Bemidji Daily Pioneer Newspaper, July 26, 1922, Page 2

(Continued from'.last issue) And yet why? That one little word ‘Jalted Fairchild as he left the eleva- tor. Why? What did they know about the PBlue Poppy mine, when qeither he nor Harry had any idea of what the future might hold for them . there? That day In court Rodaine had said that the Blue Poppy mine was a good property and that it was worth every cent of the value which had been placed on it. How did he know? And why—? Suppose that it had been Anita dchimond after all who had arranged this? It was logicaldn a way. Maurice Rodaine .was the one man who could . glve direct evidence against Harry as the man who had held up the Old Times dance, and Anita now was en- raged to m him, Judge Richmond had been a friend of Thornton Fair- child; could it have heen possible that this' friendslip might have entailed the telling' of secrets which had not been related to anyone else? The “'matter ‘of the finding of the skeleton coald be handled easily, TFairchild saw, through Maurice Rodaine. One word from him to his father could change the story of Crazy Lau and make it, on the second telling, only the maundering tale of an insane, herb-gathering woman. Anita could Lave arranged it, and Anita might have arranged it. Yet, why should she have gone through this procedure 1o reach him? Why had she not gone to Farrell with the proposition—to a man whom she knew Fairchild trust- ed, instead of to a greasy, hand-rub- bing shyster?..And besides— But the question was past answer- ing no%. Fairchild had made his de- cision, and. he had told the lawyer where to go. But one thing was cer- tain: the Blue Poppy mine was worth money,. Once before an offer had come, and now that he thought of it, Fairchild: felt almost. certaln that 1t had been froiir the sume source, That was for fifty” thousand doliays. Why. ghould theivalue have now jumped to four times its original figures? It was more than the adventurer could en- compass; he sought to dismiss It all, went to d picture show, then trudged back to his hotel and to sleep, The next day found 'him still striv- Ing to put the problem away from him as he went about the varlous errands outlined by Harry., A day after that, then the pufling, snorting, narrow- gauged train took him again through Clear Creck canon and back to Ohadi. The station was strangely descrted Only the bawling bus nian for the hotel, the statlon igent wrestling with a trunk or two—that was all. Fair- child looked about him in surp:ise, then appronched the agent. “What's happened?” “A lot. ~ From what I hear it's a strike that's going to. put Ohadi on the map ngain,” “Who made it?” . “Don't know, Somie fellow came runnlng down liere an hour or §0 ago and said” thef¢'d been a tremendous strile made on'the lsHl, and eversbody beat it up, the “Fairehild went on, tn turn h\to a de- serted street—a street where the doors of the stores had been left open end the awners gone. F\(‘rv\\lume it was the same; It was as if Ohadi sud- denly had been struck by some catas- trophe which had wiped out the whale population. Only now and then a hu- man belug appeared, a few persons left behind at the banks, but that was about all.. Then from far away,.up the street leading from Kentucky gulch, came the soundof cheerlng and shout- ing. Soon a crowd appeared, led by gesticulating, vociferous men, who veered suddenly into the Ohadi bank at the corner, leaving the multitude without for a moment, only to return, thefr hands full of gold certificates, which they ' stuck into their hats, punched through their buttonholes, stuffed Into thelr poclkets, allowing them to hang half out, and even Jammed down the collars of their rough shirts, making outstanding dec- orations of currency about their necks. On they camé; closer—closer, and then Fairchild gritted his teeth. 'lhvb' were, four of them leading the parade, rfls;flflyhm the “wenlth that stooll for“the! honanza of the silver strike they had just made, four men whose names were gall and wormwood to Robert Fairchild. Blindeye Bdfefifan nnd Taylor Bill were two of theml. ‘The ‘others were Squint and Maurice Rodaine! CHAPTER XIV Had it been any one clse, Fairchild | would have shouted for happiness and | Joined the parade. As it was, he stood far to one side, a silent, grim figure, watching the miners and towns- people passing before him, leaping about in their happiness, calling to | him the news that he did not want to hear: i Bl Sfiver Queen had “hit." . The LUSTRATIONS I R.B.Van Nice faith” of Squint_ Rodaine, xnaxmalned through the years, had shown his perspicacity. It was there; he al- ways had said it was there, and now the strike had been made at last, lead- silver ore, running as high as two hun- dred dollars a ton. It meant every- thing for Ohadi; it meant that mining would boom now, that soon the hills would be clustered with prospectors, and that the little town would blossom as a result of possessing one of the rich silver ngnes of the state. Fairchild felt cheap. He feit de- feated, He felt small and mean not to be able to join the celebration. Squint and Maurice Rodaine possessed the Silver Queen; that they, of all persons, should be the fortunate ones was bitter and hard to accépt. sheuld they, of every one in Ohadi, be the lucky men to find a silver bonanza, that they might flaunt it hefore him, that they ‘might increase thelr stand- ing in the comtunity, that they might “raise themselves to o pedestal in the eyes of every one and thereby rally about. them the whole town in any difficulty which might arise in the fu- ture? It hurt Fairchild, it sickened Mim. He saw now that his enemies were_more powerful, than ever. ~ And for a moment he almost wished that he had yielded down'there in Denver, | that*he had not given the ultimatum to the greasy Barnham, that he had ac- cepted the offer made him—and gone on, out of the fight forever. Anita! What would it mean to her? Already engaged, already having given her answer to Maurice Rodaine, this now would be an added incentive for her: to follow her promise. - It would mean a possibility.of further.argument with ‘her father, .already too weak from fllness to find the means of evading the insidious pleas of the two made: him -virtually fhelr slave. The future looked black for Robert Falr- childi; - Slowly, he walked ‘past the happy,-shouting crowd ‘and turned: up. Kentucky gulch toward the mfuted Blue Poppy, The tunnel opening looked nore Ior- lorn than ever when le sighted it, a blenk, staring, single eye whick seemed to brood over its own misfor. tunes, a dend, hopeless thing which never had brought anything but disap- pointment. A choking came into Falr- child’s throat. He entered the tunnel slowly, ploddingly; with lagging mus- cles he hauled up the bucket which told of Harry’s presence below, then slowly lowered himself fnto the re- cesses of the shaft and to the drift leading to the stope, where only a few days before they had found that gaunt, whitened, haunting thing which had brought. with It 2 new misfortune. A light gleamed ahead, and the sound of a single jack hammering on the end of a drlil could be heard, Fair- child called and went forward, to find Harry, grimy and sweating, pounding away at 4 narrow streak of black for- mation which centered in the top of the stope. * " “It's the vein," he announced, after he had greeted Fairclhild, “and it don't look like 1t's golng to amount to much " “No?" . Harry. withdrew the drlll from the Tole he was making and mopped his forehead. " “It aln't a world-beater,” came dis- conselately. . “I doubt whether it'll run more'n twenty dollars to the ton, the wye smelting prices ’ave gone up! And there ain’t much money In that. What 'appened in Denver?” “Another frame-up by the Rodaines to get the mine away from us. It was a lawyer. He stalled that the offer had been made ‘to us by Miss Rich- mond.” “How much?” “Two hundred thousand dollars and us to get out of all the troubles we are in.” “And you took it, of course?” “I did not!” “No?” Harry mopped his forehead again. “Well, maybe you're right. Maybe you're wrong. Rnt whatever YOu aid—wely that's Just the thing i would 'ave done. Only—" and Harry above himyg “iP's soing -to takeius a long !lmn Ku ‘get two hundred. thoy- | sand dollars out of things the wye they stand now.” “Bnt we're “going to keep at it, Harfy,sink or awim.” ; |u ¥ Yol Xhow fe1y: 84 “The Rodaines have hit—maybe we can have some good luck too.” “The Rodaines?” Harry stared: “'It what?” “T'wo hundred dollar a ton ore!” A long whistle. Then Harry, who Why | men who had taken, his money and | was, s‘gu‘lnp lugubriously at the vein . il ) to one side. “] Did Not” ing ip th 1iké everybody else.’ “But to go there and ask them to look at their riches—" “There ain’t no law against it!” He reached for his carbide lamp, hooked to a small chink of the hang- ing wall, and then pulled his hat over. his bulging "forehiend. Carefully he attempted to smdoth’ his smylng mus- tache, and failing, as’always, gave up the Job, “I'd ‘be "appy, Just to look at it,” he announced. “Come on. Let's forget ‘00 they are and just be. lookers-on.”, Fairchild “agreed ' against his will. Out of the shaft they went and on up the hill to where 'the - townspeople again .were gathering about the open- ing of the Silver Queen. A few were going in. Fairchild and ’Arry joined them, A long walk, stooping most of the way, as the progress .was made through the narrow, low-roofed tun- nel; then a slight rafse which traveled for a fair distance at an easy grade— at last to stop; and there before them, jammed between the rock, was the strike, a great, heavy streaking vein, nearly six feet wide, in which the ore stuck forth In tremendous chunks, embedded in a black background. Harry eyed it studiously. “You can see the silver sticking out?” he announced ‘at.last. ‘It's won- derful—even if the Rodaines did do it. Come on, Boy, let's us get out of “ere. T'11 b getting the blind staggers if I stay much longer,” Falrchild .accompanied him word- lessly. It was as though Fate had played a deliberate trjck; that it might laugh - at him. - And’ as. he walked along, he wondered’ more than: ever about the mysterious telegram and the mysterious conversation of the greasy Barnham in: Denver,+ For once a ray.of cheer came to him, . The Rodaines:had kKnown of this strike long, before he ever went. to that office in Denver. 'They had wait- ed long enough to have thelr assays made and ‘had compléted their first shipment to the ‘smelter. There was no necessity that they buy the Blue Poppy mine. Therefore, was’it simply another trick to break ‘him, to lead him up to a point of high expecta- tions, then, with a laugh at his dis- appointment, throw him down again? His shoulders straightened as they reached the outside air, and he moved close to Harry as he told him his con- Jjectures, The Cornishman .- bobbed his head. “I never thought of it that wye!” he agreed. “But it could explain a lot of things. They want to beat us and they don’t care 'ow. It 'urts a person to be disappointed. That's it. I al- wyes said you ’ad a ‘good. 'ead on you! That's it. Blue Poppy.” Back- they went, once more to de- scend the shaft, once more to follow the trail along the drift toward the opening of the stope.. And _there, ‘where loose earth covered -the place where a skeleton once had restgd, TFairchild took off his coat and rolled up his sleeves. “Harry,” he said, with a new deter- mination, “this vein doebn’t look like uch, and the mine looks worse. But if you're game, I'm game, and we'll work the thing until it breaks fus.” “You've said it. If we 'it anything, fine and well—if we can turn out five thousand dollars’ worth of stuff be- fore thie trial comes up, then we can sell hit under the direction of the court, turn over that money for a cash bond, and get the deeds back. If we can't, and if the mine pefers out, then we ain't lost anything but a \lot of ‘opes and time. But ‘ere goes, We'll double-jack. 1've got a big ’ammer ’ere. You ’old the:drill for awhile and you take th’ 'ammer and Lor' 'ave mercy on my ’ands if you miss.” Fairchild obeyed. Hour after hour - they worked.s '.l:hlu. a#' the afternoon ‘grew late, Harpy!disappeared far down the drift.t0 retufn witl a band- ful of grensy, candlelike things, ~wrapped in waxed paper. “I knew -thatdyflawite of . couldn’t ‘be B Hi1n time, s bought a little up 'm " he expl as he cut one of the.sticks in two with a pocketknife and 1aid the pieces Then out came a coil of fuse, to be cut to its regular lengths and inserted in the copper-covered had been balancing a single Jack, pre- | caps of fulminate of mercury, Harry paratory to going back to his work, | threw it aside and began to roll down | his sleeves, “We're going to “ave a look at 1t.” “A look? What good would it—?" “A cat can look at a klng. said lInrr\ “'Uluy can't_arrest} us.for go- showing his contempt!' for the danger- ous things by crimping them about the fuse with Lis. teeth, while Fair- chilg, sitting on a small pile of muck nearby, begged for caution. But Harry only grinned behind his blx mustm.he and went on. _ bif s Let’s go back to the’ turn it, while I slingth’ sledge. Then i ut came’ Dis pocketknife again as he slit the wnx!fl paper of the gelat- inous sticks, then inserted the cap in the dynumlt& One after .another the charges were shoved .into the holes, Harry tamping them into place with a steel rod, instead of with the nsual wooden affair, his mustache brushing his shoulder as he turned to explain the virtues of dynamite when handled by an expert. “It's all in the wye you do it,” he announced. “If you don’t strike fire with a steel.rod, it's fine." “But If you do?” ‘Oh, then {” Harry laughed. fifwers and a funeral—after “Then. they've finished picking you up.” :§i0ne “after, another he pressed the fl:finmm- njel tight into the drill ‘hioles and mhped them with muck wrapped “in a . newspaper ' that he dragged from his hip pocket. Then he lit the fuses from his’ lamp and stood a second in assurance that they all were spluttering. ' “Now we rum!” he announced, and they hurried, side by side, down the drift tunnel until they reached the shaft. “Far enough,” sald Harry. A long moment of waiting. Then the earth quivered and a muffled, booming roar came from the distance, Harry stared at his carbide lamp. “One,” he anneunced. Then, “Two."” Three, four and five followed, all counted seriously, carefully by Harry. Finally they turned back along the drift toward the stope, the ‘acrid odor of dynamite smoke cutting at their nostrils as they approached the spot where the explosions had occurred. There Harry stood- in silent contempla- tion for.a long time, holding his car- bide over the mle of ore that had been torn from the ‘vein above. “It ain’t much,” came at last.’ ‘Not more'n 'arf & ton. We won’t get rich at that rate, And besides—" he looked upward—*we ain’t ‘even going to be getting that pretty soon. It's pinching out.” * Fairchild followed his gaze, to see in the torn rock above him only a nar- row streak mow, fully an inch and & half narrower than the vein had been before the -powder. holes -had been drilled. It ‘could'mean only one thing: that the bet had been played and lost, that the vein had been one of those freak affairs that start out with much promise, seem to give hope of eternal riches, and then gradually dwindle to nothing. Harry shook his head. “It won't last.” " “Not more than two or three more shots,” Fairchild agreed. “ “You.can't tell abewat that. It may run that way. al} through the mountain —but what's'a fqur-inch vein? You can £o up 'ere ipithe; “Argonatt tunnel and find 'arf a dozem:of ‘them“things that they don't even take ‘the ‘trouble to mine. That I8, unless they run ’igh in picked up.a chunk of the " h silvy to be forgotten trovertible. ' “ goods. marked goods? ore from the muck pile where ft had been deposied and studled it fntently ~—‘but I don’t see any pure silver sticking out in this stuff.” “But it must be here somewhere. I don’t know anything about mining— hui don't veins sometimes pinch off and then show up later on?” “Sure they do—sometimes. But. s a gamble.” “That's all we've hld imm m be- ginning,, Harry.” “And it’s, about all .wa're ln; to 'ave any time unless:something. ;sudden like.” “Then, by commion consent, they-lafd away their working clothei ‘and_ left the mine, to wander down' the gulch and to the boarding -housé: "After din- ner they chatted a;moment: with Moth- er Howard, then went upstairs, each to his. room, An hour later Harry knocked ‘at Fairchild’s door, and en- tered, the evening paper in his hand. “’'Ere's something more that’s nice,” he announced, pointing to an item ‘on the front page. It was the announce- ment that a general grand jury was to be convened late in the summer and that one of its tasks would be to seek to unravel the mystery of the murder of Sissie Larsen! Fairchild read it with morbidity. Trouble seemed to have become mgre! than occasional, and further than that, it appeared to descend upon him at Just the times when he could least re— sist it.. He made no comment; there; was little that he could say. Again; he read the item and again, finally to turn the' page and hreathe sharply. Before him was a six-column adver- tisement, announcing the strike in the Silver Queen mine and also spreading the word that a two-million-dollar company would be formed, one mil- lion in tock to represent the mine it-’ aclt, the other to be subscribed to ex- ploit this new find as it should be ex- ploited. Glowing words told of the possibilitics of the Silver Queen. Of- fices had been opened; everything had been planned in advance and the ad- vertisement written before the town . Phene B2 51 You Shave Every bgy and of course you need the proper%having ma- - terials, - Our shn,vmg:; sticks, powder or soap; ' bay rum or witch hazel," face powder, lotion, shaving mirror, etc., are indispensable to the man who shaves. . Let us supply, you with all your toilet articles; clty Dru Store"’ LALIBERTE & ERlOK.ON lldmldjr WE ARE PROUD TO AN- NOUNCE THE NEW was aware of the big discovery up Kentucky gulch. All of it Fairchild read with a feeling he could not down —a feeling that Fate, somehow, was dealing’' the cards from 'the bottom, and’ that trickery and treachery .and & venomous nature were the necessary ingredients, after all, to success. He finished the last line, looked at the list of officers, and gasped. For there, following one another, were three names, two of which Fair- child had expected. But the other— They * were, president 'and general manager, ‘R.- B. (Squint) 'Rodaine; secretary-treasurer, Maurice Rodaine; .and’ first vice president—Miss ‘Anita Namlie B|cl|mondl R Continued in next issue - Affef the Showdown The great “buyers’ strike”. of 1920-: 21 a never event in the economic hlstory ' of this tountry, proved’ a point which must henceforth be recognized as basic and incon- It was discovered by merchants and job- {bers everywhere, in practically every line of " merchandise, that it was the and adequately advertised brand of goods that got the lion’s share of the business there _was, to get, while the preponderant loss of sates fell on the unb’randedvan‘d unadvertised trademarked | This was a great “showdown” for advertis- ing. Its position as a factor in economic life was ont trial, Had it really done what it had always been claimed for it? Had it created consumer preference that would hold against keen competition of a sacrifice price on un- The verdict of the buying public was un- qualified. It was not a straw vote to deter- mine popularity. It was the final test of wil- i lingness to buy. The ballots were dollars. ‘And § the preponderant majority voted with their dollars that they preferred to keep right on buying advertised goods. With the whole country on a ' schedule of production and sales, the factor- ies that were able to keep on producing, in anything like normal quantitiies, werein var- reduced Published hy the Bemidjt Ploneer in ee-eperaticn With) The American Asscelatlen of Advertising Agencies. . jobbers and merchants infe giving serious con-, " are finally convinced that their future lies in ‘eration, A full 24 ounces of delicious flakey white bread. Weigh it first,: then taste it and CRISPY KRUST will be your household standard. NORTHERN BREAD CO. BEMIDJI, MINN. READ THE PIONEER WANT ADS iably those makmg trademarked and nation- ally advertised goods, { All over the country\tod:ay manufacturers sideration to this important and: conspicuous- ly demonstrated fact:' the public prefer to buy nationally advertised brands of merchan- dise. And public demand is the last word in all economic situations. No one can go against it and long endure. This' will mean, then, that more and more manufacturers will :seek out ways to make their products. worthy of a distinctive trade mark and a sustained plan of advertising. It will mean that merchants will more and more give preference in' their stocks to advex:tised brands. It will mean that jobbers will more and more arrange to supply the merchant with advertised brands. - But new advertisers, manufacturers who the direction of an advertised product, will discover that the magic power of advertising can not be applied overnight. It may require sustained effort to attain a position of equal- ity with competitors who have been advertis- ing for many years. This will be an unwel- come discovery. But it will be found to be the- truth, and will be their only hope of gaining a substantial foothold in what, from now on must continue to be a more keenly competi- .. tive market than we have known for a gen-