CHAPTER I.

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ELEVEN POSSIBLE CASES.

FRANK R. STOCKTON, FRANKLIN FYLES, JOAQUIN MILLER, MAURICE THOMPSON,

INGERSOLL LOCKWOOD, EDGAR FAWCETT, BRAINARD GARDNER SMITH, KIRKE MUNROE,

NYM CRINKLE, ANNA KATHERINE GREEN, AND Q.

CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED:

_LONDON, PARIS & MELBOURNE._

1891.

[ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.]

CONTENTS.

1. THE ONLY GIRL AT OVERLOOK, _Franklin Fyles_

2. A THING THAT GLISTENED, _Frank R. Stockton_

3. A LION AND A LIONESS, _Joaquin Miller_

4. THE CHEATED JULIET, _Q._

5. THE MYSTIC KREWE, _Maurice Thompson_

6. STRANGE ADVENTURES OF A MILLION DOLLARS, _Ingersoll Lockwood_

7. A LOST DAY, _Edgar Fawcett_

8. A TRAGEDY OF HIGH EXPLOSIVES, _Brainard Gardner Smith_

9. THE BUSHWHACKER'S GRATITUDE, _Kirke Munroe_

10. THE END OF ALL, _Nym Crinkle_

11. SHALL HE MARRY HER? _Anna Katherine Green_

THE ONLY GIRL AT OVERLOOK.

BY FRANKLIN FYLES.

CHAPTER I.

Two names were used for the only girl at Overlook. In addressing her,

the men of the place always said "Miss Warriner." In mentioning her,

they often said "Mary Mite." The reason for this distinctive difference

was revealed by the sight of Miss Mary Warriner herself, as she sat on a

high stool behind a rude desk, under a roughly-boarded shelter, and with

rapid fingers clicked the key of a telegraphic instrument. There was a

perfect poise of quiet self-possession which would have been very

impressive dignity in an older and bigger person, and which, although

here limited by eighteen years and one hundred pounds, still made a

demand for respectful treatment. Therefore the men, when in her

presence, never felt like calling her anything else than "Miss

Warriner." If she had been less like a stately damsel in miniature, and

more like such a child as she was in size only; if her employment had

been something not so near to science as that of telegraphy, and not so

far off from juvenile simplicity; if her brown hair had been loosely

curled, instead of closely coiled, and if her skirts had stopped at her

ankles instead of reaching to her feet, then she might have been

nicknamed "Mary Mite" within her own hearing, as she was beyond it, by

those who described her smallness in a sobriquet. There may have been a

variance of opinion among those dwellers at Overlook who had made any

estimate of her composure, but if there was one who believed that she

merely assumed a reserve of manner because she was among two hundred

men, he had not yet tried his chances of exceptional acquaintance.

Overlook was crude and temporary. The inhabitants were making a roadbed

for a new railway at a spot where the job was extraordinary, requiring

an uncommonly large proportion of brain to brawn in the work. Those who

were mental laborers in the remarkable feat of engineering, or were at

least bosses of the physical toil, were the ones who had errands at the

telegraphic shed, and for whom Mary sent and received messages over the

wires. The isolated colony of workers was one hundred miles deep in a

wilderness of mountain and forest, but not as many seconds distant,

measured by the time necessary for electrical communication from the

construction company's headquarters in a great city.

"Must you wait for an answer?" Mary said, as she clicked the last word

of a message. "It's an hour since your first telegram went, and they

seem in no hurry to reply."

Polite indifference, and nothing else, was in her clear, gentle voice.

There was neither boldness nor shyness in the eyes that opened wide and

blue, as she lifted them from the paper to the man whom she questioned.

There was no more of a smile than of a pout on the mouth that worded the

inquiry. She did not indicate the faintest interest as to whether he

went or stayed, although she did suggest that he might as well go.

"I'd rather lounge here, if you don't mind," was Gerald Heath's answer.

Here the alertness of the placid girl was faintly shown by a quick

glance, but it was so furtive that the subject of her wariness did not

know his face was being scrutinized; and she was quickly convinced that

she was not the cause of his remaining, for he said: "I'll tell you why

I'm anxious about the telegram, and in a hurry to get it."

Gerald Heath had been lazily leaning against the makeshift desk of the

telegrapher, as he waited, and for pastime had whittled the smooth birch

sapling that formed its outer edge. He had chipped and shaved, after the

manner of those to whom a sharp pocket knife and a piece of wood provide

a solace. There had been no conversation, except a few words concerning

the messages. But now he heightened himself to six feet by standing

erect, and took on the outlines of a magnificent physique. His

proportions had not been realized before by the girl at the other side

of the counter. She comprehended, too, that if his somewhat unkempt

condition were changed to one which included a face cleaned of stubbed

beard, a suit of modish clothes to replace the half-worn corduroys, and

the shine of a silk hat and polished boots at his now dusty extremities,

he would become a young gentleman whose disregard might be an

appreciable slight. That was the conclusion which she reached without

any visible sign that her careless eyes were conveying any sort of

impression to her mind. As it was, he looked an unusually burly specimen

of the men to whom isolation from city life had imparted an aspect of

barbarians. Before he had uttered another word she realized that he was

wholly engrossed in the matter of his telegrams, and had no thought of

the individuality of the listener. Not only was she not the thing that

made him wait, but she might as well have been old, ugly, or a man, if

only she had ears to hear.

It was a summer afternoon, and the clear, balmy weather was seasonable.

The removal of protective canvas had left the structure an open shed,

over the front of which hung the boughs of the two trees against whose

massive trunks it leaned. Gerald Heath reached up with both hands and

held the foliage aside.

"Do you get an unobstructed view?" he said. "Now, I've helped lay out

railroads through many a place, where it was a shame to let trains go

faster than a mile a day. I've surveyed routes that ought to provide

special trains for passengers with eyes in their heads--trains with

speed graduated between sixty miles an hour and sixty hours a mile. It

is an outrage on nature and art that travelers should ever be whisked

past Overlook without a good chance to see what we're looking at. That's

why I wrote to the president of the company a month ago, telling him how

a slight deviation from the surveyed line would enable passengers to get

what's in our view now. He asked how much the line would be lengthened

by my plan. 'A hundred yards,' I answered. And I submitted a map,

showing how the tracks, after coming out from the tunnel, might make a

small detour to this very spot, instead of going behind a mass of rocks

that will completely hide this----" and a comprehensive gesture of one

arm followed his sweep of vision.

Places that get their names on impulse are apt to have appropriate ones.

Camps of railway makers in a hitherto unbroken country are not often

miscalled. An ensuing town on the same site may be unmeaningly named as

a permanency, but the inspirations that afford transient nomenclature

are usually descriptive. It was so in the case of Overlook. The railway

tunneled through the mountain, and emerged at a height of 1000 feet

above a wide valley. Mary had daily, and all day long, sat overlooking

the prospect. It had astonished and enchanted her at first, but

familiarity had blunted the keenness of her appreciation. As shown to

her anew, it was like a fresh disclosure. Gerald Heath stood holding

aside the boughs, which otherwise obscured a part of the landscape, and

seemed like an exhibitor of some wondrously big and beautiful picture.

Miles away were hills rising behind one another, until they left only a

little of sky to be framed by the eave of the shed, as seen by the

telegrapher. The diversities of a wilderness, distantly strong in rugged

forms, but indistinct in details, became gradually definite and

particular as they came nearer, and were suggestive of conscious design,

where they edged a broken, tumultuous river. Overlook was shelved so

high on a precipitous mountain that, from Mary's point of vision, the

foreground almost directly underneath passed out of her sight, and it

was as though the spectator stood on a platform before a painted canvas,

too spacious for exhibition in an ordinary manner. But in this work the

shapes and the colors, the grandeur and the beauty were inconceivably

beyond human copying.

Gerald Heath appeared to feel, however, that if he was not the painter

of this enormous landscape, he at least had the proprietary interest of

a discoverer, and it was with something of the air of an art collector,

proudly extolling his choicest possession, that he turned his eyes from

it to Mary Warriner. The expression of admiration on her face, although

quiet and delicate, was quite satisfactory--for a moment only; and then

the denotement of delight passed out of her visage, as though expelled

by some physical pang. It was the suddenness of the change, for it was

of itself very slight, that made it perceptible. Gerald instinctively

turned to look for the cause.

Into the picture had come a human figure. A few yards in front of the

hut stood a man. In relation to the landscape far beyond he was

gigantic, and the shade of the trees made him devilishly black by

contrast with the sunlight of heaven that illumined the rest. He was

thus for an instant in silhouette, and it chanced that his sharp

outlines included a facial profile, with the points of a mustache and

beard giving satanic suggestion to an accidental attitude of malicious

intrusion. The illusion was almost startling, but it was momentary, and

then the form became the commonplace one of Tonio Ravelli, who walked

under the shelter.

"Do-a I eentrude?" he asked, with an Italian accent and an Italian

bearing. "I suppose no, eh? Thece ees a placa beesness."

Mary's small departure from a business-like perfunctory manner ended at

once. She took the scrap of paper which Ravelli laid on her desk, and

without a word translated its writing into telegraphic clicks. Ravelli

was a sub-contractor, and this was one of his frequent communications

with officials at the company's city office. The response was likely to

be immediate, and he waited for it.

"To get the full value of this view," Gerald Heath resumed, and now he

addressed himself to Mary directly, as though with almost a purpose of

ignoring Ravelli, to whose greeting he had barely responded, "you need

to come upon it suddenly--as I once did. We had been for months blasting

and digging through the mountain. Every day's duty in that hole was like

a spell of imprisonment in a dark, damp dungeon. And your men, Ravelli,

looked like a chain-gang of convicts."

"You woulda no dare say so mooch to their-a fa-ces," Ravelli retorted,

with an insolence that was unmistakably intentional.

"O, I didn't mean a reflection on them," said Gerald, disregarding the

other's quarrelsome aggressiveness. "We all look rascally in the mud,

drip, and grime of tunnel work. And your gang of swarthy Italians are

bound to have a demoniac aspect underground."

It was more careless than intentional that Gerald thus provoked Ravelli.

There had been dislike between them, growing out of friction between

their respective duties as a civil engineer and a sub-contractor, for

the former was necessarily a critic of the latter's work. But they had

never quarreled, and Gerald saw nothing in this occasion, as Ravelli

seemed to, for any outbreak of temper.

"Bettare be civ-vil with-a your tongue," Ravelli sneered.

"Well, I think so, too, as we are with a lady."

"Zat ees why-a I inseest you treat-a me as one gentleman."

So it seemed that he was especially regardful of how he figured in the

presence of Mary Warriner.

"Like one gentleman? Oh, I will treat you like two gentlemen--so

politely;" and Gerald began to again nonchalantly whittle the birchen

pole. "I was going to tell how, when at last we broke through the rock

at this end of the tunnel, I happened to be right there. A blast tore

out an aperture several feet wide. We saw daylight through the smoke. We

rushed pell-mell over the broken stone, and struggled with one another

to get through first. It was--why, it was you, Ravelli, wasn't it?--whom

I tussled with. Yes, we got into the breach together. You tried to push

me back. You couldn't--of course, you couldn't;" and the narrator's

reference to his own superior strength was exasperatingly accompanied by

a glance not free from contempt.

"Eet was-a all een fun," Ravelli smilingly explained to Mary, and then

his eyes turned darkly upon Gerald: "Eef eet had-a been one ear-nest

fight----," the different result was vaguely indicated by a hard clinch

of fists and a vicious crunch of teeth.

It was beyond a doubt that Ravelli could not bear to be belittled to

Mary; but she and Gerald were alike inattentive to his exhibition of

wrath.

"No prisoner was ever more exultant to escape," Heath went on, "than I

was to get out of that dark, noisome hole into clean sunlight. I ran to

this very spot, and--well, the landscape was on view, just as it is now.

It was like getting from gloom out into glory."

The young man's exuberant words were not spoken with much enthusiasm,

and yet they had sufficient earnestness to prove their sincerity. He had

stopped whittling, and his knife lay on the desk, as he turned his back

against the sapling and rested both elbows on it.

"So I've been writing to the president of the company, urging him to

deflect the route a trifle, so that passengers might come out of the

tunnel to see a landscape worth a thousand miles of special travel, and

to be had by going less than as many feet. This is the very latest day

for changing the survey. To-morrow will be too late. That is why I'm

telegraphing so urgently."

Click, click, click. Mary went to the telegraphic instrument. She

delivered the message by word of mouth, instead of taking it down in the

usual manner with a pen.

"Gerald Heath, Overlook," she translated from the metallic language of

the instrument. "Your idea is foolish. We cannot entertain it. Henry

Deckerman, president."

Gerald looked like a man receiving a jury's verdict involving great

pecuniary loss, if not one of personal condemnation, as he listened to

the telegram.

"Zat ees what-a I theenk," remarked Ravelli, with insolent elation; "you

ar-r-e one-a fool, as ze president he say."

Gerald was already angered by the dispatch. The taunting epithet was

timed to excite him to fury, which he impulsively spent upon the more

immediate provoker. He seized Ravelli by the throat, but without choking

him, and almost instantly let him go, as though ashamed of having

assailed a man of not much more than half his own strength and nearly

twice his age. With Italian quickness Ravelli grabbed Gerald's knife

from the desk, against which he was flung. He would have used it too, if

self-defense had been necessary, but he saw that he was not to be

further molested, and so he concealed the weapon under his arm, while

Gerald strode away, unaware of his escape from a stab.

"He is-a one beeg bully," said Ravelli, with forced composure. "Eef a

lady had-a not been here----"

"You tormented him," the girl interrupted. "I once saw the best-natured

mastiff in the world lose his temper and turn on a----" She stopped

before saying "cur," and added instead: "If he was foolish, you were not

very wise to tease him."

"He is-a what to you, zat you take-a hees part?"

She bit her lip in resentment, but made no reply.

"Pare-haps he is one-a lover oof you?"

Still she would not reply to his impertinence. That angered him more

than the severest rejoinder would have done.

"Oh, I am sure-a zat he ees one suitor."

She gave way at length to his provocation, and yet without any violent

words, for she simply said: "You are insulting, while he is at least

reasonably polite--when he heeds me at all, which isn't often."

"Not-a often? But some-what closely he heed-a you. See zat."

With an open palm he struck the place on the sapling where Gerald had

whittled. The spot was on the outer edge, where Mary could not see it

from her seat. She went around to the front of the primitively

constructed desk, or high counter, to gratify her curiosity. There she

saw that Gerald had carved a hand--her own hand, as she instantly

perceived. The small and shapely member was reproduced in the fresh,

pale wood with rare fidelity. She had unconsciously posed it, while

working the key of the telegraphic instrument under the jack-knife

sculptor's eyes, and there had been ample time for him to whittle a

fac-simile into the birch.

"He is almost as impertinent as you are," she said, and turned to see

how Ravelli took the comment.

But Ravelli had disappeared.

Then, being alone, she laid a hand of her own coquettishly alongside its

wooden counterpart, and critically admired the likeness.

"It was an unwarranted liberty," she said to herself, "but he did it

very well."

The delicate fiber of the wood had favored the carver's purpose. The

imitation hand bore a shade of flattery in the barely tinted birchen

white, and in the fine grained satin smoothness that the keen blade had

wrought, but this was not too much for more than a reasonable

compliment. As to the modeling, that was sincerely accurate, and the

fingers rested on the key precisely as Mary had seen them during many

hours of many days. It is an excessively vain girl who admires herself

as actually as she does a portrait, and the telegrapher really saw more

beauty in the birchen hand than she had ever observed in the live one.

As she contemplated it, Ravelli returned noiselessly behind her.

"I a-wish to say something, Mees Warriner."

The Italian accent of Ravelli grated with unnatural harshness on Mary's

ears, and if he had been an intruder upon her privacy, instead of a man

in a really public place, she would not have been surprised into a deep

flush. She snatched her hand away from its wooden counterpart, and

clasped it with its mate behind her, as she leaned her shoulder against

the carving to hide it.

"If you have a message to send," she said, "I can't get it on the wire

too soon. It's within five minutes of time to shut off."

She started to go behind the desk. He stopped her with a touch upon her

shoulder, and she shrank away reprovingly, although it was solely the

man's earnestness that had made him do it.

"No, no; it ees not words for-a ze wire zat I have-a for you," he said.

"I wish-a to tell to yourself something. Will you lees-ten?"

"Yes, if it is something that I ought to hear."

"Thees eez it. I am a-more than I seem here--deef-e-rent--so deef-e-rent

you would hardly know-a me. In zis place I am on-ly a contractor for ze

laborer. I am-a as com-mon as my gang in-a clothes--in-a manner, too,

eh? But een one hour--een one minute--I could-a con-veence you zat I

am-a something finer."

Mary did not show in her perfectly regained composure that she was so

much as puzzled by the man's enigmatic talk. She said: "I don't see how

it could be worth while, Mr. Ravelli."

"O, yes--I beg-a par-don for ze contradiction--yes, it ees worth-a

while. Away from-a here, Mary, I would-a be so deef-e-rent zat you

a-love me."

"Stop, Mr. Ravelli--stop."

The command was positive, but it was not obeyed.

"I love-a you."

He caught her by one wrist as he began. She was utterly unresistant. If

she had struggled or cried out, he would have gone on with his voluble,

excited declaration; but her placidity was incomprehensible to him.

"Mr. Ravelli," she began after a moment, "you understand English?"

"Perfectly, Mees Warriner."

"Well, here is plain English for you. I would use Italian if I could, so

that you mightn't mistake me. You are to let go of my hand."

He did it.

"You are to go away instantly, and never come here again except on

business. Go at once."

That he did not do.

"For what-a did you come here, into one camp oof men eef----"

"If I didn't expect to be unsafe? I'll tell you. It was a mistake.

Operator No. 9 was ordered to this post. No. 9 had been a man, who had

within a week been discharged, and his number given to me. By an

oversight, no alteration was made in the record to show the sex of the

new No. 9. I couldn't afford to lose the work. Besides----"

"Well-a, besides----"

"Besides, I reasoned that every man at Overlook would protect me against

all the other men--if----"

"Yes, eef----"

"Yes, if I cared absolutely nothing for any single one of them.

Therefore, I am not afraid. But you must not annoy me."

Fury flashed into the man's eyes, into his reddened face, into the

sudden tension of his gripped hands. The girl's contemptuous

indifference maddened him. She saw this, and was at once alarmed, for

she realized that here was a reckless lover--one who heated dangerously

where another would have chilled under disdain; but she maintained an

unshaken voice, as she said: "You may as well know, however, that I am

amply protected. The night watchman is ordered to include this combined

office and residence of mine in every round he makes. So I sleep quite

unconcernedly. In the daytime, too, I shall have defense, if it becomes

necessary."

"O, have-a no alarm, Mees Warriner," and the man's facial expression

softened singularly as he gazed wistfully at the girl. "I haf said I

love-a you." Then, with a startlingly quick transition, he glared

menacingly off in the direction that Gerald Heath had gone. It seemed

curious to Mary, too, that in his rage his English was clearer than

usual, as he growled: "It is your lover that should be afraid of me." He

flung out one fist in a fierce menace, and added in Italian: "Nel

vindicarvi bisogna ch'egli mi rende la sua vita."

CHAPTER II.

The full moon looked for Mary Warriner's little house that night as soon

as a clearance of the sky permitted, and then beamed down on her abode

effulgently. But it was eleven o'clock before the gusty wind blew the

thick clouds aside and let the orb illumine Overlook. Back of the shed

in which the telegrapher worked by day was a structure in which she

slept at night. It was built of slabs, with big growing trees to form

its irregular corners, and their lowest limbs contributed the rafters,

while stripped bark and evergreen boughs made the roof. The foliage

swayed above in the fitful wind, and covered the cabin and the grass

around it with commingling, separating, capering shadows of leaves, as

though a multitude of little black demons were trying to get to the

slumberer within. Their antics looked spiteful and angry at first: but

as the wind lessened to a breeze, and as the moon seemed to mollify

them, they became frolicsome without malice; and at length, when the

merest zephyrs impelled their motions, they gambolled lazily,

good-humoredly above and around the couch of Mary Mite.

It was midnight when a man shot into the open space around the cabin

like a missile. He ran first to the front of the structure, where a

tarpaulin curtained the shed for the night, and gazed for a moment

blankly at this indication that the hour was not one of business.

Tremendous haste was denoted in his every step and gesture. He plucked

twice at the canvas, as though to pull it down. Then he skurried around

to the single window of Mary's apartment, whose only door opened into

the shed, and pounded with his knuckles on the ill-fitted sash, making

it clatter loudly. Silence within followed this noise without. "Hello!

Wake up!" he cried. "Don't fool for a minute. Wake up!"

There was no response, and he skipped to and fro in his impatience. He

was an ordinary shoveler and pounder, with nothing to distinguish him

from the mass of manual laborers at Overlook, but, unlike the usual man

with an errand at the telegraphic station, flourished a scrap of paper.

"I want to telegraph," he shouted, and struck the window again. "Get up

quick! It's life and death!"

Mary Warriner was convinced that her services were urgently and properly

required. She peeped warily out to inspect the man, estimated him to be

merely a messenger, and then opened wide the sash, which swung laterally

on hinges. Her delicate face bore the same sort of calm that

characterized it in business hours, but the moon shone on it now, the

hair had got loose from the bondage of knot and pin, and for an outer

garment she was carelessly enwrapped in a white, fleecy blanket. The man

did not give her time to inquire what was wanted.

"You're the telegraph girl, ain't you?" he exclaimed. "Well, here's

something to telegraph. It's in a hurry, hurry, hurry. Don't lose a

minute."

"I couldn't send it to-night," Mary said.

"You must."

"It isn't possible. There is nobody at the other end of the line to

receive it. The wire is private--belongs to the railroad company--isn't

operated except in the daytime. You'll have to wait until to-morrow."

"To-morrow I'll be a hundred years old, or else dead," the man almost

wailed in despair.

"What?"

"I was only ten years old yesterday. To-night I'm sixty. To-morrow'll be

too late. Here--here--send it to-night, Miss. Please send it to-night."

The mystified girl mechanically took the piece of paper which he thrust

into her hands, but her eyes did not drop before they discovered the

insanity in his face, and when they did rest on the paper they saw a

scrawl of hieroglyphics. It was plain that this midnight visitor was a

maniac. She screamed for help.

A watchman responded almost instantly to her call. Upon seeing the cause

of the girl's fright, he treated the incident as a matter of course. The

lunatic wobbled like a drunken man about to collapse, as he mumbled his

request over and over again.

"Here, now, Eph," the watchman said, with as much of cajolery as

command, "you mustn't bother the young lady. Ain't you ashamed to scare

her this way? Get right out of this."

The watchman took the other by the arm, and, as they started off--one

insisting and one objecting--the official looked back to say: "He won't

hurt nobody, Miss Warriner--he's just a little cranky, that's all."

Mary watched them out of sight, and while she was doing so, Gerald Heath

approached from the contrary direction. He had heard the girl's scream.

Why he was within earshot he might not have been able to explain

satisfactorily, for it was not his habit to take midnight walks, even

when the air was so brightly moonlit and so temporarily fine; but if

cross-questioned, he would doubtless have maintained that he had sought

only to escape from the darkness and closeness of his shanty quarters.

Besides, where would he so likely wander, in quest of good sight and

breath, as to the spot whence he could view the scenery which he in vain

asked the railway company to exhibit to their passengers. As he turned

the corner of the cabin he saw Eph and the watchman departing, and

comprehended the disturbance.

"Eph has been frightening you, Miss Warriner," he said.

Mary screamed again, but this time it was a low, musical little outcry

of modesty. She had not observed Gerald's approach. She clutched the

blanket closely around her white throat, which had been almost as much

exposed as by an ordinary cut of frock, and drew under cover the

gleaming wrists which had all day been bared to a greater extent by

sleeves of handy working length. Then she reached out one taper arm, and

swung the sash around on its hinges, so its inner covering of muslin

made a screen between her and the visitor. He did not apologize for his

intrusion, and she pouted a little on her safe side of the sash, at his

failure to do so.

"I see it was Eph that alarmed you," he said. "What did he do?"

She told him, and then asked: "Who is he, and what ails him?"

"He is a common laborer with an uncommon affliction," was the reply.

"One day an excavation caved in, and for an hour he was buried. Some

timbers made a little space around his head, but the rest of him was

packed in earth. He had breathed the inclosed air two or three times

over, and was almost suffocated when we got him out. He was insensible.

He never came back to his senses. He believes he is living at the rate

of more than a year every hour. This is why he was in such a hurry with

his imaginary message."

"Poor fellow," came from the obverse side of the sash.

"Yes, poor fellow," the narrator assented. "I understood his

hallucination at once. When a man is suddenly placed in mortal peril,

his past life dashes before him. Half drowned men afterward tell of

reviewing in a minute the events of years. It is a curious mental

phenomenon. Well, this poor chap had that familiar experience, but with

a singular sequence. The impression that all his lifetime before the

accident happened in a brief time has remained in his disordered mind.

He believes that his whole earthly existence is condensed--that future

years, as well as his past ones, are compressed into days, and his days

into minutes. Nothing can disabuse him of this idea. Everything is to

him ephemeral. That's why I nicknamed him Eph--short for Ephemeral, you

see. He doesn't remember his real name, and on the roll he had only a

number. He has done his work well enough until within a few days, but

now his malady seems to have turned to the worst. He has talked wildly

of getting some physicians to check the speed of time with him, and it

may have been that he wished to telegraph to this fancied expert."

"It is singular," Mary said, "and very sad."

The midnight incident seemed to have come to a conclusion. It was a

proper time for Gerald to say good-night and go away. He still stood on

the opposite side of the half-open sash, around the edge of which

appeared a small set of finger tips, which pulled the screen a little

closer, showing that the girl was minded to shut herself in. But a hand

twice as big opposed hers, gently yet strongly, and in doing so it

touched hers; upon which she let go, and the window flew open.

"Oh, you mustn't see me," Mary exclaimed, as Gerald got a vanishing

glimpse of the white-draped figure. "Good-night."

"You will be afraid if left alone," Gerald protested; "you can't go to

sleep, nervous as you must be."

"I surely can't go to sleep talking," was her rejoinder, with the first

touch of coquetry she had indulged in at Overlook.

"I won't talk, then. I'll only keep guard out here until daylight. Eph

may return."

"But there's the watchman. It is his duty."

"It would be my delight."

That silenced the invisible inmate of the cabin. The moon shone into the

square opening, but Mary was ensconced somewhere in the darkness that

bordered the income of light.

"Should I apologize?" Gerald at length began again. "It is like this,

Miss Warriner. I used to know how to behave politely to a lady. But for

six years I've lived in wildernesses--in railroad camps--from Canada to

Mexico. We've had no ladies in these rough places--no women, except once

in a while some mannish washerwoman or cook. That's what makes you so

rare--so unexpected--that is why it would be a delight to be a patrolman

outside your quarters--that is why I don't wish to go away."

"Oh!--oh! I am interesting because I am the only specimen of my sex at

Overlook. That isn't a doubtful compliment; it is no compliment at all.

Good-night."

"You misconstrue me altogether. I mean----"

"I am sure you do not mean," and now the tone was pleadingly serious,

"to remain here at my window after I request you to go away. I am, as

you have said, the only girl at Overlook."

"If there were a thousand girls at Overlook----"

"Not one of them, I trust, would prolong a dialogue with a young

gentleman at night through the open window of her bedroom."

Half in respectful deference to Mary's unassailable statement of the

rule of propriety applicable to the situation, and half in inconsiderate

petulance at being dismissed, Gerald let go of the sash with an impulse

that almost closed it. This time two miniature hands came out under the

swinging frame. Would more than one hand have been naturally used? Was

it not an awkward method of shutting a window? And Mary Warriner was not

a clumsy creature. But there were the hands, and Gerald grasped them.

They fluttered for freedom, like birds held captive in broad palms by

completely caging fingers. Then he uncovered them, but for an instant

kept them prisoners by encircling the wrists long enough to impetuously

kiss them. Another second and they were gone, the window was closed, and

they were alone.

He walked slowly away, accusing himself of folly and ungentlemanliness,

and he felt better upon getting out of the clear, searching moonshine

into the dim, obscuring shade of rocks and trees, among which the path

wound crookedly. There rapid footsteps startled him, as though he was a

skulking evildoer, and the swift approach of a man along an intersecting

pathway, made him feel like taking to cowardly flight. But he recognized

the monomaniac, Eph, who was in a breathless tremor.

"Mr. Heath, could a man walk to Dimmersville before the telegraph

station there opens in the morning?" Eph asked, with several catches of

breath and a reeling movement of physical weakness.

"You go to bed, Eph," was the reply, meant to be soothing, "and I'll see

that your telegram goes from here the earliest thing in the morning.

That won't be more than six or seven hours from now."

"Six or seven hours," the poor fellow deploringly moaned; "I'll be a

good many years older by that time. Oh, it's awful to have your life go

whizzing away like mine does," and he clutched at Gerald with his

fidgety hands, with a vague idea of slowing himself by holding to a

normal human being.

Then he darted away, swaying from side to side with faintness, and

disappeared in the foliage which lined the path he was following.

Gerald watched him out of sight, and was about to resume his own

different way when the voice of Tonio Ravelli was heard, with its

Italian extra a to the short words and a heavy emphasis on the final

syllable of the long ones.

"Mistair Heath," he said, "I saw-a your affectionate par-ting weez Mees

Warriner."

Gerald had just then the mind of a culprit, and he began to explain

apologetically: "It was cowardly in me to insult a defenseless girl. She

didn't invite it. I am ashamed of myself."

He hardly realized to whom he was speaking. The two men were now walking

rapidly, Ravelli taking two strides to one of the bigger Gerald, in

order to keep alongside.

"You-a should be ashamed--you-a scoundrel."

As much of jealous fury and venomous malice as could be vocalized in six

words was in Ravelli's sudden outbreak. Gerald was astounded. He turned

upon his companion, caught him by both lapels of the coat, and shook him

so violently that his boot-soles pounded the ground. Ravelli staggered

back upon being loosed, and threw one arm around a tree to steady

himself.

"I didn't mean to hurt you," said Gerald, "but you shouldn't be reckless

with your language. Perhaps you don't know what scoundrel means in

English."

"I saw you-a kiss her hands."

"Did you? Well, do you know what I'd do to you, Ravelli, if I saw you

kiss her hands--as I did--without her consent? I'd wring your miserable

neck. Now, what are you going to do to me?"

"I am-a going to keel you!"

The blade of a knife flashed in Ravelli's right hand, as he made a

furious onslaught; but the stronger and quicker man gripped both of his

assailant's wrists, threw him violently to the ground, and tortured him

with wrenches and doublings until he had to drop the weapon. In the

encounter the clothes of both men were torn, and when Ravelli regained

his feet blood was dripping from his hand. The blade had cut it.

"You meant to kill me," Gerald exclaimed.

"I said-a so," was the sullen, menacing response.

"And with my own knife!" and Gerald, picking up the knife, recognized

it.

"Your own knife--ze one zat you carve-a Mary's hand with so lovingly."

Ravelli had retained it since the previous afternoon, when he had picked

it up from Mary Warriner's desk. Its blade was now red with blood, as

Gerald shut and pocketed it.

"You cowardly murderer!"

"Murderer? Not-a yet. But I meant to be."

Ravelli turned off by the cross-path, and Gerald passed on.

CHAPTER III.

The first man to go to work at Overlook in the morning was Jim Wilson,

because he had to rouse the fire under a boiler early enough to provide

steam for a score of rock drills. The night watchman awakened him at

daybreak, according to custom, and then got into a bunk as the other got

out of one.

"Everything all right?" Jim asked.

"I guess so," the other replied. "But I hain't seen your boiler sence

before midnight. Eph was disturbin' Mary Mite, and so I hung 'round her

cabin pretty much the last half of the night."

Jim went to his post at the boiler, and at an unaccustomed pace, from

the point where he first saw and heard steam hissing upward from the

safety valve. On quitting the night previous, he had banked the fire as

usual, and this morning he should have found it burning so slowly that

an hour of raking, replenishing, and open draughts would no more than

start the machinery at seven o'clock. Going nearer he found that open

dampers and a fresh supply of coal had set the furnace raging.

What was that which protruded from the open door, and so nearly filled

the aperture that the draught was not impaired?

A glance gave the answer. It was the legs and half the body of a man,

whose head and shoulders were thoroughly charred, as Jim was horrified

to see when he pulled the remains out upon the ground.

Jim ran to tell the superintendent, and within a few minutes a knot of

excited men surrounded the body. The gathering grew in numbers rapidly.

By means of the clothing the dead and partially burned man was

identified at once as Tonio Ravelli. That he had been murdered was an

equally easy conclusion. The murderer had apparently sought to cremate

the corpse. Whether he had found it physically impossible, or had been

frightened away, could only be conjectured.

"Who can have done it?" was the question asked by Superintendent

Brainerd, the autocrat of Overlook.

There was a minute of silence, with all staring intently at the body, as

though half expecting it to somehow disclose the truth. The night

watchman was first to speak.

"Eph might have done it," he said.

Then he told of the monomaniac's visit to the telegraph station, and of

the acute stage which his malady had reached. Nobody else present had

seen him since the previous evening. Superintendent Brainerd ordered a

search of the lodgings. Ten minutes were sufficient for a round of the

different quarters. Eph was in none of them. The searchers returned to

the furnace, and with them came Gerald Heath.

"I met Eph yonder where the paths cross, not a hundred yards from here,

a little past midnight," Gerald said. "He was terribly excited. That was

after he had tried in vain to telegraph a crazy message. Evidently his

delusion, that his whole life was condensed into a brief space, had

driven him to a frenzy. He spoke of walking to Dimmersville, but I tried

to quiet him, and he disappeared."

Dimmersville was a town about ten miles distant, in a direction opposite

to that from which the railroad had worked its way through the

mountains. No wire connected it with Overlook, and there was no public

road for the nearest third of the way, although a faint trail showed the

course that a few persons had taken on foot or horseback.

"Very likely Eph has gone toward Dimmersville," Brainerd argued, "and we

must try to catch him."

Before the order could be specifically given a horse and a rider arose

over the edge of the level ground and came into the midst of the

assemblage. The man in the saddle had a professional aspect, imparted

chiefly by his smoothly shaven face. In this era of mustaches a hairless

visage is apt to be assigned to a clergyman, who shaves thus from a

motive of propriety; an actor, who does it from necessity; or somebody

who aims at facial distinction without the features suitable to that

purpose. A countenance of which it can only be said that it has one

nose, one mouth, and two eyes, all placed in expressive nonentity, and

which is dominated utterly by hair on and around it, may be less lost to

individuality if entirely shaven. Of such seemed the visage of the dark

man, who calmly rode into the excitement at Overlook.

"Which way have you come?" Brainerd asked.

"From Dimmersville," was the reply.

"Did you see anybody on the way?"

"I started very early. Folks were not out of their beds in the

houses--as long as there were any houses--and that is only for five or

six miles, you know. After that--yes--I did see one man. A curiously

excited chap. He looked tired out. He asked the distance to

Dimmersville, and whether the telegraph office would be open by the time

he got there. Then he skurried on before I'd half answered him."

All that was known of the murder was told to the stranger by half a

dozen glib tongues, and it was explained to him that he had encountered

the maniacal fugitive.

"I knew there was something wrong about him," said the stranger. "It is

my business to be observant."

He dismounted and hitched his horse to a tree. The dead body was shown

to him. He examined it very thoroughly. All the particulars were related

to him over and over. Then he drew Superintendent Brainerd aside.

"My name is Terence O'Reagan," he said, and in his voice was faintly

distinguishable the brogue of the land whence the O'Reagans came. "I am

a government detective. I have been sent to work up evidence in the case

of some Italian counterfeiters. We had a clew pointing to a

sub-contractor here--the very man who lies there dead. Our information

was that he used some of the bogus bills in paying off his gang. Now, it

isn't going outside my mission to investigate his death--if you don't

object."

"I would be glad to have you take hold of it," Brainerd replied. "We

can't bring the authorities here before noon, at the earliest, and in

the mean time you can perhaps clear it all up."

The eagerly curious men had crowded close to this brief dialogue, and

had heard the latter part of it. O'Reagan became instantly an important

personage, upon whose smallest word or movement they hung expectantly,

and nobody showed a keener interest than Gerald Heath. The detective

first examined the body. The pockets of Ravelli's clothes contained a

wallet, with its money untouched, beside a gold watch.

"So robbery was not the object," said O'Reagan to Brainerd. "The motive

is the first thing to look for in a case of murder."

Next, he found blood on the waistcoat, a great deal of it, but dried by

the fire that had burned the shoulders and head; and in the baked cloth

were three cuts, under which he exposed three stab wounds. Strokes of a

knife had, it seemed, killed the victim before he was thrust partially

into the furnace.

A storm was coming to Overlook unperceived, for the men were too much

engrossed in what lay there on the ground, ghastly and horrible, to pay

any attention to the clouding sky. Gloom was so fit for the scene, too,

that nobody gave a thought from whence it came. To Gerald Heath the

going out of sunlight, and the settling down of dusky shadows seemed a

mental experience of his own. He stood bewildered, transfixed, vaguely

conscious of peril, and yet too numb to speak or stir. Detective

O'Reagan, straightening up from over the body, looked piercingly at

Gerald, and then glanced around at the rest.

"Is there anybody here who saw Tonio Ravelli last night?" he asked.

"I did," Gerald replied.

"Where and when?"

"At the same place where I met Eph, and immediately afterward."

"Ah! now we are locating Eph and Ravelli together. That looks like the

lunatic being undoubtedly the stabber."

"And we must catch him," Brainerd interposed. "I'll send riders toward

Dimmersville immediately."

"No great hurry about that," the detective remarked; "he is too crazy to

have had any clear motive or any idea of escape. It will be easy enough

to capture him." Then he turned to Gerald, and questioned with the air

of a cross-examiner: "Did the two men have any words together?"

"No," was the ready answer; "I don't know that they even saw each other

at that time. Eph went away an instant before Ravelli came."

"Did you talk with Ravelli?"

"Yes."

"About what?"

"Not about Eph at all."

"About what, then?"

Now the reply came reluctantly: "A personal matter--something that had

occurred between us--an incident at the telegraph station."

"The station where Eph had awakened the girl operator? Was it a quarrel

about her?"

"That is no concern of yours. You are impertinent."

"Well, sir, the question is pertinent--as the lawyers say--and the

answer concerns you, whether it does me or not. You and Ravelli

quarreled about the girl?"

"The young lady shall not be dragged into this. She wasn't responsible

for what happened between Ravelli and me."

"What did happen between you and Ravelli?"

The two men stood close to and facing each other. The eyes of the

detective glared gloatingly at an upward angle into the pale but still

firm face of the taller Gerald, and then dropped slowly, until they

became fixed on a red stain on the sleeve of the other's coat. Did he

possess the animal scent of a bloodhound?

"What is that?" he sharply asked. He seized the arm and smelled of the

spotted fabric. "It is blood! Let me see your knife."

Quite mechanically Gerald thrust one hand into his trousers pocket and

brought out the knife which he had taken back from Ravelli, whose blood

was on it yet.

The storm was overhead. A first peal of thunder broke loudly. It came at

the instant of the assemblage's tensest interest--at the instant when

Gerald Heath was aghast with the revelation of his awful jeopardy--at

the instant of his exposure as a murderer. It impressed them and him

with a shock of something supernatural. The reverberation rumbled into

silence, which was broken by O'Reagan:

"There'll be no need to catch Eph," he said, in a tone of professional

glee. "This man is the murderer."

Again thunder rolled and rumbled angrily above Overlook, and the party

stood aghast in the presence of the man dead and the man condemned.

"Bring him to the telegraph station," O'Reagan commanded.

Nobody disputed the detective's methods now--not even Gerald; and a

prisoner as completely as though manacled, although not touched by any

one, he went with the rest.

Mary Warriner had taken down the tarpaulin front of her shed when the

men approached. In the ordinary course of her early morning doings she

would wait an hour to dispatch and receive the first telegrams of the

day, and then go to breakfast alone at the table where the engineers and

overseers would by that time have had their meal. She was astonished to

see nearly the whole population of Overlook crowd around her quarters,

while a few entered. But she went quickly behind the desk, and took her

place on the stool. The soberness of the faces impressed her, but

nothing indicated that Gerald was in custody, and her quick thought was

that some disaster made it necessary to use the wire importantly.

"I wish to send a message," said O'Reagan, stepping forward.

The eyes of the girl rested on him inquiringly, and he palpably

flinched, but as obviously nerved himself to proceed, and when he spoke

again the Irish accent became more pronounced to hear, although not

sufficiently to be shown in the printed words: "I will dictate it

slowly, so that you can transmit it as I speak. Are you ready?"

Mary's fingers were on the key, and her bright, alert face was an answer

to the query.

"To Henry Deckerman, president," the detective slowly said, waiting for

the clicks of the instrument to put his language on the wire; "Tonio

Ravelli, a sub-contractor here, was murdered last night."

Mary's hand slid away from the key after sending that, and the always

faint tint in her cheeks faded out, and her eyes flickered up in a

scared way to the stern faces in front of her. The shock of the news

that a man had been slain, and that he was a man who, only the previous

day, had proffered his love to her, was for a moment disabling. But the

habit of her employment controlled her, and she awaited the further

dictation.

"His body was found this morning in the furnace of the steam boiler."

O'Reagan resumed deliberately, "where it had evidently been placed in a

vain attempt to destroy it."

A shudder went through Mary, and she convulsively wrung her small hands

together, as though to limber them from a cramp. But her fingers went

back to the key.

"The murderer has been discovered," the detective slowly continued, and

the operator kept along with his utterance word by word. "He killed

Ravelli for revenge. It was a love affair." Here the girl grew whiter

still, and the clicks became very slow, but they did not cease.

O'Reagan's voice was cold and ruthless: "The motive of the murderer was

revenge. His name is Gerald Heath."

All but the name flashed off on the wire. Mary Warriner's power to stir

the key stopped at that. She did not faint. She did not make any outcry.

For a moment she looked as though the soul had gone out of her body,

leaving a corpse sitting there. A grievous wail of wind came through the

trees, and a streak of lightning zig-zagged down the blue-clouded sky.

"Go on," said O'Reagan.

"I will not," was the determined response.

"Why not?"

"Because it is not so. Gerald Heath never murdered Ravelli."

Gerald had stood motionless and silent. Now he gave way to an impulse as

remarkable as his previous composure had been singular. If there had

been stagnation in his mind, it was now displaced by turbulence. He

grasped Mary's hands in a fervid grip; then dropped them and faced the

others.

"I did not kill the Italian," he said. "He attacked me with my knife

which he had stolen. In the struggle his hand was cut, but I took the

weapon away from him. He quitted me alive and unhurt. I never saw him

again. You don't believe it? Mary does, and that is more than all else."

"The circumstances don't favor you," the detective retorted, "they

convict you. You killed Ravelli because you and he were both in love

with this young lady."

"Isn't it the rejected suitor who kills the other one for spite?" This

was in Mary Warriner's voice, weak, but still steady. "Ravelli loved me,

I knew, and I drove him away. Mr. Heath loved me, I believed, and I had

not repulsed him. If I were the cause of a murder between them, it

should be Ravelli who killed Gerald."

"You detested Ravelli?" O'Reagan asked, with a strange bitterness.

"Yes."

"And you love Heath?"

The answer was no more hesitant than before; "Yes."

"Send the rest of my message," and the detective was boisterous. "Send

the name. Gerald Heath is the murderer."

He roughly seized her hand and clapped it on the key. She drew it away,

leaving his there. A blinding flash of lightning illumined the place,

and what looked like a missile of fire flew down the wire to the

instrument, where it exploded. O'Reagan fell insensible from the

powerful electrical shock. The rest did not altogether escape, and for a

minute all were dazed. The first thing that they fully comprehended was

that O'Reagan was getting unsteadily to his feet. He was bewildered.

Staggering and reeling, he began to talk.

Mary was first to perceive the import of his utterance. He was merely

going on with what he had been saying, but the manner, not the matter,

was astounding.

He spoke with an Italian accent, and made Italian gestures.

"You-a send ze mes-sage," he said; "Heath ees ze murder-are. Send-a ze

mes-sage, I say."

Tonio Ravelli had unwittingly resumed his Italian style of English.

His plenitude of hair and whiskers was gone; and in the face, thereby

uncovered, nobody could have recognized him in Detective O'Reagan but

for his lapse into the foreign accent; and he said so much before

discovering his blunder that his identification, as indeed Ravelli, was

complete.

Who, then, was the dead man? Why, he was Eph.

Nothing but the fear of being himself condemned as a murderer of the

maniac, as a part of the scheme of revenge against Gerald, induced

Ravelli to explain. He had found Eph lying dead in the path, after both

had parted from Gerald. The plot to exchange clothes with the corpse,

drag it to the furnace, burn away all possibility of recognition, and

thus make it seem to be his murdered self, was carried out with all the

hot haste of a jealous vengeance. Ravelli was not an Italian, although

very familiar with the language of Italy, and able, by a natural gift of

mimicry, to hide himself from pursuit for a previous crime. Overlook had

been a refuge until his passion for Mary Warriner led him to abandon his

disguise. Thereupon, he had turned himself into Terence O'Reagan, a

detective, whose malicious work wrought happiness for Gerald Heath and

Mary Warriner.

A THING THAT GLISTENED.

BY FRANK R. STOCKTON.

In the fall of 1888 the steamship _Sunda_, from Southampton, was running

along the southern coast of Long Island, not many hours from port, when

she was passed by one of the great British liners, outward bound. The

tide was high, and the course of both vessels was nearer the coast than

is usual--that of the _Sunda_ being inside of the other.

As the two steamers passed each other there was a great waving of hats

and handkerchiefs. Suddenly there was a scream from the _Sunda_. It came

from Signora Rochita, the prima donna of an opera troupe, which was

coming to America in that ship.

"I have lost my bracelet," she cried in Italian, and then, turning to

the passengers, she repeated the cry in very good English.

The situation was instantly comprehended by every one. It was late in

the afternoon; the captain had given a grand dinner to the passengers,

at which the prima donna had appeared in all her glories of

ornamentation, and the greatest of these glories, a magnificent diamond

bracelet, was gone from the arm with which she had been enthusiastically

waving her lace handkerchief.

The second officer, who was standing near, dashed into the captain's

office and quickly reappeared with chart and instruments, and made rapid

calculation of the position of the vessel at the time of the accident,

making an allowance for the few minutes that had passed since the first

cry of the signora. After consultation with the captain and

recalculations of the distance from land and some other points, he

announced to the weeping signora that her bracelet lay under a little

black spot he had made on the chart, and that if she chose to send a

diver for it she might get it, for the depth of water at that place was

not great.

By profession I am a diver, and the next day I was engaged to search for

the diamond bracelet of Signora Rochita. I had a copy of the chart, and,

having hired a small schooner with several men who had been my

assistants before, and taking with me all the necessary accouterments

and appliances, I set out for the spot indicated, and by afternoon we

were anchored, we believed, at or very near it. I lost no time in

descending. I wore, of course, the usual diver's suit, but I took with

me no tools nor any of the implements used by divers when examining

wrecks, but carried in my right hand a brilliant electric lamp connected

with a powerful battery on the schooner. I held this by an insulated

handle, in which there were two little knobs, by which I could light or

extinguish it.

The bottom was hard and smooth, and lighting my lamp I began to look

about me. If I approached the bracelet I ought to be able to see it

sparkle, but after wandering over considerable space, I saw no sparkles

nor anything like a bracelet. Suddenly, however, I saw something which

greatly interested me. It was a hole in the bottom of the ocean, almost

circular, and at least ten feet in diameter. I was surprised that I had

not noticed it before, for it lay not far from the stern of our vessel.

Standing near the rocky edge of the aperture, I held out my lamp and

looked down. Not far below I saw the glimmer of what seemed to be the

bottom of this subterranean well. I was seized with a desire to explore

this great hole running down under the ordinary bottom of the sea. I

signaled to be lowered, and although my comrades were much surprised at

such an order, they obeyed, and down I went to the well. The sides of

this seemed rocky and almost perpendicular, but after descending about

fifteen feet they receded on every side, and I found myself going down

into a wide cavern, the floor of which I touched in a very short time.

Holding up my lamp, and looking about me, I found myself in a sea cave,

some thirty feet in diameter, with a dome-like roof, in which, a little

to one side of the center, was the lower opening of the well. I became

very much excited; this was just the sort of place into which a bracelet

or anything else of value might be expected to have the bad luck to

drop. I walked about and gazed everywhere, but I found nothing but rocks

and water.

I was about to signal to be drawn up, when above me I saw what appeared

to be a flash of darkness coming down through the well. With a rush and

a swirl it entered the cavern, and in a moment I recognized the fact

that a great fish was swooping around and about me. Its movements were

so rapid and irregular, now circling along the outer edge of the floor

of the cavern, then mounting above me, until its back seemed to scrape

the roof, that I could not form a correct idea of the size of the

creature. It seemed to me to be at least twenty feet along. I stood

almost stupefied, keeping my eyes, as far as possible, fixed upon the

swiftly moving monster.

Sometimes he came quite near me, when I shuddered in every fiber, and

then he shot away, but ever gliding with powerful undulations of his

body and tail, around, about, and above me. I did not dare to signal to

be drawn up, for fear that the terrible creature would enter the well

hole with me. Then he would probably touch me, perhaps crush me against

the wall, but my mind was capable of forming no plans. I only hoped the

fish would ascend and disappear by the way he came.

My mind was not in its strongest condition, being much upset by a great

trouble, and I was so frightened that I really did not know what I ought

to do, but I had sense enough left to feel sure that the fish had been

attracted into the cavern by my lamp. Obviously, the right thing to do

was to extinguish it, but the very thought of this nearly drove me into

a frenzy. I could not endure to be left alone with the shark in darkness

and water. It was an insane idea, but I felt that, whatever happened, I

must keep my eyes upon him.

Now the great fish began to swoop nearer and nearer to me, and then,

suddenly changing its tactics, it receded to the most distant wall of

the cavern, where, with its head toward me, it remained, for the first

time, motionless. But this did not continue long. Gently turning over on

its side, it opened its great mouth, and in an instant, with a rush, it

came directly at me. My light shone full into its vast mouth, glistening

with teeth, and there was a violent jerk which nearly threw me from my

feet, and all was blackness. The shark had swallowed my lamp! By rare

good fortune, he did not take my hand also.

Now I frantically tugged at my signal rope. Without my lamp I had no

thought but a desire to be pulled out of the water, no matter what

happened. In a few minutes I sat, divested of my diving suit, and almost

insensible, upon the deck of the schooner. As soon as I was able to talk

I told my astonished comrades what had happened, and while we were

discussing this strange occurrence, one of them, looking over the side,

saw slowly rising to the surface the body of a dead shark.

"By George," he cried, "here is the beast. He has been killed by the

current from the battery."

We all crowded to the rail and looked down upon the monster. He was

about ten feet long, and it was plain that he had died for making

himself the connection between the poles of the battery.

"Well," said the captain pleasantly. "I suppose you are not going down

again?"

"Not I," I replied. "I give up this job."

Then suddenly I cried:

"Come boys, all of you. Make fast to that shark, and get him on board. I

want him."

Some of the men laughed, but my manner was so earnest that in a moment

they all set about to help me. A small boat was lowered, lines were made

fast to the dead fish with block and tackle, and we hauled him on deck.

I then got a butcher's knife from the cabin and began to cut him open.

"Look here, Tom!" exclaimed the captain, "that's nonsense. Your lamp's

all smashed to pieces, and if you get it out, it will never be any good

to you."

"I don't care for the lamp," I answered, working away energetically,

"but an idea has struck me. It's plain that this creature had a fancy

for shining things. If he swallowed a lamp, there is no reason why he

should not have swallowed anything else that glittered."

"Oho!" cried the captain, "you think he swallowed the bracelet, do you?"

And instantly everybody crowded more closely about me.

I got out the lamp. Its wires were severed as smoothly as if they had

been cut by shears. Then I worked on. Suddenly there was a cry from

every man. Something glimmered in the dark interior of the fish. I

grasped it and drew it out. It was not a bracelet, but a pint bottle

which glimmered like a glow-worm. With the bottle in my hand, I sat upon

the deck and gazed at it. I shook it. It shone brighter. A bit of oiled

silk was tied tightly over the cork, and it was plain to see that it was

partly filled with a light colored oil, into which a bit of phosphorous

had been dropped, which, on being agitated, filled the bottle with a dim

light.

But there was something more in the bottle than phosphorus and oil. I

could see a tin tube, corked at each end, and the exposed parts of the

corks spreading enough to prevent the tin from striking the glass. We

all knew that this was one of those bottles containing a communication

of some sort, which are often thrown into the sea, and float about until

they are picked up. The addition of the oil and phosphorus was intended

to make it visible by night as well as by day, and this was plainly the

reason why it had been swallowed by a light-loving shark.

I poured out the oil and extracted the tube. Wiping it carefully, I drew

out the corks, and then, from the little tin cylinder, I pulled a half

sheet of note paper, rolled up tightly. I unrolled it, and read these

words:

Before I jump overboard, I want to let people know that I killed

John Polhemus. So I have fixed up this bottle. I hope it may be

picked up in time to keep Jim Barker from being hung. I did think

of leaving it on the steamer, but I might change my mind about

jumping overboard, and I guess this is the best way. The clothes I

wore and the hatchet I did it with are under the woodshed, back of

Polhemus's house.

HENRY RAMSEY.

I sprang to my feet with a yell. Jim Barker was my brother, now lying in

prison under sentence of death for the murder of Polhemus; all the

circumstantial evidence, and there was no other, had been against him.

The note was dated eight months back. Oh! cruel fool of a murderer.

The shark was thrown overboard, and we made best speed to port, and

before the end of the afternoon I had put Ramsey's note into the hands

of the lawyer who had charge of my brother's case.

Fortunately he was able to identify the handwriting and signature of

Ramsey, a man who had been suspected of the crime, but against whom no

evidence could be found. The lawyer was almost as excited as I was by

the contents of this note, and early the next morning we started

together for the house of the Polhemus family. There, under the

woodshed, we found carefully buried a bloodstained shirt and vest, and

the hatchet.

My impulse was to fly to my brother, but this my lawyer forbade. He

would take charge of the affair, and no false hopes must be excited, but

he confidently assured me that my brother was as good as free.

Returning to the city, I thought I might as well make my report to

Signora Rochita. The lady was at home and saw me. She showed the most

intense interest in what I told her, and insisted upon every detail of

my experiences. As I spoke of the shark, and the subterranean cave, she

nearly fainted from excitement, and her maid had to bring her smelling

salts. When I had finished, she looked at me steadily for a moment, and

then said:

"I have something to tell you, but I hardly know how to say it. I never

lost my bracelet. I intended to wear it at the captain's dinner, but

when I went to put it on I found the clasp was broken, and, as I was

late, I hurried to the table without the bracelet, and thought of it no

more until, when we were all waving and cheering, I glanced at my wrist

and found it was not there. Then, utterly forgetting that I had not put

it on, I thought it had gone into the sea. It was only this morning

that, opening what I supposed was the empty box, I saw it. Here it is."

I never saw such gorgeous jewels.

"Madame," said I, "I am glad you thought you lost it, for I have gained

something better than all these."

"You are a good man," said she, and then she paid me liberally for my

services. When this business had been finished, she asked:

"Are you married?" I answered that I was not.

"Is there any one you intend to marry?"

"Yes," said I.

"What is her name?" she asked.

"Sarah Jane McElroy."

"Wait a minute," said she, and she retired into another room. Presently

she returned and handed me a little box.

"Give this to your ladylove," said she; "when she looks at it, she will

never forget that you are a brave man."

When Sarah Jane opened the box, there was a little pin with a diamond

head, and she gave a scream of delight. But I saw no reason for jumping

or crying out, for after having seen the Signora's bracelet, this stone

seemed like a pea in a bushel of potatoes.

"I don't need anything," she said, "to remind me that you are a brave

man. I am going to buy furniture with it."

I laughed, and remarked that "every little helps."

When I sit, with my wife by my side, before the fire in our comfortable

home, and consider that the parlor carpet, and the furniture and the

pictures, and the hall and stair carpet, and all the dining-room

furniture, with the china and the glass and the linen, and all the

kitchen utensils, and two bedroom suits on the second story, both

hardwood, and all the furniture and fittings of a very pleasant room for

a single man, the third story front, were bought with the pin that the

signora gave to Sarah Jane, I am filled with profound respect for things

that glitter. And when I look on the other side of the fire and see Jim

smoking his pipe just as happy as anybody, then I say to myself that, if

there are people who think that this story is too much out of the

common, I wish they would step in here and talk to Jim about it. There

is a fire in his eyes when he tells you how glad he is that it was the

shark instead of him, that is very convincing.

A LION AND A LIONESS

BY JOAQUIN MILLER.

CHAPTER I.

I doubt if you will find either profit or pleasure in reading this

incident of my third voyage up the Nile. It is really not worth reading.

I have written it down merely for a few friends who know something of

the facts; and also to escape the annoyance of having to tell it over as

one of the features of my four years' travel in the Orient. But to

begin. Wearying of the Levant, I was resting a time in Rome, when I was

formally invited, as well as specially urged, to witness the marriage

ceremony between the Grand Duchess Alexandria and the Duke of Edinburgh.

Let us pass over these wasteful follies, the waste of time, the waste of

sense, of soul! I have only mentioned the reason for my presence in St.

Petersburg; have only mentioned the fact of my being there, because I

saw a face in that gathering of people that could not be forgotten. It

was the face of a tall, dark, and serenely silent Dolores; a young woman

who had surely met and made the acquaintance of sorrow early in the

morning of life. I sometimes wonder if I could ever have known or cared

to know any one who had not sorrowed deeply. And yet I now know very

well that, in whatever guise that woman could have come, there could

have been no two roads for us from the day of her coming to the day of

her going.

Let me be a little confidential right here. I knew, I had always known,

I should meet this woman. I had waited for her; worked hard, built up

the battlements and the fortress of my soul so that I might receive her

into it; and defend her well against my baser self when she should come.

And now tell me--have you never had a thought, a conviction like this? A

certainty in your own heart that your other and better self would come

to you complete and entire some day, soon or late, so soon as you might

have the fortress ready? The doctors said she was dying. She had been

trying to stand between the Czar and the Jews. She may not have been of

that "peculiar people," but I think she had the money of Rothschilds and

Sir Moses Montefiore behind her.

There had been attempts at assassination, followed by executions. Some

of the condemned were women. It was as if this woman herself had been

condemned to death. I think she suffered more than all the others put

together; she was so very, very sensitive to the pain and sorrow of

others.

There are souls like that. But there is a good God. The soul that

suffers keenly can and shall enjoy keenly. You can, if you care to

persist in it, make yourself, as the centuries wheel past, more than an

entire nation in this.

We had common ground to work on in the cause of the condemned people. It

was on this ground that we first met; as two swift streams that flow in

the same direction and so finally unite forever. All that could be done

was done speedily; for "the law's delay," whatever else must be laid to

the door of Russia, is not one of her sins.

As summer took flight we went south with the birds. For she surely felt

that she was dying. Besides, she had been impressed with the idea of

restoring Jerusalem and having this homeless race re-established in the

holy city. Her religion? I think it was all religions. I saw her kneel

in the Kremlin at Moscow, cross herself in St. Peter's at Rome, and bend

low at prayer in the Synagogue at Alexandria. I think she would have

done the same in a mosque. As stated before, I had, previous to meeting

her, been all over Syria. And so, whenever she referred to her cherished

idea, as she so often did, of forming Jewish settlements in and about

Jerusalem and restoring Israel, I took occasion to explain how

impossible and impractical it all was.

I remember telling her how that in a whole day's ride from Babylon

toward Jerusalem I had seen no living thing save a single grasshopper! I

explained to her that the path of civilization had been in the track of

the setting sun ever since the dawn of history, and that it was not in

the power of man to reverse this course. I attempted to show that the

tide of population would pour upon the salubrious and fertile shores of

the farthest west till the heart of civilization would beat right there.

I explained to her that wherever the great strong heart of commerce beat

strongest, there would be found the strongest and best of these people

whom she hoped to help; while the weak and helpless of that race would

remain stranded by the waters of the Levant, as in Russia now.

"Why not, then, let us anticipate this and build the city of refuge by

your great sea in the path of this civilization which you say will so

surely come?"

Like the golden doors of dawn was the great earnest idea to me as she

spoke. But of course I know, as I said before, that the "peculiar

people" could not be induced to brave the desert. They do not seek rest,

but action--employment in the marts. They would rest but a single night

even by the sweet waters of Jacob's well.

CHAPTER II.

As winter came on and Egypt began to be oppressively full of tourists,

it was decided that we should make our escape up the Nile and haunt the

ruin of Kamak and other places until the outgoing tide set in. Once

fairly on our way, it did not take long to persuade me that she was not

only gaining strength each day in body but in soul. We had been more

than a month on the Nile; a tattered palm tree here tossing in the wind

and sand; a gaunt, clay-colored camel yonder, all legs and hair;

beggars, disease, despair all around us; a land to fly from, fit place

for tombs, jackals, and famishing lions!

But she was stronger, there were roses in her face. Her glorious black

hair had not the dampness of death in it now, but was luxuriously

sensate with renewed life and health and possible happiness.

One warm sunset, as the boat lay with its prow in the yellow sand that

seemed to stretch away into infinity, she proposed that she and I should

ascend to the top of the tall ruins on a hill a little distance back

from the river, and there wait and watch and listen for the coming day.

It was a dreadful place. I had already walked a little way out, but on

seeing a shriveled black hand stretching up from the sand, I had turned

back; only to stumble over the head of a mummy which I had afterward

seen one of our servants gather up and take to his Arab camp for

firewood. Still, we had been pent up in the boat much; and then would

not she be with me?

Two Arabs were taken with us to carry a bottle of water and the rugs and

robes. The hill was steeper than it at first seemed; and the ascent

through the sand heavy. I was having an opportunity to test her strength

and endurance. I might also have an occasion to test her courage before

the break of morning, for as we entered between two towering columns of

red granite, one of the Arabs dropped on a knee and spread his hand as

wide as he could in the sand. But wide as he spread it, he could not

more than half cover the fresh foot-print of a huge lion.

The clamber to the top was steep and hard. Yet it was not nearly so

steep and hard as I could have wished it, when I reflected that very

likely before midnight a lion might pass that way.

We found that these wonderful columns of granite were coped with great

slabs of granite. These granite slabs were of astonishing breadth and

thickness. This temple, as it is called, had probably been a tomb. I

took good care to see that there was no other means of ascent to the

place where we had chosen to spend the night than the one by which we

had ascended. And I remember how eagerly I wished for a crowbar in order

that I might break down a little of the _debris_, so that the ascent

might be less easy for prowling beasts.

But as there was nothing of the sort at hand, I dismissed the two Arabs

and resolved to be as brave, if possible, as the singularly brave and

beautiful woman who had come here to hear the voices of desolation.

The sky was rimmed with yellow; yellow to the east, yellow to the west;

a world of soft and restful yellow that melted away by gradations as the

eye ascended from the desert. It was like melody in its serene harmonies

and awful glory.

And she at my side partook of it all; she breathed it, absorbed it,

literally became a part of it. I saw her grow and glow. Soul and body I

saw her dilate and expand till she was in absolute harmony with the awe

and splendor that encompassed us. I felt that she had been in the midst

of, even a part of, this tawny desolation ages and ages before. Perhaps

her soul had been born here, born before the pyramids.

CHAPTER III.

With my own hands I spread her couch of skins and rugs in the remotest

corner of a great stone slab that still lifted its unbroken front, in

defiance of time, high above the tawny sands of the desert. The night

was very sultry, even here on this high and roomy summit. The broad,

deep slab of granite was still warm with sunshine gone away, and gave

out heat like a dying furnace. The steep and arduous ascent had taxed

her strength, and unloosing her robe as I turned to examine more

minutely our strange quarters on the top of this lofty tomb, or temple,

she sank to rest, half reclining on her arm, her chin in her upturned

palm, her face lifted away toward the rising moon.

Half a dozen paces to the right I saw two tall and ponderous columns of

granite standing in line with those that supported the great slab on

which she rested. Evidently these grand and solitary columns had also

once been topped by granite slabs. But these had fallen to the ground

under the leveling feet of many centuries, and now lay almost swallowed

up in the sea of yellow sands below. I put out my foot carefully, trying

to reach the broad top of the nearest column of granite, but it was

beyond me. Stepping back a couple of paces and quietly removing my

boots, I gathered up my strength and made a leap, landing almost in the

center of the column's top. A half step backward, another leap--who

could resist the challenge of that lone and kingly column that remained?

I landed securely as before, then turned about. Her face had not lifted

an instant from the awful majesty of the Orient.

Slowly, wearily, the immense moon came shouldering up through the seas

of yellow sand. These billows of sand seemed to breathe and move. The

expiring heat of the departed sun made them scintillate and shimmer in a

soft and undulating light. And yet it was not light; only the lone and

solemn ghost of a departed day. Yellow and huge and startling stood the

moon at last, full grown and fearful in its nearness and immensity on

the topmost lift of yellow sands in the yellow seas before us. Distance

seemed to be annihilated. The moon seemed to have forgotten her place

and all proportion. Looking down into the sullen Nile, it seemed a black

and bottomless chasm. And it seemed so far away! And the moon so very

near.

Black as blackest Egypt rolled the somber Nile down and on and on

through this world of yellow light; this light that was not light.

Silence, desolation, death lay on all things below, about, above. The

west was molten yellow gold, faint and fading, it is true: but where the

yellow sands left off and the yellow skies began no man could say or

guess, save by the yellow stars that studded the west with an intense

yellow.

Yellow to the right and yellow to the left, yellow overhead and yellow

underfoot; with only this endless chasm of Erebus cleaving the yellow

earth in halves with its bottomless pit of endless and indissoluble

blackness.

After a time--and all the world still one sea of softened yellow, torn

in two by Charon's chasm of black waters--I silently leaped back,

replaced my boots on my feet and then held my breath. For I had seen, or

perhaps felt, an object move on the lifted levels of sand between us and

the moon.

Cautiously I sank down on my breast and peered low and long up the

horizon. I saw, heard nothing. Glancing around to where my companion

lay, I saw that she still had not stirred from the half reclining

position she had first taken, with half lifted face in her upturned

palm.

Then she had seen nothing, heard nothing. This, however, did not argue

much. Her life had not been of the desert. She had spent her years in

the study of men and women. I had spent mine with wild beasts. I could

trust her to detect motives in men, give the warning note of danger from

dangerous men; but the wild beasts and wilder men of the border were

mine to watch and battle with, not hers.

She had seen nothing; evidently she feared nothing, and so was resting,

resting in mind as in body. And as I glanced again over my shoulder and

saw how entirely content she seemed, I was glad. Surely she depended

entirely on me; on my watchfulness and my courage. And this made me more

watchful and more resolute and stout of heart. A man likes to be

trusted. A true man likes a true woman's trust, much indeed. A strong

man likes to be leaned upon. It makes him stronger, braver, better. Let

women never forget this. Admit that she, too, has her days of strength

and endurance; and admit that she, too, has her peculiar fortress of

strength and courage, and these also man respects and regards with

piteous tenderness. But man, incapable of her finer and loftier courage

and endurance, resents her invasion of his prerogative.

It is only a womanly man who can really love a manly woman. But to

continue: Looking up a third time to this woman at my side, I saw that

she had let her head sink low on her leaning arm. She was surely

sleeping. How I liked her trust and her faith in me? And how I liked her

courage, too, and her high quality of endurance. It was her courage that

had brought me up here this night to the contemplation of awful and

all-glorious Africa. Silently and without lifting a finger, she had

shown me a world of burnished gold. I had surely seen God through her.

We stood nearer together now than ever before. This single hour of

indescribable glory should forever stand as an altar in the desert. Our

souls had melted and flown and tided on, intermingled like molten gold

in the golden atmosphere and the yellow scene that wrapped us round

about, and no word had been said. When God speaks so audibly let man be

silent.

I must have looked longer on the sleeping and trustful woman at my side

than I ought to have looked, for on turning my eyes again to the

horizon, there distinctly on the yellow sand and under the yellow moon

moved, stealthily as a cat, yet graceful and grand, the most kingly

beast I ever beheld. He did not look right nor left, but moved along

with huge head in the air, slow and stately, and triumphant in his

fearful symmetry and strength.

CHAPTER IV.

I half arose and felt for a trusty six-shooter. This pistol was not one

that had been purchased for this or any other occasion, as the worthless

pistols of the time are usually purchased, but it had been my companion

from boyhood.

As I half arose the lion suddenly halted. He lifted his proud head

higher still in the air, and to my consternation half turned about and

looked straight in my direction. Then a sidewise and circuitous step or

two with his long reach of hinder leg, his wide and deep and flexible

flank; slow and kingly; splendid to see!

I sank down again, quite willing to let him interview the land of Arabs

in the black chasm below. They had spears and guns and everything down

there, everything but courage to face a lion with; and I was not going

to interfere with a fight which at the first had promised to be entirely

their own.

But this new movement of mine only accentuated his graceful motion. The

head now turned in the air, like the head of a man. I had time to note,

and I record it with certainty, that the massive head and the tumbled

mane towered straight above the shoulder. In fact, the lower parts of

the long mane looked most like the long shaggy beard of a man falling

down upon his broad breast. This I noted as he still kept on in his

sidewise circuit above us and around us on the yellow sand and under the

yellow moon. At times he was almost indistinct. But the carriage of that

head! There was a fine fascination in the lift and the movement and the

turn of that stately head that must ever be remembered, but can never be

described.

As he came nearer--for his sidewise walk was mainly in our direction--I

saw that he, too, was yellow, as if born of this yellow world in this

yellow night; but his was a more ponderous yellow; the yellow of red and

rusty old gold. At times he seemed almost black; and all the time

terrible.

In half a minute more he would be too close for comfort, and I decided

to arouse my companion. She wakened fully awake, if I may be allowed to

express a fact so awkwardly. You may know that there are people like

that.

"What is it?"

"A lion."

"Are you sure?"

"Certain."

"Where?"

"Right before your eyes."

"Why, I see nothing."

She had looked and was still looking far out against the yellow horizon

where her eyes had rested when she fell asleep. And as she looked, or

rather before I ventured to point her to the spot almost under the tomb

where the lion strode, he passed on and was by this time perhaps almost

quite under the great slab of granite where we rested.

I was about to whisper the fact in her ear when I fancied I felt the

whole tomb tremble! Then it seemed to shake, or rather rumble again.

Then again it rumbled. Then again! Then there was a roar that literally

shook the sand. I heard the sand sift and rattle down like drops of rain

from where it lay in the crevices as I listened to find whether or not

he was moving forward toward the place by which we had ascended. He was

surely moving forward. I felt rather than heard him move. I assert--and

I must content myself for the present with merely asserting--that you

can _feel_ the movements of an animal under such circumstances. And I

assert further that an animal, especially a wild beast, can _feel_ your

movements under almost any circumstances. The undeveloped senses deserve

a book by themselves. But just now, with the largest lion I ever saw

coming straight upon me, is hardly the time or place to write such a

treatise.

Pistol in hand I sprang to the steep and rugged passage. And not a

second too soon. His mighty head was almost on a level with the granite

slab. And he was half crouching for a bound and a spring upward, which

would perhaps land him in our faces. I could see--or did I feel--that

his huge hinder feet were spread wide out and sunken in the sand with

preparation to bend all their force toward bearing him upward in one

mighty bound.

I fired! fired right into his big red mouth, between two hideous pickets

of ugly yellow teeth. He fell back, and then, gathering his ferocious

strength, he bounded up and forward again; this time striking his left

shoulder heavily against a projecting corner of the granite slab.

Fortunately the ascent was slightly curving, so that the distance could

not be made at a single bound without collision, else had we both surely

been destroyed.

Again the supple and comely beast, disdaining to creep or crawl, made a

mighty leap upward. But only to strike the rounding corner of the great

granite slab and fall back as before.

But I knew he would reach us in time! And if ever man did wish for

fitting arms to fight with and defend woman it was I at that time. True,

I had five shots left; but what were they in the face of this furious

king of beasts? I began to fear that they would only serve to enrage

him.

Still, he should have all I had to give. Death is, has been, and will

be. The best we can make of it all is to try and see that we shall not

die ingloriously.

The woman had been by my side all this time. And now, as the lion paused

as if to gather up the broken thunderbolts of his strength, she laid a

hand on my arm, never so gently, and said: "Let me go down and meet him

face to face. I think he will not harm me."

"Madam," I exclaimed impetuously, "you will meet him up here, and face

to face, soon enough, I think."

"No, that will not do. You must trust the lion; as Daniel did."

I pushed her back, as she tried to pass down, almost violently.

"There!" I cried as I wheeled about and forced her before me for an

instant, "if you have real courage leap to the head of yonder column,

then on to the next! Quick! be brave enough to save yourself and----"

"No! I will not run away and leave you to die."

"For God's sake you will run away and save me."

"Why? How?"

"I will join you there, go! Quick, or it will be too late!"

Another leap of the lion! Bang! Bang!

This time he did not fall back, but held on by sheer force of his

powerful arms; his terrible claws tearing at the granite slab as they

hung and hooked over its outer edge.

Bang! Bang! Bang! The last shot. I hurled my revolver in his face, for

he had not flinched or given back a single grain. His breath and my

breath were mingled there in the smoke of my pistol. I heard--or did I

feel--his great hinder feet fastening in the steep earth under him for

his final struggle to the top?

I turned, saw that she had reached the farther column; and with three

leaps and a bound I had crossed the granite slabs and stood erect on the

nearer one! Not a moment had I left. The lion, with great noise of claws

on the granite, came tearing to the surface. I crouched down out of

breath on the outer edge of my column, so as to be surely out of reach

of his ponderous paws. I expected him to decide the matter at once, to

reach us or give it up instantly. But he seemed in no haste now. He

scarcely advanced at all, for what seemed to me to be a long time.

Finally, jerking his tail like the swift movement of a serpent, he

strode along the farthest edge of the granite slab and seemed to take no

notice of us whatever. Blood was dripping from his mouth, but he did not

seem to heed it.

Once more he strode with his old majesty, and seemed ashamed that he

should have descended to the indignity of a struggle to gain the place

where he now stood sullen and triumphant. Enraged? He was choking, dying

with rage; and yet this kingly creature would not even condescend to

look in our direction.

Why, I could feel his fearful rage as he now walked on and around the

edge of that granite slab. At length he came opposite to where I lay

crouching on the farther edge of my column. He passed on without so much

as turning his eyes in my direction. And yet I felt, I felt and knew, as

distinctly as if he could have talked and told me, that he was carefully

measuring the distance.

When the lion, in his stately round, came to the narrow pass by which he

had ascended he paused an instant, and half lowered his head.

Ah, how devoutly I did pray that he would be generous enough to descend

to the sands and gracefully present us with his absence.

But no! Lifting his huge head even higher in the air than before, he now

passed on hurriedly, came on around to where in his stately majesty he

stood with quivering flank and flashing eye almost within reach of me.

Yet he still disdained to even so much as look at me. His head was far

above me as I crouched there on the farther edge of my column; his

flashing eyes were lifted and looking far above me and beyond me. Maybe

he was on the lookout over the desert for the coming of his companion.

Soon, however, he set his huge paws on the very edge of the great slab

on which he stood, and then suddenly threw his right paw out toward me

and against the edge of my column with the force and velocity of a

catapult!

I heard the sharp, keen claws strike and scrape on the granite as if

they had been hooks of steel.

Then he threw himself on his breast, and hitching himself a little to

one side, he threw his right paw so far that it landed full in the

center of my column's top and tore a bit of my coat sleeve. Then he

hitched his huge body a little farther on over the edge and again threw

his huge paw right at my face. It fell short of its mark only a few

inches, as it seemed to me. But, having hastily gathered in my garments,

his claws did not find anything to fasten on and they drew back empty.

At this point three dusky etchings stood out against the golden east on

the yellow sands, and looked intently at us with their enormous heads

high in the air. And now the beast slowly arose and moved on. A lion's

head seems always disproportionately large, but when he is exercising

for an appetite to eat you it looks large indeed.

The monster who was occupying the platform with us surely saw his

followers; indeed, he must have seen them long before; but his unbending

dignity seemed to forbid that he should take any heed of them.

The new-born hope that he would descend and join his followers died as

he came on around.

And now something strange and notable transpired. This one incident is

my excuse for thus elaborating this otherwise passive and tediously dull

sketch of this night. I had risen to my feet, and as the lion came on

around, this woman, with a force that was irresistible, sprang to my

side, thrust me behind her, and stepping forward with a single spring,

she stood on the edge of the column nearest to the lion.

I would have followed, but that same force, which I can now understand

was a mental force and not at all a physical force, held me hard and

fast to where I stood.

She had let her robe fall as she sprang forward and now stood only as

the hand of God had fashioned her; a snow-white silhouette of perfect

comeliness against the terrible and bloody mouth and tossing mane of the

lion. She leaned forward as he came on around and close to the edge of

his slab. She looked him firmly and steadily in the face, her wondrous

eyes, her midnight eyes of all Israel, the child of the wilderness, had

once more met the lion of the desert as of old.

Who was this woman here who stepped between death and me and stood

looking a wounded lion in the face? Was this Judith again incarnate? Or

was this something more than Judith? Was it the Priestess and the

Prophetess Miriam, back once more to the banks of the Nile? Was it the

old and forgotten mastery of all things animate which Moses and his

sister knew that gave her dominion over the king of the desert? Or was

her name Mary? "That other Mary," if you will, who won all things to her

side, God in heaven, God upon earth, by the sad, sweet pity of her face,

and the story of holy love that was written there? The lion's head for a

moment forgot its lofty defiance as she leaned a little forward. Then

the tossed and troubled mane rose up and rolled forward like an

inflowing sea. It never seemed so terrible. He was surely about to

spring! And she, too! Her right foot settled solidly back, her left knee

bent like a bow, her shapely and snowy shoulders, under their glory of

black hair, bowed low. Her dauntless and defiant spirit had already

precipitated itself forward and was smiting the imperious beast full in

his blazing eyes. I knew that her body would follow her spirit in an

instant more.

Face to face! Spirit to spirit! Soul to soul! A second only the combat

lasted. The awful ferocity and force of the brute was beaten down,

melted like lofty battlements of snow before the burning arrows of the

sun, and he slowly, surlily, shrank in size, in spirit, in space. A paw

drew back from the edge of the block, the eyes drooped, the head dropped

a little, and the terrible mane seemed terrible no more, as slowly,

doggedly, mightily, aye doggedly and majestically, too, at the same

time, this noble creature forced himself sidewise and back a little.

Then he hesitated. Rebellion was in his mighty heart. He turned suddenly

and looked her full in the face once more. All the beast that was in him

rose up. The terrible mane now seemed more terrible than before. With

great head tossed, tail whipped back, and teeth in the air, talons

unsheathed and legs gathered under him, he was about to bound forward.

But the woman was before him! With eyes still fastened on his face, she

with one long leap forward drove not only her shining soul but her snowy

body right against his teeth. Or rather, she had surely done so had not

the lion, half turned about, shrank back as she leaped forward. Then

slowly, looking back with his blazing but cowering eyes, feeling back

with his spirit still defiant, if but to see whether her courage failed

her in the least or her mighty spirit was still in battle armor; and

then he passed. His companions had drawn back and into a depression in

the desert where he slowly and sullenly joined them.

One, two, three, four dim yet distinct black silhouettes against the

yellow east; then but a single confused black etching; away, away,

smaller and smaller, gone!

I gathered up her robe, crossed over, and letting it fall on her

shoulders where she still stood, looking down and after the beast. I

picked up my pistol from where it had fallen, a few feet below, and as

she turned about, carefully reloaded it from cartridges by chance in my

vest pocket.

Returning to the summit, I found her again resting on her couch at the

corner of the huge slab, tranquilly as if we had not been disturbed. I

did not speak. Not a single word had been uttered all this time.

I sat down at the feet of this woman--not at her side, as before--and

let my own feet dangle down over the edge on the side farthest away from

the isolated columns. Neither of us spoke; nor did she move hand or foot

till morning.

THE CHEATED JULIET.

BY Q.

_Extracted from the Memoirs of a Retired Burglar._

The house in question was what Peter the Scholar (who corrects my

proof-sheets) calls one of the rusinurby sort--the front facing a street

and the back looking over a turfed garden with a lime tree or two, a

laburnum, and a lawn-tennis court marked out, its white lines plain to

see in the starlight. At the end of the garden a door, painted dark

green, led into a narrow lane between high walls, where, if two persons

met, one had to turn sideways to let the other pass. The entrance to

this lane was cut in two by a wooden post about the height of your hip,

and just beyond this, in the high road, George was waiting for us with

the dog-cart.

We had picked the usual time--the dinner-hour. It had just turned dark,

and the church-clock, two streets away, was chiming the quarter after

eight, when Peter and I let ourselves in by the green door I spoke of

and felt along the wall for the gardener's ladder that we knew was

hanging there. A simpler job there never was. The bedroom window we had

marked on the first-floor stood right open to the night air; and inside

there was the light of a candle or two flickering, just as a careless

maid will leave them after her mistress has gone down to dinner. To be

sure there was a chance of her coming back to put them out; but we could

hear her voice going in the servants' hall as we lifted the ladder and

rested it against the sill.

"She's good for half a hour yet," Peter whispered, holding the ladder

while I began to climb; "but if I hear her voice stop, I'll give the

signal to be cautious."

I went up softly, pushed my head gently above the level of the sill, and

looked in.

It was a roomy place with a great half-tester bed, hung with curtains,

standing out from the wall on my right. The curtains were of chintz, a

dark background with flaming red poppies sprawling over it; and the

further curtain hid the dressing-table, and the candles upon it and the

jewel-case that I confidently hoped to stand upon it also. A bright

Brussels carpet covered the floor, and the wall-paper, I

remember--though for the life of me I can't tell why--was a pale grey

ground, worked up to imitate watered silk, with sprigs of gilt

honeysuckle upon it.

I looked round and listened for half a minute. The house was still as

death up here--not a sound in the room or in the passages beyond. With a

nod to Peter to hold the ladder firm I lifted one leg over the sill,

then the other, dropped my feet carefully upon the thick carpet and went

quickly round the bed to the dressing-table.

But at the corner, and as soon as ever I saw round the chintz curtain,

my knees gave way, and I put out a hand towards the bed-post.

Before the dressing-table, and in front of the big glass, in which she

could see my white face, was an old lady seated.

She wore a blaze of jewels and a low gown out of which rose the

scraggiest neck and shoulders I have ever looked on. Her hair was thick

with black dye and fastened with a diamond star. The powder between the

two candles showed on her cheek-bones like flour on a miller's coat.

Chin on hand, she was gazing steadily into the mirror before her, and

even in my fright I had time to note that a glass of sherry and a plate

of rice and curry stood at her elbow, among the rouge-pots and

powder-puffs.

While I stood stock still and pretty well scared out of my wits, she

rose, still staring at my image in the glass, folded her hands modestly

over her bosom, and spoke in a deep tragical voice--

"The Prince!"

Then, facing sharply round, she held out her thin arms.

"You have come--at last?"

There wasn't much to say to this except that I had. So I confessed it.

Even with the candles behind her I could see her eyes glowing like a

dog's, and an uglier poor creature this world could scarcely show.

"Is the ladder set against the window?"

"Since you seem to know, ma'am," said I, "it is."

"Ah, Romeo! Your cheeks are ruddy--your poppies are too red."

"Then I'm glad my colour's come back; for, to tell the truth, you did

give me a turn, just at first. You were looking out for me, no

doubt----"

"My Prince!"--She stretched out her arms again, and being pretty well at

my wits' end I let her embrace me. "It has been so long," she said. "Oh,

the weary while! And they ill-treat me here. Where have you been, all

this tedious time?"

I wasn't going to answer _that_, you may be sure. It appeared to me that

'twas my right to ask questions rather than stand there answering them.

"If they've been ill-treating you, ma'am," said I, "they shall answer

for it."

"My love!"

"Yes, ma'am. Would it be taking a liberty if I asked their names?"

"There is Gertrude--"

"Gertrude's hash is as good as settled, ma'am."

I checked Gertrude off on my thumb.

"--that's my niece."

For a moment I feared I'd been a little too prompt. But she went on----

"And next there's Henry; and the children--who have more than once made

faces at me; and Phipson."

"Phipson's in it too?"

"You know her?"

"Don't I?" It surprised me a trifle to find that Phipson was a female.

"Three times to-night she pulled my hair, and the rice she brought

me--look at it! all stuck together and sodden."

"Phipson shall pay for it with her blood."

"My hero--my darling! Don't spare Phipson. She screams bitterly if a pin

is stuck into her. I did it once. Stick her all over with pins."

By this I'd begun to guess what was pretty near the truth--that I was

talking with a mad aunt of the family below, and that the game was in my

hands if I played it with decent care. So I brought her to face the

important question.

"Look here," I said, "all this shall be done when you are out of their

hands. At present I'm running a considerable risk in braving these

persecutors of yourn. Dearest madam, the ladder's outside and the

carriage waiting. Hadn't we better elope at once?"

She gave a sob, and fell on my shoulders.

"Oh, is it true--is it true? Pinch me, that I may awake if this is but a

happy dream!"

"You are ready?"

"This moment."

"There's just one other little matter, ma'am--your jewels. You won't

leave them to your enemies, I suppose?"

This was the dangerous moment, and I felt a twitch of the nerves as I

watched her face to see how she would take the suggestion. But the poor

silly soul turned up her eyes to mine, all full of tears and confidence.

"Dearest, I am old, old. Had you come earlier, my beauty had not wanted

jewels to set it off. But now I must wear them to look my best--as your

bride."

She hid her face in her hands for a second, then turned to the

dressing-table, lifted her jewel-case and put it into my hands.

"I am ready," she repeated: "let us be quick and stealthy as death."

She followed me to the window and looking out, drew back.

"What horrible, black depths!"

"It's as easy," said I, "as pie. You could do it on your head; look

here----," I climbed out first and helped her, setting her feet on the

rungs.

We went down in silence, I choking with laughter all the way at the

sight of Peter below, who was looking with his mouth open and his lips

too weak to meet on the curses and wonderment that rose up from the

depths of him. When I touched turf and handed him the jewel-case, he

took it like a man in a trance.

We put the ladder back into its place and stole over the turf together.

But outside the garden-door Peter could stand no more of it--

"I've a fire-arm in my pocket," whispered he, pulling up, "and I'm going

to fire it off to relieve my feelings if you don't explain here and now.

Who, in pity's name, is _she_?"

"You mug--she's the Original Sleeping Beauty. I'm eloping with her, and

you've got her jewels."

"Pardon me, Jem," he says in his gentlemanly way, "if I don't quite see.

Are you taking her off to melt her or marry her? For how to get rid of

her else----"

The poor old creature had halted, too, three paces ahead of us, and

waited while we whispered, with the moonlight, that slanted down into

the lane, whitening her bare neck and flashing in her jewels.

"One moment," I said, and stepped forward to her. "You had better take

off those ornaments here, my dear, and give them to my servant to take

care of. There's a carriage waiting for us at the end of the lane, and

when he has stowed them under the seat we can climb in and drive

off----"

"To the end of the world--to the very rim of it, my hero."

She pulled the gems from her ears, hair, and bosom, and handed them to

Peter, who received them with a bow. Next she searched in her pocket and

drew out a tiny key. Peter unlocked the case, and having carefully

stowed the diamonds inside, locked it again, handed back the key,

touched his hat, and walked off towards the dog-cart.

"My dearest lady," I began, as soon as we were alone between the high

walls, "if the devotion of a life----"

Her bare arm crept into mine. "There is but a little time left for us in

which to be happy. Year after year I have marked off the almanack: day

by day I have watched the dial. I saw my sisters married, and my

sisters' daughters; and still I waited. Each had a man to love her and

tend her, but none had such a man as I would have chosen. There were

none like you, my Prince."

"No, I daresay not."

"Oh, but my heart is not so old! Take my hand--it is firm and strong;

touch my lips--they are burning----"

A low whistle sounded at the top of the lane. As I took her hands I

pushed her back, and turning, ran for my life. I suppose that, as I ran,

I counted forty before her scream came, and then the sound of her feet

pattering after me.

* * * * *

She must have run like a demon; for I was less than ten yards ahead when

Peter caught my wrist and pulled me up on to the back-seat of the

dog-cart. And before George could set the horse going her hand clutched

at the flap on which my feet rested. It missed its grasp, and she never

got near enough again. But for half a minute I looked into that horrible

face following us and working with silent rage; and for half a mile at

least I heard the patter of her feet in the darkness behind. Indeed, I

can hear it now.

THE MYSTIC KREWE.

BY MAURICE THOMPSON.

CHAPTER I.

About seventy years ago a young man of strong physique and prepossessing

appearance arrived at New Orleans. He had come from New York, of which

city he was a native, and had brought with him a considerable sum of

money, supplemented by a letter of introduction to Judge Favart de

Caumartin, who was then at the flood tide of his fame.

It would not be fair to call our young man ("our hero" would be the good

old phrase) an adventurer, without taking pains to qualify the

impression that might be produced. Hepworth Coleman had his own way of

looking at life. Fifty years later he would have been a

tragedian--probably a famous one, but the conditions were not favorable

to awakening histrionic ambition at the time when his character, his

tastes, his ambition should have been forming. What he saw that was most

fascinating to him had no distinct form; it lay along the south-western

horizon, a dreamy, mist-covered something not unlike the confines of

romance.

Hepworth Coleman was rich, and what was, perhaps, a greater misfortune,

he had no living kinsfolk for whom he cared or who cared for him.

Practically speaking, he was alone in the world: moreover, he had an

imagination. Scott's novels, Byron's poetry, the French romances, and I

know not what else of the sort, had been his chief reading. For physical

recreation he had turned to fencing and pistol practice. When I add that

he was but twenty-two and unmarried, the rest might be guessed, but

Coleman was not a young man of the world in the worst sense--he had not

turned to evil sources of dissipation. Healthy, vigorous, full of

spirit, he nevertheless had sentimental longings as indefinite as they

were persistent.

Youth is the spring time when "Longen folk to gon on pilgrimages," as

old Chaucer words it, and it would be hard to find the young man who has

not felt the vaguely outlined yet irresistible desire to wander, to go

over the horizon into a strange, new world. Hepworth Coleman, when he

was taken with this longing, felt no restraint cast around him. He was

absolutely free, had all the means necessary--why should he not go where

he pleased? If it seems strange that he should have been attracted to

New Orleans rather than to the Old World, we must remember what New

Orleans was in 1820. No other city, not even Paris, could at that time

compare with it as a center of genuine romance, nor was this romance

unmixed with lawlessness of the most picturesque kind. Money poured into

it from a hundred sources more or less illegitimate, besides the streams

of wealth produced by cotton, sugar, and rice industries. Gambling was

indeed a fine art, duelling appeared more a pastime than anything else,

and what went on in the gilded halls and melody-filled salles may be

imagined, I suppose, though, I do not care to cast a glance that way.

Hepworth Coleman had heard much of the gay city, of its warm, odorous

atmosphere, its hospitality, its social charm, the smack of reckless

romance in all its ways. Somehow the desire to go there got hold of his

imagination and he went.

The letter to Judge Favart de Caumartin was given to Coleman by his

banker, who in handing it to him said:

"I don't know the Judge personally, never saw him; but he has done a lot

of business through us. He is very rich, evidently very influential, and

certainly will be of use to you. I feel that I can take the liberty of

sending you to him, because--well, he is under many obligations to the

bank, and is likely to want many more large favors. I fancy that you'll

find him a trifle eccentric, but enthusiastically hospitable. A creole

of the creoles I judge him to be, and a representative of the nabobs."

Young Coleman considered himself lucky to carry with him a document that

would give him introduction to a person so renowned as Judge Favart de

Caumartin, of whom he had been recently reading a good deal owing to a

duel fought between the Judge and one Colonel Sam Smith, of the United

States army, in which the latter had been killed. The duel had brought

out history from which it appeared that Judge Favart de Caumartin had

fought before, not once only, but many times, and always to the death of

his antagonist. Along with these facts were disclosed numerous

picturesque details of the Judge's past life, with more than hints that

in his young days he had been a pirate or something of the sort. The

account also made the most of his wealth, his almost reckless

liberality, his eccentricity, and, most of all, the air of mystery which

still hung over his business operations.

All this was rich food for an imagination already thoroughly saturated

with the spirit of romantic adventure, and during the voyage from New

York to New Orleans Hepworth Coleman found deep satisfaction in

anticipating what he felt was in store for him. In every fiber of his

frame he felt the assurance that he was on the way to new and strange

experiences.

His banker had sent a letter to precede his arrival by a few days,

asking a friend to secure suitable apartments for Mr. Hepworth Coleman,

gentleman, the consequence being that a dark young man, small but

well-built and handsome, met him at the landing to conduct him to his

suit of elegant rooms on Royal Street.

"Is you Meestu Coleman, sah?" inquired this young stranger in a musical

and respectful tone of voice. "I look fo' zat ma' at prayson."

"Yes, sir, that is my name," said Coleman briskly, at the same time he

showed by his look that he would like to know whom he was meeting.

"Varee glad you come, Meestu Coleman; varee glad, sah, indeed. Got your

rooms all prepare fo' you, sah. Yes, sah, zey is beautifu' an' sharming

rooms."

"Thank you; I am much indebted. Are you the gentleman to whom Mr.

Cartwright, the banker, wrote in my behalf?"

"Nah, sah, not any banker write to me; I been told to meet you at zis

place at prayson. Happy to see you. Mist Coleman; varee happy."

There was an elegant carriage at hand waiting for our friend. A negro

driver in livery and a small black footman stood by.

Coleman entered the vehicle, followed closely by the young creole who

had met him on the landing. He saw his baggage hoisted into a little

wagon to come after the carriage.

For some reason not exactly explained this whole proceeding affected

Coleman peculiarly; he felt a sort of vague uneasiness, as if he were

passing into an atmosphere of mystery, if not of danger.

As he was whirled through the narrow streets he caught glimpses of queer

tile-covered houses with curious hanging galleries. High walls and

gloomy courts flanked these, and here and there a dusky palm or a bright

orange tree flung up its foliage. Blooming magnolia clumps filled the

air with a heavy, languid odor.

But what most attracted the attention of Coleman was a company of four

or five young men dressed like dandies, swaggering along on one of the

_banquettes_ (sidewalks) and singing a drinking song at the top of their

voices. One of these hilarious fellows made a lasting impression on our

young friend's imagination. He was a tall, olive-skinned, handsome man,

apparently about twenty-five, strikingly dressed in a plaid coat, a vest

of red and black velvet, gray trousers, and a profusely ruffled shirt.

Evidently he was the leading spirit of the party. At all events he was

somewhat in front, with his black cap set well back on his shapely head,

while his jet black hair fell in shining curls over his strong

shoulders. He was shouting forth the French drinking carol in a voice as

sweet as it was loud, and at the same time waving in the air a small

cane. The entire group looked the worse for wine, their faces flushed

and their eyes brilliant.

"Who is that strange-looking man in front?" inquired Coleman of his

creole companion, as they passed them by.

"Zat ge'man ees ze goozh Favart de Caumartin," was the answer that

fairly startled the interrogator.

Coleman actually grew red in the face and exclaimed:

"_That_ Judge Favart de Caumartin! Surely, sir, you are mistaken."

"Beg pahdon, sah, zat ees Monsieur le Juge Favart de Caumartin. I him

know varee well myself at prayson."

Coleman turned and stared back through the window at the strutting

youthful figure leading the noisy rout.

How could that be the celebrated duellist, the guardian pirate!

"It cannot be," he muttered aloud. "It is impossible."

"Varee well, Meestu Coleman," said the young Creole dryly; "but I mus'

inqui yo' pahdon, sah. Monsieur le Juge Favart de Caumartin ees to me

well acquainted. I wemark to you, sah, zat zare ees not any mistake."

"Oh certainly, sir; I beg a thousand pardons!" exclaimed Coleman,

pulling himself together and seeing his breach of etiquette. "Of course

you were right; but I was so surprised to see the Judge looking so

young. I had supposed he was an aged man. I am astonished."

"Oh, Monsieur le Juge ees not so young--not so varee--hees hair not much

gray." While they were still discussing this matter the carriage stopped

in front of a square, heavy-looking house, which, painted a dull red and

projecting its upper gallery over the _banquette_, flung out on either

side a heavy brick wall on whose top was a jagged dressing of broken

bottles and jags. It looked more like a convent than like an

apartment-house.

Hepworth Coleman found his suit of rooms admirable in every respect,

large, airy, luxuriously furnished. His creole conductor parted with him

at the door without giving his name or address and without any

explanation whatever of his connection with the matter of securing these

elegant apartments or with making his arrival easy and pleasant.

Some silent and obsequious negro servants were at hand to do his

bidding; but he soon dismissed them; while he flung himself upon a sofa

and lit his pipe. Altogether incomprehensible to him were the

suggestions of secrecy and mystery connected with his reception;

scarcely less so was the youthful, nay, boyish appearance of Judge

Favart de Caumartin.

As if the mysterious atmosphere meant to continue growing denser, it was

while he lay along the luxuriant scarlet sofa, smoking, resting, and

meditating, that a beautiful girl came and stood for a moment in the

doorway of his chamber. She blushed sweetly at sight of him, recoiled

violently, and then slipped swiftly away, leaving behind her a rustle of

fine stuff, a sparkle of rare jewels, and a lingering bouquet of violets

and roses.

Coleman felt the delicious shock of her magnetic beauty thrill through

him. A sort of shimmering outline of her body wavered or appeared to

waver in the door after she had gone, so dazzling had been the effect of

her fresh, pure, flower-like, yet intensely human, beauty. He heard her

feet tap swiftly and lightly along the hall. Involuntarily and with

unpardonable curiosity he sprang up and, hurrying to the door, looked

out, but she was not in sight. For the first time in his life, he felt

his heart beating unnaturally.