Evening Star Newspaper, August 14, 1921, Page 56

¥ THE DIM DIM GIRL F you were not accustomed to the houses of the New Guinea inland ranges—and in the world not 100 white people are—it seemed un- safe. Willis Rothery wanted to know why we had camped in a plaee that eeemed likely to tumble into the mid- dle of last week if you coughed. He sat on the floor and looked down through the splits of the palm sheath- ing between his own feet, at the sun- ° set making a hell pit of the boiling mountain mists 2,000 feet below. The sight did not please him. “This house,” he said, “is simply bracketed onto a perpendicular preci- pice, God knows how! When we came along in those treetops that you called a track—track. good heavén, for mon- keys, or men?—and saw these things stuck above us like the nests of some mad bird, 1 couldn’t believe you when you said they were houses. The only sensible thing 1 can see about the people who built the place is that they've deserted it." “I don't suppose they did” I satd, without paying too much attention to what he said. The fact was that all this mad mountain scenery—the scarped peaks and tumbled camel humps. and dislocated spines of the mighty Owen Stanley—and the smell of the closing night up here in the clouds—it was a wet smell, and smoky from the ancient thatching of the hut—was hypnotizing me. i had not 'n it since the days when 1 had been living a white boy among the mountain folk Who 1t was half a life then—almost so in years. and in happenings and history. since utterly The years of the great war alone, when I had fought and been pen- sioned and refused my pension be- cause I the white savage. had no real need of money. loomed up behind as big as a century. Yet they were unreal tonight, and the adventures of Rothery, the poet, and myself, all over the island world were unreal, and Rothery was unreal, too. Nothing was true except the small of the Scented forests wet With long mountain rain amd the reek of smoky thatch and the stnister sound of evening storm, ravening and blun- dering up the chines of the Cloven ranges, as it had sounded for me on a hundred nights of this half-forgotten mountain world—years ago. “What did they do, then?' asked Rothery, drawing in his legs—for it was damp and cold up here above the 5.000 feet, and the fire that the car- riers had lighted at the other end of the ruinous room was damp, and smoked more than it blazed. “What did_who @02 1 asked. half absently. Hornbills, huge-headed. wide of wing, were planing home above, with a sound like a Gno engine in want of repairs. The o'clock” locusts had started a vast whirring _and rattling among the treetops far below, as if - some one had on a sudden turned the tap of a reservoir of sound. Swift as spring tides, the enormous, lonely night of the mountains was rising—rising. “The people who you say didu't de- sert this place™ answered Willis. “0, those? Eaten out, 1 should think.” Willis looked at me oddly. “A nice place fo be in." he said. “You wanted to See the unexplored country and yog put up the money,” I reminded him. 'm not sorry; I * k% % ol rather like the ? idea of being surrounded by cannibal tribes whom no one's evér seen. It seems exciting—or would if you weren't 30 calm over it all.” “If you'd been a year and a half in the war,” I remarked. mixing myself a chew of betel nut, “the liveliest of the New Guinea cannibals would seem like lambs to you. I spent yes. terday evening, after you'd gone to sleep, telling'a 1ot of them about Bel- glum. They were very genuinely shocked. - “You—where were they? I never knew.” “No. They, don't advertise. I didn't think you ripe for them you sleep. And, anyhow, y have seen thém even If you'd been awake.” “You wouldn’t see them if they were all round you, unless they wanted.” “I bet you I should. know what q “I do not. You don't u‘ck perception I have.” You can’t even see them now. Rothery jumped—just a little. Then he settled himself more firmly on the floor. loosened his knife in his belt and felt the trigger of his revolver— they do in books. but in real life one doesn’t; one might shoot some one doing it—and told me he was ready if there were a thousand 1 didn’t say anything. Years had ac. customed me to the curious views th average man-holds on the subject of cannibals. T only beckoned. and out of the dusk, up among the piles.of the house, from rocks and bushés and holes, came two or three and twenty short chunky. naked figures, carrying ebony spears and obsidian clubs that a collector would have bou much money. They had their hair plaited in small tails, mountain fashion, and adorned, not with white men’s heads. but with ight for beads made of native shells, showing | thereby that they had mo friendly communications with the tribes from the coast; whom, indeed, if I remem- bered correctly, they were apt to eat on_ sight. Willis stared as hard as a cat, and, if you will remember, there is noth- ing that stares harder. The moun- taineers did not stare at him; never- thele: knew that these indifferent. deep-dug eyes of theirs had not missed a single hair on his head or button on his clothes. With the politeness of the inland cannibal—I will make you a pr nt of the ill manners of the coastal breed—they waited for my pleasure, not setting toot on the ladder of the house. “Nambu and Maisi and Rore” I said, “tell the others of your village that the food is ready. and come up, my brothers, without fear. You know me as your frignd, the Pigeon of the Hills.” For so they had named me, because of my piping voice, in the days when 1 was a little white savage among them to dinner,” them. “TI've asked 1 bracketed to Rothery. “If you are quite sure that the din- ner won't be on us, I've no possible objection,” he said. “On the contrary, they're probably worrying now a to whether you and the carriers don’t intend to make & feast of them. It's a favorite trick in Papua to ask people to dinner. and then. make them provide the dinner themselves.” “Travel enlarges the mind,” said Willis. “T always like to discover an entirely new crim: * x k% Blscm'rs these people did mot un- derstand, nor sugar. Salt I gave them In handfuls, and they licked it up with joyous cries. Then I spened some tins of meat. They looked at the picture on the outside—a highly colore@ representation of Uncle Sam it was an American brand—and Jerked their hea n; *Oh, companio! happy smile “thi you are bringing us; man is our prop- er eating.” *““What does he say?’ asked Willls curiously. “Says he likes the brand,” I trans- Jated. I didn't want to give the poet too much all at once. ‘When they had eaten, they and I sat staring at each other in the light of the hurricane lamp. There were men among them who had been beys with the little white savage, who had spearsd wallaby with him, strangled sleeping birds on the trees at night in his company, danced the boy dances with him as leader, passed through the secrets of the togeter with him. My heart was drawn to them. Man- eaters though they were, they were brave and simple, and they treated their prisoners better than I have been treated at; Ruhleben. Oh there are_woei le In the world, and so I thought, 8s I sat on. my heels in the dusk Mght of t he hurricane {ing through the roof. mple life | lamp and ate meat with the men of the ranges. And Willls, his yellow hair ruffied into strange feathers, his queer, forty-year-old little face looking old and young at the same time, as 1 sup- pose only poets’ faces do look, stared and stared and drew and drew long breaths of interest. “It is all invaluable—from a lit- erary point of view.” he said. As for me, his saying made me sorry for him. 1 can't exactly explain. It seemed connected with his little legs and his thin, roosterlike neck, and the fact that he had never been drunk in his life. I'd hate to be—outside. Of course, you have to be outside to see. But who wants to see? Doing is 80 much more. The night had fully come: there were bell birds clanking and clinking all through the gorges below the house, and once a giant frog bleated from some creck. Then the night rain burst like a dam, and we began mov- ing about the hut to find a dry place to sit in. You couldn't hear any one talk at larst; I found, to my annoyance some- | what, that I had lost the old power of hearing through the thunderous downpours of the hills. When the rain suddenly ferked itself short off and took a breathing space, I had got a good bit behind the conversation. “Oh, companion,” Nambu was say- “she is very much devil-devil.” 1 agreed, not ing, “Most women are, particularly interested. “And you were devil-devll, too, Pigeon of the Hills, so no doubt it is the custom of your people.” “Oh, yes, companion.” I said absent- y. I was getting very sleepy now. 1 thought 1 would like to curl up on my mat in the old, old way and let the thunder of the night rains and the rain-fed river whelm me into | sleep—as in long ago. * ¥ ¥ % ! ] MUST have nodded forward, for the next thing I remember Is jerking myselt back and listening, suddenly quite wide awake, to what Nambu was saying. “We think she is bad to look at,” he sald. | to marry her, and yet there were girls who cooked potatoes for you, Pigeon of the Hills, when you lived with us, though you were 50 young. It is quite true, you were bad to look at also, but they did not mind that. Eut a dim-dim girl, that is another thing.” A what?" 1 yelled. Nambu looked at me reproachfully. The man-eater of the ranges does not rudely raise his voice unless he hap- pens to be raiding a village; then— but you men who have been through the war don't need to be told. We are. like the colonel's lady and Judy O'Grady, all one family under our skins. “Did you say there was a d!m-dim | girl here?" I cried. “Who is she. How fong has she been here? And how— how—how did she get here?" You cannot say “how the devil” in any native language; it is a pity. “What's a_dim-dim’ girl?" asked i who knew the word for “Good Lord “It means a white girl, no less. And he says there’s one here.” “Isn't that_impossible?" “Of course. But it seems to have hap-, pened.” I showered questions on Nam- bu. Generally speaking. the passage} of any white person through the in- terior of New Guinca leaves a wake as big as that traced by a white ele- phant in an English village. It geem- ed unthinkable, first, that any white woman should have penetrated to those formidable fastnesses; secondly, that the whole country should not have been ringing with it If she had. “Hold on!" said Willis unexpectedly, after I had translated a question and answer or two. “I think I can tell you something. He says that it was a white baby, and that they got it fifteen yam seasons ago, counted on two hands and one foot, and that he doesn’t know how they did.” “Yes, but the last only means that he won't tell.” “Hold on! I remember everything I read. 1 read about this. It's Grace Gordon.” L S “Grace how much? This isn't the time or place to make poetry, Roth- ery. What tree do you think you're barking up?* “I don’t think; I know. Fifteen years ago there was a missionary and his wife murdered somewhere in this part of New Guinea or near Her name was Jessie Gordon and his was | Campbell Gordon, and they had a; baby girl called Grace, who wasj killed, too—so it was said. Why, man, there was quite a lot of fuss made about it” “I remember, now you tell me. At{ least, I remember someth'ng. But it was never thought any one survived.” “It seems clear some one did.” said Willis Rothery positively. “This is iGrace Gordon for a ducat, carried off iinto the hiils.” * ok k% she is,” T said, “she will be a proper little savage. I was pretty i 1 i {much of a Papuan when they found {me, and I'd had ten years of white «F ! { people first. But this child can't| {bave been two. They spoke of her . ‘prattling babe’ if T remem- be ‘Willis rose to his feet. It may have; been because he had been rufiling up his hair, but I swear he looked an inch or two taller. “Simon,” he said, with a tremble in his vo'ce, “you and I will go and rescue her. “What from?” I asked. “She wouldn't | thank you. She has settled down among them, and must be a native in all but color. Remember what the Jesuit said about the first six years of a child's life.” S He brushed my words aside. “She must be rescued.,” he safd. “By_all means, if it amuses you, old man,” I answered. “Anything to please. Nambu will take us to the “Our young men do not wish ' were not to know which of them all was to be yours. When the snake bit me in Queens- land and I was scarcely drawn back from death in time, I thought, “Is it this door, then?’ But the door closed before me. And ‘n Flanders in '15, when there was one great door open night and day, and hun- dreds of thousands through in crowds, I be this door, then?" ered of my wound and and that door clanged again, 1 knew which door would, in all probability, swing on its hinges to let my friend the poet pass; it was a pale, heart shaped door. And for me, I thought, one of two would most certainly open, the red door that hurried you through on the swing of sharp, sudden death, or the far-away, low-bent door, gray with cobweb rime, that bore a name almost worn out with years—“Old Ag Half awake In the moonlight. I sat and listened to and smelled the night and I felt more surely than ever, that some strange fate was ascending and 1t is to But I recove was sent home, Tolling through the waves of time to me “Whether there is or is not, T may as well sleep,” 1 thought, and so I slept again. 1 woke a little before dawn and had the carriers out of their blankets and boiling their morning rice just as sun- | rise burst like a red volcano flame! through the seas of m!st that tossed about our peaks. Willis and 1 had food, packed up and got away. He was anxious, I remember, and could not hurry me enough. “What am I going to see?" he said. And again with that fluttering eager- ness strong on him: “What am I going to see? “I'll tell you,” I said, “when we are back again tonight.” But I did not, and to this day I do not know, although I shall. It grew l'ght; we were on our way. The village where Nambu had said we should find the dim-dim girl was one that I had known long ago; I needed no guide to the lifting precipice, plumed with dangling trees. up which our pathway lay. Rothery. though he had as plucky a soul as every small, weak body held, seemed somewhat daunted at the sight of this typical Papuan “road,” with its faint streak of liana ladder, half rot- ten, dropped from ledge to ledge and waiting in the wind raised by the waterfall that spumed beside ‘t. *“It looks bad,” he said. “Can we take a long time?” “Not if ‘we are to get up before dark to the village” T said. “Don’t you come if you feel it too much.” “I shan't let myself feel It too much,” he said. “I wish you had & shred or two more soul, Simon. Can’t you see that the rescuing of this girl is simply a sacred duty to one's race?’ “I don't mind taking it so from you,” I assured him; indeed, 1 had a_considerable respect for Rothery's odd fancies, little though 1 understood them at times. * kK ok village tomorrow, and you can do all the rescuing you want; I expect it won’t be much. No doubt they'll be glad to get rid of®her. She doesn't em the idol of the village, exactly.” “That's settied, then,” said Willis. “Why—where are the men?" “Went a minute ago while you were talking. They don't move about like elephants—or white people.” “What way did they go? “Out at the front.” “But that's' impossible!” screamed the poet, balancing hurricane lamp in hand, over the verge of a pretty steep precipice. It was not quite perpen- dicular, but it looked very nearly so. & . Those are their torches bob- bing about half-way down.” “Marsh lights surely!" “Do. You want me to go down and show ou?” I asked, unlacing my boots. “‘Just et me take my clothes off, and—why, I know that scarp as well as you know the Hotel Australia. I could walk down ‘without using mhand % “For God's e, don't! Simon, you make my blood run cold among these mountains. The things I've seen you oy d "'Oh,you ferget I'm one of themselves. Well, it's settled about tomorrow, then. I want to see the dim-dim girl as much you t's @ thing that Interests me far more tRa#m it could interest you, for the matter of that. But I don't se of this rescuing idea.” heathen and I won't argue said Rothery. I scarcely 1 with you, heard him, for I had curled myself up on the floor asleep. Long ago I had never been used to dream in the' mountains, but that night the river flooded all my rest. ere is it carrying me?” I cried. and woke to find the rain finished and the hut full of slatter moonlight sift-| Far, far be- Tow the invisible stream ran heavily. To my half-awakened mind it sounded big with fate. %k CCY\XJHAT is to happen?” I thought. “Will the door open tomorrow?” Por that was the way I had always thought of death; it seemed to me Itke a hall with rows ‘of doors, each door marked with the name of some d was three-quarters 'of the doors you wers surs, quite sure, to pass—but till the Woor opened you FTER that it was impossible to talk—not on my account, 8ince I felt very much at home, but because of the d'fficulty Rothery found in as- cending the rock faces and the straight-up banks of bush, where you hold on by roots and by your toes—unless, like him, you wore ham- pering, inconvenient boots. I went first and showed Rothery where to trust it. “Lo6rd!” he sald, pausing half way up to wipe the streaming sweat out of his eyes. “You are a perfect Pithecanthropus. When that rung gave way beneath you just now, you s‘mply hiccupped with one foot and went on; whereas, by all the laws of gravitation you ought to be lying at the—I can't get my breath.” “Give it up,” I advised. “If she's lived fifteen years among these peo- ple, she might as well go on living to the end.” For answer he began to climb again. I reached down for him and half-dragged him on to the top. I don't think he could have done it otherwise. At the summit we sat for a long time, staring back and dow the view was one on which a dise: bodied spirit miht have looked, won- dering why Heaven was called the fairer of the two. Mountains and forests and rifts through the heart of the hills; pu: wreaths of foam llalunf above water- falls unseen; tree tops felted to green and golden velvet and flowing—flow- ing—to the verge of the horizon and beyond, a seamless robe of exceeding beauty; the crystal sun and the pale, bright maiden blue of high-level skies; airs of Paradise blowing. How can I tell in words the soli- ., unstained wonder of it all? “Does no one live here?’ asked Rothery when he had caught his er- rant breath again. “You may say no one. The village 1s the only one for a long way. There, you can see it now “Those brown toadstools on the queer little truncated cone of a hill?” “Yes. They probably cut off the ta‘ of the hill to build on it. We shall have to keep off the high points after this.” Why P e § :n'nl,ln‘t have weleomed strange white people myself when I was liv- ta THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTO A Tale of Love and Romance Among l (LA passing | T 7 | the D. ©, Monntain Cannibals ing up here. I didn't. They Prac- tically captured me.” “And after that,” remonstrated Wil- lis Rothery as we began descending into green depths below, “you would abandon this white girl! “‘For two reasons,” I agreed. ‘One —that'she has been among the na- tives all her life, not part of It. W “What about two?" he asked as I hesitated. “I've sometimes wondered” I sald, and broke off. “I've wondered if I— Whether I shouldn't have been— Mind, that's a tige He'leaped three feet in the air, and then paused in the middle of the track to tell me that there were no tigers in New Guinea, so he couldn't imagine what I meant by- * ¥ % % ] HAD to take him by the back of the neck and swing him away, or the coppery tiger snake would have brushed him a tree. It did not sirike. It was hanging from I knocked (I A I \* its head off with my knife just in time. So I did not finisn what I was say- ing at the moment, and on reflec- tion I decided to leave it unfinished for good. We did not near the village till late in the afternoon, close though it looked. You can never accept the look of things in the mountains, and besides we had to keep under shadow of the bush all the way. It was certaln that the women of the place would be coming home from their gardens about 5, and if the dim- dim girl caught sight of us I was fairly certain she would make a bolt of it.. I should have been mnone the worse pleased, but I didn’'t want to disappoint Willis, since he was set upon carrying the matter through. ‘We came in sight of a break in the deep forest and of a little track lead- ing to it; we concealed ourselves and sat still. “That is the clearing for the gar- 1 said. “The women will come along by and by with the food for the evening meal. and we can see with- out being seen—if you keep quiet.” “Of course, I shall keep quiet,” said Willis, indignantly. He struck a match. I took it away and relieved him of his cigarette. “Do you suppose they have no noses?”’ 1 asked him. We sat there for some time before they came. The sun dipped quite suddenly behind a tall rampart of forest, and it became greenishly dark, like the look of things when you swim under water. Still, it was not really late; there was another hour of day- light. A dog yelped at I they were coming, for it was a young dog. such as the women carry about with them and tend often more care- ;u"y than they tend their own chil- ren. I touched Willis to impress on h‘m the necessity for silence, and he said in a rustling whisper, *“Yes, all right.” Then they were upon us—a file of small, bent, brown creatures, dressed in the narrowest fringes of grass hung about their hips, each woman loaded down incredibly under a mountain of firewood, bables, sweet potatoes and bananas, and some, in addition, carry- ing her small pet dog. They were not ugly women, though their hair wi hort and plaited into two small black tails, each weighed down with a single white dog’s tooth, and thelr figures were bowed with labor. Some of them had the bright- est and merriest brown-black eyes that a man could wish to laugh into, and there were one or two men who had features sc dainty as squirre! and hands, tod, small and neat, as & squirrel's little hands, They talked as they came in soft, tinkling voices, like the wind blowing through boughs or water running on small stones. It was harder than I could have thought mot to spring up and greet them in their own odd tongues, every word of which I knew. Last of all came a woman, taller by six inches than any. though she ‘was no more than five feet two. This and I knew woman was very young. but she wore no ornaments, no shell beads or medals, no feather nec! es, no white dog’ oth, nor was her halr braided into tails. Instead it hung down her back, a glorious mass of ruddy gold. and half-clothed the unprotected. girlish bosom. Her dress no more and no less than that of the others. On her shoul- ders she carried the heaviest load borne by any of the crowd, and the shoulder and the figure and the slim. well-turned 1im! rched feet and narrow, pointed hands were white. * % % % _BURNED by sun and beaten by mountain rains, darkened almost to the hue of a half-caste—none the less, among those small bronse figures the girl, in shape, size, color alike, proclaimed herself of Rothery’s race and mine. , g I heard him catch his breath, and I pinched him to kesp him quist. 1 knew what It was that had startled him. The: creature was beautiful. She did not look happy; she was sullen in expressjon, and her. fina brown aye- Brows seemed to be pérmanently fixed in a frown, but no cloud could spoil the loveliness of her face. The eyes, brown, like those of the native women, but most unlike them in keenness and fire, were very large and deeply hed; they were set with the finish of gems under a brow that —relieved of hard, angry lines and of searng sunburn — would have looked like pale new ivory. The mouth and nose were graceful, the shape of the face exquisite. 2 1 nevér saw a prouder or a sadder lip on any human countenance, mor, outside of a Da Vinci drawing, had 1 thought such a graceful flow of cheek into delicute neck could exist. Her hair was a wonder; her figure, undisgu'sed save by the brief grass fringe, seemed in its loveliness to scorn all veiling. The girl was mis- erable clearly; the girl was a savage, but the girl was beautiful. Do I seem changeable or smali- minded when I say that on the in- stant when I saw Grace Gordon labor- ing under her pack of food and fire- wood up the stony track my thoughts about the whole matter of search and '[I”:If“ AUGUST 14, 1921—PART 4 “Will she run away?” he asked, stil) panting and tolling. “Doesn’t matter; she wouldn't get far. I only wanted to prevent her taking to the bush before 1 got there. We said nothing more, Rothery be- cause he could nof, I because I do not talk unless there is something to say. and there was nothing just then. It was quite dark by the time we reached the little cluster of brown huts on the hilltop. As I said, the summit had been sliced off to make & site. The houses stood like ornamente on a table; there was hardly a yard of spare ground on any side. * % k * ELOW, the mountain miste wreathed and blew, and from the Inevitable gorge came a low grum- bling of waterfalls, Within the village the women were passing to and fro, carrying large wooden dishes of food, lift'ng clay pots on and off the fires. There was & smell of hot sweet pota- toes and of stewed bananas on the alr; nothing more pronounced. “Just as well, on Rothery's ac- S ) m}fl.m[ H rescue changed and I became as solved as Willis Rothery himself If 80, I can only plead that beauty is beauty and that since the beginning of the “werld” man has instinctively bowed before it. Yet there was more in my change of feeling that plain admiration of Grace Gordon’s face and figure. The sense of some great event about to dawn—of a door near to opening—that had haunted my sleep the night before, now seemed to gather itself together and break into light. “This is it,” my mind said to me. “Not death, but life.” For I knew that I had found the woman at last. It would be absurd and you would not belteve me if I told you that I, a strong man in the thirties, had never taken interest in any woman before. Only in books does a man pass half his life asleep like the silly princess in_the wood waiting for love. I had been broad awake since first they tied the armlet of manhood on me n these very mountains, and, as Nambu, my friend, had said, there were girls even then who were ready to cook my food for me—in Papua, a significant act. And in France and in_Queensland— ‘Why should I speak of any of these? Not one was the woman. In no case had it ever appeared possible to me that I might marry. T had taken it for granted that light loves, fancies that came and passed, were all that life could hold for me. I was not as other men. Civilized on the surface, beneath it I was the man of the for- ests and the seas, not tied to houses. hating the indoor life with a hatred deep as death. ' re- ? * % % % ~HERE are men like myself in the world; more, perhaps, than you of the citles would believe, and the same problem strikes them every one. But, almost every one, they solve it by taking a brown woman to wife, or a half-caste. 5 I was different. - White Australian to the roots of my soul, I would not give my name nor the mothering and care of my children to @ woman with one dark drop in her veins. And so it had seemed certain that children, companionship, home would never be mine—until, in the emerald light of the mountain evening I met Grace Gordon. Here was the native woman, the creature of forests and rivers, the hardy, bush-trained girl, careless of money and the things that money brings—yet, though uncultured, un- educated, utterly uncivilised, white, ‘with the noble te: ble white mind and the pure white blood that holds and carries onward no stain. And—let me say it once again—she was_beautitul. I don’t know how the thing might have struck me if she had been squat or crooked or frog-mouthed eyed. Perhaps I might have held my original opinion, that it was! kinder to leave her where she had lived. But being what she was, it was not in the heart of man to nee her and pass by on the other side. And the natives thought her flllg’! They did—and the young men would not look at her, or she at them, ac- cording to Nambu. . Yes, I remember that the mountain tribes had called me ugly, with my queer pale skin and foolish light hair and eyes. It had taken ‘a strong man and an elo- quent tongue to win them to other opinion, Grace Gordon, if I judged her right, had been despised and set aside till she was utterly sullen and sulky. No wonder she was not popular. ell, I did not desire anything else, The women had passed by, the sun was I'IDMF Eo'ng down bshind the forest walls. Willis and I rose from our cramped position and loked at one th £ J. what do you think now?’ asked he, I did not answer him at Y but I e vil- I HEARD HIM CATCH HIS BREATH AND PINCHED HIM TO KEEP HIM QUIET. now, and excited over seeing me. They will let me have anything, if they happen to notice my taking her. Tomorrow they will repent, but we shall be out of reach, I hope.” Will's answered nothing, but his eyes remained on the girl and there was a certain sadness in their glance. “You're thinking no one will ever make much of her,” I said. “You're wrong. She would never quite civil- ize, but give me six months and she’ll speak English as well as you or I, wear all the clothes any one needs, read and write and sew and do dim- dim cooking. No, I shan't teach her all that, only some of it. The mission will do the rest and do it well.” “and then?” said Willis. 1 did not answer at onci - “Do you remembes here we he, I closed the door as ple forget. Come back with us. “You're going back?" To the white beach there and the little palm leaf house and my great open seas that feed me. There might be a little palm ieaf house for you. Isn't it a life for a poet?” Willis Jooked hard at me. “You don't see everything, Simon,” he said. I was 8o stupid that indeed 1 did not understand. And yet she was very beautiful! “Come.” T kept on begging. “Come now, and keep on coming. We'll all let the world go by and be happy.” “You haven't asked for the girl,” was all he s: 2 1 went to where the headman of the village was leaping and twisting in a mad abandon of dance. “Companton, touching him, should come with us: she is no good to you. You give her?” And I held up a fine tomahawk head for pay- ment. He snatched it. “Take her. companion,” he howled. with an extra leap. “She is not worth half so much as a good Dig.” * k% % N©OW I was anxious to get away, for “Y I knew by experience that this dancing orgy might end in trouble, and it was from all points best to get off while the village was still drunk with its own exertions. Already the howling that accompanied the dance had somewhat changed in character. I slipped out of the light of the fires, Grace Gordon gliding before —she understood perfectly—and Wil- lis close beside me. We were right in BY BEATRICE GRIMSHAW the marrow, stockaded entrance, and almost out of sight, perceived, it cemed, by noune. when, withgut the least warning, an ebonywood spear. thrown by some dancer who had reached the crazy stage, came through the with an ugly “Whoo!!” Gordon. the man knew what he was doing. He simply flung the spear anywhere, at random, because he felt like Neverthel the weapon would have gone through the girl had not Willis Rothery—who was next her, I being some way in the rear—made a quicker spring than I should ever have thought possible to him, and flung her out of the way. In £0 doing he flung himself into the way, and the spear transfixed him. He fell instantly, and lay stil] I could mot answer for the pevp) of the hills when their blood w. worked up with dancing. I slung my poor friend over one shoulder before any one had time to see what was happening, took the girl by one hand, and ran down the narrow track in the dark as hard as I could go. ‘When we were a few hundred yards away, and apparently unnoticed, I put down my burden, struck a match or two, feit the heart and the lungs, held my ear close and listened. He was dead. In places like the interior of Papus one thinks quickly. Isaw that it was best to get out of the way, lest my friends of the hills should think well | to illustrate practically a certain fa- imous adage about dead men and the telling of tales. I could not take the body with me. But neither could I, nor would 1, leave it behind me, to be found and dealt with as the men of the mountains would deal with it. There was the sound of & mighty waterfall not far away. I felt once more to make sure—as If one who had seen the battlefields of Europe did not know death at first sight!— and then I left Grace for a moment, warning her to keep hidden, tramped through a few rods of tangled bush, came out on the verge of a great white torrent that seemed to light up the moonless night, and with single word of farewell gave Willls' body to the deep. “You are eating tears” whispered Grace to me as we ran along side by side through the dusk, her hand in mine. “Why?" “He was my friend.” I sald. “Will you love me as much?" “As much, but otherwise T sald. “Now, mountain girl, run hard.” And as we ran through the night | T heard the door that had opened. but {not for me. swing loud on its hinges | benind us. - (Copyright, 1921 The Joys and Troubles Of a Municipal Golfer BY MAJOR.TEE. HILE Douglas Fairbanks and Charlie Chaplin may fur- nish more thrills and antics than the average man, they have not produced all the amusement and funny situations in the world. Right here in Washington we have a continuous performance consisting of a nine-teel picture—a picture that is kaleidoscopic in its character, that is intensely amusing and that gives a wonderful insight into the character of the average human. The players who participate in this picture are not the high salaried and petted actors and actresses who have brought added renown to California. Our artists pay for the privilege of going through the reel. If you have not, by this time, guessed what this story is going to be about, just think of the municipal count,” I thought. I had never shared |g0lf links, and you will have the in any of the meat that the fighting men brought home from time to time; still, I had seen too much of it to be shocked. Of course they had seen us long be- | frequent the municipal golf fore we reaehed the place, and of course they knew who I was—eve soul In the range knew it by th time. Nevertheless, you should have heard the yell they thought it neces- sary to raise when we came in. The men seized their spears and danctd madly; the women put down the cooking pots and howled like dogs. And every dog in the place joined in the clamor. “Are they going to attack?’ asked the poet with interested curiosity. “Wait and see,” 1 s: 1 walked up to the biggest warrior—they were none of them very big—called him by his tribal name and clapped him on the shoulder. He had me round the neck in a minute, and 1 remem- ber 1 found myself thinking that it would be a good missionary act to in- troduce that unknown luxury, soap, to the people of the ranges. “Pigeon of the Hills” he yelled, rubbing his face on mine. “Pigeon of the Hills™ the whole vil- lage took up in chorus. Most of them did not remember me, as they had been children when I left, but all acted as if they had only lived for that moment and that event—to see me back again. Food was cram- med into my mouth and into Roth- ery’s. = We were dragged to & sitting posi- tion, and two old womepn began to rub our legs. The dogs stood afar off and howled like wolves, as native dogs do, and the girls acted in much the same way, simulating unbearable terror. But the white girl, in her fringe of grass, with her wonderful hair falling down, stood and looked at us silently. She did not rum away. She crept nearer and nearer. No one in the village seemed to notice. The old women finighed the!r rubbing and left us. Somebody started a dance, and they were hard at it before long, pounding the earth, leaping, and sing- ing ;to express their.joy and excite- ment. And Grace Gordon, in the fire- light, crept up and up. ‘When she had come within artm’s length she reached out and touched my hand. Something told me what she wanted. I la'd my hand beside hers, and long and earnestly she com- pared the two. Then she spoke in the mountain tongue. * % ¥ X nYoU are like me,” she said. I answered her, “We are of the same village,” using the native idiom. “There are many, many others in that village. Will you come to it with me?” » “Would they, love me there?” she asked, an !nfinite sadness in her voice. I hesitated. Somehow I could not lie to her, this poor White-savage girl. - Never, I thought, would the people of “her village” receive her as quite one of themselves. It had gone on too long for that. “They will love you a little,”™ was all I could say. “Will no one love me much?’ she asked, leaning forward with her brown éyes full of fear. “Then I will not gg," 5 Something broke in my breast at that, and I took her firmly by the hand. “I wlill love you," I told her. *“I will 1ove you very, very much, and you shall cook thy food and make my garden, and I will cut down the forest and keep the devils of the bush away and carry spear and club for you For 1 knew I must speak to her after the way of the natives or she would not have understood. by t are youw saying?” asked Wil- lis, who had never taken h!s eyes off lto play. ySundays the guter is fllled to over- “location” where a most dissimilar aggregation of stellar players per- form daily. Some of the players who links would furnish Dickens, were he alive, ar|With enough material to double his works of character sketching. As one motors to these links he has a view of the site of the famous Long Bridge, now replaced by a modern structure. He sees the beautiful place that was once the home of that gal- lant southern gentleman, Robert E. Lee. He notes the spider-like far- | reaching towers of one of the greatest wlreless plants in the world, and as his eye follows the course of the Potomac River he sees in the distance the famous old city of Alexandria. Turning Hains point at the lower end of the golf course, one comes back by the side of a branch of the Potomac in which are harbored the humble rowboat, the little ‘“putt, putt” launch of twenty feet or more, he gazes perhaps with envy at numer- ous spjck-and-span private yachts, the property of wealthy senators or other high officials. The auto is then turned 1o the left and straight ahead are two commodious and well equipped club- houses, one for the fair sex and the other for mere man. In each house are lockers, showerbaths and all the conveniences. Twenty-five cents is paid the courteous attendant and a ticket from a roll similar to those used in motion picture houses is pre- sented. Then one passes the swing- Ing doors and stands on the tile porch, before the eye is a beautiful nine- hole course. The bunkers and other hazards are artificial, as are the putt- ing greens, and while the course is level except for the hazards and the greens, it is one on which the player “earns everything he gets.” The fair- ways are kept in good condition and while some have criticized them as being too narrow, players who drive for direction do not complain. The higher grass, known as the “rough.” on either side of the falrway tests the players' skill, for the “rough” is all that its name implies, and once the ball enters it, forward direction ceases. * % k% THE putting greens are not level; they are undulating, in the main, and call for the maximum amount of £kill. The surfaces are, however, beautifully kept. As you leave the clubhouse and wander to the first tee you place your ball in a little tin gutter. This is done so that each player will know when his turn comes Saturday afternoons and flowing and it is amusing to watch the players carefully note how many balls are ahead of them. At last those preceding you have been given the word to go. Th tions to you to tee up, you hand him your little green ticket, grasp pinch of wet sand and build your lit- tle mound. Your turn confes, take your position, or golfers term it, select your stance, and prepare to drive the little white ball toward the first cup. You throw back your club—but, as a noted English writer says, that is another stary. ‘Whether pyscologists were born, made, evolved, or however thev came into being, It must' have been with the thought that their mission in life was to study golf players, and while in Washington psychologists may have had to content themselves with such Interestng studles as members of the House and Senate, the cabinets, Presidents and other outstanding fig: ures in the past, they now have & far broader fleld. The Washington golfér, both native and adopted, is here in force. Before we drive off the tee, suppose we watch some of attendant mo- you her, though I am bound to say she swept him with her glance as though he was something Insignificant on the far horison. 8 14 him. {"a‘ DY (ERY PNy A iteath :x"ihnd will you take her away?” “You are going to get her away?” w." he nl‘. ml}lnx h'h "l:. u have| “Now! wn{r-. gl (Ot g ekt Siman By Rectirs i e 805 SLSIMY t i it :n -hpt,s;kfi m‘%.'g _her_wp In oold bloo ‘es,” I Baid, “a man ight” % 'They are all worked up with dancing the players who are indulging in this healthy exercise. The first is & four- some, masculine In composition and generous adipose tissue. That courtesy of the links prohibits any one from talking while a player is preparing to hit the ball; not so with that foul some, however. The man on the treme left, who in architectural lines resembles the late John Bunny of movie fame, is being guyed by his three associates. Their ‘banter is ! | | l | | l good natured, consisting of sugges- tions as to how properly to propel the ball in the desired direction. One of the boon campanions, himself a trifie under 300 pounds’ weight, gi Sug- gestions as to how to reduce weight, while the third inquires as to how the one about to drive would like to have a nice cold stein of (deleted by censor). * % x % BANG! Bang! Bany! Bang! This foursome has left the tee, and in their white loose costumes they remind one of the snow men in motion as theys waddle after the balls. Each one h made a good drive. The next up a twosome. One player wears leather leggins, army trousers and a khaki shirt, and his -well-knit figure be- speaks army training. His compan- fon has a black and white plaited shirt, a black jersey coat trimmed with white, a fetching little headplece surmounts her crown of brownish hair, upon which the sun plays, show- ing a glimpse here and there of deep bronze hue. Her violet eves are of the kind that sent Mark Anthony on his wild dash up the Nile, her tiny feet are encased in‘black and whits sport shoes. The man builds the iittle mound of sand, places the ball gently upon its apex and. like a true gal- lant. gives her the honor of the first play. She looks at him and smiles. takes her position. draws back her club, gives a nervous little swing and the ball goes off at an angle—distance thirty feet. Manlike. to curry favor, he hastens to assure her that he did not place the hail properly. Those waiti for their turn are filled with various emotions. The hardened golf s a stolid demeanor. 11: a regular poker fice: o h who e played but a short w while on the f. making their depicted dete: maiden's effor and she siands her hero to while show sympathy. 's of those who are t public attempt is tion to excel the now his turn hless, awaiting ke it “in onme” or else get a He hitches up his_trousers. tukes his stance, swings back his club. starts the drive, looksy at her instead of the ball, and “dubs” his shot. Those lustrous orbs depict mixed emotion. there is an instant flicker of amusement, then one of womanly sympathy. He smiles a sickly grin, looks around at the wait- ing crowd. a flush steals o’er his face, then his jaw is squared. in his eyes comes a look of determination. He sets himself and, bang'—a good drive, straight as a shot from a rifie. She looks at the other women with an air of proud possession; he hurls a glance of defiance at the waiting throng and they pass out of the picture toward the next tee. You do mot hear a sigh of relief from those who are wafting, but you sense it just the same. The next. a threesome. One a southpaw. another a slight, nervous chap—a student of law, perhaps. The other was a husky fellow, built to pull the No. 2 oar of a crew. Three cracks that re- mind ene of the impact of a base ball as it hits Babe Ruth's bat! These three are half way down toward the No. 1 hole before the mnext four- some takes its place. The composi- tion of these players is as follows: A pair of newly-weds ond a pair of near-weds. You watch the hubby and the hubby-to-be fix the little mounds of sand and something causes you to turn, and the majority of men await- ing their turn have retreated out of earshot. You can't be profane and polite at one and the same time. Four drives, two giggies, three of the balls have gone in the rough and the other can be reached by a good hop. skip and jump. The fair members of the quartette suggest to their escor that they wait. as the sun is really quite too warm. * % %% THE ne¥t up is another foursome, an oddly assorted team, all of them taking their golf seriously. One is a retired naval officer, the other n ofMcer of the Army about to be retired, one a man of the cloth, the fourth owns a stall in the market. They place their balls in & business- like fshion. The Navy man hitches up his trousers—habit, no doubt—and lete go a drive that easily clears the first hasard. The Army man dreps his pellet within a few feet of his predecessor's drive. The spiritual adviser hooks his arive and looks at it disappearing in the trees—without a single word! The market man lands his ball at the edge of the green in one. —_— No Kick in Watermelon. Juice of the watermelon contains a high content of sugar and table sugar has beén made from it, but not in a commercial way. There is one peculiar thing about the watermelor: Unlike nearly all other plants, fruits and_ vegetables having sweet juice, good wine has not been made from the juice of the watermelon. Canta- loupes, on the comtrary. when their Suice is fermented and distilled, pro- duce a good: quality, or a bad quality, of brandy, lmrlln.c‘ t&:ll point o ‘watermelon view or palate. innocent. l : I