up to the ranch for some chow?"

"Ma'am," said Jeff, bowing gravely, "even if I wasn't wanting more of your company like I never wanted anything before, that'd be an invitation I couldn't refuse."

She laughed gaily, as he whistled to Smoke and they started for the ranch house.

THE sun was slanting down behind the hills when Jeff pushed the plate away from him, stretched out his long legs with a sigh and started to roll a cigarette.

"Miss Follette, ma'am," he said, "that was plumb perfect."

"You may call me Joan," "she said smiling, "My friends do. Is that all you want?"

Jeff's eyes studied her lovely, impish face, traveled on down the young swelling curve of her bosom to the blue denim trousers that moulded themselves to the roundness of her thighs and calves. His temples were starting to throb again with the memory of how he had had first seen her.

"I... couldn't eat another thing Joan," he said.

She was standing close to him now, so close that he could breath the fragrance of her body and feel its warmth.

"That's not what I asked you," she said softly. "You see, I hated Red Rosson from the very first minute I saw him. I always knew I'd fall in love the same way."

"Joan!" A moment Jeff stared at her in ecstatic unbelief. "Listen, I'm only a poor puncher who's been battin, around the country since I was old enough to straddle a hoss. I've seen plenty of girls in my time but never..." then somehow he knew that further words were unnecessary and he had pulled her down on to his lap and was burying his face in her soft hair. "You like me! God!"

He pressed his mouth to hers and felt her lips part under its pressure. Her arms were around his neck as she held herself against him, her breasts crushed on his chest with unbearable softness, for all their resiliency seeming to stab him to the heart. He kissed her again and again, the hollow of her neck, her shoulders, her mouth. His blood was roaring in his veins, his ears singing as — he heard her quickened breathing. Then, as her eyes rolled up and closed, he rose to his feet still holding her, cradling her possessively in his arms. ...

JOAN stirred sleepily in Jeff's arms and looked out the window at the low gleaming stars that winked above them.

"Big Tim should be home soon," she whispered. "Then we can tell him about us."

"Your father?" asked Jeff.

She nodded.

"When I first saw this here valley," Jeff went on, "I said it looked like a bit of heaven, but I shore never thought I'd find it complete with angels." He swept a long burning kiss down her bared shoulder and arm.

"Darling!" whispered Joan, but he could see that she frowned in the darkness. "It could turn out to be a hell instead of a heaven if dad doesn't get a good price for his cattle,"

"How's that, honey?" asked Jeff.

"Well, we've been having a hard time here lately," explained Joan. "Been losing cattle right and left. Rustlers, I guess. And we've been having difficulty with the cow hands too. Some just quit and won't say why, and some.... Well, last month we found fifty head of prime yearlings gone and two of our punchers shot dead where the cattle should have been grazing."

"Hmmmm," Jeff frowned reflectively.

"And that's not the worst of it," Joan went on, "Red Rosson's been after dad to sell the place to him for a long time. This is getting to be a dry range and he. needs the water for his cattle. He's the biggest rancher around here, you know. Well, dad wouldn't sell but finally we needed the money so badly he gave Rosson a mortgage on the place. The money's due tomorrow and that's why dad went to town to sell some cattle, even though the price is way down now. If he doesn't get the money to Rosson, he'll have to let him take over Hidden Valley."

"What time did your dad say he'd be back?" asked Jeff.

"Oh, along about eight."

"Eight!" exclaimed Jeff. "It's after eleven now!"

"Well, he had the boys with him to drive the stock," said Joan. "They probably got to drinkin' and were delayed."

Jeff was on his feet now and again his eyes were alert, wary.

"Mebbe so," he said. "But if you was my gal, I wouldn't leave you here alone longer'n I had to. I'd let my punchers find their way back by themselves."

Joan looked frightened.

"Where are you going?" she asked. "You don't think anything could have happened to dad?"

"I dunno," said Jeff. "But I'm shore gonna find out."

He strapped on his two .45's, then knelt and kissed her.

"So long, honey," he said. "I'll be back soon as I kin." Checking an impulse to crush her lovely body in his arms just once more, he was out of the house and whistling up his horse.

FAR away and slightly below him, Jeff could make out the blinking lights of the town. He estimated the distance with his eye.

"Bout four or five miles," he said to himself. "All right, Smoke, let's go." He prodded the big gelding on. The horse was just breaking into a lope when suddenly he reared and swung sideways. Jeff steadied him with a sure hand.

"Now what in thunder...?" Then, his eyes catching sight of the dark object on the ground at which the horse had shied, he was out of the saddle and kneeling. A man of about fifty lay there, blood on his face, yet even through the red smears there was something vaguely familiar about him.

"Good God!" gasped Jeff. "Big Tim! Joan's dad! It must be! He looks exactly like her!"

He started to bend his head to the man's chest to listen for a possible heart-beat but at that moment Follette opened his eyes and looked dazedly about him.

"What... what happened?" he asked weakly.

"You got your head creased," said Jeff, studying at the scalp wound. "Must have stunned you. An inch lower and you wouldn't never have a headache again like the one you probably got now."

"Wait. I remember!" said the wounded man. "The money!" He fumbled at his waist for a belt that wasn't there.

"Gone!" he groaned.

"You're Big Tim Follette, aren't you?" asked Jeff. The wounded man nodded despairingly, and he went on. "I come out lookin' for you. Did you get a look at who plugged you?"

Big Tim shook his head.

"No," -he said. "There were about eight of them, all wearing masks. They held me up, took my belt, and then one of them shot me."

Jeff swore savagely under his breath.

"I'll come back here tomorrow and see if I can pick up their trail," he said. "Meanwhile, I think I'd better get you back to your ranch. Where's your cayuse?"

Big Tim looked around him.

"Must have run off," he answered. "He weren't mine anyhow. Mine needed shoeing so I left him in town and borrowed Sheriff Ward's pinto."

"Wal, t'aint so far back to Hidden Valley," observed Jeff. "I guess Smoke can carry double for a spell." He helped Big Tim up behind him and started the horse along the arroyo toward the ranch.

THE stars were just paling toward dawn when Jeff saw the darker blackness of Hidden Valley appear in the notch of the gully's end as if in the buckhorn sight of a 30-30. carbine. Smoke was plodding forward, lead-footed, his head hanging down in utter exhauistion.

"Be there in a shake," said Jeff grimly." Then it'll soon be light enough for me to borrow one of your broncs and backtrail to where you was plugged. 'll pick up them bandits if I have to follow them to..." Suddenly he checked himself, staring down into Hidden Valley.

"Look!" he said and pointed to where the ranch was just becoming visible in the growing light. Big Tim leaned forward following the pointing finger.

A bunch of horses stood hobbled near the ranch and just leaving them, stealing toward the dark house were five men, three others remaining near the horses with rifles in the crooks of their arms.

Jeff slipped off Smoke's back and threw the reins to Big Tim.

"I'm goin' down there," "Pronto!"

In a moment Big Tim was at his side and they were running down the valley's slope toward the ranch.

"My head's still buzzin' a bit," gasped the older man, "but that don't bother me nearly so much as the awful itch I got in my trigger finger. Them there men are the ones that plugged me!"

They were in the belt of cottonwoods now and Jeff checked Big Tim's headlong pace. They started to work their way. through the cover cautiously. They could hear three heavy blows as one of the men rapped on the door with the barrel of his gun.

"Wake up there, Joan," shouted a voice, "and give us that murderin' rat, Jeff Corbin!"

"Red Rosson!" gasped Big Tim. "It was him that..."

"Shhh!" whispered Jeff. They could see a lamp light up inside the house.

"Who is it?" Joan's frightened voice came faintly to their ears.  "What do you want?"

"It's me, Red Rosson," answered the man at the door. "We want Jeff Corbin."

"He's not here," answered Joan. "What do you want him for?"

Jeff's fingers were digging into Big Tim's arm as in a flash of intuition he realized what Rosson's plan was.

"What for?" Rosson bellowed. "For murder and robbery, that's what for! He killed your own father and took his money away from him and we're gonna give him a little necktie party."

Jeff flinched as he heard Joan scream.

"Do you get it?" he whispered to Big Tim. "Rosson wants your ranch. It's been him who's been stealin' your cattle, scarin' and killin' your punchers to make things tough for you so's you'll go broke. You go into town to get money to pay off his mortgage. He holds you up, shoots you and leaves you for dead. He takes the money from you and then when Joan can't pay up, he takes the ranch besides. And then, to make it perfect, he tries to cover up his murder by blaming it on a stranger, me. He knows that if he can get me lynched for killing you, then no one's gonna investigate the matter further."

"And I thought I'd stomped out most of the rattlesnakes around these parts," growled Big Tim,

"Well, how about finishin' the job now?" asked Jeff as he started to rise to his feet.

"Wait!" said Big Tim. "They're eight to two. We'll take 'em, but let's inch in on them and pick our time." He nodded toward the three men who stood near the horses, their eyes searching the hill slope as if expecting someone to appear from the head of the arroyo, their rifles ready in their hands. "Them rannies would pick us off like rabbits if we came out a'shootin' now."

"I DON'T believe it!' Joan was saying over and over again. "I don't believe it!"

"No?" snarled Rosson. "Well, you'll believe it when you see him doin' a jig four feet from the ground! Come on, boys. Break in the door."

In a swift rush, the men dashed forward and hurled themselves at the door. There was a crash as it burst open and then they were inside. Jeff was trembling with rage, swearing steadily under his breath, yet with Big Tim's restraining hand on his arm, he held himself back until the time was ripe for him to cut loose with his six guns.

They could hear doors slamming as Rosson and his rannies searched the house, looking in closets, under beds, everywhere.

"Where is he?" As he spoke, they could see Rosson through the window and with one accord both Jeff's and Big Tim's guns came up and leveled on him. But before either could fire, he had swung Joan around in front of him so that she was between him and the window.

"Where is he?" repeated Rosson.

"I won't tell you!" answered Joan defiantly. "I know he didn't do it!"

"You won't talk, eh?" sneered Rosson. "Miguel!" he called and a swarthy Mexican with one arm in a sling stepped forward. Jeff recognized him at once as the man he had winged the morning before.

"Hold her!" commanded Rosson and with an evil grin the Mexican stepped forward and grabbed Joan's shoulder. Like a wild cat she turned on him, scratching and tearing until he staggered backwards.

"Help him, Lefty!" roared Rosson, and a burly cowpuncher leaped forward and helped Miguel hold her.

"I got a purty good squint at how you look without all those duds," said Ros son, a bestial look on his red face, "but... I think it's about time I had another at closer range. Are ya gonna - tell me where Corbin's hid?"

"No!" answered Joan. "You wouldn't dare... !"

JEFF was struggling like a madman in Big Tim's grasp, but Joan's father, his face white with strain, was holding him firmly to keep him from dashing down the slope to certain death at the rifles of the men who guarded the horses. "Wouldn't I, though?" said Rosson. One of his hamlike hands shot out and fastened in the neck of her kimono. He looked gloatingly into her face. She screamed, as he tore the garment from her, leaving her clad only in a sheer nightdress that showed the lovely curves of her young body through its clinging fabric.

Rosson licked his lips.

"Gonna talk?" he asked again, his voice thick with the barely repressed emotions that the sight of her almost nude body awoke in him.

"No!" said Joan again, her voice sharp with the anguish of shame. "No! No!"

"Good!" said Rosson and again his hand started to go out.

"LET me go!" Jeff demanded of Big Tim. "Let me go! By God, I'll get that son...!" Big Tim's voice was harsh with controlled murderous rage. "Good God, Jeff," he said, "don't forget she's my daughter! Do you think I...?" He gritted his. teeth, leaving the sentence unfinished. "But if you bust out of here, you'll just get plugged and then where will she be? Wait for a break!" he implored.

They both stared through the distant window again. Rosson's hand was fastened on the thin cloth of Joan's nightdress now, Swiftly she bent and sank her teeth into his big hand. With a wild yell, Rosson snatched it away, stilt clutching the neck of the nightgown. There was a ripping sound, the gown slithered from her shoulders, and Joan moaned, half her dainty beauty exposed to the avid eyes of the five men. Vainly she tried to cover her nakedness with her hands.

"You hell cat!" snarled Rosson shaking his bitten fingers. "By God, I'll get you for that!" Leaping forward, he seized her in his arms in a bear-like hug.

Jeff could stand no more. With a wild yell of hate he threw off Big Tim's powerful grasp as if it were the clasp of a child and started pelting down the slope toward the house. He heard the crack of a rifle as one of the men near the horses saw his figure break out of the cover. He heard the whine of the bullet as it whizzed close to his head but his eyes remained fixed on the window where Rosson still held Joan between himself and Jeff's line of fire, only now he was holding her deliberately there as a shield. The burly cowboy, Lefty, moved sideways, bending low at the sound of the rifle's crack and now Jeff's gun barked and the rannie threw up his hands and pitched forward on what had once been his face. Rosson was down on the floor, crouched below the window and one of the other men in the house had knocked out the lamp.

There was a pile of rocks to Jeff's right and with guns booming at him from the house and from where the three men stood by the hobbled horses, with lead whistling all around him, he leaped behind the rocks and squatted down. A moment later Big Tim joined him there.

IT WAS growing lighter by the minute -now. The first rays of the rising sun glinted on the gun barrel of one of the men near the fidgeting horses and Jeff snapped a shot at him. A yell of pain told him that he had found his mark. :

"We'll get 'em!" gritted Jeff. "Every one of 'em!"

"Sho', son!" drawled Big Tim. "Or they'll get us. Sort of like grabbin' a bear by the tail, ain't it? Yuh got him, but yuh dasn't let go. They got us covered from two angles here."

It was only then that Jeff realized the predicament they were in. They were huddled behind the pile of rocks exposed to fire from two sides. The sun would go up higher and higher and they would have no shade, no water, no food, while the men in the house could take their time and pick them off. Jeff snapped another shot at a movement inside the house and cursed.

"Rosson!" he yelled. "Kin ya hear me? I wanta talk to you."

"I'll talk to you with lead, you long legged son!" roared back Rosson.

"That's just what I want!" answered Jeff. "This here is our fracas. Will you call off your boys and shoot it out with me like a man or are you the murderin' yellow dog I think you are?"

"Yah!" jeered Rosson. "Come out and have you plug me? Not a chance!"

"Don't do it, Jeff," Joan called pleadingly. "Don't do it!"

Jeff gritted his teeth. :

"Yuh got my word the fight'll be on the square, Rosson," he said. "And I ain't found it necessary to lie yet. The man with the fastest draw wins."

"No!" screamed Joan again. "They're going to. ..." then her voice choked off as if a hand had been clapped over her mouth.

"All right, Corbin," said Rosson. "Come on down here in front of the house."

"First let your rannies throw their irons out and line up where I can see them," said Jeff. "I don't aim to let two men take shots at me at once."

He could hear a faint whispering going on inside the house, then at Rosson's command the three men beside the horses threw down their rifles and walked over to the clear spot in front of the ranch house where they dropped their six shooters. The men inside the house filed out, Rosson behind them, and put down their guns too. Jeff rose to his feet.

"Don't, Jeff," said Big Tim. "Rosson's quick as a strikin' sidewinder and besides I don't trust him as far as I can throw a maverick by the tail."

"Wal, I ain't no snail myself," drawled Jeff. "Nor too trustin' neither. I'll keep my eyes peeled." With Big Tim at his side he walked down the slope to the clearing in front of the ranch house.

Joan was standing in the doorway, her torn kimono wrapped around her.

Her eyes widened when she saw Big Tim.

"Father!" she gasped. "Then you weren't...? Oh, thank God!"

MIGUEL, standing beside her in the doorway, his arm in a sling, turned a dirty yellow when he saw what he thought was a dead man, but he said nothing. Rosson looked at Big Tim coolly.

"So I didn't get you after all, eh, Follette?" he said. "Well, there'll be time enough to try again... soon!"

He stood there with his legs widespread, his hands hanging loosely at his side. Even as he talked to Big Tim his bloodshot eyes were fixed not on him but on Jeff, glaring murderously at him with all the fires of hell burning in his cunning brain.

Jeff stared back at him, hate a raging flame in every fibre of his body, and so they stood for several minutes, neither moving, each watching the other withvibrant, electric tenseness. The sunlight was getting stronger, hotter. The silence heavier, quivering. A wounded man inside the house groaned.

"Well," barked Rosson finally, his voice off key with strain. "What the hell are you waiting for? Make your play, damn you!"

Jeff smiled grimly.

"I'm a stranger 'round these parts, Rosson," he drawled. "I thought I'd be polite and wait till..."

And then it came.

Even though his eyes were fixed on Rosson, Jeff saw Miguel, standing in the doorway, snap for his gun and a fraction of a second later Rosson followed suit. Jeff's own draw seemed slow, terribly, impossibly slow, yet to the onlookers it was a blur of speed. He was wondering vaguely if some paralysis had struck him or if his weapon could have got stuck in the leather of the holster when Miguel's shot blasted out and he felt the hot lead sear the side of his face. Then his gun was out and he felt its jarring kick travel up his arm, felt the recoil twice as his thumbs snapped the smooth acting hammer. His two shots seemed to make one with Rosson's and the air quaked with gun thunder, He braced himself for the impact of searching lead that did not come. He saw Rosson stiffen, an expression of childish dismay on his face, then Miguel out from the doorway, crouching way forward, his arms wound tightly around his stomach where Jeff's first slug had caught him only to fall on his face. :

A moment longer Rosson's big body swayed, then he too broke forward and fell on top of his henchman.

A low murmur came from the lips of the rest of Rosson's punchers.

"He got him! He got the boss!" Then, "Plug the son!" one yelled and dived for his .45 on the ground. A gun barked to Jeff's left and the puncher howled with pain, wringing his punctured hand.

"Rest easy, gents, and keep 'em idle," sisaid Big Tim, "I got you covered all the way." Then as the clopping of horses' hoofs sounded in the distance, drawing nearer, he smiled grimly. "And if I ain't mistaken, that must be the sheriff and some of his boys comin' to see why his hoss came back last night without me after you lunkheads missed out on pluggin' me for keeps."

He looked at Joan sobbing softly in Jeff's arms, her head resting on his shoulder and his smile softened. "And I'm a'thinkin' it's a good thing the sheriff is also the Justice of the Peace, 'cause it'll save two youngsters a trip to town if they're aimin' to get spliced."

"Which they sure are," answered Jeff, grinning over Joan's head.

______________

18: The Wedding Guest

Joseph A. Altsheler

1862-1919

Harper's Monthly, Oct 1903

Joseph Alexander Altsheler

TRESSILIAN surveyed with interest the dress, features, and general manner of the man who, in a measure, had thrust his friendship upon him, and he decided that while credit might be given to the apparel, which was of a holiday nature, it must be denied otherwise. The features were too heavy, inclining to brutality, and the mouth, in particular, was coarse and sensuous. But his doublet and breeches were of purple velvet slashed with gay satin, and his hose was silken. A brilliant jewel shone in the cocked hat lying upon the table beside him, and the sword that swung from his belt had a hilt of gold.

"One of fortune who goeth to a festival," was the thought of Tressilian.

"Wish me luck, sir," said the man. "You knew it not before, but I tell you now that it is to be a merry night for me."

He lifted his glass of wine, gazed lovingly for a moment or two at the dark red bubbles on its surface, then drank it at a draught.

It seemed to Tressilian that his chance companion's joviality had begun already, but an easy bearing, a courteous acceptance of any situation, a manner that told of a good mind and some experience of the world, were among Tressilian's gifts, and he used them now. He lifted his own glass of wine, holding it level with the other's, and when the man drank he sipped a little and put the glass back on the table.

The stranger struck the board with his fist, not by way of anger, but to put emphasis upon his words.

"Sir," he said, "a momentous event in my life is approaching: two hours from this moment I shall take to myself a bride."

"Ah!" said Tressilian; "then I make to you my congratulations. You spoke truly when you prophesied that it would be a fair evening for you."

But it seemed to Tressilian, although he was inclined to no narrow ways of thinking, that if ever he was so near his own wedding the hour would not find him in a coffee-house freely drinking wine, and with equal freedom enlarging to strangers upon that which should be dearest to him. He glanced about the room, which was heavy and Dutch in its nature, including the host, who sat silently in a great oaken, chair, smoking a pipe with a long curiously coiled stem tipped with a silver mouthpiece. Tressilian and the stranger were the only guests, although the dark was falling and a cold wind whipped a cold rain down the narrow street. But in the room the fire burned brightly and a generous warmth came from the heart of the red coals.

"It is a good night for one's bridal," said Tressilian, wishing to be agreeable. "The cold and the darkness and the rain without will only color more deeply the joyous tints of love and beauty within."

"You speak, sir, with sense and discrimination," said the stranger. "When I first put eyes upon you I knew— I have the same qualities myself— that you were a man of parts, of a natural wisdom, reenforced by a knowledge of the world."

"Then we are indeed well met," said Tressilian, gravely.

"My name," said the stranger, increasing his volubility with more wine, "is Philip Augustus Vanderheyden, and it is not unknown in this town."

His tone had a definite touch of pomposity, and Tressilian saw that he was expected to show himself impressed. But he said quietly:

"And mine is Arthur Tressilian. I am, and I take it you are too, a native of this town, but I have been away a long time in various and odd parts of the world, and upon my return I find changes; even the name is different: it was New Amsterdam then, it is New York now."

"Sir," said Vanderheyden, "the change of flag troubles us little."

"I inferred as much; I myself felt no alteration in the air I breathed until I was duly informed of it. Our host, who sits so much at ease in the corner, and who does not remember me, but whom I remember, has not changed by a hair. The last time I saw him, now some ten years ago, when I was a boy, he sat in the same chair and smoked the same pipe. As a lad, sir, I coveted a silver mouthpiece."

"Then, my dear Tressilian," said Vanderheyden, who was growing over-friendly as well as effusive, repeated libations inciting him to the highest spirits, "you have come home most opportunely; one who has been so long absent wishes a warm welcome, and I take it that it would be a friendly act upon my part to invite you to my wedding to-night. And you, sir, would requite me in proper fashion by coming and smiling upon my bride and myself. It will call for no sacrifice on your part. The lady, I assure you, is of great beauty and of a dignity corresponding. If you have any ailment of the eyes, whether trifling or severe, it is sure to find a cure."

"I thank you, sir," said Tressilian, departing in no measure from his grave manner. Nevertheless he felt embarrassment. He did not wish the comradeship to extend beyond the coffee-house; even there it had not been of his seeking,— merely beyond his avoidance, without a quarrel. Vanderheyden was not of the kind that he would seek for friend. It was quite plain that he lacked all the finer and more delicate essences of human nature, being full fed and gross of mind and body. Tressilian felt pity for the lady, whatever she might be, condemned to mate with one who described her so freely to a stranger but two hours before the marriage altar. "I shall tear myself from him," he resolved, "or the lady will have to give him physical support before the clergyman. I will not be even remotely the cause of such a shameless procedure."

He rose as if to take his departure, but Vanderheyden again smote the table violently with his fist, and now it was in anger and not by way of emphasis.

"Sir," he said, "I take it ill of you that you have not responded to my most courteous invitation."

Tressilian was in no mood to quarrel, in particular with one about to take to himself a bride; he would not spoil so festive an occasion with unseemly words or anything in the fashion of a blow, and he sat down again.

"That is done like a gentleman," said Vanderheyden, who was growing lighter of head. "I wish you to go with me, and insist that you do so. Then I shall compel you to acknowledge that I am a gallant of true taste. The lady, sir, hath eyes of divine blue, a most noble arm, and a fine ankle. The recital of her charms would be like the catalogue of Homer's ships."

Tressilian, as he gazed at the coarse and complacent bridegroom, felt a singular repulsion, and his feeling of pity for the unknown bride deepened. Truly she must have many charms and the patience of an angel if she would balance the faults of him who was about to become her lord. Even as he looked, Vanderheyden drank again, and so deeply that his eyes became dim, and he laughed like a foolish child.

"My dear Tressilian," he said, in voluble confidence, "I shall be a good husband; none better, I assure you; but I mean to assert myself. I will be master in my own house."

"To that I fancy a lady so fair and gentle as you describe would make no protest."

"There was some little objection on her part to the match, a trifling need of moral compulsion from her relatives. But, my good sir, can you see the shadow of an excuse why any girl should object to me as a spouse? It is true that I have been a bit of a rake in my time, but what man of the world is not? With a lady of sense I should think it a recommendation rather than a hindrance."

As he spoke his heavy jaw lowered, his narrow, dull eyes contracted yet further and shed a cruel light, his entire aspect becoming brutal and repellent to the last degree. It suddenly occurred to Tressilian that he should rather see a sister of his, if he had one, be taken by death than become the wife of such a man. But he avoided an answer to Vanderheyden's question.

"I trust, sir," he said, "that you will not think I am intrusive if I inquire the name of the lady who is so soon to become your wife."

"Clotilde Van Zeyl."

Tressilian pondered a moment, and then came a flash of pleasant memory. Clotilde Van Zeyl! He remembered a slim, long-legged girl of nine or ten, whom he had carried on his shoulders through the deep snow. She seemed to have in her the promise of a fine woman, and doubtless she was one now; even then she had a wit, and a charm, too, quite her own. It was an evil thing that little Clotilde, with her grace, her beauty, and her mind, should be sold to the heavy, coarse man who sat on the other side of the table.

"I take it that you will come?" said Vanderheyden.

"I fear, sir, that I cannot be a guest at your wedding. I am not properly clothed. These garments of mine would be much out of place upon so joyous an occasion."

Vanderheyden laughed foolishly.

"Behold my cloak, sir," he said, lifting a most gorgeous piece of apparel from the back of his chair. "It may be that you can wear this; a few shakes of the dice will determine it."

"Sir, I would not deprive you of your wedding-cloak; it has been said of me that I am lucky in games of chance, and I do not deny it."

"Should I lose, I can with ease obtain another. It seems to me, man, that you are reluctant to accept a fair invitation, reaching hither and thither in obscure corners for the shadow of an excuse. Should it go further, which I am loath to believe will happen, I shall consider it an affront to myself, and, above all, to the lady who is about to become Madame Vanderheyden."

Tressilian flushed slightly. Much drifting about a variable world had taught him how to bear and forbear, but his natural ease of temper was ruffled. Upon occasion he could be as stiff and unyielding as the best of them, and he did not like to be driven into an affair for which he had no taste and which did not concern him, and yet there was a flickering desire to see little Clotilde again. In her scarlet dress and with her eager face she had been as bright as a flame, and he smiled again at the memory.

"You smile, sir," said Vanderheyden. "Am I to understand that you already regard my cloak as yours? He who boasts of his favor with fortune should be willing to put it to the proof."

Obviously his words were a taunt, and Tressilian took them as such. From a small leather pouch fastened under his belt he drew forth ten gold coins of goodly size and put them upon the table.

"If these do not fairly match the value of your cloak," he said, "I shall add to them."

"It is enough," replied Vanderheyden. "I see that you are a man of proper spirit."

His heavy eyes blazed up with a new flame, the love of gaming, and he rested both elbows upon the table, while he shook the dice with an uplifted and fat right hand.

They threw alternately until the decision was given, and as Tressilian had predicted, fortune was in his favor. Vanderheyden tossed the garment to him.

"It is yours," he said; "you have won it fairly."

But Tressilian felt repugnance.

"I cannot take your wedding-cloak," he said.

"Would you insult me, sir? I play fairly. When I win I expect to be paid, and when I lose I pay."

The red of Vanderheyden's face turned to purple, and he put his hand threateningly upon the hilt of his sword. Tressilian felt no fear of him, but in such a case, being averse to a quarrel, he saw there was nothing for it but to take the cloak.

"I see that it is mine," he said, and he put it across the back of his chair, where its purple and gold glowed richly in the firelight.

"I feel, sir, that I shall have a speedy revenge," said Vanderheyden, shaking the dice again. "My hat, which has a jewel in the feather, as you can see, against your cloak."

Again Tressilian felt embarrassment, but under the code he could not refuse to give Vanderheyden his chance to square himself with fortune. He looked about, seeking an excuse, however slight, to escape from this unpleasant pass, but they were yet alone in the coffee-house, save the landlord, who smoked placidly, and who watched with a satisfied eye the rings of smoke rise and break against the oaken ceiling. There was nothing upon which he could fairly hinge an interruption.

"Make your cast," he said.

Vanderheyden threw, and the score was bad.

"I begin ominously— for myself," he said.

But the fever of gaming was in his eyes and his manner. He hung over the dice, intent upon every throw, forgetful of all else, even of the marriage altar and the bride who awaited him, now scarcely an hour distant. Once Tressilian's hand by accident touched Vanderheyden's, and he felt a shudder of repulsion at the coarse, unpleasant contact. A thrill of pity, deeper and stronger than ever, for the little Clotilde, ran through him.

Vanderheyden lost the hat with the jewel in the feather, and, still insisting upon his revenge, sent his sword and his doublet after it. As he played and lost, a great ill-humor grew upon him, and he moistened it with brandy until he saw but dimly, and his hands when stretched for the dice often missed them.

"I refuse to play further, even at the risk of your anger," said Tressilian, when the doublet was passed to him. "It is not fitting, and you have, sir, an occasion to celebrate, upon which it is time that you should start."

"What is it?" said Vanderheyden. "I do not seem to remember."

He rubbed his brow with his thick hand and closed his eyes, as if he would draw back the memory that had slipped from him. The effort was vain, the eyes remained shut, and presently Tressilian was startled by his heavy breathing. Vanderheyden, overpowered, had fallen asleep. Tressilian quickly recovered the coolness and ease which lay at the base of his nature.

"I do not think it likely that I shall fall asleep on the eve of my wedding—if I ever have one," was his silent thought. "Now, what a pretty spectacle we have here!"

He rose and surveyed the man sprawled in his chair, his head resting upon the back of it, his mouth wide open and giving forth muffled sounds. Such a creature was not worthy of a wife. Poor little Clotilde!

Tressilian lay the gorgeous cloak across his arm and looked at it, admiring its richness of color and texture; then he put on the doublet and draped the cloak over his shoulders, and, having a fine figure, turned to the Dutch mirror to see how they became him. The effect was admirable, as he and Vanderheyden were of a height, and the fit was perfect.

"I won them in fair contest," he said, nodding to the host, who never took his pipe from his mouth, but nodded back, so much as to say that he understood.

Tressilian had a certain love of color which belongs to an easy and joyous spirit, and having found the doublet and cloak to sit so well, he was fain to try the hat and the sword, too, and again the effect was harmonious and pleasing to a degree. In the mirror he showed both the figure and spirit of a gallant knight, and the contemplation of himself gave him pleasure. Then he bestowed one look of commiseration upon the recumbent and sleeping figure of the groom-elect.

"At least I am not the cause of this," was Tressilian's thought; "it was forced upon me."

His look lingered upon Vanderheyden, as if he had summoned all his faculties for deep thought. Then he raised one hand and made a gesture to the inert figure, as if bidding it a peaceful good night, after the graceful doing of which he walked to the door, opened it, and stepped into the outer air.

The cold rain had turned to a fine snow, whipped about and driven hither and thither by a wind that bit through Tressilian's new cloak and made him shiver.

A heavy Dutch carriage, half veiled in the drifting snow, was standing before the step, and the driver, leaning forward, said, respectfully, through the white mist,

"If we tarry longer, sir, we shall be late."

Tressilian, without a word, stepped into the carriage, and it drove swiftly away, bearing him northward. But he opened the window now and then and glanced out, keeping a good watch upon his course, as long absence had not dimmed his familiarity with the city and its salient points. Nor did he feel apprehension. The question troubling his mind at that moment was whether he partook in any degree of the character of Vanderheyden when he put on his garments and sword; had he been convinced that it was so, he would have opened the carriage door at once and cast raiment and weapon alike into the street.

The night was yet stormy; the houses, so solid in the day, looked ghostly in the dusk and the driven snow. A night-watchman lifted his lantern as they passed and nodded to the driver. Once they heard the beat of waves, and Tressilian caught a glimpse of the long narrow sea that girts the eastern side of the city like the arm of a lover. When he opened the door of the carriage the snow swept in, and closing it again, he shivered slightly,—the act being purely physical, and in no sense of the nerves. Tressilian was of an easy temperament, never taking his position ill, and nature had given him great mental curiosity; he was always eager to know what would follow logically. So he drew his new plumage more closely to shut out the cold, and calmly awaited the effect of arrangement, as qualified by happy or unhappy chance.

The carriage stopped, and the driver, descending from his seat, announced with respect that they were at the church. Tressilian stepped out, and was forced to bend his head to keep the snow from driving into his eyes. Shading them with his hand, he saw a dark church with an open door, and a lantern shining dimly in the vestibule. Near him a half-dozen people were gathered, and a linkboy held aloft a torch, which sputtered badly, and gave forth so faint a light that Tressilian could see the face of no one.

"The bride awaits you, Mynheer Vanderheyden," said a voice in his ear. "She is already at the church, and there is comment on your tardiness."

"But I am here— an accident— unavoidable," replied Tressilian in tones half lost in the shriek of the wind about the walls of the church.

The spirit of the knight errant was in Tressilian, and at that moment he was animated by chivalry, pride, and the underlying sense of mental curiosity that always led him on. He held himself proudly erect, and, with a gesture of inimitable grace, touching the hilt of his sword as if half in salute, walked boldly into the church, the little group forming a line on either side of the door.

The vestibule was dim, and not more than a dozen people were gathered there. Tressilian could see only their figures, not their faces, but a heavy man said in his ear,

"The lady is within; she awaits the bridal kiss."

He opened a door, and Tressilian, alone, stepped into a small inner room, closing the door behind him with his own hand.

The room, like the vestibule, was dim, but not too dim to hide from Tressilian the slender, drooping figure of a girl, in bridal white, who stood at a window, looking out at the falling snow and the gloom of the night. She started, turning when the door creaked, and into her eyes came such a look of horror and repulsion as Tressilian hoped never again to see on the face of any one. He had not thought until then what must be the feelings of a woman when, on her bridal night, the man whom she does not love comes to her.

And yet Vanderheyden had told but a part of the truth when he boasted of her beauty and her radiance. The little Clotilde was tall and slender, but with the ample graces of womanhood. Hair black as night encircled a face as fair as sunlight and all the whiter by the contrast, save where the delicate red bloomed in either cheek. Tressilian looked into eyes of a dark blue, a divine tint that he loved well, though they were now shadowed by unshed tears of pain.

Every fibre in Tressilian was stirred. He had a deep and tender feeling for woman, believing that the Supreme Being had been less kind to her than to man; hence, without irreverence, it was the duty of his sex to atone as far as might be for the difference. But here the case was of a nature most extreme, appealing to every noble impulse in him.

He saw the horror and repulsion growing in her eyes as he approached her, himself in the shadow, she in the light from the window. She shrank back against the hard sill and put up both hands, as if she would protect herself.

"I did not know it would be so hard," she breathed, and he saw her figure moving in a nervous shudder.

Tressilian stopped quite still, his heart melted with pity; in her dread her beauty was heightened, and a desire to protect her, to shield her from any one whom she feared, overpowered him.

He moved a step nearer, and again she threw up her hands, cowering against the window-sill.

"Oh, don't!" she cried. "Don't touch me now!"

She looked away from him and at the night, with its sombre shadows and driving snow, and then, as if held by a cruel fascination, her eyes came back to him.

"Clotilde!" said Tressilian, softly.

She moved at his tone, and gazed at him with startled eyes.

"Clotilde!" repeated Tressilian, in a voice full of protection and tenderness, as he took off his hat and opened his cloak.

"Ah!" she cried, and fell back against the window.

"It is not Vanderheyden who comes," said Tressilian, "and he will not come. I am here in his place at this juncture; it does not matter how. The groom is absent from the wedding, but the guest is here; there is no need that anything should tarry."

She did not speak, her startled gaze still upon him.

And yet Tressilian thought that he saw in her eyes relief, the joy that comes of a momentary escape from danger, brief though the moment be.

"I repeat it— there is no need that anything should tarry. I come in the bridegroom's place. Do I fill it badly? At least I can love as well as he. My heart is as warm— maybe warmer. I shall leave those things to the intimate testimony of my wife, a testimony not to go beyond us two, and I shall know how to defend her."

With the lofty gesture that became him so well he touched the gold-hilted sword by his side, and stood before her a gallant knight, young, strong, and with tender eyes.

"Clotilde,— ah, you remember now,— the bridegroom whom you awaited does not come to-night, but unless that which I wish happens, he will come to-morrow night, and there will be no escape. Clotilde, I have been in various lands and on the great seas, but there has been in my heart, as there is in the heart of every young man unwed, a picture of the bride whom I wished some day to be mine, and in this picture she was tall and slender. Her hair was gloriously black, but her face was gloriously fair, and her eyes, by way of contrast to her hair, were of blue, a dark, a tender shade that I have seen but once. It was in my heart, Clotilde, even then, that if ever I met this woman I should know her at one glance, and she would know me. Few words would pass between us two, only a gaze that should carry with it our love. Clotilde, am I right?"

A low and swelling sound, the note of solemn music, came from the church without.

"Clotilde, they await us; if we do not go, another will be in my place here to-morrow night. Ah, Clotilde, I spoke no idle words when I said that I would love my wife, that I would shield her and cherish her as bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh."

There was a gentle knock at the door.

"The clerk with the papers which they said he was to sign," exclaimed Clotilde, in terror.

Tressilian opened the door, took the papers and pen from the hand of a little man who stood there in the dim light, and signing them, thrust them into his own pocket, after which he shut the door in the clerk's face.

"Clotilde," he said, in fervent tones, "our affair begins well. I have complied with the forms of the law, and the law makes no objection. Listen! they still await us."

Louder swelled the volume of the music, solemn, majestic, and insistent.

"It is calling us, Clotilde."

Outside the darkness had thickened and the window-panes rattled under the driven snow. She shivered, and with a movement that went to the heart of Tressilian came a step nearer to him, as if here stood her champion. In her eyes shone a glorious radiance like sunlight flooding through the storm.

He put his arm around her waist, and kissed her on lips which she did not turn away. The swell of the music, solemn, haunting, and still insistent, filled all the church, even the room in which these two stood, their pulses beating.

"Come, Clotilde, they shall wait no longer."

He drew her arm within his own, threw open the door, and walked down the dim aisle toward the altar. Some in the shadowed seats said that the groom bore himself with a strange, new dignity.

They knelt at the altar, and Tressilian felt the hand upon his arm tremble a little and then grow firm.

"Fear not, dearest one," he whispered; "it was decreed long ago that it should be."

The clergyman, little and old, scarcely of this world, repeated the marriage service in muffled words, and when he came to the name of the groom he paused, as if he could not remember, as he had paused more than once before.

"Arthur Tressilian," said Tressilian, in low tones, and "Arthur Tressilian" the little old man said after him in tones equally low.

They rose, the two now one, and up the aisle they walked, while the music became loud and triumphant.

In the vestibule the people were gathered and the lights blazed up. There Tressilian paused, and, his bride on his arm, stepped into the heart of the glow. He heard the astonished "Ah!" from all, and then with that old indescribable gesture, a movement that was now full of defiance, he said aloud, for all to hear:

"Friends, I bid you Godspeed; I am about to take my wife home, and we wish no company to-night."

________________________

19: The Planter at Castle Reef

Captain Frederick Moore

1881-1947

The Popular Magazine, 5 May 1928

Frederick Ferdinand Moore

1. A Stolen Gun.

THE queer, black, hunched figure in the vague starlight of the palm grove moved slowly from tree to tree, advancing toward the yard of the plantation house. It was not until it passed through a bare space that the figure was revealed for a second as a man.

He stopped to listen, pressed against the gigantic bole of a coconut-palm tree, leaning forward and peering into darkness ahead, mottled with the pale brilliance of the trickle of starlight through the mop heads of the palms.

To the left, the sea was visible as a dark plain with a clear-cut horizon against the light-speckled sky. To the northward there was a long streak of luminosity which was the phosphorescent surf on the coral reef. The dull boom of the breakers came down the shore of the island in a soothing undertone.

The man strained his eyes into the great pits of velvety blackness where the edge of the jungle, which rose on the hills, marked the end of the sand flats extending to the beach. Here and there a palm tree that had been whitewashed against insect pests, stood out of the gloom with greater clearness than the untreated trees. These white trees gave the man his bearings to the plantation house. He had fixed their positions in his mind by daylight, preparing for his journey under cover of darkness.

Satisfied that there were no lurkers along his path, the man moved forward. The blade of a knife in his hand caught the glint of starlight as he dodged out of one shadow into another. He made rapid progress until he had reached a point which he knew to be within a hundred yards of the veranda of the big plantation house.

He dropped to his hands and knees and crawled past the house. Then he moved at right angles and approached the building from a side veranda. He waited a few minutes when he had reached the vines which grew over the railing. dog barked somewhere in the hills.

Suddenly a light flamed behind the house. The man lay still, waiting to see what the brightness that spilled out upon the grass could mean. It came from the screened opening in the side of the bamboo cookhouse. He saw the vague figure of the old Chinese cook filling a long-stemmed iron pipe as he sat up in his cot. The dog had waked the old man, and he was having a smoke.

Without noise, the man near the veranda stood to his feet and, feeling for the stanchion of the railing, drew himself up slowly. He swung his legs inward in the heavy blackness of the wide veranda and lowered his feet until they were upon the matting. He tested his weight on the veranda flooring before each step, and gained the attap wall of the house.

He felt for the rough edge of the kajang, or awning of split bamboo which shuttered the big window. He found it. but a few feet from the spot where he had pressed against the wall, and thrust his hand gently under the overlapping fibers. He felt softly with the tips of his fingers until they encountered the edge of a web belt hanging down inside.

There was a slight sound inside the house, as if a sleeper had stirred. But the sound proved. to be the subdued grunt of a lizard under the house. Five times it coughed, and then there was a faint rattle as the lizard scampered over dried leaves.

The hand inside the house followed the belt downward until the fingers reached the soft surface of polished leather. It was a loose flap. The man drew it toward him, holding it out from the surface of the kajang, and pressed his other hand in carefully until he could feel cold metal. He extracted the revolver from the holster and let the belt sway back into position. He slipped the long-barreled weapon into the front of his unbuttoned shirt and thrust the muzzle down under his belt so the pressure of his body would keep it in place.

Slowly the man moved across the veranda. He stopped for a few minutes at the railing and drew the revolver out, dropped the cylinder into the palm of his left hand, and ran his thumb nail over the flanges of the cartridges. There were five of them, one chamber being empty for the hammer when the weapon was closed. He put the revolver under his belt and cautiously lowered himself to the ground.

The light was still burning dimly in the cookhouse. The man swung away for the beach, making a wide detour in front of the house, and, passing up through the palm grove again, found the bottom of a path which ran up a hill under cover of a heavy undergrowth.

It took half an hour for him to feel his way to the top of the hill, where he emerged into ferns and heavy grass. There was an inkling of morning light on the sea horizon. He was now on a level with the tops of the gigantic palm trees of the flats below. He stood for a minute and gazed out to seaward, then turned and pushed across the clearing toward the dark spot which was a small, square bungalow without any verandas. It stood up from the ground like an ungainly haystack, its low-hanging eaves of thatch clearly marked in the starlight.

Moving straight to the black pit which marked the open doorway of the bungalow, the man climbed' the crude steps, and walked into the single room of the building.

"Who's that?" called a voice, and then the creak of somebody sitting up swiftly on a rattan cot.

"Keep your shirt on," said the man with the revolver.

"Well, you give me a jolt when you come pounding in like that," complained the man in the bed. "What time is it, baron?"

"Near daylight. And say— you lay off that name around here. How do you know somebody ain't listenin' in on what's said around: this dump?"

"I forgot— I was only coming awake." There was the flash of a match from a mosquito-netted bed, and a thin-faced man lit a cigarette.

The man addressed as "baron" struck a match himself and lit the rag wick of a coconut-oil lamp. The heavy, wavering flame showed that kajangs on each of the four sides of the new bungalow were drawn inward and secured with pieces of undried rattan.

Turning his back to the door, he drew out the revolver he had stolen. He was a man with a dark and squarish face, his heavy jaws covered with the bluish tinge of a stubble of beard. His cotton trousers had been hacked off below the knees to make "shorts," and his feet were in slippers. -About his lower legs he had wrapped strips of an old khaki shirt to protect his: skin against the thorns of creeping vines. His heavy neck, revealed by the loose collar of his khaki shirt, had two white stripes under the left jaw— scars that had been left by the swift, clean slashes of a razor. His black hair was short, and his forehead was crinkled thoughtfully as he bent over the weapon in his hands and examined it with critical eyes.

The man in the cot thrust aside the netting and peered out at the other, something like a look of horror on his long, thin face.

"You damned fool!" he whispered. "You went and got it— and I told you it was the most dangerous thing to monkey with!"

"I guess I don't need you to tell me what to do," said the other, proceeding with his scrutiny of the weapon. He drew out the cartridges one by one and tested their weight in his hand.

"Hassler, I tell you Finlayson'll know, when that gun's found missing, that one of us must've got away with it."

"Aw, it'll maybe take a month before he misses it."

The tall man got out of the cot and moved toward Hassler. He who had been asleep was wearing blue-silk pajamas, and the elegance of the garments were strangely out of place in the crude surroundings of the new native-built bungalow. He was a higher type of man than his companion, who had the appearance of a beach comber. And the sharp contrast between the two accentuated the rough character of Hassler and had the effect of giving the other a more gentlemanly aspect than he might have had otherwise.

"We've got every reason to believe that Finlayson and his wife are beginning to be suspicious of us," went on the tall one, sucking slowly at his cigarette while he stared at the revolver turning over and over in the dark man's hands. "That's why he built this shack and put us up here. He's afraid of us—and that's bad, when you consider our game. And we've got to be here when Gurnley comes."

Hassler looked up with a belligerent scowl.

"Say, listen, Mr. Easton," he growled, with peculiar emphasis on the name; "you just mind your own business. Gurnley ain't here yet, and I got to depend on myself. We had to have a gun, and I've got it. Now shut your trap." He pulled up the sleeves of his shirt and exposed his hairy wrists. Then he stepped to his cot and put the weapon under the pillow of his cot, lit a cigarette and moved slowly to the door.

Easton went back to his cot and sat a while, smoking in silence. Now and then he looked up at the figure of Hassler filling the doorway, leaning against the frame.

Then, without warning, the sky flashed to crimson, and morning broke upon the island. The land breeze began to drift down from the hills and rattled the tops of the palms. Birds called in the jungle, and the clearing before the bungalow was filled with the shrilling of insects.

Hassler yawned noisily and turned away from the door.

"I guess I'm entitled to a little nap," he remarked. He took a new tin dipper from the wall and drank from a new water bucket in the corner. Then he rolled into his cot, turned his face to the wall, and was soon breathing deeply.

Easton dressed himself in white trousers, low shoes, and a soft shirt of brown silk. He rolled back the collar and, taking soap from a little shelf near his cot, began to lather his face. He shaved quietly, and when he had finished went to the door and looked out over the sea before he washed the soap from his face. He gave a low whistle.

"Say! There's a schooner in sight— and she looks as if she's going to pass us pretty close!"

Hassler leaped from bed and ran to the doorway. He looked in the direction Easton pointed. There was a vessel not three miles away, moving slowly on the port tack. Her canvas made a pretty picture as the sunlight glinted upon it in the salmon-tinted sea as she lifted daintily to meet the long, smooth, heaving swells.

"She ain't comin' in," said Hassler. "And if Gurnley was in her, she'd be headin' to make into the bay." He went back to his cot and threw himself down again.

Easton remained in the doorway watching the vessel. The sound of native voices came up from the flats below, but he could not see the beach there, nor the palm grove, for the bungalow was set too far back from the edge of the hill. But as he was about to leave the door, Easton's eyes caught something moving through the tops of the palms— something on the water in front of the beach just opposite the plantation house.

"Baron! Come here— quick!" Easton's long, thin body was bent forward stiffly and the bare arms hanging out of his rolled sleeves became rigid.

"Aw, what's up?" demanded Hassler crossly, as he turned to look toward the door.

"Finlayson's going out to meet the schooner— in his flying proa!"

Hassler was beside Easton in an instant. The native boat which held the attention of the two men had just cleared. the beach and the triangular brown sail was bulging in the land breeze, and driving swiftly to sea toward the distant schooner.

"Now, what's the game?" demanded Hassler. "What's he makin' that sneak jump out for?"

"That's his own business, and we couldn't've stopped him," said Easton. "But it's a cinch he jumped out before we could get to the beach."

"Say, ain't that his wife with him?" asked Hassler.

Easton squinted against the sun dazzle over the water.

"I'd say so," he agreed. "That white spot—amidships. Yes, that's Mrs. Finlayson. And sick as she's been, he takes her out at this time of the morning to whang around on the swells, which proves that they ain't going out just for a pleasure trip." He chewed at his finger nails, and then turned his soapy face toward Hassler,

"He's a slick bird, that planter," said Hassler soberly. 'Never did know just what he thinks about us— he's so damned polite and smooth."

"I know what he's on the way to that schooner for."

"What— if you're so smart?"

"He missed that revolver, first pop, this morning. And he's out to see the skipper and have us collared and shipped away from this island."

"Aw," scoffed Hassler, "that gun's the only thing that makes me feel safe."

"I tell you, you've got Finlayson scared. He couldn't be sure about us— until you swiped that gun."

"How do you know he ain't a friend of that skipper, and has gone out for a visit?" demanded Hassler.

Easton snapped his fingers nervously.

"Maybe you're right— but I wish Gurnley'd come."

The finger snapping annoyed Hassler. He swore under his breath.

"Cut out that frettin', bo, I can handle things until Gurnley comes."

"Sure!" said Easton bitterly. "You always think you can handle anything —with murder."

"You stop talkin' like that!" flared Hassler. "You've got the jumps, that's what's the matter with you. On edge all the time. There was a couple of men killed at the start of this game, so you better look out what you say. You should have kept out of the game we're in, if you're so afraid of bumpin' off a guy that stands in the way."

Easton frowned.

"You go and do things before I know anything about it— like stealing Finlayson's gun."

Hassler rolled into his cot and lay on his back.

"Say, stop crabbin'. Nothin' suits you. And I'm tired of your beefin' mornin' and night. Anybody'd think there was a flock of harness bulls around the nearest pile of lava on this island. And are we the only two on Castle Reef Island who'd snitch a gun? What if the planter thinks some of his Malays swiped it?"

"Why didn't they swipe it in the last few years?" retorted Easton. "No, we show up— strangers with a thin yarn about how we got here—and the next thing the planter knows his gun disappears from where it's hung since the Lord knows when."

Hassler sat up and slapped his hands together, and gave a warning hiss. He had heard something outside the bungalow.

Easton was alert at once. He turned and looked out into the clearing and saw Hebat coming with a tray loaded with breakfast things.

The house boy, supplied as a servant from Finlayson's place on the flats below, was a tall, lithe young man, lean of face, light as to complexion for a Castle Reef native, and self-effacing in manner. His name meant "the handsome one," and its bestowal had been an inspiration. His features were uncommonly fine, yet not womanish. There was something in his face which betrayed a distant strain of shrewd Arab blood. His eyes were soft, large and full. His black hair was straight and long and showed from under a scarlet turban— more of a headband than a formally tied turban. It matched the color of his chawat, or breech cloth.

Hebat halted at the threshold. He laid the tray on a small table just inside the door and then, with the backs of his hands to his forehead, he made a low salaam which revealed the top of his head to the two men. This deferential greeting started a soft tinkling of the double rows of little silver coins that hung as unused buttons down the front of his gay-patterned open cotton waistcoat. The usual ceremony of the morning greeting complete, the Malay picked up the tray and offered it in turn to Hassler and Easton.

Each of the men took from the tray a glass of amber-colored liquid with bits of fruit floating on top. Then, placing the tray back on the table, with flashes of scarlet and a tinkling of the decorative coins, Hebat flitted through the open doorway and moved to the path down the hill. He might have been some brilliant bird that had strayed in from the jungle.

"Well, y' see," laughed Hassler, as he put down his empty glass and reached for the coffeepot, "Finlayson didn't stop our grub comin' up, even if he's as suspicious as you think he is."

"What if it's a gentle hint to stay here while he's out in the boat," suggested Easton.

"You ain't far off the track, at that," said Hassler. "That fancy servant's smarter'n you'd think, even if he can't understand English— and I ain't so sure he can't, either. If I don't miss my guess, he'd like to hear what we've got to say about Finlayson's boat trip this mornin'."

"I wonder how long it'll be before Gurnley comes," fretted Easton.

"Aw, stop your squeal about the big. boss. We've got along so far all right, ain't we? And the stuff's buried safe enough, so all we got to do is wait. Finlayson can't do anything, even if he does suspect we're phony. What can one white man do in a place like this— and a sick wife on his hands?"

They moved to the doorway with the coffee cups in their hands and watched the outrigger speeding over the water toward the approaching schooner.

"Then if you've got us in a jam, I'll leave the job to you of squaring things with Finlayson. If you're wise, you'll drop down to the plantation house and leave that gun somewhere so the planter'll find it when he comes in." Easton was speaking.

"That gun stays right here— and damn that schooner, anyhow! It's spoiled my mornin' for me."

The two were silent for a while, observing the leaping proa as it skimmed the crests of the great swells. There was a dark, moving figure in the stem of the boat— a half-naked Malay. There was another native astern with a steering paddle. And two men were on the outrigger body to trim the craft against the wind. The huddle of varied colors midway in the main craft, marked the position of Finlayson, and in front of him, a patch of blue and white revealed the presence of his wife.

Hassler sucked at his coffee noisily and glowered through the door, unappreciative of the tropical beauty lavished on the gently sloping clearing before the bungalow. It was all softly green with short ferns, wiry grass, and heavy, trailing vines from the near-by jungle; farther on was a three-foot border of feathery second growth through: which wound the trail beaten into a path; then came the high-swinging, mop-topped palm trees with their heads on a level with the verge of the hill. There were glimpses of glowing sand below, edgings of white coral, a bit of frothing surf, and the wide background of blue water.

"I'll tell you what," began Hassler suddenly. "We're all wrong on this boat trip of his nibs. He's got that boat filled up with coconuts and fruit. The skipper out there's a friend of Finlayson— and he's takin' some fresh stuff out to a passin' pal."

Easton shifted his red slippers nervously.

"Maybe you've hit it. Anyway, I hope so. Also, it's likely that the captain of that schooner'll come in here to look us over— or Finlayson and his wife'll sail away with the vessel."

"What would we care if they did sail?"

"Not much," said Easton. "It's an easy question to answer— unless Mr. Finlayson comes back to his island in a coast-guard cutter. Then the gun you've swiped would do us a lot of good."

Hassler snorted in disgust.

"I tell you I've a hunch it's all right. And Gurnley ought to be here any day now. And what could the coast guard do? Finlayson can't prove I've got his gun, and it ain't likely that our police descriptions have got this far by this time— even if they've been sent this way. No, we're safe."

Easton set aside his cup and went inside to wash the dried soap from his face. He was suddenly silent, and every movement he made seemed to reveal the fact that he had made up his mind to a course of action independent of Hassler. ;

"Looks to me as if that schooner's comin' close enough so Finlayson can speak to the skipper," Hassler reported.

Easton lowered the towel from his face.

"If you're right, that's bad for us," he said quietly. "Maybe Finlayson'll make arrangements to have us shipped away from here. Under his concession, he's got the power of a magistrate. He's the law on Castle Reef."

For the first time Hassler looked worried.

"We'd have to jump for the jungle. We'd stay out long enough so the skipper'd git sick of waitin'. It costs a pile of jack to keep a ship at anchor. And, you ask me, I'm goin' to stick here till Gurnley comes, skipper or no skipper, planter or no planter."

Easton began to loosen a belt which he wore under his shirt. As he drew it off it swung heavily and stiffly, being of leather and stitched so that the pattern suggested the back of a snake.

"What's the big idea?" demanded Hassler.

Easton spread a hand towel on the floor, snapped the fastening at one end of the belt and shook it. There fell out a shower of gold pieces, small and new. They flashed in the sunlight that slanted through the doorway.

"I'm going to bury what's left on me of this stuff," he said firmly.

"You fool, put that out of sight before Hebat drops in here! Quick! You've got to keep a little on you for anything that goes wrong, and—"

"I don't intend to have any schooner skipper search me and find me lined with this stuff— you know what Gurnley said— the dates on these gold pieces'll give us away. And one of these could be dangerous enough to hang us."

"Say, you shut your trap on that talk!" growled Hassler, with due caution. "That's what I got the gun for— nobody can frisk us and live through it. We can stand our ground on that, bo! One more dead man— or a dozen more— means nothin' now. Put that stuff away!"

Easton hesitated, then began to put the coins back in the belt. Hassler stood in the doorway to make sure no native could enter without warning.

"You're right, baron," admitted Easton. "We can't worry now about who's killed if we find ourselves cornered in this place."

"Planter or skipper, man of woman— I ain't carryin' any insurance on any of 'em. If Finlayson brings that skipper ashore to bother us, I've got five slugs in that gun and when the smoke clears away there'll be only two white men on Castle Reef."

2. A Desperate Plea.

WITH the sun slanting over the sea, Finlayson was almost blinded by the glare as he watched the schooner the outrigger was racing out to meet. Mrs, Finlayson, however, was seated with her back toward the strange vessel, and propped against some cushions. One of her fragile hands held a hand of her husband's. Now, anxiously, again with a wan smile, her young eyes studied his earnest face.

"I think she'll stop for us, all right," soothed Finlayson. "Didn't look so at first— and it disappointed me to see her keep her sails full. She was steering by the wind, and I was afraid she'd go off on another tack and bear away. Most captains hate to run too close to the island on this side— those shoals to the northward have never been very well charted, they tell me. But she's holding her course, and we'll speak her, sure enough."

She nodded without answering. The tropics had taken its full toll of her, in the way that is known to every white woman. Her color was gone. Even her eyes had paled. Her thin body had the limpness that follows exhaustion.

Finlayson suddenly swung up his free hand as a signal to drop the sail.

"I don't want to run right under her bows," he explained. "The skipper might decide to stand away from us to give us a wide berth— and we're being watched from the quarter-deck."

Now Mrs. Finlayson spoke, her look traveling from his big sun helmet, held on tightly by a chin strap, to his freshly whited shoes. His white shirt and trousers still bore the creases of the smoothing iron.

"They'll know you're dressed for a ship visit," she told him, almost in a whisper. "A man would hardly be out fishing with natives— and all in white, like you."

"Yes, I had to look out for that— they wouldn't stop for just islanders in a proa. So it's all right— no more worry now, dear. And are you sure you feel all right? Motion of the proa doesn't bring back any of the old weakness, does it?"

"No, I find it lulling— and the air seems to strengthen me."

Castle Reef Island was a full two miles behind them now, outlined vividly upon the faintly blue sky. The island lifted from the sea in a series of brilliant green-black turrets based upon white rocks. It was the turrets that gave the lonely scrap of land the aspect of a fortress. They were jungled heavily. And from where Mrs. Finlayson's sick eyes peered back at them, the rich growth studding them resembled thick, green plush. Circling these were the coral beaches with the ocean meeting them in a smoke-like spume.

Finlayson stood up and waved an arm toward the schooner. The man studying the outrigger from the quarter-deck made a signal of his own with his arm, but not to the planter. Presently the foresail began to slack.

"Confound the luck!" breathed Finlayson. 'Is she easing her foresheet to tack?"

His wife stirred, turning her head to question :

"Is it the Unicorn? Or do you know her ?"

"She's strange to me," Finlayson told her. "If it was Marston, he'd stop." He pushed back the helmet and wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of a hand.

"Take off your helmet— wave it," she suggested.

He did this instantly, and next put on some brown goggles. The shaded glass interfered with his vision, but he endured the handicap while he once more waved the helmet up and down with vigor.

"There we are!" he broke out joy fully. "They're not hauling the spanker aft— it's all right. She's going to stop after all. Good!" He sank back to his seat atop the coconuts.

The schooner fell off a couple of points. Presently she was heading straight for the proa, which began to roll in the swells, now that the way was off her. Mrs, Finlayson's straw hat was small. Her husband hastened to open and raise over her a large, faded-green umbrella. The filtered light through the fabric deepened the hollows of her eyes and accented her pallor.

Now the Malays of the crew idled, one in the bow relishing his betel, the others on the outrigger frame, balancing with bare, brown legs in the swaying water. The boat was loaded with coconuts, mangoes, pisang, pawpaws, and a basket of huge thimble-like berries, more scarlet than sweet. These were intended as a gift to the vessel they had hailed.

As the schooner swung slowly and got out of the direct sun track, Finlayson could see her better. He took his goggles. She was slowly drawing nearer in the softest of morning breezes. Her mainsail had a wide patch across the head. Her spanker was spotted with squares of glaringly new canvas on the old cloths. Her topsails were all new. She had a white stripe below the line of her bulwarks.

The planter. shook his head.

"Nothing familiar about her. Rotten luck!"

"Then we'll have to deal with a stranger!"

"Yes. I've been praying for Captain Harper, or Smithson, or even Ackerley. Any one of them would help us sure. Well, we'll do the best we can. If this skipper sees how weak you are, and knows that you're the only woman on the island— and maybe he's heard of me and—"

Mrs. Finlayson's eyes widened with a look of strain that he knew.

"We must have help!" she declared. "Oh, Ned, if you have to carry me up on deck so I can say something to him— or if he's a good-natured man, he might come into the proa."

"Don't worry, dear," he assured her. "He'll understand what we're up against when I tell him all about it."

The schooner, now within a hundred yards of the proa, slowly luffed, swinging a broad stern toward the watchers. "Amoy Maid, Hongkong," read Finlayson from the white lettering. Once more he got to his feet.

The man with the glasses was leaning over the port taffrail.

"What'll you be wantin', mister?" he called.

"I've brought you out some fresh fruit, and I'd like to have a word with you, sir. I'm the planter here."

A second man came up from below and idly watched the proa, and said something to the man who held the binoculars. The man who had spoken was evidently the master of the schooner.

"Well, I can use some fresh fruit, but I got to make what I can of this breeze," argued the captain. His tone showed that he was not greatly interested— even hinted at ill temper.

"It's important, or I wouldn't trouble you, sir. I want to send word to the police— or my wife—"

"What you think I am? A gunboat, mister? All right— pull up alongside." His command was more cheerful, but it might have been mere curiosity.

The triangular sail of the proa was snapped into place and she headed for the Amoy Maid, whose jibs were flubbing loosely, with her gaffs beginning to swing and slat her sails fretfully.

A sea ladder was dropped with a thumping and slashing, and the dark-skinned crew of the schooner began to chatter. The proa swung close in, and checked her way in the lee of the larger vessel. Finlayson grasped at the ropes and swung up.

By now the captain of the Amoy Maid was standing by the mizzen chains, smoking a long, thin, Sumatran cigar. He studied with pleased eyes the load of fruit in the outrigger, and snapped his fingers at his native crew to make them hustle the gift aboard.

Finlayson went up the lee ladder, and touched his helmet in a respectful greeting. As the skipper nodded in return, the planter saw that he had to deal with a man who was probably over-shrewd in everything.

"I'm Finlayson— I've got the copra concession at Castle Reef. My father was here before me, and I inherited the plantation when he died— a year or so back. Maybe you've heard of us? Most schooners in these waters have."

The thin-faced, shrewd-eyed skipper hesitated. Then he spat overside, and shook his head.

"Don't know as I do. My name's Catlett— bound for S'pore. I'd like to be gettin' on, too. Now what do you look for me to do?"

"I'm in rather a serious situation, captain." Finlayson's voice shook with his earnestness. "And I've come to ask a favor."

"I ain't traversin' round and stoppin' to do favors." There was a note of displeasure mixed with reproof in Captain Catlett's voice.

"My wife's been at the plantation for three years," went on Finlayson. He gave a tip of his helmet downward to the proa. "She's been terribly sick. Nerves, mostly— from losing the baby a while back, in the last rains."

Captain Catlett frowned.

"I ain't a doctor, if that's what you're lookin' for. And what's that you said about police?"

"We're alone, sir, except for our Malays. They're a good lot— were with my father. But lately, my wife and I have worried. I had a revolver, and it's been stolen— and we feel helpless without a weapon."

Captain Catlett spat again, and the man standing by the helmsman— without doubt the mate— sniffed scornfully.

"I dunno as I can do anything about that!" said the .captain.

If it were not for the fruit going over the side, Finlayson felt, the skipper's language would not have been so conservative.

"Will you sell me a gun? My wife's life is in danger, and—"

"No, sir! I ain't goin' to have the law on me." The captain veered his eyes downward to the green umbrella. Finlayson knew now that the skipper was simply killing time until the last of the fruit was aboard.

"You don't know just how badly fixed I am," went on the planter desperately. "It's not the Malays, as you probably think, that worry me. There are a couple of white men who have come to Castle Reef— they call themselves Hassler and Easton, but I believe they are lying about themselves— and I'm not sure of what they'll do. I've an idea they're fugitives from the police, and that's what I really want you to make a report on in Singapore. I believe they took my gun— and that means trouble."

"What'd y' want to let 'em go aboard your island for?" asked Captain Catlett. There was an amused light in the skipper's eyes. "You're runnin' the place, ain't y'? Seems to me, you ought to be able to boss the island."

"I couldn't help myself,' explained Finlayson. "They landed in an outrigger from Catabaygan Island, sixty miles to the south, and the outrigger was gone before I could get to the beach. Either the native crew was afraid of 'em, or they had it fixed with the Catabaygan men to skip before I could make a kick."

"Put 'em to work— or p'izon 'em," said Catlett. The mate gave a subdued guffaw in appreciation of the skipper's joke.

"I've offered to send 'em back to Catabaygan in this outrigger," went on Finlayson hurriedly, "but they don't want to go. Anyway, they stalled and just looked at each other. And now they've got my gun."

"Mister, you'll be in one hell of a pickle if them men don't let you land on your island again. You two better come along with me, and git the coast guard to come back here." Catlett was suddenly sympathetic, as if he now fully understood the plight of the planter and his wife.

"Yes, I took a wide chance— but I thought I'd have a gun on my way back. They may think I've got one, anyway. As to my wife going along with me now, I can't leave the island— the plantation is all I have in the world; but the worst of it is my wife is a very poor sailor and she can't risk the passage, with the monsoon. about to break. You'll have a stormy passage. As to the law on giving me a gun— I'm the concession holder here, and I'm entitled to have arms, so there'll be no law broken if—"

"Mister, I only got one gun aboard— a rifle— and if I let that out of my hands, and got into any trouble, I might lose my vessel. Anyhow, the owners'd raise pa'ticular hell, and I'd be ashore without any ship. I never know when I'll have to shoot one of these hellions for'ard— or be ready to, anyhow. So I better pay you for that—"

"No," protested the younger man hastily. "The fruit's for your trouble in stopping.'

Catlett looked down to the green umbrella again.

"I hate to refuse," he said with unfeigned sincerity. "But if your wife's too ailin' to come along, and you can't leave—" He made a helpless movement with his hands swung outward.

"I'd like you to meet Mrs. Finlayson, sir.' Then, without waiting for the reply which followed the suggestion, "Emily!" he called down toward the gently rocking proa. "Put back the umbrella— Captain Catlett, dear!"

The pale face turned upward, and it was smiling.

"Is it all right, Captain Catlett? You can help us out, can't you?" Her voice quavered.

The skipper touched his cap visor with the hand holding the half-burned cigar.

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but I don't see that I can do much. I'd like to accommodate, but I might lose my license if I had to have a gun myself. But I'll tell

you what I'll do"—he turned to Finlayson— "I'll send the mate off in a boat, and you herd that pair into it, and I'll  take 'em along with me."

Finlayson laughed ruefully.

"That's mighty kind of you, sir. But I don't intend to waste your time on any wild-goose chase. If they saw a boat— or any of your crew— coming ashore, it'd take a week to catch that pair. They'd head off into the hills, and you can't take any such chance. Besides, that would bring on an open break for me, and I'd be worse off the minute you were hull down. We'd probably be shot promptly, if there's anything in the suspicions I have of those two men."

Mrs. Finlayson's upward-peering eyes suddenly glinted from the sunlight on the tears misting them.

"We'd counted on you, captain," she said. "But, I'm sure you'd help if you could."

"Now, ma'am, don't you fret yourself,' urged Catlett, touched by her show of keen disappointment. 'Because if I've a chance to speak a ship, I'll git the news out."

"Ships— are— are scarce around here," she said haltingly.

"Yes, they be, ma'am. But I'll git word to the coast guard— quick's I can. You take my word for it, if I sight. anything I'll go off my course. Them men won't dare do anything much, if you keep your natives on watch, and before a sheep could wiggle his tail twice, you'll see a cutter." Then, to Finlayson: "If you could let your gents hear how a cutter's comin', they'd mind their Ps and Qs, gun or no gun."

"The trouble with that idea," said Finlayson, "is that first off, before I had any suspicions, I told 'em that it might be six months before a cutter showed up here; and now, if they're the desperate characters I think they are, any hint that a cutter's about to come would only increase our danger. I'll just have to keep up a close watch— but we hoped that you might end my wife's worry."

Catlett nodded. "I guess you'll be smart to play it the way you say, mister." But as Finlayson's expression and gesture said that the situation was grave enough, the skipper went on: "Yes, I know there's some pretty slick customers come down into these lonely islands— on the run, mostly, they be. But they'll be a little cautious, special since they'll know you've been out to talk to a vessel."

Finlayson moved closer to the skipper and kept his voice low so his wife could not hear.

"Yes, cautious— or too bold. I thought of that before I came out. They'll be worried. But I had to take the chance."

As Finlayson turned to the lee ladder, Captain Catlett lifted his binoculars and leveled them on Castle Reef Island. He made out two crouching figures in the doorway of the bungalow on the hill.

"Mr. Finlayson!" he said sharply. Then, quietly: "Them boarders of yours seem to have'a likin' for the scenery— to seaward, this mornin'." He proffered the glasses to the planter. "I s'pose it's natural to want to look at a vessel. maybe matters ain't so bad as you make out. You've done a lot of guessin'— but what do you actually know on 'em, mister?"

Finlayson looked at the bungalow for 'a minute.

"I know what I'm talking about, captain," said the planter cautiously, with a glance toward the proa. "I've got a Singapore baba among my Malays. Speaks English like a professor, and understands it like his own tongue. But Hassler and Easton think he knows but a word or two of English— they think he's one of the natives of the island. Well, I planted this boy Hebat on my two guests as a kind of house boy, and he—"

Captain Catlett nodded solemnly.

"That's a splice with another twist," he admitted.

"I can't take your whole morning up," said Finlayson, as he handed back the binoculars. "I'll have to be going— and before long I'll be hearing just what they've got to say about my run out to you." He shook hands with Catlett, and moved forward.

"Say, ain't you got any weapons— spears, and so on, mister?"

The young planter laughed.

"Sure! But I can hardly kill a pair of white men on suspicion. The real weapons— the only ones— that I can use, are my wits."

3. "NEURALGY."

FOR a week or more the after-guard of the barkentine Pointer, Swatow to Tanjong Priok, had been compelled to listen to the deep and tortured lament of a man in agony. Night and day the groaning, mingled with outbursts of gentlemanly profanity at suitable intervals, beset Captain Reeves, his two mates, and the barkentine's cook. Only when the suffering man slept was there any comfort for those aft.

A passenger, Mr. Robertson Stanley, was the man. And this particular night, as he came staggering from his little stateroom off the main cabin, he resembled a large-bodied mummy that had unexpectedly come to life. For his head was wrapped around and around with thready edges of torn sheeting used as bandages. The sheeting formed a white turban, mottled with the stains of a brown liniment, and covered most of Mr. Stanley's face, leaving slits for mouth and eyes. While he moaned with anguish his well-kept soft and white hands pressed against the sides of his head.

Captain Reeves looked up from a volume of "Sailing Directions," and lifted his steel-framed spectacles to his forehead.

"Your head at it again, eh?' he exclaimed. "I looked for that sleeping dram to quiet you proper."

"I seem to be worse than better, skipper," was the reply. Though it was sifted through the bandages, Mr. Stanley's voice was nicely modulated. "Oh, if I could only sleep!"

The captain laid down his book and glanced at the cabin clock.

"None of us can sleep," he commented, but good-humoredly. "It's near midnight, too. Well, sir, I know what the neuralgy is myself." He sighed. "Bilges a man like his head has been carried away by the help of a plank broadside on."

"I don't know how I'm going to stand this pain much longer," continued the passenger, making a slow turn about the room. "It's awful! Awful!" He lowered both hands from the region of his ears to his lower jaws.

Then he dropped wearily to the transom seat,. leaned forward, and laid his sheeted head upon his knees. About him hung the pungent odor of the liniment. Soon the cabin reeked with its spreading aura until the captain's eyes grew moist.

The harassed skipper began finger-combing his graying hair.

"Dash the luck! We're helpless as a blind juggler! Dammit, man, I can't get you to where there's a sawbones short of six whole days and night— maybe seven. We've lost that leading wind— and we ain't doing better than four knots now."

The turbaned figure swayed gently with the motion of the vessel.

"Six days and nights to go!" repeated Mr. Stanley dolefully. "And every second torture! Skipper, I'll be wild-eyed crazy by that time."

Captain Reeves leaned back in his chair, spreading his arms.

"Most likely," he agreed, "unless you have a turn for the better. Neuralgy's like fog— it comes and it goes, and no rime nor reason behind it, a man might say." He forbore to add that his opinion was that the entire after guard would also be crazy before they got up to the jetty of Tanjong Priok.

"It's the continual motion," went on Mr, Stanley, still doubled forward as if abased before some idol on the floor. "And there's little motion to-night, too. But when a man's nerves are as raw as mine, and my head moves on the pillow— wow! If I could only get ashore! Somewhere! Anywhere! And lie down on solid ground!"

"It ain't wise of you to be poling around in bare feet that way," admonished the captain. "Also, in pajamas. These waters are warm enough— but the thermometer's nothing to go by. It's in the wind, like— what there is of wind.

"Sumatras they call 'em in these latitudes. They rasp on a man's nerves— like them winds in the Mediterranean waters. Why, once—"

Stanley broke out in loud groaning again.

"I start to sleep, and the ship lifts. I come awake with a jolt, and that makes my blood pound in my veins until it seems they'll burst."

"I know, sir," agreed the skipper in sympathy. "Your whole top hamper strains like loose standing rigging running under bare poles off the Horn."

"If I'd been wise," went on the muffled voice of the passenger, "I'd've gone ashore at Castle Reef Island. Never mind if there was no doctor there. I want quiet. It'd have done, that place."

Abruptly the captain got up.

"Castle Reef? Why, it's not too late to put you ashore at Castle Reef, man!"

The swathed head jerked up from the hands.

"I haven't the least idea that you wouldn't do it for me, Captain Reeves. I'm ashamed to ask you to bear with me— But six days! It's a pity to ask you to put back to Castle Reef, now that we've passed it."

"No, sir!' exploded the skipper. "We've not passed it!"

"What's that?" Mr, Stanley rose, wavering weakly, his jaws clasped tightly between his hands once more. He leaned forward, seeking the face of the bulkhead clock. "But you said we'd be off the island at ten o'clock, and it's midnight now!"

"And we've got Castle Reef Island abeam," declared the skipper, a note of downright joy in his voice. "Yes, sir! Didn't I tell you we'd lost our leading wind. You said before you went to bed you wouldn't get off at Castle Reef— and we ain't logged the distance I looked for then." He took Stanley by the arm and drew him to his little cabin. "Look out your own porthole, sir! That's Castle Reef— big as Gibraltar!"

Eagerly the turbaned head lifted to peer, one well-groomed hand holding aside the tiny curtain. And the passenger saw, surprisingly close, a high island thrust upward from the quiet sea, its domelike hills standing out sharply against the moonlit sky.

"You mean— to say— that's Castle Reef?" asked the tortured man.

"What else? The chart shows, if I mark the course and distance from my last fix, Castle Reef Island, no less— and you could toss a porridge pot ashore."

The little room was unlighted. Clinging to the bunk board to steady him, Stanley continued to stare for a minute.

"See that wide, squarish light down close to the beach?" asked the captain.

"Most likely the planter's up and about, or reading in bed— I'd say that light's from a big open kajang— it's dim-like, but maybe you don't make it out."

"A plantation!" said Stanley. "So you said yesterday— and that sounds good to me. I'd better go— especially, if we're as near as that. And my pains seem to get worse every hour. I've got to have sleep." He swung round, looking in the gloom of the room like an odd-helmeted figure, or somebody playing at ghost. "I'm such a nuisance to everybody aboard here, captain. I can't stand the sea air and the dampness."

Captain Reeves put his spectacles into their case and snapped the cover.

"You're giving the orders, Mr. Stanley, and you get what you want. I've done all in my power, sir. The medicine chest is played out. Sing out, and I'll have you and your gear on the beach in short order. Sure, now?"

"Ashore, yes, sir!" said Stanley with swift decision. He began to fumble half-blindly among his effects in the drawer under his bunk.

Captain Reeves sprang for a door that opened forward toward the galley and the storeroom. He tapped at another door. "Mr. Cantlow!" he called. Then as a muffled reply issued from within a sleeping cabin: "I'll have to turn you out to put the dinghy over. Mr. Stanley's decided he wants to quit us for the island here."

"Right, sir!" came the willing assent. A match scraped and a gimbal lamp flared, revealing the second mate of the barkentine in an undershirt.

Reeves returned to his passenger.

"Mr. Stanley, if you'll excuse me, you'd better get into your pants— an shoes."

Stanley made a disconsolate figure, kneeling and groaning over a bag standing open on his cabin floor.

"I'll put on a bath robe— that'll do."

"Finlayson, the planter, has his wife with him," the skipper went on. "You an't expect to drop in where there's womenfolks and not be proper duds."

"That's so— I forgot there was a woman," answered the passenger in a painful mumble, as he began to dress himself. And Captain Reeves routed out the cook, an American colored man from Memphis, to help pack and porter the passenger's dunnage.

In a few minutes Stanley was in the waist of the vessel.

"You've been mighty patient with me, and I hate to go. But you can see I can't sleep aboard here. And I'll keep my face wrapped until I can turn the sun on it in the morning."

The dinghy was drawing up to the ladder over the side, and on the quarterdeck, the first mate, who had the watch, was swearing joyfully but secretly over the fact that the Pointer was losing her passenger.

When Stanley had been helped into the dinghy, Captain Reeves drew Mr. Cantlow aside under the bulwarks and remarked :

"Finlayson won't make any kick about our friend, I take it, mister. But if he does, just manage to pass the word to him that it'll be a personal favor to me to let the gentleman land. Your job of work now is to see that Mr. Stanley, and his neuralgy, are beached. Understand?"

"I'd say I do, sir," said Cantlow. "We're more like a blasted hospital— if that's what you. mean, sir."

"You read my meaning, mister. We've got to have some comfort—and I'm worn out with this gentleman's bellyachin'. That's all."

Cantlow went over the side swiftly, and with four native seamen at the oars, the dinghy headed away for shore through the white moonlight.

When they were a quarter of a mile from the Pointer, which was lying to, Mr. Stanley raised his head and looked back to her. As her bows lifted and dropped with the gentle swells, her port light tinctured her black shadow on the water with tiny flashes of crimson.

"I'm sorry to leave her—and Captain Reeves, and all of you," murmured the passenger. "I regret it very much, Mr. Cantlow."

"Well, mebbe it's all for the best," said Mr. Cantlow.

The low hum of the Castle Reef surf came to them over the crests of the bright swells like the sound of the swarming of hiving bees. All the juts and peaks of the island stood forth against the sky at the end of the moon track like some gigantic piece of spatterwork. But the lower turrets and terraces were in blackness. It was upon this blackness that Mr. Stanley and Mr. Cantlow saw a glowing spark.

This tiny light wavered at irregular intervals. At the same time, it traveled downward windingly, as if the spark were slowly singing in the shadows of the hills. They knew it for a lantern being carried down a hill trail.

Next, closer to the line of the beach, there glowed suddenly three rectangular patches of light in a row. Lamps had been lighted again in the Finlayson bungalow.

"That means the planter's on the know that we're comin', Mr. Stanley," announced the second mate. He spoke an order to the rowers, and pulled at the tiller to steer toward the group with the lantern— those men had reached the beach.

The passenger nodded his bandaged head.

"I hope he won't be afraid that I'm sick of something that's catching," said Mr. Stanley. "Be sure to explain, if he makes any objection, that all I need is sun and quiet."

Cantlow promised. The island loomed higher and blacker as the clicking oars drove the dinghy shoreward. Presently, at a spot where a curving reef formed a tiny bay that gave protection against the breakers, the lantern stopped its meandering, and was lifted and swung in a signal.

"That's the proper landin' they' re at with that light," said the second mate. And when he had the boat abreast of the end of the reef, he swung it into the lee of the natural breakwater. Behind them now, the piling combers were filling the night with a deep, continuous roar as they battered on the jagged barrier of coral. Fast progress was made in still water. Soon they could make out a group about the lantern.

It was Finlayson who hailed first:

"Hello, the boat! What ship are you from?"

Mr. Cantlow checked the rowers and stood. "Barkentine Pointer, Swatow for Tanjong Priok; Reeves, master."

"Oh, Captain Reeves, eh?" said Finlayson gladly. "Beach her here."

"We got a passenger that wants to come ashore, sir," the mate explained.

Finlayson made no comment. Easton was standing to his right, Hassler to his left, and some Malays were behind them.

Now the passenger spoke.

"My name's Stanley— Robertson Stanley, sir. I'm suffering from facial neuralgia, sir—and I've got to quit the ship."

"You mean, you intend to stay here?" asked Finlayson. "Why, Captain Reeves knows there's no doctor near— and you may be marooned with us five or six months before there's a ship."

Now Easton touched the planter's arm warningly.

"If you don't know this passenger, you'd better be careful, if you'll let me say a word. It may be something worse than what he says— something that's infectious."

Hassler put in a few words.

"You've got to think of your wife," he whispered to the planter. "She's run down— and weak."

"Oh, Captain Reeves wouldn't do that sort of thing with me," said Finlayson.

"You're right, of course— if it was anybody else but Reeves sending him ashore."

Mr. Cantlow, after Finlayson's objection about a doctor, had failed to order the boat ahead, but remained standing in the stern sheets.

Stanley, knowing that there was some delay, half rose, and waved a hand.

"I'm able to pay my way, no matter how long I stay here, sir. Ill be no trouble, Mr. Finlayson. Heat and rest is all I need."

"All right, as long as you know what you're doing," said Finlayson. "Come on, the boat!"

Stanley breathed his relief, the mate gave his order, and the boat went on. A few minutes, and the dinghy grated on the shingle. The Malays leaped overboard and drew it up, to help the sick man step from the stem to the sand.

Instantly Stanley advanced toward the planter. With his left hand holding the bandages in place, he extended his right. "Mr, Finlayson! I appreciate your kindness. Excuse my appearance— had to wrap up my face. I'm worn out, that's my chief trouble. I couldn't stand the motion of the ship."

Finlayson shook hands.

"I can't assume any responsibility for you, Mr. Stanley. You understand that— but I can put you up, and I'll do what I can."

"Thank you! I'll not be a burden, I assure you."

His luggage was passed ashore. Its extent and quality indicated a man of. means and taste.

"I'm a rubber buyer," explained Stanley. "I've been having this trouble off and on for some time, and I'm on a long vacation. Hoped a sea voyage would do me good— but it nearly killed me."

"Mr. Easton— Mr. Hassler," said the planter, with a gesture right and left. "You won't have to depend on my company, wholly." Stanley shook hands with the two men, while Finlayson went on: "I can have some coffee made, and a little supper."

"All I want to do is to drop down on a cot and sleep," said Stanley. "Sorry I had to come in like this, in the middle of the night. Don't put yourself to trouble."

"We're guests here ourselves," put in Easton. ''Mr. Finlayson's been very kind to us since we wished ourselves on him."

"You sure struck a good place, Mr. Stanley," Hassler assured him.

Easton turned to the planter.

"As Mrs. Finlayson isn't very well, suppose we take Mr. Stanley in for the night. You know, we've got a hammock—and this gentleman can have my bed."

"That'll suit me perfectly," declared Stanley with gusto, before Finlayson could reply. "You see, I groan a good deal— even when I'm dozing. And I don't want to disturb Mrs. Finlayson. So I can go along with these gentlemen. He turned toward Easton.

Finlayson seemed a little surprised. His Malays had already picked up the luggage.

"Well," he agreed haltingly, "it'll suit me, Mr. Stanley, if you think it's best." And to Cantlow. "But I'd like to have you go up to the house with me. I've got a jug of coconut toddy that I want to send out to Captain Reeves. I owe your skipper for a favor he did me a few months back—it won't hold you ten minutes."

"No, he won't gibe me if I come back with toddy,' said Cantlow, and he sprang ashore,

As the white men drew apart into two groups, Finlayson asked:

"Would a drop of wine help you, Mr. Stanley?"

""Thank you, I've got a flask of brandy with me—in the luggage." He turned to follow Easton and Hassler and the luggage-burdened Malays, and added courteously: "I hope to be more presentable in the morning, and I shall give myself the pleasure of a call to pay my respects."

"Yes, by all means." Finlayson waved his hand affably. "I'll see what can be done to make things more comfortable for you than your temporary lodgings for the night."

"I feel better already," vowed Stanley. "Good-by, Mr. Cantlow!"

"Good-by, sir." I can tell by your voice you're better. And the skipper'll be glad to hear that. He felt awful bad for you." He waved a hand, and then swung away beside the planter, while the lantern started up the hill with the others,

The three white men who were slowly climbing the slope did not speak for some minutes, and followed the Malay porters at a distance that gradually increased, for the natives hurried ahead. The brilliant carpet of light which the moon laid on the sandy flat was crossed quickly. The little party entered the wide, dappled strip of coconut grove. Presently, they gained the beginning of the zigzag path which led them up through low second growth.

Hassler was carrying the lantern. He spoke in an exultant whisper. "You made it slick, big boss!"

Stanley reached out an arm to clap the dark man heartily on the shoulder.

"Stanley's a name a lot easier to remember than Gurnley, eh, baron?"

"Say! We're glad you're here!" said Easton. "When I saw that boat, we knew—"

"Made a perfectly clean get-away, both from land to ship, and from ship to land— here," reported the newcomer, as he paused to catch his breath. "And the Pointer was glad to be rid of the man with the neuralgia!"

"The lot of 'em well boggled, afloat and ashore, with none of 'em wise that you wanted to land at this island?" pressed Hassler.

"The ship certainly suspected' nothing of the sort," boasted Gurnley. "And I'd say that your planter man feels better to have the company of Mr. Stanley ashore with him." Easton laughed softly under his breath.

"We both objected to your landing— after we knew that Finlayson knew Captain Reeves. And that threw the planter off the track that we knew you, assuming he might have had that dangerous little idea in his head."

"Good work!"

"We didn't know just when. you'd blow in, Gurnley," said Hassler. "Oh, boy! I want one sniff of that brandy of yours, big boss! You may have pains in your head, but I'm cockeyed for a drink. You sure do manage things wonderful!"

As they slowly went on, Gurnley took hold of his bandage and began to unwind it..

"Maybe I won't feel better when I pull off this sheeting! Sweat! These rags are hot! And I'm gassed with my own liniment."

Hassler, now in the lead, half turned his head.

"Bring the gats?"

"An automatic pistol for each of us— small ones, but, you know, I had to smuggle 'em.'

"Hassler's picked up a gun since we got here," announced Easton— then checked his desire to tell how indiscreet Hassler had been.

The latter, thus forced, hastened to tell on himself.

"Yes, I took Finlayson's," he confessed boldly. "Stole it day before yesterday."

Again Gurnley halted.

"Baron!" he exclaimed reprovingly. "What'd you do a thing like that for?"

"That's what I told him, too!" cried Easton. "I said—"

"You shut your mouth!" ordered Hassler.

Gurnley took care, then, not to say too much.

"It was running chances," he warned, "of getting suspected."

"All right! All right!" growled Hassler. He went tramping on, kicking the bushes.

They arrived at the edge of the clearing before the new little bungalow. From this point the view of sea and island was gorgeous in the moonlight. Gurnley paused again, drew his breath and gazed with appreciation.

"Land alive, what a place!" he broke out. "Was I right when I picked Castle Reef Island for a good long: hideout? Weil, I guess I'm a picker! Here we stick till the hullabaloo behind us blows over and the police back home give up finding us. Boys, some scenery! Look at that sea! Look at that moon! And the Pointer! Good old dumb-bell of a skipper! He was glad to get rid of me!"

"And never had any idea of your game!" laughed Easton, who was feeling the extra satisfaction of not having made any blunder like Hassler's.

"And, of course, you've get the stuff safely hidden?" Gurnley asked quietly.

"Planted deep," answered Easton. "Show you the places in the morning."

"It can ride where it is for months, if necessary," said Gurnley. "And no rent to pay on the safe-deposit vault."

He laughed at his own joke and followed on to the house.

4. The King Of Snakes.

"AND with those two men here, now you can understand why I need a weapon," Finlayson was saying, his voice lowered, that it might not be heard beyond the circle of his own table. Cantlow, a glass of toddy in his hand, stared through the lamplight from husband to wife, and back. "Plain enough, sir," said the mate.

"You've got to have firearms— but me, I'd turn my Malays on 'em and drive em off into the sea."

"No, I can't do that," said the planter. "I can't kill a couple of white men just because I believe they're a pair of crooks. They may have a reason for their hiding here that's secret, but it may not warrant a double murder on my part."

"No, I see that," admitted Cantlow, as he sipped at his glass. "But this Mr. Stanley, now— he'll be a help— and I'll leave my revolver with you, sir." He pushed back from the table and his right hand started for a hip pocket. The planter checked him, though the kajangs which opened from the large sitting room upon three verandas were carefully shut.

"Don't take it out now," advised Finlayson, still speaking under his breath. "I've got a native stationed on watch at each side of this house, but the news that you passed me your gun might filter up to the bungalow on the hill.. You slip it to me outside when you start for the beach."

Cantlow nodded. "And you don't seem scared none about it all," he said to Mrs. Finlayson admiringly.

"The worry's all over now," said the planter's wife. "As you said, we expect this Mr. Stanley to be of help. We'll put him up here in the house."

"Do you think he has a gun with him?" asked Finlayson.

Cantlow shook his head.

"I'd say not. He's a good deal of a swell— a nice, easy-spoken kind of a gent, except when he's swearin' at his misery. We all smoked fancy cigars while he was in the vessel, but we paid for 'em, listenin' at him beef about his nerves and all." He grinned reflectively,

"Well, we'll be two against two now, anyway," said Finlayson with satisfaction. "And with your gun, I'll be loaded. for bear."

"If you'll let me put an oar into the business," said the second mate, "I'd never let him gone up with them two, under the circumstances. You should have brung him right to the house here, and give him an earful, just as you did me."

"I wanted Mr. Stanley to have a chance to observe the pair," said Finlayson. "Then, when I take him into the secret to-morrow, he'll know better what I'm driving at. And I want him to tell me what he thinks of 'em before I say anything myself. Being a business man, he'll be a shrewd judge of men."

"I'd say that's good judgment on your part, sir,' said Cantlow. "And when we come up from the beach, I could see that this house's pretty well guarded. I kind of had the creeps, when I see that there were men hidin' around in the palm grove, and stickin' in the shadders."

"Yes, but they've got nothing but knives," said Finlayson. "And you know, these islanders are not accustomed enough to guns to stand up against bullets. That's one reason why I only needed one revolver here— which was foolish on my part."

"Well, I'll have to be gittin' along," said Cantlow. He lifted his face to the large, overhead beams of bamboo in the high room, their polished surfaces shining in the glow of the hanging lamp. "It's a beautiful place you got here for a home, and I don't wonder that such troubles stir you up. Bad business to have these scalawags comin' ashore on you like they did. And I ain't sure that Cap'n Reeves won't come in and drop anchor when he hears about this business. He wouldn't want you people to be in any dangerous mix-up."

"No, you tell him not to stop now," said the planter. "But for the fact that your passenger came, I'd probably risk my wife in the new monsoon, and go along with her. We might find the plantation house burned, or some of my natives killed when we got back, but there's no need to quit now— I can't have Reeves stand any loss on my account, holding the Pointer here while we tried to catch and arrest the pair on the hill. The more dangerous they are, the less chance we'd have to get our hands on 'em, once they suspected what we wanted to do."

"I'll give him your letter about the coast guard, anyhow," said Cantlow, as he rose and bowed to Mrs, Finlayson.

"Yes, the authorities may know more about these men than I do— and come hotfoot for 'em, once they've got their descriptions. And the Dutch may drop a gunboat in here, when they get my report from Reeves."

"I'll eat the ribbon off my hat that the police'll want to pick 'em up," agreed the mate. "All you got to do is play for time now— and with Mr. Stanley, them two won't start any monkey business. It's funny how lucky his pains and all come in— you know the sayin' about ill winds, of course, sir. It's almost what you might call fate or somethin' that our passenger come down with a head misery. I suppose your missis here done a little prayin'— and Mr. Stanley's the answer." He smiled back at the planter's wife, moving for the doorway with Finlayson,

Mrs Finlayson smiled cheerfully. "I did pray," she admitted. "And we're both grateful to you— and you must thank Captain Reeves for us. He'll wonder why you stayed so long, but he won't scold when you tell him the reason."

Cantlow picked up the glass jug with the liquor.

"I'll let this do the talkin' for me," he laughed. "And don't you fret none about me— Captain Reeves always did like this island, and you folks, ma'am."

And just outside the woven door of the house, in the shadows of the vine-embowered veranda, Cantlow turned his revolver over to the planter. Finlayson walked down to the beach to see the dinghy away, and to make sure that his Malays were on the alert in the palm grove and around the house.

And by the time Finlayson had secured the house from the inside to his satisfaction, he saw the Pointer hull down on the horizon.

"I'll sit up a while, dear,". said the planter to his wife. "You go to sleep —Hebat'll be back pretty soon, but I suppose he thought he ought to listen at the bungalow. He can't be long now, for Mr. Stanley, needing sleep so badly, must have turned in at once."

But it was a good hour later before Finlayson, reading by a shaded lamp, heard the quiet challenges. of outside watchers, and presently there was the sound of feet on the veranda. Mrs. Finlayson waked as her husband Jet in the head of the house servants.

"There was little need for your losing so much of the night from us, Hebat," said Finlayson, in Malay.

"No, Hebat,' said Mrs. Finlayson from the screened bed. "We are safe now— with a senjata left us by the ship, and a man who will aid us." She spoke in English, using only the word for weapon to explain the revolver Cantlow had left.

The young Malay crossed the floor softly, lifting his hand to his forehead. .

"Sir, and the madam," he began in his precise English, "the passenger gentleman perhaps came for aid— but not for bantu with this respectable household."

Finlayson stared. The single word which Hebat had put into Malay had a special meaning— to help in war. Mrs. Finlayson did not know the language well enough to understand the significance of that word.

The planter laughed lightly to cover his sense of alarm. He saw at once that Hebat was unaccountably grave, and might have misunderstood Mrs. Finlayson's reference to aid.

"Oh, no," said Finlayson, "Mr, Stanley didn't come to work here. It is as an ally that we'll use him— and to-morrow he will take residence here with us. We need have no more alarm for those on the hill you have been watching— though you will continue your watch."

"Tuan!" said Hebat. "When I have spoken you will make the decision required, this being your house. But I ask that you have patience— now the thieves be complete on the hill."

Mrs. Finlayson gave a little cry of astonishment and alarm. Her husband did not speak for a minute.

"I don't understand, Hebat," he said, still doubting the import of the Malay's words.

"From all kinds of men I have acquired your tongue, tuan," said Hebat with a slight bow.  "Though I use your words, they flow in my own style and the manner of my ancestors. It is this way— like brothers the two already on the hill stroke the new arriver on the breast: They are no strangers, one to the other or the third, but like a family returning from pilgrimage and being reunited with joyful words. The three be one— from their talk, from their laughing, from their drinking out of a silver bottle brought by the new arriver who came out of the boat with a lie, the others knowing he was to come."

"Good heavens, Ned!" cried Mrs. Finlayson from the bed. "Is it possible! Is this new man—"

"Hush, dear!" warned her husband. "It's a lot more than we bargained for, I'll admit. But let us know all we can." He nodded to Hebat to go on, not willing to let his wife be too alarmed, and concealing his own alarm by holding his voice steady.

"But, Ned! If we'd only known this before Mr. Cantlow— before Captain Reeves— were gone!"

"A pity," agreed Finlayson. "But we'll have to handle it ourselves. I'm sorry you heard this now— you should have had your sleep out." He went behind the screen and comforted her, but returned at once to hear Hebat's details.

The Malay, standing by the shaded lamp, bowed.

"That turban, it only was a cover to the face of the stranger. It came off even as he had left the high ferns before the guest bungalow. And his mourning of pain is all silenced. These things I saw and heard myself— and I speak true talk, tuan." His earnest look sought the face of his master.

"And what kind of a man is he with the bandages off?" asked Finlayson. "Does he look like a ruffian, or is he of refined face, such as I gathered from his talk?" Finlayson asked the questions now in Malay, so there could be no doubt about the meanings.

The baba stuck to his Singapore English, preferring to sound like a scholar rather than a native.

"Of agreeable looks, but fattish about the eyes—and those eyes, though gentle, might be the eyes of the king of snakes."

Finlayson paced the floor a few minutes.

"Don't worry, Ned," soothed his wife. "You're armed now, and after all, it's better for us to know the truth. But for Hebat we might have taken this 'king of snakes' into the house."

"Emily, I'm not worried. I can cut off their supply of food if I have to. And I want to avoid killing anybody here— even a criminal. And as to taking this Mr. Stanley into the house, that's exactly what I intend to do."

"Ned! Don't say such absurd things!"

"In the morning, Hebat," said the planter, "it is my wish that you carry up early from the cookhouse, an excellent breakfast for three men. And at the same time, you will carry the invitation to the newcomer to have lunch with us here at this house. By sending the invitation so early, Mr. Stanley will not come before we are ready for him. In the meantime, see, Hebat, that no word of what has happened reaches the ears of the workers or servants. The fact that we suspect—or know—Mr. Stanley is a close friend of the other two, must be kept a secret."

Finlayson walked up and down as he talked, and his words were intended for his wife as much as for Hebat—also, they clarified his ideas, for he was planning as he talked.

Hebat bowed—and he would have bowed in assent if his master had given orders to put a kris into the back of Mr. Stanley.

"If you are to break bread with this man, tuan, I shall stand near by. There is but one time that I can be loosed from my body, and if that time come in the noon of to-morrow, I am content. There is little in this world for this poor man but to die for those he serves, when the need comes. I am ready."

"You jewel, Hebat!" said Mrs, Finlayson.

The planter laughed.

"You will not die in this case, Hebat, till you have my permission. You are to live—that we of the island shall go on living. When I have finished with Mr. Stanley at luncheon he will not be dangerous."

Hebat allowed himself to smile.

"Rachunt" he whispered. "It is the way!"

"Poison— yes," said Finlayson. "A poison so strong that Mr. Stanley will drink of it, and will be made all the stronger. But he will not die."

"Mixed with madu— honey, as you speak it— I know a poison that can be gathered in the jungle, tuan, whereby a man drinking of it, he does not die until the moon has waned four times; therefore his death is a mystery and no one is sought for that death. But four moons is too long for a bad man to live here, and there be three bad men on the hill. They will slay unless we hasten their departure from their bodies."

"I shall certainly use honey," said Finlayson with a smile. "Emily, you'll have to make a special effort and help me to-morrow at tiffin."

"I'll— I'll do what I can, Ned," answered his wife, puzzled and somewhat frightened.

"Never mind what it is now, that you'll have to do. We need sleep. Time enough after daylight to work out the details."

"I shall pick the poison leaves before the new day," declared Hebat. "That is the way it must be done, if it is desired to have the man die a little quicker from the juice than four moons."

"Gather no poison," ordered Finlayson, "for the kind of poison I shall use needs no gathering. Heed my words, Hebat."

"Tuan," said the Malay, "I see that you have a better poison than this servant."

5. An Impending Execution

IT was a changed and improved "Mr. Robertson Stanley" who made an appearance at the plantation house for tiffin the next day. He did not wear his bandages, and except for the liniment still showing on temples and jaws, there was nothing about him that hinted of invalidism. His thick, brown hair was carefully combed, his . well-rounded cheeks were freshly shaven, though still somewhat crinkled by the strong lotion. As. for the dress of this man who was called "Gurnley" on the hill, it was so well chosen and fresh that he might have come from the bund of any tropical city. His well-cut white suit was immaculate. His shoes were as white as his clothes. His shirt was a cream silk, striped narrowly with blue, the cuffs linked with bits of carved jade. His tie was blue, matching the stripe of the shirt. And a wide, silk cummerbund folded round and round his middle, but slightly loose, covered the belt of his trousers—and: concealed under its folds, at the left side of the coat, a small but most efficient automatic pistol. His soft 'straw hat, of finest native make, was banded with a plaid ribbon.

Altogether, the tiffin guest was— a first-class passenger.

As he mounted the steps, Stanley saw the tiffin table was set on the front veranda, shielded from the glare of the sun by thick vines growing up trellises between the stanchions. On the gentle slope of the flats below the house were the shadows of the palms. And a soft offshore breeze faintly rustled the tops of the lofty trees.

When the planter and his wife had finished their greetings, Stanley assured them of his appreciation of their invitation.

"I had the first good sleep in a week or more," he declared thankfully. "And I feel like a new man this morning. You know, the Pointer was an awfully damp ship. I didn't like to explain fully in the presence of Mr. Cantlow last night, because Captain Reeves is a splendid man, but the quarter-deck leaked and I never had dry bedclothes in my bunk. Another week in her would have killed me."

"No, you probably couldn't have stood it, under such conditions," said Finlayson, as he indicated a seat at the side of the table, Mrs. Finlayson having sat down. where she would face her husband, the guest between them, but with his back to the front wall of the house, close to a partly open kajang.

Hebat was serving the table, the food being brought from the cookhouse by way of a side veranda by another Malay. And Hebat was dressed specially for the meal. Over his silver-buttoned waistcoat he wore a white steward's jacket with brass buttons; a white breech cloth was about his loins; his pale-brown legs were bare, but his feet shod with sandals made from a fine grass tied on with ribbons. He wore a real turban now, of rich fabric dyed a dull red, and batiked with tiny gilt deer at full run. He stood proudly behind Finlayson when not serving dishes.

The guest found before him a gold and green half of a pawpaw.

"Try a few drops of lime juice on it," urged Mrs. Finlayson. And Hebat moved the tiny pitcher before Stanley, at her sign.

"Thanks— I think what I need is plenty of fruit— my nerves are crying for it. And, allow me to say that I was fortunate that the island to which I came was Castle Reef." He bowed to his hostess.

"You still look worn," said the planter. "Your eyes show the strain of pain. Well, this sunlight'll cure you. You're welcome to stay as long as you like. Castle Reef has a limited society, as you'll discover— and we'll enjoy having you here— won't we, dear?"

"There is every reason why Mr. Stanley's coming will only make us the happier," said the planter's wife. "And perhaps you'll find the plantation house more agreeable than the bungalow on the hill."

"We'll leave the decision to Mr. Stanley," said Finlayson.

The guest beamed. "You certainly make me feel at home. I hope that if you ever come to Batavia, you'll let me return this hospitality. Just ask for Stanley, the rubber man. Any driver will know, in case you arrive ahead of a letter."

"Rubber, eh! That's good— I've some trees up in the hills you'll be interested in looking at— I'm not sure what they are. But I'd have taken you for a man interested in financial matters— somehow. Anyway, if you don't mind my saying it, I can see that you're accustomed to doing things on a big scale."

Mr, Stanley showed a modest embarrassment, but he relished the fact that he had made the impression he sought for with the planter.

"And it's so nice to have a gentleman come to Castle Reef, Mr. Stanley," put in Mrs. Finlayson. "It's an infrequent thing, on an island so isolated. Not all those who come here are— well, you understand; we don't open the house to— everybody."

Stanley glanced at his hostess, and caught her hesitant meaning, and understood the look she gave her husband.

"I quite understand," said Stanley. "You've got to be— well, 'discriminating' may be the word, but if a person wanted to speak bluntly, 'careful,' would do. You must have to deal with all kinds of— say, shady— characters,"

Finlayson and his wife exchanged frank glances. They seemed to be mutually satisfied that Mr. Stanley had formed opinions of his own, but refrained from committing himself too far.

"Why, yes," said Finlayson slowly. "Now and then somebody comes along, and we have to be cautious. And, by the way, did you find Mr. Easton and Mr. Hassler agreeable— companionable?"

Mr. Stanley was carving his pawpaw with his spoon. His hand, white and soft, was embellished with an excellent diamond ring. Now the spoon became immovable, while he gave Finlayson a bland, yet mildly surprised stare. And the guest's eyes twinkled, as the shadow of a smile crossed his face.

" 'Agreeable' fits the case, sir— 'companionable' is a word that I would prefer to withhold until I have carried my observations a trifle farther."

"Of course, you feel the restraint of a guest," said Finlayson. "We appreciate that— but you are rather a special guest, Mr. Stanley, and the fact that you are here at our table proves it."

"Yes, you belong to the household, Mr. Stanley," said the planter's wife. She attempted a significance deeper than the words in her tone—and she glanced at Stanley.

Stanley bowed again and muttered something appreciative.

"If I can be of any service, why, give me your confidences."

"You felt— thoroughly comfortable?" asked Finlayson. "They did what they could, as fellow guests?" And Finlayson lifted a finger in a signal to Hebat to refill Mr. Stanley's glass from the yellow fruit juice in the glass bowl.

Mr. Stanley did not reply at once, but touched his lips with a polite napkin. He appeared to be thinking for the suitable words that would fit the problem.

"I can't say— that I'd be warranted in making any complaint. I'm quite satisfied— for the time being." He lacked a certain enthusiasm for the guest bungalow. And he drank the fruit juice.

"Perhaps I could put up a first-chop bungalow for you— one with plenty of kajangs so the air would be dry and a double roof to avoid excessive heat; also, a little nearer to us than the hilltop." It was the host speaking.

Mrs. Finlayson now leaned toward Mr. Stanley, lowering her voice.

"I'm sure that you don't want to stay on at the bungalow where you'd quartered now," she said.

"Oh, I'll stay where I'm put," said Stanley earnestly. "I don't want to be any bother— I've planted myself on you, and I certainly don't intend to find fault with my quarters— or the men I camped with last. night."

Mrs. Finlayson laughed lightly.

"Exactly— 'camped' shows how you feel about it. Now, Ned, it's plain enough that. Mr. Stanley is being considerate. He wants more privacy than he'll get where he is, but he doesn't want to say so— now frankly, Mr. Stanley?"

"Oh, I never intended last night's quarters for Mr. Stanley as anything but temporary," said the planter.. "I can throw up a small bungalow in a day with my workmen, and you can have your own house boys." We'll fix you up— won't we, dear?"

"Ned," began Mrs. Finlayson, suddenly openly serious, "I know that Mr. Stanley is the kind of man you can take into your confidence. I really do—and I wish you would. He's had a chance to—well, observe—those two on the hill. And it's time that you two men compared notes."

Finlayson nodded, his look reflective. Hebat's assistant took away plates with the pawpaw rinds and brought hot dishes for the fish course. The three at the table sat in silence for a minute or two while the soft-shod feet of Malays pattered about on the side veranda.

With the fish served, Finlayson began abruptly:

"I'm going to be frank, Mr. Stanley. Those two men are strangers to us. They are guests, but they arrived without any by-your-leave. I don't like to criticize them, but I feel warranted in asking you what you think of them— and before I tell you too much, so you'll be able to give an unbiased judgment."

Mr. Stanley did not appear to be surprised. He leaned back in his chair a trifle, and his eyes examined critically the edge of the thatch at the overhanging eaves.

"I feel better that you've taken this up with me without delay," said Stanley in a minute. "I happen to have considerable money with me— and some other valuables. And I'd made up my mind to discuss these two gentlemen with you."

"There! You don't like them!" said Mrs. Finlayson, leaning forward.

Stanley turned his head. Hebat had gone inside through the near-by kajang, and was coming out again. He took care not to make any unnecessary noise, even in his softly shod feet. And Stanley seemed curious for an instant about the movements of the chief servant.

"So you have a decided opinion on them!" said Finlayson, with a look of triumph to his wife. "Didn't I tell you, dear? Mr. Stanley is too shrewd a man to be fooled— by them!"

Stanley straightened, and casting glances to right and left, he said:

"I can report that my impressions of those two men lead me to wonder if you're not taking great risks by having them on the island."

"I agree with you," said Finlayson. "And, your opinion tallies with ours, without our leading you to suspicion." He then gave a brief account of how Easton and Hassler had come to the island.

"It's a queer proposition all around," said Stanley. "And the thing that struck me as important, was that Mr. Easton was out of his class in traveling with this— what's his name?"

"Hassler," supplied the planter.

"Yes, the dark, short man," nodded Stanley. "They did a good deal of whispering after I turned in last night. They didn't realize that I slept fitfully, and that half a dozen times I was aware of a covert conversation. And I imagine that they've kept you on the anxious seat since they came."

"I'm not specially anxious about them," said Finlayson carelessly. "If I'd considered them dangerous to myself and my wife, I could've sent 'em away the other day, when a schooner— the Amoy Maid— passed here. Or I could've taken Mrs. Finlayson with me in the schooner— or got some extra firearms from the Maid's skipper."

"Oh, then you've been in touch with a schooner since they arrived? And— of course— you gave the skipper an account of them— so the coast guard will drop in to look 'em over."

"No, I only took out some fruit to the skipper. At that time, I hadn't any suspicions about Easton and Hassler, so I said nothing."

Stanley relaxed in his chair. He had taken on some of Finlayson's peace of mind. And Hebat was helping him to fish. "Well, I presume there are coast- guard cutters going to and fro at regular intervals? You can get help before very long?"

"We don't see a government cutter once in six months," said the planter. "We're off the regular beat of such boats, you know. My father was here a long time, and most of the ship masters know us. So if these men intend any mischief, and were to commit a crime, they'd have a hard time getting away."

"And the Malays? They'd make considerable trouble for anybody who tried to harm you?"

"Oh, the Malays are mild enough here. And I don't keep much cash here —and I doubt that Easton and Hassler has any designs on the plantation, or us."

"We're probably safe enough ourselves," said Mrs. Finlayson. "But it would be an awful shock—and something to shrink from over a long time— if they murdered anybody here."

"Murder!" said Stanley. "Who, then, would they murder?"

"That's just what we don't knew," said the planter. "All the same'"—he paused, leaning toward his guest a little— "before they leave, there's every evidence that these men are going to make trouble, and serious trouble,  for somebody."

Stanley blinked, puzzled by the planter.

"Somebody?" he repeated. "Natives? Or are there other white people on this island ?"

"No, not natives—and we're the only whites."

"But we are afraid of a tragedy," said Mrs. Finlayson. "And if something dreadful happens it'll spoil the island for me. I hate to even think of it!" She shuddered slightly.

"I don't— follow you in—" Stanley was now amazed—and not a little worried.

"It's this way," explained Finlayson. "They have a carefully laid plan, and they intend to carry it out here. I don't want 'em to. I'd like to forestall the thing. I might lose all of my workers— you know how these Malays are after somebody had been killed on a place— not to mention the poor devil who's been marked for slaughter. We feel as if we were waiting for an execution which we'll like to stop, but can't, somehow."

Stanley's lips had taken on a swift limpness. And he stared at Finlayson as if struck dumb with horror.

"Why!" he gasped presently. "I'm nervous— my condition, you know— but your language is something I didn't expect. And what do you mean— by execution?"

Finlayson smiled.

"Please don't feel alarmed— none of us at the table is in danger. But Mrs. Finlayson and myself agreed that we'd take you fully into our confidence— and I'll tell you the whole plan."

"You see," put in Mrs. Finlayson, "we knew you could be trusted— with everything. We knew that Captain Reeves would not have sent a man ashore here to us without knowing he was trustworthy."

Stanley bowed to wife and husband in turn.

"I feel complimented— and honored. Certainly, Captain Reeves knows enough about me to feel satisfied on that score— that I'm— a man of some standing in business. And I assure you, I can be trusted. Your problems are mine. I shall respect any confidence to the full." He spoke with such intensity of feeling that his voice shook.

"I felt sure of that," the planter answered heartily. "You won't want to stay with that pair another night— you'll get your belongings out of that bungalow at once."

Mr. Stanley sat straight up in his chair, his fork suspended.

"As bad as that!" he gasped.

Finlayson smiled enigmatically. Then he spoke under his breath:  "Their party is not complete."

Stanley was really alarmed now. He saw that the planter really knew something that might seriously interfere with all the carefully laid plans of the trio. The guest's stained forehead wrinkled.

"What do you mean—'party?' "

"They're expecting another man."

"Really!"

But though his single word was a pretended apprehension, Stanley really relaxed and felt relief. For it was evident that Finlayson could not suspect his guest and tell of a third man who was expected on the island. The planter was duped— and the three were safe.

"No doubt of it," said Finlayson. "And crook No. 3 is the man they intend to kill."

Mr. Stanley's fork clattered to the veranda floor. His sudden and uncontrollable start was only a slight indication of his real emotions.

6: Counterplot.

FINLAYSON did not seem surprised at Stanley's show of alarm. And Hebat picked up the fork and supplied a fresh one, while the guest continued to stare at the. planter.

"It's natural enough for you to be a bit startled," said Finlayson quietly, as he continued to put canned butter on a biscuit. "It gave us rather a jolt, I'll admit."

Mrs. Finlayson nodded gravely.

Stanley felt calmer when he realized that his amazement was taken for granted. But he was still unable to control himself. His mouth opened, slowly closed, opened again, his full lips twisting with his thoughts. He grew red over the unstained areas of his face. The perspiration stood out on his nose.

"Now, Mr. Stanley, you see what a terrible thing is before us," said Mrs,

Finlayson. "The man who's coming seems to be a friend of theirs— and he probably trusts them."

"You— you didn't learn— the name— of this man coming?" asked Stanley.

"No— that's the trouble," said Finlayson, "But we'll know him when he asks for 'em. Even though he may be a crook, I don't want him killed on this island."

"And you can help us save him— from death, anyhow," said Mrs, Finlayson.

"Oh, yes— count on me. I'll do what I can," said Stanley.

"They may carry out their purpose in spite of us," said the planter. "Men capable of such a damnable piece of double-dealing will be hard to beat if they suspect that their game is to be balked."

"But what do they want to kill him for? Did you learn that?" asked Stanley.

"Yes," said Finlayson. "It appears that the three of them are involved in some big deal— a money deal of some sort. Loot, probably. And I'd say Hassler and Easton don't want to split it three ways."

Stanley was at his ease again. He felt deeply thankful for the way things had turned. He knew now fully just what the planter knew— and felt sure he was aware of just how much the planter did not know. And the guest's thankfulness was based on the fact that the planter and his wife had never for a minute assumed that the man who had come ashore from the Pointer was the third man. It was all another triumph for Stanley, and he congratulated himself on his ability to handle people. But Easton and Hassler had been stupid— that was plain enough. It seemed incredible that they had failed to keep such vital secrets away from the planter. But the matter was not past remedy as Stanley saw it. He needed more information.

" 'When thieves fall out,' " he began to quote; then angled for more details. "But how can you be sure of all this? You may be putting a wrong construction on—"

"I know!" broke in Finlayson. "It's all so appalling, so ruthless, that if I hadn't got it just the way I did, I probably wouldn't have believed it myself."

"We're absolutely sure,' said Mrs. Finlayson. "We've talked it all out. We hoped at first that we were mistaken."

The guest did not glance her way. His look was fixed upon the planter.

"Then you must have full trust in your informant's story."

"My informant is myself," said Finlayson. "It was this way: They were then staying here at the house, just after they came. They were pretty well done up after the hard trip in the outrigger, exposed to the sun— from Catabaygan. I had begun to build the new house for them, and Mrs. Finlayson and I started across the flats. They stayed in one of these back rooms, where they'd slept the night before. I turned back— I'd forgotten something or other—"

"The small saw, dear," said his wife.

"Oh, yes— it was under the house here. And this building is more or less like a basket. I didn't intend to listen— we had no suspicions of them at that time. But they thought they were alone, and I thought they were asleep, so I was quiet. But when I began to understand what they were saying— well, I was staggered.

"Then you heard— quite a conversation?" said Stanley.

"Yes, but not complete. They were discussing the man they expect when I first got under the house— they referred to him as 'too damned bossy.' That was Easton's expression."

"Easton, eh?" said Stanley, as if that were something important to be kept in mind.

"Also, I take it, they feel they've done the work— the hard work— and the really dangerous part of the business. And Hassler said something about how the third man puts on too— much style; and Hassler said something to the. effect that the third man would 'give 'em the dish' when everything was cleared away."

Stanley looked keenly alert.

"Oh, there's jealousy involved, eh? And we can be sure of one—" He checked himself. He had been about to say that the third man must be of a higher type than the other two, but that was a thought he knew must be kept from Finlayson's mind. So Stanley used his napkin hastily and took a deep drink from his glass.

"I'd call it more than jealousy," said Finlayson. "They spoke with a sense of deep hatred."

Stanley's eyes wandered to the sea horizon while he thought.

"Did they say— how they'd kill? Have they any arms?"

"It was arms they were discussing at that time," said the planter. '"Hassler's idea was that they'd need a weapon by the time this third man arrived. I believe they expect him to. have arms. And the argument was that if the third man knew they didn't have arms— which it seems he does know— it would be easy to kill him before he was aware of the fact that they had a gun.

"I'm sure that they did not bring guns from the port they came from— to avoid any trouble with the customs. But the third man is to bring them weapons. And Easton argued that they would not depend upon the weapons the third man would supply. "There may be no powder in the cartridges,' he said, 'and if we pull a gun on him, to settle his hash, he'll just give us the laugh and kill us both.' "

Stanley smiled. "That sounds as if Mr. Easton's the man with the brains in the pair," he said.

"Oh, Easton handles the other one, right enough. Hassler listens to him. Easton's idea was that they should steal my revolver. I had an old-style navy .38, long barreled, in a holster behind a kajang in my front room."

Stanley leaned forward.

"You saved it, eh?"

"No. Hassler balked for a minute. But Easton won him over—and I heard somebody— Hassler, I'd say— walk into the front room and back again. They left the holster and the belt, so I'd think when I saw the bend of the belt that the revolver was still there. I had started to come out and run up the veranda— but they'd beaten me to it— and I kept my mouth shut. You see, I didn't know they were going to act so promptly. By the time I got inside the house they'd slipped out the back way. When they came back— well, the revolver was hidden out in the brush. And they were smooth as silk."

"They're a precious pair," said Stanley. "And you were right not to start any trouble about the revolver. Of course, you've got another, so—"

"No, I haven't," said the planter. "I've kept down to a bare minimum with firearms here— natives generally steal 'em. And I thought at first that Easton and Hassler were bunkered, because that gun in the holster was empty. I went on that assumption for several days, feeling pretty safe. Then I found that a jacket which had cartridges in a special pocket had been raided— and ten cartridges missing. So— they've got ammunition."

"But you've never hinted that you've missed the revolver?"

"Not a word. I've kept on a good friendly basis with 'em. So we'll have to hold that confidence with 'em, and not get 'em nervous."

"I suppose you sent some word of all this to Captain Reeves?' Stanley's voice was curiously soft.

"No, I didn't. If I had, he'd've come in and anchored. And a delay to the Pointer would've meant heavy expense to Reeves. I don't like to load my troubles on my friends. Besides, the minute I knew you intended to stay, I saw you'd be some help. However, I'd have warned you if I'd had any chance, but they made it their business to be on the beach. They didn't want you to come ashore— they advised against it."

"By George, I wouldn't have come if I'd known it— not alone," said Stanley. "Their whispering last night was probably a discussion of what they ought to do about me— kill me— so I'd be out of the way. They certainly didn't want me here."

"More likely," said Finlayson, "they wondered if you had any arms— and if there are any in our luggage— gone by now!" He waved his hands in a gesture of disgust. "It's my fault. You should have come up to the house last night with me— I should have insisted upon it."

"It's all right," said Stanley. "I've got no arms to steal, except this little pistol under my belt here. As to my sleeping here, they might have got in a panic last night if they'd thought I was to be given any information against 'em. You worked it better as it was— you demonstrated a lack of suspicion."

"They may feel that this invitation to tiffin— alone— is something to be suspicious about," said Mrs. Finlayson.

"I'll send the servants up for your luggage," said the planter.

Stanley nodded. "You've done right to keep them in the dark about what you know, Mr. Finlayson. Just as long as they feel safe, we're all safe."

"But we ought to make up our minds . on what to do in case we can get word away to some port. Maybe you'll agree with me that it will be wise to send out the proa to speak the first sail or smoke that's sighted— some precaution."

"I'm sure it would be dangerous," said Stanley. "They'd know it meant an alarm."

"That's what. I've told Ned," said Mrs. Finlayson. "I'm glad you agree with me, Mr. Stanley."

"All right," agreed Finlayson. "I'm out-voted. But won't they also be suspicious if you, Mr. Stanley, leave the bungalow?"

Stanley considered.

"We'll make that separation gradually. I'll find some excuse— and apparently leave against my will."

"That's it!' said Finlayson. "You must fool them utterly. They must feel absolutely secure, and you must be friendly with them. And probably. it'll be a mistake to move too abruptly, if you can stick it out another night or two. Then— the jungle is damp— any reason that seems to fit. We've discovered mutual friends, or something like that. They don't suspect for one minute that I'm on—and you must reflect that frame of mind."

"Oh, right up to the hilt, sure!" said Stanley earnestly.

"We must avoid anything that would bring on a break,' went on Finlayson. "We must wait for that other man, and we must be able to warn him of his danger. Then we'll be three men against two, and I'll fix it so the two will be glad enough to take my proa and go back where they came from with a native crew from here."

"Say, that's the smartest idea yet!" said Stanley. "When they see their game is beaten, they'll get out of their own accord— and Castle Reef Island hasn't got any murder!"

"Exactly! But what're you going to do about this afternoon? And _ tonight?"

Stanley pondered for a minute. He saw that the time had come for him to leave. There was a humorous twinkle in his eyes as he lit the cigar Finlayson offered.

"I'll tell you what, Finlayson," said the guest, as he put the charred match in a shell tray with careful fingers. "I'd better not stay any longer now— and don't send a servant for my luggage. It'll be more natural and above-board if I just drift up there, and casually pass the word that you've spoken highly of 'em."

"Fine!" said Finlayson admiringly.

"That's the best possible thing you could say," agreed the planter's wife.

"And," went on Stanley, in his expansively important way, now that he was primed with information and was sure of a satisfactory outcome, "I'll drop a word or two about how you showed me a fine repeating rifle, and some paper targets showing what a good marksman you are at long ranges. That'll give 'em something to whisper about, eh?" His shoulders shook with convulsive and deep laughter which he restrained otherwise— an internal chuckling over his huge joke.

Both the planter and his wife laughed openly and appreciatively.

"That's a masterly stroke!" declared Finlayson.

Stanley got to his feet, took the gay hat which Hebat handed him, and walked to the stoop. The departing guest held the hat gallantly a few inches above his head, and went down. He turned and bowed.

"We'll be so eager to hear about it all," said Mrs, Finlayson.

"I'll let you know all about it, be sure of that. I must thank you both for a most delightful tiffin— I've enjoyed myself immensely."

The guest smiled, nodded, put on his hat, took his cigar between his teeth with a firm grip, and sauntered away into the palm grove.

7: Double Murder!

FOR HALF AN HOUR or more Stanley strolled by the beach and wandered through the palm grove of the flats, gradually making his way to the trail.

As he walked, he laughed now and then. Some of the planter's Malays, busy among the trees, stared curiously at the new white man who wandered about by himself and found cause for hilarity over nothing at all.

But Stanley— or Gurnley— was highly elated with himself.

"I've got the thing by the tail!" he boasted. "And it's lucky I got here when I did, or the whole thing might have been messed up beyond my ability to straighten it."

He paused, and allowed himself a minute of scenery. The sea was a clear, deep blue. The sunlight filtered down upon him through the palms in a way that he savored. He enjoyed the lacy whiteness of the gentlest surfs, soapily washing the sand and coral, and making a long, graceful, wavering line on the shingle with shells and bits of flotsam.

The roar from the reef, farther out, had a soothing effect upon his mind. It was the sort of sound that could lull a man to long, delicious periods of sleep through many a month of waiting in peaceful security.

By the time he reached the trail he was whistling softly. And the smile that constantly hovered about his mouth interrupted his tune. To any observer, he was a man without worries. He had told the truth when he said he had enjoyed the tiffin; and there was satisfaction in having gained to full measure the thing he had sought for at the plantation house. Finlayson had supplied all the information needed to insure success on the island.

Tunefully he mounted the slopes, in no hurry. For while Stanley had loitered on beach and grove, Hebat had carried up the lunch tray to Easton and Hassler, and had come down again to disappear in the plantation house. The two in the bungalow would have finished their tiffin by this time, and would be eagerly awaiting the news about Finlayson's attitude toward them.

And when he gained the last upper bench of ground, Gurnley could see the two men seated on a mound of lava in front of the bungalow, watching the trail. They were smoking at their ease.

Gurnley took off his hat and swung it at them, conveying what he could of the idea that his visit to the planter had been satisfactory. They waved to him in reply, but remained where they were.

When he had arrived within ten yards of the two, Gurnley bared his head again, wiped at his face, and grinned broadly. He did a little jig step in the trail and laughed.

"Wine with the lunch, eh?" called Easton with a laugh. "The sick man comes back with a snootful!"

Gurnley walked up to them, cast a wary eye about to make sure there were no straggling natives observing them, and said gleefully:

"And both ears full! The both of 'em are thoroughly boobed!"

"What'd I say?" demanded Hassler triumphantly. "We're all right!"

"Well, break the glad news to us, big boss," said Easton happily. '"Certainly, things went well."

"Couldn't have been better!' Gurnley assured them, his voice raised. "That planter's a fine chap! And his wife— charming! I enjoyed every second!"

Hassler gave Easton a playful poke in the ribs.

Gurnley dropped his voice now.

"Boys," he began, "the goose hangs high. No reason to lose any sleep around this beautiful island. Why, you confounded ninnies, what'd you want to give me that scare for? Those people below are safe as a church!"

"Come inside," said Easton. "The Malay's gone, and we're all by our lonesome, but it's just as well that we're not too chummy out in the open."

"Sure, everything out of sight," agreed Gurnley. "But not one of us is under suspicion. Finlayson's got no message away to the police or coast guard., I managed to find out everything.. The last thing in his mind is that I came here to meet you."

"You're the goods!" declared the baron.

The three went into the bungalow, took chairs and sat.

"At first, I felt that the planter had something under his hat," resumed Gurnley. "But that was because I felt I was on thin ice with him. But I could tell before long by his wife's talk that there was nothing worrying 'em. And by the time I left, I was standing ace high with 'em."

"An educated guy like you can always swing it with these uppish kind," commended Hassler.

"And," went on Gurnley, "if they did have any sneaking fears about you two, I cured 'em. I certainly put on strong— how I enjoyed myself last night, how you did everything to make me comfortable, and so on." He loosed his tie and soft collar, and worked himself out of his coat without getting up, letting the garment fall over the back of the bamboo chair. He let both his feet slide out in front of him, stretching his big legs. His face was still wet with perspiration after his climb up the hill— and over-red. The stained and unstained areas of it almost blended in color. He pushed his damp hair away from his forehead so that it stuck straight up. He hooked his thumbs in the sides of his cummerbund. He was the picture of a thoroughly pleased man who is ready for well-merited praise after closing a difficult deal.

Hassler also felt that he had triumphed.

"Well, I guess I didn't crab the party so much, at that, when I lifted that gun! Did he say anything about it?"

Gurnley took his time to answer.

"Yes, he did— and he was worried about it, too. But the fool thinks it was a Malay who lifted it. Say, he's simple, that fellow!" He laughed softly.

Easton and Hassler joined in the joke on the planter.

"And you know what he told me? Now that he's got three white men on the island with him, he's got no reason to worry even if the natives have pinched his revolver! Can you beat it?" He leaned back and rocked himself on- the rear legs of the chair.

"And all the beefin' I've heard about that gun!" said Hassler, with a look at Easton. The dark man made a grimace of disgust, and spat on the floor.

"Yes, we razzed you plenty," admitted Gurnley. "As a matter of fact, the gun was just what we needed to work things out right." He nodded his head soberly.

"How's that?" asked Hassler, a little puzzled that condemnation had turned to commendation so suddenly.

Gurnley hunted a fresh cigar out of his coat pocket behind him, bit the end of it, and struck a match.

"This way," he said between puffs. "If things fall so we have to kill Finlayson, it'll be better to do it with his own gun." He met their eyes with a frank stare.

"You're right!" declared Easton. "I'll see it. Baron, I'm glad you stole it— now."

Gurnley continued:

"We'll have to rig the thing so the natives and his wife'll be fooled. As for her, the shock'll probably kill her anyway— but we'll be in the clear. We'll avoid any funerals as long as we can— but if he should get wise— blam! Only for emergency, mind! Only if he's about to spill the beans to some ship or coast guard after he blunders into something. We can't be sure some ship won't drop in here and leave a police warning with our descriptions. If. that happens— we've got to protect ourselves and put him out proper."

"But when we have to kill him, we've got the scheme all set and ready to shoot! You always keep three jumps ahead of the game, big boss," said Easton admiringly.

"I always try to be ready," said Gurnley with modesty. "I may not be right all the time, but—"

"You got us here— and the stuff here— all safe enough," said Hassler. "You done the thinkin'— and you been right so far."

"We know we can always depend on your decisions," said Easton. "And I certainly needed you before this. When Finlayson took his wife out to the schooner, right after the baron lifted the gun, I had reason to worry. She was sick— and she hates to get into a boat. Well, that had my goat!"

"You had every reason to be pessimistic," agreed Gurnley ponderously, puffing his cigar. "I'd have been worried myself. But it turned out all right. Cut the worry now. We're safe. We can take our time. You see, the very fact that the baron here got the gun before I was on the island, made Finlayson willing to tell me about it. Otherwise, he might have had doubts about us "

Hassler laughed hoarsely. "The early bird snitches the gun!" he laughed.

"Well," said Gurnley, "I'm going to make it my business to stay thick with the planter and his wife. I want to know what they're thinking about— just for safety. Now, Mrs. Finlayson happened to say she's out of reading. That's what they went out to the schooner for— to swap fruit for books. The schooner didn't have any. But I've got a couple of novels with me."

Hassler slapped his knees and roared with laughter.

"So it was books they wanted! And I git ripped up the back proper!"

"Oh, shut up!" said Easton. "Drop that damned schooner stuff!'

Gurnley rose.

"I told Mrs. Finlayson I'd send 'em down." He turned to Easton with a smile. "Here's a chance to-make yourself solid down there. You take the books— I'm supposed to be tired after my walk, see? It gives you an excuse for making a call and asking about her health."

"You mean— right away?" Easton smoothed his hair with both hands.

"Sure!" Gurnley began to unfasten the straps around a steamer rug. "Say I'll be down a little later. It shows 'em that we're all on a friendly basis— and you can say a word or two about how you. like me. We'll all work together on this business— and keep solid with the house down on the flats." He chuckled.

Easton put on a fresh shirt, buttoned a white coat, and by the time his tie was ready, Gurnley had the books out of the rug roll.

"You'll notice that I've got 'R. Stanley' written in the volumes," he pointed out to both of the men.

"Say, you think of everything!" said Hassler, with a shake of his head that was a tribute to the ability of the leader.

"No, not everything— but I do my best. I have to study things out. Now, Mr. Easton, I want you to wear your best manners. You've been neglecting your social duties!"

"Oh, he's a swell, all right!" jeered Hassler.

Easton took the books and went out without any delay, waving an assuring hand to Gurnley.

Gurnley sat down again, resuming his cigar thoughtfully. Hassler got his pipe going well, and their eyes followed the tall figure departing into the lower levels of second growth. Then they saw Easton leave the great ferns for the open trail leading down to Finlayson's house.

"Everything jake at last, eh, big boss?" said Hassler contentedly.

"Everything nice and tidy," agreed Gurnley. "All we've got to do is sit tight— and wait."

"You said it!"

"Would you mind handing me a drink of water, baron?"

Hassler rose promptly, crossed the room to the rear and reached for the dipper on a hook. "That Hebat boy brought in some fresh," he remarked. He brought the dipper in his right hand, the left supporting the cup carefully against spilling as he walked.

Gurnley was still sprawled backward, legs thrust out, his arms crossed on his cummerbund, his right toward his left hip.

As Hassler drew near, directly in front of him, Gurnley did not reach to take the dipper. But his right hand lifted in a swift, jerky motion— his automatic glinted in the sunlight from the doorway, and at the same instant he fired.

The bullet, at such close range, fairly blasted Hassler off his feet. He lifted from the floor in a grotesque, stiff-legged jump, uttering a gurgling cry that was like a cough. His right hand flew high, tossing the dipper into .the rafters. His dark head snapped backward, and his face upraised, the eyes bulging with shock and pained surprise. His feet struck the floor again, and he took a couple of limp and shuffling steps backward, then bent forward and fell face down. The water he had thrown upward came down upon him, and the dipper rattled near by.

"That'll teach you to steal guns— to kill me with," growled Gurnley.

The man with the automatic remained sitting in the chair, watching the prostrate man, who was now coughing stranglingly. His right hand fumbled along his right leg, twitching, and feeling for the stolen weapon in his hip pocket. Then the hand stopped, and the curling fingers fell limp upon the flooring, splayed out wide like the points of a starfish.

Gurnley saw that he did not need to waste another bullet. He was conscious now of the sound of running feet out on the trail. He left his chair and ranged himself alongside the inner wall near the doorway, waiting, automatic in hand.

Easton, just as he had gained the lower level of the first bench of land on the slope below the bungalow, had heard the shot fired by Gurnley. And Easton had stopped in dismay, puzzled at first as to where the report had come from. As he searched the flats below for some sign that would explain the shot, he saw that others were looking about like himself. And they were all looking up to the hills. Among the palms before the planter's place a white figure had come to a tense standstill. Mrs. Finlayson was visible— she was staring across the gentle swale that separated the two buildings. On the sandy flats among the trees, natives at work had suddenly frozen into wooden men— listening. All at once, every moving thing in sight, it seemed to Easton, had become a solid part of the immovable landscape. Only the gulls whirled and dipped and rose again above the line of the shaking coconut mops as the birds ranged over the forth along the beach.

There was a rumbling echo from the hills across the valley beyond Finlayson's house— and then Easton knew that the shot he had heard had come from the bungalow he had just left.

It seemed impossible that anything could have gone wrong at the bungalow, with its general agreement that everything was as it should be with the three men. He dropped the books and nibbled at his nails. The silence which followed the shot only increased his fears that something disastrous had happened. He waited for voices— for another shot— for anything that would give him a key to what had taken place back in the bungalow.

"That crazy fool of a baron!" he whispered. "I'll bet he's fired off that stolen gun— maybe at some lurking native!"

He ran up the trail and approached the bungalow.

Gurnley appeared in the doorway. Easton could detect nothing about him that indicated he was in any way alarmed.

"Oh, I thought you were gone," called the big man carelessly.

"Say, what was that shot?" demanded Easton.

Gurnley gave a grunt of disgust.

"Aw, you might've known that the fool baron would pull something to gum the game for us. He dropped that big— you know the one— and it went off."

Easton moved on toward the bungalow.

"I guessed it right, the first time," he grumbled. "The whole island's on its toes after that blast— and the kajangs all open, too. They must have heard it a mile— the planter's wife— the natives down below— all looking up this way when I turned back. Now they'll know we've got a gun, and they'll all suspect it's Finlayson's. What'll the damned fool baron do next?"

Something made Easton stop; he knew 'that Hassler should be arguing to excuse his carelessness, or moving about. And— Easton had caught a queer look of anger in Gurnley's face which did not fit with the soft carelessness of his voice.

Gurnley,: seeing Easton's hesitation, turned to look back into the room, as if at Hassler.

"I tell you, baron, put it away!" he commanded irritably. "Hide it! That Malay'll get his eyes on it if you don't take care! And if you keep on monkeying with it, you'll most likely fire it again."

Easton, from where he was standing on the ground at a lower level than the sill of the door, could not see Hassler lying on the floor. But assured, now, that Gurnley was really talking to the baron as Gurnley pretended, he slowly started up the steps.

But Gurnley, standing athwart the doorway, did not make way for Easton to enter. His body covering the doorway, the big man's right hand was apparently resting on a shelf just inside.

"You know," he observed lightly, as if he were mentioning some unimportant trifle, "Mr. Finlayson told me of a little conversation you had— with the baron. The planter was under his house, but you two didn't know it— and Finlayson heard everything."

Again Easton halted— on the top step. Now he saw that the look on Gurnley's face was accusing. "A— a conversation?" repeated Easton, faltering. "Why— what about?"

"About how you told the baron to steal the revolver," replied Gurnley, "so the two of you could do for me— when I got here." His voice was pleasant. And he smiled.

"I told the baron? When?" repeated Easton. But he divined the bitter enmity in Gurnley's smooth words. So Easton did not finish his question. His eyes roved over Gurnley's shoulder and: caught a glimpse of the figure stretched on the bamboo floor. In that fraction of an instant Easton understood the degree of disaster which was upon him. One foot went back, feeling for the step beneath. "That's crazy talk!" he cried. "Don't fall for—"

"No, I ain't crazy," retorted Gurnley. "I've got wise." Now there was a rasp in his tones. "Told you I'd made a hit with the planter, didn't I? That was the truth. And he handed me the lowdown on you two birds, but he doesn't know I'm in on the game. So let me tell you something— you've lost out! Because I'm not a man to double cross. Told you that once before, and you didn't believe it. You'll believe it when I'm done with—"

Easton turned swiftly, hoping to break for safety. But Gurnley was too quick for him. The right hand that had been on the shelf came into sight, and the automatic pistol snapped to within a foot of Easton's side. Gurnley fired twice.

Easton pitched headlong off the stoop. Striking the ground at the foot of the steps, he rolled over a couple of times in the sweet-smelling ferns before the bungalow. Then he lay with one arm under his head, his dying look fixed on the swaying tops of the palms and on the wheeling gulls.

Gurnley hastened down to him, and. made sure that he was in his death agony. Easton's lips twitched and he showed his teeth, but he could not speak. Gurnley took from him, and pocketed, the automatic pistol which Gurnley had himself supplied to Easton the night before.

"I guess that'll be about all," said Gurnley. Then he went inside to Hassler. The latter was dead beyond a doubt. From the body Gurnley took both the revolver Hassler had stolen from Finlayson and the automatic brought from the Pointer.

Hurriedly pulling off his own white coat, Gurnley held it up before him in his left hand and into its right front near the low pocket, fired the planter's weapon so that a bullet went through the fabric from the inside. Then he fired into the thatch overhead, dropped the revolver near Hassler's right hand, but kept the pistol.

Now Gurnley was ready to leave the bungalow. He put on the perforated coat, ran his fingers through his thick hair to stand it on end and rumple it. Then, holding in his hand the automatic with which he had killed the two men, he bolted out of the house, bareheaded, yelling as he ran:

"Mr. Finlayson! Oh, Mr, Finlayson!"

Down the trail went Gurnley, toward the edge of the hill. When he entered the high brush and ferns, he paused.

"That damned Hebat!" he muttered. "If he's around—"

But there was no sign of anybody either in the clearing or in the near-by jungle. He rushed away again, heading for the flats below. And now, he shouted again and again for Finlayson. putting the utmost of excitement and fear into the summons.

Presently other shouts answered. There were Malays running about wildly in the palm grove. As he neared them, some of the men ran toward him, screeching questions he could not understand. He was still holding the automatic, and seeing the weapon, the Malays suddenly sheered away from him, and fell to gabbling among themselves.

He tried to call. them back, then waved an arm in the direction of the hill bungalow.

"Dead!" he shouted, hoping they would understand some English. "Men dead— up there!"

Then Gurnley ran on toward the planter's house.

From where he stood, listening and watching, on his veranda, Finlayson saw the recent tiffin guest approaching; and shifting from a back pocket the revolver which Cantlow had left him. the planter thrust it handily into his right outer coat pocket.

8. One Against One.

"WHAT'S the trouble?" called Finlayson, Gurnley came panting up to the Bee of the house. Gurnley slowed to a walk, his face red and streaming with sweat. He was really winded after his run, and he answered the question chokingly.  "Hassler! He— shot— at me!"

"What for? To hold you up?" demanded the planter. He saw that his guest was carrying a pistol in his hand. Finlayson slipped his fingers over his own gun in his coat pocket.

When he was within a few feet of the planter, Gurnley threw his automatic to the ground and staggered on toward the steps. He sat on the lowest board, gasping for breath, and pretending he could not speak.

Finlayson stood near by, waiting. He was also pretending— pretending that he was shocked and amazed at the news. His manner was sympathetic, waiting until "Mr. Robertson Stanley" could get back his normal breath.

"So they were set to rob you, after all," said Finlayson. "Now— you see— they are dangerous."

Gurnley shook his head.

"They think— I'm police," he began. Then he began to tell part of his story in pantomime. Leaning back, he held out his coat front and showed the bullet hole, surrounded by pits of powder stains. "Look! Fired at close range! Nearly got me— narrow escape!" Chest heaving, he waved the perforated coat front so Finlayson could see the inside.

The planter whistled.

"And my gun?"

Gurnley nodded, for again he had no breath for speech. He waved a hand toward the trail he had just come down.

"Look out!" he whispered between his gasps. "Easton— he may come down!"

"He chased you?" The planter's face was suitably grave.

"I shot at 'em— both," said Gurnley, now better able to talk. "Guess I got Hassler— anyway, he' won't bother us much more, even if he's not dead."

"Then you hit him?"

Gurnley nodded.

"May be dead. About Easton— I'm not sure. Got two shots at him. Hear 'em? But he kept coming for me— and drove me out. He fell off the steps as I hit for the trail here— maybe stumbled, maybe he's hit. Say! Give me a drink— my heart!"

Acting the part of a man on the verge of collapse, Gurnley leaned forward, holding his head between both hands, which rested upon his knees. Finlayson climbed the steps and shouted for a servant.

A Malay boy came on the run from the cook shack in the rear. From some- where in the back of the bungalow Mrs. Finlayson called a question to her husband.

Finlayson halted on the top step.

"It's all right, dear," he told his wife. "Don't come out— you're too weak. Mr. Stanley's had trouble with the pair on the hill— I'll let you know later." And to Gurnley: "Come. up into the shade here, Mr. Stanley, if you can make it— it's too hot there where you are."

Gurnley got to his feet and wearily climbed to the veranda. There he took a chair at the table he had quitted only a short time before. The table was cleared of its dishes now. He leaned an elbow on it, and with the handkerchief he had chosen so carefully for his tiffin with the Finlaysons, he mopped sweat from face and throat.

Finlayson took a bottle and glass from the startled servant and dismissed him. As the boy disappeared, with glances over his shoulder, the planter poured out a stiff drink for his guest, who took it with shaking hand and finished it promptly.

As he set the glass on the polished board, Gurnley was ready to resume the story he had carefully thought out as he was strolling in the grove after tiffin. He felt that it was sound and wholly plausible.

The planter drew up a chair and sat down across the table from Gurnley, in such a position that he could see the trail that led down from the hill bungalow.

"Mr, Finlayson," said Gurnley, his voice conveying the seriousness of the matter, "when I left you and your wife an hour ago, I simply walked into what was intended for a death trap!"

"You never should have gone back there," said Finlayson. "I felt a bit nervous after you'd gone— but as you were armed, it seemed all right. Especially, as there was not an idea in my mind or yours that they'd think of attacking you."

"That's what made my danger all the greater. I was sure everything'd be all right— and found myself in a shooting match with two ruthless men. I don't see how I got out alive!" He worked up a fairly good shudder.

"Now you know why I was afraid— and why I did my best to warn you," said the planter.

"You had their number, old eh I'm mighty glad I took the battle on myself— now that it's turned out all right. Just fancy what it'd have meant if they'd started spilling lead with Mrs. Finlayson around— and they shoot without warning, believe me!"

"Lucky that you had a gun on you."

"Lucky I was so quick with it. But you'd better send somebody up there to have a look around. Because if we've still got Easton to deal with—we ought to find out what shape he's in, though I'm pretty sure I put one lead pill into him."

Gurnley looked around and observed several workmen gathered in the palm grove not far away, talking quietly,

"I've already sent one of my natives," said Finlayson. "But tell me— what broke the fight open? What'd they pull on you?"

"It was Hassler who made the first move," resumed Gurnley. "I had just got back into the bungalow, and I was starting to take off my coat. Had it down from my right shoulder. He was bringing me a drink of water, just as pleasant as he could be. Dipper in his left hand. As I turned to take it, he shoved your big revolver at me, and says: 'You've come here to spy on us! Put up your mitts!' It was all as quick as that!"

"Must have given you a jolt."

"You bet it did! Your gun looked like a cannon. 'What're you talking about?' I asks him, and just then I leaned a little to one side to pull my coat back on again. I was pretty badly rattled— he had the drop on me. But he never answered me— next I knew, he fired. The bullet went through the coat, as you see— right past my hip. It was the way I leaned that made him miss me.

"Well, I hadn't thought of pulling my gun— you know, I told you at tiffin I had an automatic. And on my way back, I'd loosened it some. Must've had a hunch I'd need it. Not that I really expected trouble, but I was nervous. Mr. Finlayson, I just grabbed for the automatic and fired into the smoke from that big gun of yours. And I dropped him! As he fell, he fired again, but the bullet went over my head!

"I turned to run out through the door. And there was Easton, coming for me, with one hand high up, as if he had a knife! I'm not sure what he had— something ready for me, anyhow. I fired a couple of times, quick, and kept going for that door. He backed out ahead of me, and fell. I just jumped over him— and man! I kept going, I tell you!" He sighed heavily, and fumbled in his pockets for a cigarette.

"You certainly gave 'em a surprise party! By George! They thought they had you— and they got a handful!"

"You see," went on Gurnley, as he puffed rapidly, "they took me for a detective— thought I'd trailed 'em here, and. decided they might as well finish me off. That's what they probably whispered about last night. And when you invited me to tiffin, and left 'em out, they got panicked. Figured, probably, that you'd been told what I knew, and they'd be arrested."

"Of course," said Finlayson, "they felt safe enough with only me to deal with, and the chance that I knew nothing about 'em; but with both of us— that was another thing altogether."

Gurnley nodded and glanced nervously toward the trail to the hill.

"And taking you for a police officer," Finlayson went on, "they knew you'd be armed. They'd swiped my gun— and they felt that if they killed you, they'd have yours. They could deal with me then— fully armed, and my gun in their possession. Then they'd murder the third man they're expecting. They felt cornered and ready to shoot their way through anything— beginning with you. My hat! If they'd got you, I'd have been in for it!"

"We're not out of the woods yet. We'd better find out quick about Easton. Anyhow, we're two to one now." Gurnley turned for a glance in the direction of the hill trail.

"And you've got a gun," said the planter.

Gurnley's head snapped up.

"Say! I didn't fetch away your revolver— from where Hassler dropped it. That was a fool trick to pull! Walk off and leave a loaded gun in the bungalow for Easton to get his hands on!"

"Yes, that's bad, if he's able to use it," admitted Finlayson. "I think we'd better go up there and scout around a little. Can't depend too much on what that native'll report. You see, he may be too scared to go inside the house, and unless he finds Easton dead— or moving around— we won't be sure just what we're up against. And we can't wait for sundown, either."

Gurnley assented, but did not rise.

"Sure, we'll take a look at things soon as I feel in shape for a walk— and ready for fight."

"No hurry. You've been considerably shaken up."

"I'll say I'm jarred a trifle. To have to shoot two men— and that run. I was afraid Easton would beat me down here by some short cut and put a bullet into you. Maybe he played dead on me, too, and he'll pop up on us with that big revolver."

Finlayson stood up.

"I'd better have a word with my wife. She heard the firing, and it gave her another fainting spell. I want to tell her everything's quiet—and all right. In the meantime, we'll maybe get some sort of report from the man I sent up the hill to investigate."

The planter entered the house. When he had beckoned Mrs. Finlayson out of a rear bedroom to the back veranda, he recounted Gurnley's story in normally loud tones. He wanted Gurnley to feel sure his story had been believed.

As Finlayson talked, there was a gleeful light in his eyes. And when he had finished Gurnley's yarn, the planter added a cautious, but triumphant whisper:

"Emily, that poison I fed him against Hassler and Easton at tiffin time, has worked like a charm. He just went back to the bungalow and shot 'em up— and we're safe!"

"You think it's possible— that he's killed— both?" whispered Mrs. Finlayson in return. Her face was pale with anxiety and the shock of tragedy so appalling. "Oh, Ned, I can't believe it! There was shooting, but—"

"You mean you believe the bullets went into the air? Well, maybe it's a clever blind, and I'll not trust him, anyhow."

"Don't go up there with him!"

"Not by a long shot! I was simply testing him on how eager he was to get me away from the house. But I'll not chance walking into any trap he may have set. I'll wait until Hebat brings word."

"Even if they're both dead— he's dangerous," she warned.

"Yes— but it's man to man now, in any row, assuming he told the truth about killing the others. And— he doesn't know I've got a gun." He patted his side pocket.

"He'll want to stay here—in the house with us," she said, her face worried at the prospect.

"Yes. But he'll be safe, because I'm sure he's going to take credit for what he's done—that he saved us. He wants to be solid with us. As long as he feels that way, he shouldn't want t6 try anything with me. He threw his automatic on the ground in our front yard as he came up— sort of a way of disarming himself, so I wouldn't have any suspicion against him."

"But that pistol may be empty— or jammed. Ned, you can't be too careful with that man!"

"Don't worry, dear. I'm well aware of what a tricky bird he is. But he's got sense enough to understand that he's being watched by our Malays in the grove. He'd hardly attack me under the circumstances. No, dear, he'll play as smooth a game as he can, as long as he can."

As he made a turn to go, she caught him by his arm.

"Wait here with me, Ned," she begged, "until Hebat comes! Stay away from Stanley! Oh, do, dear! Find out first whether he's been lying to you about what happened."

"I don't want him to suspect that I've the slightest doubt of his story," argued Finlayson. "You get Hebat's report, and call me in on some other pretext— medicine, or so on."

With a cautioning gesture the planter then passed through his house to the front. Gurnley was leaning back in his chair, smoking a fresh cigarette.

"I'd better gather up that gun of yours," said Finlayson, as he crossed the veranda to the stoop. He went down the steps, but hesitated there, waiting to see what the guest would say.

"Oh, yes, if you'll be so kind," said Gurnley. And, with a laugh and a shake of the head, he added: "Wasn't that another prize trick for me to pull— throwing away the only gun I've got!"

Finlayson picked up the weapon. Some of his workers moved toward him through the grove, but he gestured them back. Then the planter rejoined Gurnley and placed the pistol on the table.

"Vicious little thing, that," remarked Finlayson. "It fits into the palm of a man's hand— but it did the business when you needed it."

Gurnley did not reach for the pistol, but helped himself to another drink..

"There's about three more bullets in it— and what spare ammunition I've got is up in my luggage."

"Let's hope you won't need any more bullets."

Gurnley made a grimace .at some thought which pained him. Then:

"I hope I'll not have to kill again— not even a criminal. I had to defend myself, Mr. Finlayson— it was kill or be killed. But— I hope I won't have to use that gun on Easton again."

"Now look here, Mr. Stanley; you were justified in what you did up there," declared Finlayson. "And under my concession on Castle Reef, I've got the powers of a magistrate. So from the legal side you needn't worry. If they're both dead, they got what they deserved— and I hope Easton's dead."

"You make me feel better," returned Gurnley. "And I suppose it is best if the two are dead, taking things all around. You and Mrs. Finlayson won't have to worry about 'em any more."

Here was the attitude which the planter looked for, and he promptly met it with due praise.

"In any event, you've been a great help to my wife and me, Mr. Stanley," said Finlayson solemnly. "Your coming has been a godsend to us. Of course, you can't stay up there in that bungalow after what's happened. We expect you to move in here with us. Too. bad you had to go through that duel— your nerves have been in such bad shape with pain so long in the Pointer."

Three Malays were approaching the house down the hill from the little bungalow. Finlayson and Gurnley watched them

"Now, these men'll know something," said Gurnley. "What do you think, just from looking at them? They don't seem to be in fear of anybody behind 'em."

"No," agreed Finlayson, "they're not afraid. They're hurrying, but there's no sign of alarm. One of two things— they know that both men up there are dead, or Easton has got into the jungle. We'll find out mighty soon what—"

A high and excited voice, calling from the rise of hill back of the house, broke in upon Finlayson's comments. He knew then that Hebat was shouting something to Mrs. Finlayson, from a jungle trail which led to the house from the bungalow.

The piping words came clearly to the ears of both men on the front veranda:

"—of the new man, he who came by the ship last night! His words were soft but he deceived with them! He's killed the short man who would bring him water to drink! And after that, he laughed in the eyes of the tall one, called him back to the house, and killed him also! Then he fled this way. Beware of him! He is more evil than we thought! Tell the tuan, before—"

Hebat, the trusted servant who was supposed to understand only his own Malay, was talking the purest English!

Mrs. Finlayson saw the danger of it, and tried to check his talk by a wild waving of her hands and a warning in Malay.

"Diam! Diam!" she cried, urging him to silence. "Jangan chakap Inggris!" which latter meant, "Do not speak English!"

Now there was silence back. of the house, and in front. Hebat had clapped his hands over the lower half of his mouth, as if the caution had not come too late.

By the table on the front veranda, Gurnley's face betrayed astonishment, then fear, next rage. But Finlayson held his breath and tensed his muscles, preparing for the trouble which impended. Gurnley could be fooled no longer.

But for several minutes Gurnley did not move even an eyelash. His unkempt head cocked a trifle to one side, he turned over in his mind the thing he had just learned— Hebat understood English, he must have heard Hassler and Easton talking since their arrival on the island, had made reports to Finlayson, and then had heard without a doubt enough conversations since the arrival of the Pointer to be fully aware of the fact that the sick passenger was the third man the other two had been waiting for! The planter knew that his guest was a crook— and now would be told of the double murder in the bungalow!

It was Finlayson who spoke first.

"Looks as if Hebat gave the bungalow a careful examination," he said casually. He was not certain that Stanley had heard Hebat's report or caught the significance which lay behind the Malay's English speech. So the planter kept his eyes on Gurnley's hands and at the same time was ready to draw his own revolver.

Gurnley laughed in his throat, shook his head a little, then slowly swung round toward Finlayson.

"Mr. Planter you've played a canny game with me!" The compliment had a genuine ring. "I can see now that your yarn was as phony as it was clever. You see what I did! Hebat's got it. I shot my pals! But young man. w

He grabbed for the automatic.

Finlayson's right hand seized the other's wrist.

Gurnley froze, neither jerking his wrist from the planter's hold nor attempting to take the tabled weapon with his free hand.

Finlayson spoke.

"Don't try any gun play on me!" he advised. He reached with his left hand to snatch the automatic his way.

"What put that idea into your head?" protested Gurnley. Again he was trying to be disarmingly suave. But his voice quavered in spite of him. That slight tremolo told of a murderous wrath.

Inside the house there was a sound of running feet. But neither man glanced away from the other.

"Ned! Ned!" It was Mrs, Finlayson calling in a terrified whisper from the main room behind the partly closed kajangs.

Finlayson answered her and there was a strange hollow note in his voice.

"Go away Emily! Go away! Go back— to the veranda!"

He heard her utter words brokenly as if she were in a nightmare. She said something to Hebat in Malay. The workmen loitering and watching in the grove began to move slowly toward the veranda, now understanding that their employer was in trouble. Finlayson only waited to see what Gurnley would attempt next.

Gurnley brought the cigarette from his mouth with his free hand and tossed it over the veranda railing. And his hand kept going— to his side and to his cummerbund. He whipped out the automatic he had taken away from Hassler's body.

Finlayson thrust the muzzle of Gurnley's automatic against Gurnley's left arm. The little weapon was askew in the planter's hand and his finger was feeling for the trigger.

Gurnley threw himself backward in an effort to free his right wrist from the planter's grasp and at the same time Gurnley tried to aim his new automatic.

Finlayson fired.

With the sound of the shot there was a scream. It was Mrs. Finlayson. There came excited cries from the natives in the palm grove. Some ran away, others moved toward the house.

Gurnley fell over his chair to the matting of the veranda. He dragged Finlayson along, for the planter clung to the big man's wrist. The table crashed to its side.

The two men struggled, each seeking an advantage. Servants ran from the cook shack and there was a great clamor of voices on the verandas. Mrs. Finlayson came through the door, white and staring, with-Hebat at her heels. Finlayson was conscious of the fact that his face was wet with something warm. He supposed that he had been cut in some unaccountable manner. Then he saw that blood was pouring from a small wound in Gurnley's throat— a bullet hole from the automatic. The planter had tried to wound his guest in the arm, and in the tussle the aim had been shifted to a more deadly 'spot.

Suddenly Gurnley ceased to struggle, and lay limp upon the bleached matting of the veranda. His eyes fixed themselves upon the figure of the red-turbaned Hebat, stooped above him, kris in hand.

"You— and your damned—Engglish!" gasped Gurnley.

"Yes— he knew," said Finlayson. "I didn't want to kill you— but you knocked the gun— Emily, give me that brandy!"

But Gurnley was past the drinking of anything. The few drops of liquor remaining in the overturned bottle met a froth of blood on the dying man's lips. In a long, strangled sigh he drew his last breath.

"EMILY, listen to this!" Finlayson called one morning from his big reclining chair in the living room. He was holding before him a Shanghai newspaper which had come only an hour or so earlier by a schooner which had left mail at Castle Reef Island. "It's an item that'll interest you!"

"I don't know anybody in Shanghai, Ned," answered Mrs. Finlayson from the back of the room.

Finlayson began to read:

"The local police admit that all traces have been lost of Gurnley, Sanders and the man known as 'the baron.' They were trailed to this port, but dropped from sight. It will be remembered that Gurnley was employed by a bank in the States. He was on the verge of being found short in his accounts when he engineered a robbery with the aid of two former convicts, Sanders and the baron. Two bank watchmen were killed. The three escaped with considerable money, a good part of which was in gold coin. Gurnley separated from the other men, but is presumed to have joined them again at Honolulu. The trio reached this city, and disappeared again, It is thought that the three men got away in a sailing vessel which has not yet reached port. All vessels which cleared from this port in the period of time involved are being checked up, and the necessary cables will be sent in the hope of insuring capture of the trio."

"Gold coin!" exclaimed Mrs, Finlayson. "Ned! Does that explain to you why Hebat—"

"Yes— it explains why Hebat left us so unexpectedly," broke in the planter, laughing. "Also, how it was that he came to inherit a fortune from a so very rich uncle in Singapore."

"Hebat knew where they hid that stolen money!"

"Exactly! And the next time we walk the bund of his beautiful city, there he'll be, riding around in a silk-lined automobile, and diamonds for waistcoat buttons instead of silver coins. Well, that's what all the smartness of that crooked gang came to! All they did was to give us the scare of our lives, start a cemetery at Castle Reef Island, take the best No. 1 boy we ever had from us, and set him up in S'pore like a blooming rajah!"

________________

Table of Contents

1: The Idol's Eye / "Sapper"

2: The Desire of the Moth / Alice C. Tomholt

3: Miss Cameron's Art Sale / Charlotte Rosalys Jones

4: The Exit of Anse Dugmore / Irvin S. Cobb

5: The Third Partner / Edward S. Sorenson

6: The Forgers / Arthur B. Reeve

7: The Orange Trees / H. Bedford-Jones

8: La Haute Finance / Richard Marsh

9: The Film That Was Never Shown / "Sapper"

10: Mr. Truesdale Tells the Truth / Ellis Parker Butler

11: Pink Tulips / Ethel Lina White

12: A Memorable Night / Anna Katharine Green

13: The Suicide and the Saint / Ethel Lina White

14: To Whom This May Come / Edward Bellamy

15: Derelict / Gilbert Parker

16: The Papuan Paddle / H. de Vere Stacpoole

17: Hell in Hidden Valley / King Saxon

18: The Wedding Guest / Joseph A. Altsheler

19: The Planter at Castle Reef / Captain Frederick Moore