Lakeland Evening Telegram Newspaper, June 20, 1914, Page 2

i kG g0 By DANE A Stirring Story Of The Mexican Revolution L3 QL 0S QSO TEPOFOSOPOERF N O SRS PP OGP RO ST The possession of the town; the arme of the defenders; food, clothing and horses to ride—none of these would satisfy them. They would de- mand the rich Spanish landowners to be held for ransom, the women first of all. And of all those women hud- dled up in the casa grande not one would bring a bigger ransom than Gra- cla Aragon. Bud pondered upon the outcome as the emissaries wrangled on the hill- elde, and then he went back to the corral to make sure that his horse was safe, Copper Bottom, too, might be ' held for ransom. But, knowing the rebels as he did, Hooker foresaw a different fate, and rather than see him become the mount of seme rebel chief- tain he had determined, if the town surrendered, to make a dash. Riding by night and hiding in the hills by day he could get to the border in two days. All he needed was a little jerked beef for the trip and he would be ready for anything. So he hurried down to the hotel again and was just making a sack of | food fast to his saddle when he heard a noise behind him and turned to face Aragon. For two days the once- haughty Don Cipriano had slunk about like a sick cat, but now he was headed for Gracia’s big roan, and the look in his eyes betrayed his purpose. “Where you going?” demanded Hooker in English, and at the gruff challenge the Spaniard stopped in his tracks. The old, hunted look came back into his eyes, he seemed to shrink before the stern gaze of the Texan, and, as the memory of his past misdeeds came over him, he turned as if to flee. But there was a smile, an amused and tolerant smirk, about the Ameri- can’s mouth, and even for that look of understanding the harried hacien- | dado seemed to thank him. He was broken now, thrown down from his pedestal of arrogance and conceit, and as Hooker did not offer to shoot him at sight he turned back to him like a ' lost dog that seeks but a kind word. Bud knew that Aragon was entirely at his mercy, that fear had clutched | the once arrogant Spaniard by the' throat, and it was almost worth the anxiety he felt for this man’s daugh- ter to see the father cowed. Aragon' crawled closer to Bud as if for the' Jprotection he could not get from his own people. “Ah, senor!” he whined, “your par- don! What?” as he sighted the sack of meat—"you are going, too? Ah, my! friend”—his eyes lighted up suddenly at the thought—*let me ride with you! T will pay you—yes, anything—but if Bernardo Bravo takes me he will hang yme! He has sworn ft!"” “Well, you got it coming to you!” lanswered Hooker heartlessly. “But I will pay you well!” pleaded lAragon. “I will pay you—" He paused a8 it to consider what would tempt him and then suddenly he raised his {head. “What 1s it you wish above every- fthing?” he questioned eagerly. “Your title to the mine—no? Bien! Take me to the line—protect me from my enemies—and the papers are yours!" “Have you got them with you?” in- quired Hooker with businesslike di- Tectness. “No, but I can get them!” cried Ara- gon, forgetful of everything but his desire to escape. “I can get them while you saddle my horse!” “Where?” demanded Hooker craft- dly. “From the agente mineral!” an- ewered Aragon. “I have a great deal of influence with him, and—" “Bastante!” exploded Bud in a voice which made Aragon jump. “Enough! If you can get them, I can! And we shall see, Senor Aragon, whether this pistol of mine will not give me some iInfluence, too!” “Then you will take them?” faltered 'Aragon as Hooker started to go. “You will take them and leave me for Ber- nardo Bravo to—" “Listen, senor!” exclaimed Hooker, halting and advancing a threatening forefinger. “A man who can hire four men to do his dirty work needs no protection from me. You understand that—no? Then listen again. 1 am going to get those papers. If I hear a word from you I will send you to Join your four men.” | He touched his gun as he spoke and strode out into the open, where he beckoned the mineral agent from the crowd. A word in his ear and they went down the hill together, while Don Cipriano watched from above. Then, as they turned into the office, Aragon spat out a curse and went to seek Manuel del Rey. CHAPTER XXIV. In a land of class privilege and offi- cial graft it is often only in times of anarchy that a poor man can get his rights. For eight months Hooker had battled against the petty intrigue of Aragon and the agente mineral, and then suddenly, when the times t od to war and fear gripped at their hearts, he rose up and claimed his own, hold- ing out his brawny right hand and de- manding the concession of his mine. In a day the whirligig of fortune had turned, and it was the fighting man who dominated. He spoke quietly and made no threats, but the look in his eye was enough, and the agente gave The Land of Broken Promises | around her, was Gracla Aragon, and . ican fights. . THE EVENING TELEGRAM LAKELAND, FLA, JUNE t g OO o COOLIDGE=—= SulSudlud him his papers. -Then he wrote out a receipt for the mining tax and Bud stepped forth like a king. ‘With his papers inside his shirt and a belt of gold around his waist there wae nothing left in Mexico for him. Once on his horse and headed for the line and he could laugh at them all In Gadsden he could show title to Kruger, he could give answer for his trust and look the world in the eye. It had been a long and strenuous fight; a fight made agalnst seemingly insurmountable odds; a fight that had cost him much, but he had won. He had proved the trust Kruger had placed in him, and it had been a fight worth winning. Yes, he was a man now—but his work was not quite done. Up at the big house, with the screeching women he owed her something for his rough words. To pay her for that he would stay. Whatever she asked now he would grant it; and if worst came to worst he would take her with him and make good his promise to Phil. He had given his word and that was enough. Now he had only to wait. It would not be long, for the parley would soon be over, and if the coward- ly rurales surrendered the town to the bandits he would make a break for the line and civilization with the girl. It would be a hard ride, and alone he would have no fear of the results, but he would chance it even with the girl rather than leave her. The boy lieutenant, the brothers Mendoza, the superintendent, and Man- uel del Rey, all were out on the hill- side talking terms with Bernardo Bravo and his chiefs. With the rebels it was largely a bluff, since field- glasses had shown them to be short of cartridges; but they had over a thou- eand men massed along the ridges' and, with courage, could easily take | the town. Bud knew that courage was the one thing lacking. It was the one thing that was always lacking in these Mex- The Mexican bandit takes but little chance when he goes to war. As for the Mendozas and their So- noran miners, they were properly chagrined at their waste of ammuni- tion and swore by Santa Guadalupe to fight it out with hand grenades. Even as their leaders wrangled the Mexican powder men were busily manufactur- ing bombs, and all the while the su- perintendent was glancing to the south, for swift couriers had been sent to Alvarez, the doughty Spanish ha- clendado of the hot country, to beg him to come to their relief. Twice before Alvarez had met the rebels. The first time he spoke them well and they ran off all his horses. The second time he armed his Yaquis and Yaqul Mayo rancheros against them and drove them from his domain, inflicting a sanguinary punishment. Since then he had been itching to engage them in a pitched battle, and when the word reached him he would come. Two hundred and forty Yaquis, all armed with repeating rifles, would follow at his back, and even with his boasted thousands Bernardo Bravo could hardly withstand their valor. So, while the rebels parleyed, demanding a ransom of millions and threatening to destroy the town, the defenders argued and reasoned with them, hoping to kill the time until Alvarez should arrive, In the open space in front of the house the refugees gathered in an anx- fous group, waiting for messengers from the front, and as Hooker walked among them he was aware of the ma- lignant glances of Aragon, There were other glances as well, for he had won great favor with the ladies by ditching the powder train, but none from Gra- cia or her mother. Bud would not have admitted that he resented this lack of appreciation on the part of Gracla. In fact he hard- ly knew that he did resent it, but he watched anxiously for any sign of ap- proval from this girl who was to be his pardner’'s bride should he conduct her safely to the border. From the beginning the Senora Ara- gon had treated him as a stranger, ac- cording to the code of her class, and Hooker had never attempted to in- trude. But if Gracia still remembered that she was an American girl at heart, ehe forgot to show it to him. To all she was now the proud Spanish lady, thrown with the common people by the stress of circumstances, but far away from them in her thoughts. The conference between the leaders dragged on and messengers came and went with the news—then, after hours of debate, it broke up suddenly in a row and the emissaries came back on the run. Even at that they narrowly escaped, for the rebels opened fire upon them from the ridges, and before they could get back to cover the dandy, Manuel del Rey, received a bul- | let hole through the crown of his hat. A grim smile flickered across Bud’s | face as he saw the damage it had | wrought, for he knew that Amigo was in the hills—and a bullet shot down | hill goes high! Some trace of what was in his mind must have come to Del Rey as he halted in the shelter of the house, for he regarded the Ameri- can sternly as Aragon spoke rapidly in his ear. But if they planned ven- geance between them the times were not right, for a rattle of arms came from the low‘ town and the mpgalnl was up and away to marshal his men to the defense. So far in the siege Del Rey had kept under cover, patrolling the streets and plaza and letting the volunteers fight, but now the war had shifted to his territory and his rurales were run- ning like mad. For, matching treach- ery against deceit, the rebel leaders had sent men around to elip up near the town and at the first fusillade from the hillside they came charging up the creek. Then it was that the ever-watchful rurales proved their worth. As the rebels appeared in the open they ran to the outlylng houses and, fighting from the flat roofs, checked the ad- vance until the miners could come to their aid. But in the confusion another party of rebels had rushed down the gulch from the west, and while the fight was going on in the lower town they found lodgment in a big adobe house. And now for the first time there was fight- ing In earnest—the house-to-house fighting that is seen at its worst in Mexico. While women screamed in the casa grande and the Americans paced to and fro on the hill, the boom of a dynamite bomb marked the begin- ning of hand-to-hand. If there was to be a casualty list in this long-looked for battle of Fortuna, the time was at hand when they could begin counting the dead. With a fearlessness born of long fa- miliarity with explosives the Sonoran miners advanced valiantly with their hand grenades—baking powder cans filled with dynamite and studded with fulminating caps. Digging fiercely through wall after wall they ap- proafhed unperceived by the enemy and the first bomb, flung from a roof, filled the adobe withy wounded and dead. A dense pall of yellowish smoke rose high above the town and, as bomb after bomb was exploded and the yells of the miners grew louder with each success, the stunned invaders broke from cover and rushed helter-skelter up the gulch. Then there was a prodi- gious shouting from the Sonorans and more than one triumphant grenadier swung his can of giant powder by the sling and let it smash against the hill in a terrific detonation. In the big house all was confusion. | Soon the chcers of the defenders her- alded victory and, in spite of all efforts | to restrain them, the wives of the miners rushed into the open to gaze upon the triumph of their menfolk. On the hilltops the ineffective rebel riflemen rose up from behind their stone wall to stare, until suddenly they, too, were seized with a panic and ran to and fro like ants. Then, around the curve below the concentrator, a tall man came dashing up on a pure white horse, and behind him, charging as he charged, came the swarthy Ya- quis of Alvarez, their new rifles gleam- ing In the sun. Up along the hillside and after the fugitives they ran with vengeful eager- ness, racing each other for the higher ground and the first shot at the reb- els. First Alvarez on his white horse would be ahead, and then, as they en- countered rocks, the Yaquis would surge to the front. It was a race and at the same time it was a rout, for, at the first glimpse of that oncoming body of warriors, the cowardly follows ers of Bernardo Bravo took to thelr heels and fled. But over the rocks no Chihuahuan, no matter how scared, can hope to out- distance a Yaqui, and the pop, pop of rifles told the fate of the first luckless stragglers. For the Yaquis, after a hundred and sixty years of guerrilla warfare, never waste a shot; and as savage yells and the crash of a sud- den volley drifted down from the rocky | heights the men who had been be- sleged In Fortuna knew that death was | abroad in the hills. Fainter and fainter came the shots | as the pursuit led on to the north and, as Hooker strained his eyes to follow ! a huge form that intuition told him was Amigo, he was wakened suddenly from his preoccupation by the touch | of some unseen hand. He was in the open with people all about him— Spanish refugees, Americans, trium- phant miners and their wives—but that touch made him forget the battle above him and instantly think of Gracla, He turned and hurried back to the corral where Copper Bottom was kept, and there he found her waiting, with her roan all saddled, and she chal- lenged him with her eyes. The sun gleamed from a pistol that she held in her hand, and again from her golden hair, but he saw only her eyes, so brave and daring, and the challenge to mount and ride. Only for a moment did he stand be- fore her gaze, and then he caught up his saddle and spoke soothingly to his horse. They rode out of the corral together, closing the gates behind them and passing down a gulch to the rear. All the town lay silent below them as they turned toward the west- ern pass. The time had come. Well he knew the dangers that lay between them and the American line. Dangers not for him but for her. In the hills and passes and the cactus-covered plain were theusands of men with whom she would not be sate for instant, and iinst whom he must guard her that she might be delivered safely to Phil. And he loved her then as he had not believed it possible to love a woman. He love an that he was attempting to save for another man, a “pardner” who had at the best been reckless of every trust, who had been unfaithful to ev- ery promise. And across the border this man was waiting for the woman on an 19, 1914, Bud Hooker loved. That he take fier to him was a more severe test of his manhood than any to which he had before been subjected. That he be untrue to the trust she reposed in him never entered his mind for a mo- ment. With & strong man’s love for her he thought only of how he was to conduct her safely out of the dangers which seurrounded her. Soldiers, miners, and refugees, men, women, and children, every soul in Fortuna was on the hill to see the last of the battle. It had been a crude affair, but bravely ended, and some- thing in the dramatic suddenness of this victory had held all eyes to the close. Bud and Gracta passed out of town unnoticed, and as soon as they had rounded the point they spurred on till they gained the pass. “I knew you would come!" said Gracla, smiling radiantly as they! paused at the fork. | “Sure!” answered Hooker with his | good-humored smile, “Count me inon | anything—which way does this tl‘auli go; do you know?” i “It goes west twelve miles toward Arispe,” replied Gracia confidently.‘ “and then it comes into the main road ' that leads north to Nogales and Gads-; den.” “That sounds about right for us” replied Bud, “Gadsden’s the place we want to head for, and we want to get there mighty quick, too, it them reb- | els will let us, an’ I guess that's what ' they’'ll have to do whether they want | to or not.” They rode on together for some dis- tance, the girl seemingly oblivious of the dangers which surrounded her, | and Hooker watching carefully for ev- | ery sign of difficulty. “What is there up here?” inquired Bud, pointing at a fainter trail that led off toward the north. “This coun- | try is new to me. Don't know, eh? | Well, if we followed that trail we’d: run into them rebels, anyway, so we might as well go to the west. Is your saddle all right? We'll hit it up then —TI'd like to strike a road before dark.” They hurried on, following & well- marked trail that alternately climbed | ridges and descended into arroyos, | until finally it dropped down into a precipitous canon where a swollen | stream rushed and babbled and, while they still watched expectantly for the road, the evening quickly passed. They had no opportunity for conver- sation, for the trall was too narrow to permit of their riding side by side. Bud was thinking not only of the dan- gers that surrounded them, but of this errand on which he was engaged, and what the end of it meant to him. First the slanting rays of the sun struck fire from the high yellow crags, then the fire faded and the sky glowed an opal-blue; then, through dark blues 'and purples the heavens turned to black above them and all the stars | came out. Thousands of frogs made the canyon resound with their throaty songs and strange animals crashed through the brush at their approach, but still Hooker stayed in the saddle and Gracla followed on behind. If she had thought in her dreams of an easier journey she made no com. ment now and, outside of stopping to cinch up her saddle, Bud seemed hard- ly to know she was there. The trall was not going to suit him—it edged off too far to the south—and yet, in the tropical darkness, he could not search out new ways to go. At each fork he paused to light a match, and whichever way the mule- tracks went he went also, for pack- mules would take the main trail. For | two hours and more they followed on down the stream and then Hooker stopped his horse. “You might as well get down and rest a while,” he sald quletly. “This trail is no good—it's taking us south. We'll let our horses feed until the moon comes up and I'll try to work north by landmarks.” “Oh—are we lost?” gasped Gracla, dropping stiffly to the ground. “But of course we are,” she added. “I've been | thinking so for some time.” | “Oh, that's all right,” observed Hooker philosophically; “I don’t mind being lost as long as I know where I'm at. We'll ride back until we get out of this dark canyon and then I'll lay a line due north.” They sat for a time in the dark-| ness while their horses champed at the rich grass and then, unable to keep down her nerves, Gracia declared for a start. A vision of angry pursuers rose ! up in her mind—of Manuel del Rey and his keen-eyed rurales, hot upon | their trail—and it would not let her | R. R. Station Avondale large variety of h est trees, and untol many wild birds. wh deep and shady giens 1whlcla sa fort is made for the pleasure then come to Auburndale Springs, Tenn. We represent the able companies: —— AVONDALE SPRINGS TENNESSEE are lo e ealth-giving mineral spr F. J. HOFFMAN, P P. 0. Rutledge Tey beautiful nook in the mountains, v iy R ings. surrounded by "“S:ttflox‘ d quantities of wila flowers, cheered by the 80ngy r ere a cool breeze is always to be felt in ty, urround the grounds. and where every o nd comfort of each and every L’ueat; Note the address abaye. roprietor Conservation On the Farm Practically every farm in this count would show a nice profit if the above ex- pressed idea could be and was carried out with all its possibilities. problems of today are many. Good fences and lots of them go a long toward solving \he question of bigger profits. Then why not get in line and buy your fence from home people, who treat you right and ap- preciate your business. The great farm R SR R YR Just received a soli American Fence d car load of Also a car of pitch pine fence post. WILSON HARDWARECO. | The Loss by Fire in the U. S During a Recent Year following reli- Fidelity Underwriters, rest. | Nor was the vision entirely the re- sult of nervous imagination, for they‘ | had lost half the advantage of their start, as Hooker well knew, and if he made one more false move he would find himself called on to fight. As they rode back through the black canyon he asked himself for the hun- dredth time how it had all happened —why, at a single g e from her, he had gone against his better judg- ment and plunged himself into this tangle. And then, finally, what was he going to do about it? But he knew what he was | ing to do about it. He knew he going | 3 to take this girl through to l?;awlsdefi % and to Phil, and his loyalty was such that he would not admit, even to him- self, that Phil did not deserve her Alone, he would have taken to the | & mountains with a fine disre trails, turning in his purpose best the lay of the land. Even with her n his care it would be best to do that yet, for there would be trailers op thelr track at sunup, and it was either ride or_fight ga rd for rved (To Be Continued.) capital ...... v o0 G180 Philadelphia Taderwritery, " 00 ORIERLLS o it st o $4,500,000 JGer;nan American, | Springfield Fire and Marine capital MANN Brgrerodr Yy capital 2,000,000 2,000,000 Amounted to Almost One-Half the Cos Of All New Buildings Constructed During the Entire Twelve Months! When Buying or Building Provide the Means For Rebuilding! & DEEN Room 7, Raymondo Building Security Abstract & Title Co. Bartow, Florida R. B. HUFFAKER, PRES FRANK H. THOMPSON, ABSTRACTS 0O New ang up'to-date plant, Lakeland businesg left with receive prompt ang efficient attention ...... L. J. CLYATT, SECRETARY VICEPRES H, W, SMITH, TREASURER F TITLES Prompt service., our Viee President at City Hall will _— — s T ———— i N s e B A TP