The evening world. Newspaper, September 30, 1914, Page 17

ACoprright, 1913, by Bobbs Merrill Us.) OPSIS OF PRECEDING CHAPTERS, Witlock, ‘an outlaw in the southwest, eaves of & settler named Gledware and the Deby Mtepdanehter, Lahoma, Gledware and find refuge among Indians, Gledware faite & tribe, whose chief, Red Feather, rings Lahoma to Willock’s mountain Jair Seaves her with the outlaw, Willock and hie Athing, adore the little girl, As she grows Tahoma expresses & longing to become “civ. "Brick promises that her wish shall be ‘They educate hee as best they can, A , Wilfred Compton, finally asks leave to @p ber, Brick and Atkins permit this, but ©% condition that Wilfred shall case hia 8 soon as be finds himscif falling in lore ‘ber, CHAPTER VII. ; (Contiued.) The Half-Opened Bud. ] ILFRED smiled at him tol- \ erantly and turned to Wil- lock. "I ought to go to my work, Brick. I won't try to explain what this hour has int to me for I believe you under- I'm like & man crossing the who finds a spring and gets bh water to last him till the next ” held out his hand to Lahoma @ had risen swiftly at these signs departure. “God bless you, little "he eaid cheerlly. “A man's ite who finds such oases along Gesert trail!” ‘was not Bill's gruffness, but La- a's charm that we.ned him to flee he break his promise to her dians, you can’t go yet,” cried La- not taking his hand, “there are thousand things I want to do with that I've never had a .sance to with anybody else—strolling, for nce. Come and stroll—I'll show @bout the cove, Brick and Bill "t know anything about strolling they do in pictures. Hold out your with a crook in it and I'll alip yy hand just inside where you'll hold @oft and warm like a bird in ita © ¢ © Isn't bis moble? And holds bxck—excuse me—I hold back skirts with my other ‘hand, and t@ the way we stroll, like an en- Wing out of the histoiy of Louls Fourteenth's court. Do, oh, do!” Bright eyes glowed into his like ine stars. “We stroll,” he gravely announced, Feepending to the pressure of her fiagees, but at the same timo feeling it guilty as Bill rolled his ea fearfully at Brick. ‘When they were a fow yards from the trees Lahoma whispered, “Make the other side of Turtle Hill. 1 t to feel grown up when I do my trolling, but I’m nothing but a little oted kid when Brick and Bill looking at me!" Hidden by the shoulder of the gran- hill island she stopped, withdrew band and stood very straight as aid, with breathless ‘Asswer me quick! Wilfred, @nyugh to be a sweetheart? “Ob, Lahoma,” he protested warm- ly, “please don't think of it. Don't be dy’s until—until I say the word. ‘om. couldn't understand sucb mat- @ear, you wouldn't know the te proper time. I'll tell you when je time comes. p looked at him keenly. “Am I to for-a time or for a person? I *you'd never met that girl back I think you'd have filled the fer me, becauss; having always here in the mountains, I've not 4 to be particular, Not but phat I've seen lots of trappers and Muatters in my day, but I never d to stroll with them. I don't gee why that Eastern girl ever turned you loose from her trap. I think a man’s a very wonderful thing; es- pecially a young man—don't you, Wil- reat’ “Mot half so wonderful as you, La- na.” His voice vibrated with sud- intensity. ‘There's your won- ul hair, like light shining through brown veil * * * and your eyes, your soul keeps her lights ing when all the rest of you is twilight * * © and your hands feet, four faithful little guides the wonderful treasures that be- only to maidenhood * * * and mouth, changing with your hts—an adorable little ther- r, showing how high the have risen in your heart: a atl so pure and sweet’— “Hey!" shouted Bill Atkins, Brick came around the hil, “Hi, there! You may call it strolling, but if so, it's because don’t know it's true name, if “Wilfred. came to himself with « ~indrawing of his breath. he'stammered, somewhat di ‘yes, 1-1 must ‘ * The Story of a Little “Mountain Country” ; Girl Who Wanted to Become “Civilized” ‘ JOHN BRECKENRIDGE ELLIS QOOOQOQOQOHOHOHODH OOOOOO She held his hand beseechingly. “But you'll come again, won't you? ‘When I hold your hand it’s like grab- bing at a bit of the big world.” “No, Lahoma, I'm not coming again.” His look was long and steady, showing sudden purpose which con- cealed regret beacath « frank smile of king. She still held his hand, her brown eyes large with entreaty. “You will come again, Wilfred! You must come again! Don’t mind Bill. I'll have a talk with him after You're gone. I'll send him over to the ranch after you. Just say you'll come again if I send for you.” “Of course he'll come, honey,” said Brick, meited by the tears that sounded In her voice. “He won't get huffy over @ foolish old codger like Bill Atkins. Of course he'll come again and tell you about street cars and lamp-posts. Let him go to his work now; he's been up all night, just to get a word with you. Let him ro ~he'll come back to-morrow, I know.” Wilfred turned to Brick and looked into his eyes as he slowly relensed Lahoma's hand. “Oh!” said Brick, considerably dte- concerted. “No, I reckon he won't come back, honey—yes, I guess he'll be busy the rest of the summer. Well, eon, put ‘er there—shake! I like you fine, just fine, and as ycu can't come here to see us no more, being so busy and—otherwise elsewhere bound—I'm kinder sorry to see you go.” “Partings,” eaid Bill, somewhat mollified, “are painful but necessary, else there wouldn't be any occasion for dentists’ chairs.” . “That's so," Brick agreed. “You called Lahoma an oasis, And what is an oasis? Something you come up to, and go away from, and that's the end of the story. You don't settle down and live at @ spring just because it gives you a drink when you was thirsty, A man goes on his way re- joicing, and Wilfred according.” Laboma walked up to Wilfred with steady eyes. “Are you coming back t e me?” she asked gravely. ‘No, Lahoma. At least not for a long, long time. I don’t belleve it's good for me to forget the life I've chosen, in for a happy hour. When T left the city, it was to drop out of the world—nobody knows what be- came of me, not even my brother. You've brought everything back, and that isn't good for my peace of mind and so—goodby!" - Tall and astraight he stood, Itke a soldier whose duty 1s to face defeat; and, standing thus, he fastened his eyes upon her face as if to stamp those features in @ last long look upon his heart. “Goodby,” said Lahoma; this time she did not hold out her hand, Her face was composed, her voice quiet. If in her eyes there was the look of one Who has been rebuff * r pride was too great to permit a show of pain. Wilfred hesitated. But what was to be done? Solitude and homesick- ness bad perhaps distorted his vision; at any rate, he had succumbec to the folly against which he had been warned, He could not accept Lahoma as a mere child, and though, during the scene, he had repeatedly remind- ed himself that she was only fifteen, her face, her voice, her form, her manner of thought, refused the limits of childhood. Therefore he went away, outwardly well content with his morning, but inwardly full of wrath that his heart had refused the guidance of his mind. And she had been so simple, so eager to meet him on an equal plane, even clinging to him as to the only hope in her narrow world that might draw her into deeper currents of knowledge. “T’'ve alwa: been a fool,” he mut- / as he sought his “T was a fool about Annabel— and now I'm too big a fool to enjoy what fortune has fairly flung in my path.” Presently he began to lar¢h—it was all so ridiculous, beating a retreat because he could not regard a fifteen- year-old girl as a little child! He drew several time-worn letters from his pocket and tore them into small bits that fluttered away like snow- flakes on the wind, He had no longer &@ sentimental interest in them, at all events, | H Compton had severed con- nections with Old Man Walker she merely exchanged one hope, one dream, for another. The op- portunity to learn about the big world was withdrawn; but the antict- pation of one day meeting Wilfred again was as strong as ever, She made no secret of this expectation. “I reckon it ain't right,” said Brick Willock to Bill Atkins as they went one morning to examine their traps before Lahoma was astir, “to keep our little gal to ourselves as we're doin’. I tell you, it ain’t right to CHAPTER VIII. The Big World. E did not come again. Lahoma courted Ilustons, And when she knew that Wilfred be going, now.” “‘keop her aut up ap ine cage. Can't | you see she's pining for high societ: such as I ain't got it In me to supply, and you are too cussed obstinate to display?” “I guess that’s ao." Bill drew him- self stiffly up by the tree above— they were ascending the wooded gully that extended from base to mountain to) “Well, what's the hurry? She's only seventeen years old.” “Yes, she was only seventeen years old, two years ago; but she's nine- teen, now.” ® Bill Atkins sank upon a rock at the foot of a bristling cedar. “Nineteen! Who, Lahoma? Then where've I been all the time?” “You've been a-travelling along at & pretty fast clip toward your last days, that's where you've been. Just look at yourself! Ain't you always careful in making your steps as if scared of breaking something? And now you're out of breath!” Long and sadly the old friends talked. And as a result they decided to send Lahoma away. Willock bit on the plan: “There' party over there in Tent City that's come on from Chicago just from the lust of seeing pioneer life at first hand, people that haven't no idee of buying or settling—it’s a picnic to them, They‘re camping out, watching life develop—and what's life-and- death earnestness to others ie just amusement to them, That there's a test of people high-up, Real folks in the big world don't do nothing. It takes all their time just being folks. “They'll make friends with Laho- ma, all right, and invite her home with ‘em. That's the way I "low to set her out in the big world. Lahoma don't know my plans and neither do they, but I was never a man to make my plans knowed when I was going to hold up people. Of course I'm speaking in a figger, but in a figger I may say I've held up several in my day.” “They won't invite Lahoma to Chi- cago, not if they are the right sort.” “They will invite Lahoma to Chi- cago,” retorted Willock firmly, “and they are the right sort, Wait and ace; and when you have saw, render due honor to your Uncle Brick.” 2° ee “Pardner, I sure am glad tq see you —put ‘er there again! How are you feeling, anyhow? Look mighty tougtt and wiry, I do eay. Here, Bill!" Wi- lock raised his voice to a powerful shout, “Bill, come and see what's blowed in with the tumbleweed and tickle-grass—Wilfred Compton! A sure-enough man, that’s what I « ° him, and me to fight if any dispute's made to the title, according.” The tall, bronzed man who was leading hie horse along the road en- tering the mountain horseshoe smiled with a touch of gravity in the light of his gray eyes. “Everything looks very natural!” murmured Wilfred Compton, gasing about on the seamed walls of granite in whose crevices the bright cedars gerne at winter's threatening hand. . reed Willock, “mountains {s more natural than humafis,” “Did Lahoma marry?’ Compton asked abruptly as they descended to the lower level of the cove, “She ‘er did, yet,” replied Bill dryly. ‘Young man, I'm powerful giad to see you.” Wilfred cast @ longing glance toward the cabin. He even stopped in the path; but Willock went on, ua- conscious, and he was obliged te follow. “Lahoma Is well, I suppose?” Comp- ton asked presently. picture of health—wh left,” Brick declared admiringly, the prettiest little gal this side of not here?” asked anxiously. ‘Not now, nor for some time,” an- awered Brick. I wii interposed Bill giumly, “that when you're going to talk about me, Brick, you'd begin with Bill and not be dragging me in at “the tail-end of what concerns other people. I reckon, Wilfred, you just travelled here to take a look at the country where you used to herd cattle?” “That wasn't my reason. Princi- pally, I wanted to see Lahoma, and incidentally, my brother.” “Your brother? He ain’t in these parts, is he?” “No,” ruefully, “but I expected him to be, When I left home to turn cow- puncher I didn’t tell anybody where I'd gone; but just before I left for Oklahoma to turn farmer I wrote to my brother. And about a month ago, seeing things clearing up before me, 1 asked him to meet me here at Tent City—he'’s interested in new towns; +he's employed bya rich man to plant hardware stores, and I thought he might find an opening here. He came on, and was here several weeks with & party of sightseers from Chicago; but he left with them about a week ago.” Willock eat suddenly erect. “Couldn't have been that Sellimer crowd, I reckon, from Chicago?” “Yea—Mra. Sellimer and her daugh- ter and some of their friends.” Willock whistled loudly. “And that up-and-down looking chap in the gold nose-glasses was your brother?” “Never thought of that,” Bill ex- claimed, “although he had your name —he looked so different! But now that you've laid aside yout cowboy riging 1 guese you could st in his class, down at the bottom of it.” Willock was uneasy. “I was told,” he observed, “and I took the trouble to get datty on the subject, that them Sellimere—the mother and daughter and the herd they drift with—is of the highest pedigree Chicago can produce. It sort of jolts me to find out that anybody we know is kin to the bunch!" Wilfred laughed without bitterness, “Don't let my kinship to brother Ed- gerton disturb your ideal. We're so different that we parted without say- ing goodby, and, although I had the ‘Wiltrea . Weakness to imagine we might patch up old differences if we could meet heré in the desert, I suppose we'd have fallen out in a day or two—we're so unlike. And as to Miss Sellimer— Annabel Sellimer—she is the girl whore letters I waa carrying about with me when I first saw you. She refused me because I was-Rs poor as herself; so you see the whole bunch is out of my clams.” “That's good.” Willock's cleared up. “Mind you, I ain't sa: that as for me and Bill; we'd rather ait with you in a dugout than with face them in @ palace on Lake Michigan. But it's all a matter of getting La- boma out into the big world, and you gave me a terrible jolt, scaring me that after all we'd made a mistake and they was just of your plain every-day cloth.” ‘Wilfred moved uneasily. “Has La- boma made their acquaintance, then?” “It looks like it, don't it?” “What looks like it?” Wilfred asked with sudden sharpness. “Why, her going off with ‘em to spend the winter In high life.” “That's why I was giad to see you,” Bill explained, “her being gone and us so lonesome. That's why I'd like to have you stay with us a long time— until she comes back, if it suits you.” “But I thought * * © But I came here to see Lahoma,” cried Wilfred, unable to conceal his disappointment. “I thagght as I came up road that I saw her half-opening the cabin-door.” “That was Red Feather taking a peep at you. He's the Indian that brought Lahoma to Willock, as a child, He comes, about once a year, to eee us, but this time hp was a Uttle too late for Lahoma. Yes, she’s gone east—they're all putting up in Kanses City just now, on their way to Chicago.” “Bon,” sald Willock, puffing at his pipe, “why did you want to eee La- homat” “Well—you know she was just a child whea I was here before, but a hovered before my mind a good deal—I’ve been too busy to seek the acquaintanesof strangere—just want to keep the few I know.” He blew a rueful breath. “You can't think how all my air-castles have fallen about my eare!l I wanted to eee Lahoma! ~ «4, I wanted to see how she'd turned out. I have a good farm, now, not very far from Oklahoma City and— ‘Well, being alone there, year after year, @ fellow gets to imagining a great many things’—— He stopped abruptly. “That's 20," Willock agreed sympa- thetically, “I ain't a-saying that if Lahoma’d been like me and Bill, she mightn't of liked farming with you first class. But she was born as an associate of high men and women, not cows and chickens, It's the big world for her, and that’s where #1 gone, She's with real folke, Be Mr. Edgerton Compton your brother, or be he not, you can’t imagine him set- ting down with us sociable in this dugout. You're right about his being different, And the fact that Miss Bel- Nmer turned you down is encouraging too, It shows you couldn't run in her course; you didn't have the speed, I guese we ain't made no mistake after all” ‘There was silence, broken presently by Bill—T'm glad you've come, sure!” “How 41d she get acquainted with Annabel?—and with my brother?” “It come about, son. I see at once that the bunch of ‘em was from the big world, I come home and told Bill, ‘Them's the people to tow La- homa out into life,’ saya I. So they invited her to epend the winter with them, the Sellimers did, and show her city doings.” “Yes—but how did it come about?” “Nothing more natural. I goes over to their tent and tells them of the curiosities and goog points of these mountains, and gets ‘om to come On @ sort of picnic to explore, So here they comes, and they gete scattered, what with Bill and Lahoma aad me taking different waye—they liked ua- homa fret time they see her, as & matter of course. And eo, that Miss Bellimer, ehe gets separated from all the rest, and I sho hiding-place where nobody find her, and I shows her what a good joke it would be to pretend te be lost. So I leaves her there te go to tell her crowd she dares’ em te find her. Are you listening?” “Of course.” “Well, while she was setting there waiting to be searched for, of a sud- Gen @ great big Injun in a blanket and feathers and red paint jumps Gown beside nd grabe her and Dicks her up, and about as quick as ghe knew anything, she was gagged and bound and bel! bere along through the air. I reckon it was a terrible moment for h Now there ie @ crevice in the top of the moun- tain that nobody don't neverexpiore, because it’s just a crack in the rock that ain't to be climbed out of with- out @ ladder, Bo the Injun carries her there, and lets her down with a rope that it seems he must of had handy somewheres, and he puts out; and there she is, in a holler in the mountain, not able to move or cry out no more than if she'd been captured by @ regular highwayman.” ‘Wilfred stared at Willock im com- plete bewilderment, Willock chuck- led. ‘There was a terrible time!” re- marked Bill, “Dark was a-coming on before the party got plumb scared,” Willock con- tinued, “but they brgshed and comb- ed the mountain looking for the Door lost lady, and ae I tells ‘em she’s a-hiding a-purpose, thep-think it a pore sort of joke till midnight catches ‘em mighty serious, Torches is ca?ried here and there and every- where, but no use. woul nk that the next day the crowd would naturally look down tn that crevice, but that’s because I've posted you up on where she is, There's lots of other crevices, and no reason as they can see why Mise Gellimer should take the trouble to worm herself down into any of ‘em—and as nobody saw that Injun, how could they suspicion foul play? It must of been awful for pore Miss Sellimer, all bound and gagged in that horrible way, but it takes herolo treatment to get some cures—and so Lahoma went with ‘em to spend the winter.” “But the Indian"—— ‘Needn't think about him no more, gon, we got no more use for that In- jun. Well, on the next day, Lahoma is looking everywhere, being urged on by me, and lo, and behold! when she comes to that crevice—looked like ehe couldn't be induced to go there of her own will, but it was brung about finally—what does she see but a@ tomahawk lying right at the edge what must have been dropped there recent, or the crowd would have saw it the day before, It come to her that Miss Sellimer is a prisoner down below, “She looks, but it's too dark to see nothing. Not telling nobody for fear of starting up false hopes, she gets @ light and lowers it—and there is that miserable young woman, bound and gagged and ber nofity dress all e TALE OF Gh S22 ao tore. Lahoma jumpa to her feet to raise the cry, when she discovers a ladder under @ boulder which the In- jun must have put there meaning to descend to his victim when the coast was clear. Down she skins, and frees Mise Sellimer, who's half dead, poor young lady! Lahoma comes up the ladder and meets me and | carries her out just like a feather—Well, oan't you imagine the rest? I reckon if Misa Sellimer itves a thousand years she'll never forget the awful- nese of that big Injun and the angel sweetness of the little gal that saved her. Why, if Lanoma had asked for the rings off her fingers, she could have had’ em, diamonds and al! “Just ap soon as Mise Bellimer was well enough te tracel, nothing could hold her in these parts, and that'e.why your brother had to leave before secing you—he’a setting to Mise Selltmer, and if Lahoma don’t git him away from her, I reckon he's @ goner!” OOOO! ©9600 CHAPTER IX. Writing Home. AHOMA wrote a wonderful letter to her guardians, ‘They gave it to Wilfred Compton to read. It ran: “Dear Brick and Bill: “1 don't know what to tell first. It's all 60 strange and grand—the people are just people, but the things are wonderful. The people want It to be eo; they act and think according to the things around them. They pride themselves on these things and un belog among them, and I am trying to learn to do that too, When I lived in the cove—it seems a long, long time ago—my thoughts were al- jay from dirt-floors and cook-stoves and cedar logs and wash- pans. But the people in the big world keep their minds tied right up te such thinge—only the things are er—they are marble floors and magnificent restaurants 4 houses on what they call the ‘best streets.’ At meals there are all kinds of little spoons and forks, and they think to use @ wrong one is something dread- ful; that is why I say the forks and spoons seem more important than they are, but they want it to be se, “They have certain ways of doing everything, and just certain times doing them, and if you do a thing at a right time, or e right at a wrong time, it shows you from the Weat. At first, I couldn't only a few days, I'm getting so that nobody can tell that I'm more impor- tant than the furniture around me. I'm trying to be just like the one I'm with, and I t believe an outsider oan tell that I have any more sense than the rest of them. “We are in o Kansas City hotel where all the feathers are in ladies’ hats and bonnets instead of in the gentlemen's hair. To get to our Foome you go to @ dark little doar and push something that makes & bell ring, and then you atep inte a dugout on pulleys, that shoots up in the alr eo quick it makes you feel @ part of you hae fallen out and got lost, The dugout doesn’t slow up for the third story, it just etops that quick—they call it am elevator, and {t certainly does elevate! “There's an entire room set apart for the sole purpose of bathing!—and the room with the bed in !t is sepa- rate from the eitting-room. The din- and from the way she treats me I know she has a tender heart, And her mother te a perfect wonder of o manager, and never makes mistakes exeept such as happen to be the fad of the hour, And Mr. Comptom eould be epiendid, seems to know everything, we travel with him, or parke and ail that, people he says, ae if he were “I know what Mre, Sellimer ber heart on, because ready begun instructing {deals, She wants her daught: marry « rich man, and Mr. Edgerton Compton isn't rich, he only looks like he is. Mra Gellimer feels that she's terribly poor herself; it's the kind Just as bard on her as it would be on you if the bacon gave out and you couldn't go for more. Annabel— that's Miss Sellimer—iikes Mr. Comp- ton very, very muoh, but she feels like her mother about marrying a rich man, and I don’t think he has much chance, “The funny thing to me ts that Annabel and Mr. Compton both think they have to marry eomebody rich, or not marry at all. They really don't snow they could marry each other, because imagining they would be un- able to keep the wolf from the door. “We are not going straight on to Chicago. A gentleman has invited the Sellimers, which of course in- cludes me, to @ house-party in the country net far from Kunsas City, He Next Week's Complete Novel in THE EVENING WORLD By George Randolph Chester . Book on the stands Will Cost You $1.25, You Get infer 6 C ae RED ROSES} WOXH2GOOSHOT SG ie @ very rich man of middle they tell me, a widower whe is terested in our sex and ‘owwhe fm Annabel Sellimer. Mr. Compton isn’t invited. You"ss®, & sort of rival—a poor rival. middle-aged man has known the limere a long time, and be hae trying to win Annabel for two, If it hadn’t been for Mr. © al ton she’ have married his house & fore now, I gather. The house is i to be immense, in a splendid near the river, I am all when I think of going there fer days. There are to be fifty and the other forty-nine are ap a means of getting Annabel his roof. “Won't I feel like a little girl im am old English novel! The best \ is that nobody will bother teo poor to be looked at a time, I mean, what they call Sometimes [ laugh when I'm for I feel like I'm a gold mine § with rich ore that nobody hee covered. Remember the ‘fool’ we used to see among the mountains? I think the gold that Hes on the surface must al be fo A gold. The name of the country- we are to visit is the eam® as fl of the man who owns it"——— Wilfred Compton held the closer to the light. s Brick Willock spoke impat “No use to stare at that there we couldn't make it out. I guess : got it wrong, first, then wrote it over. Just go ahead.” ie Bill suggested, “I think the fret fat- ter is/an ‘S.'" Wilfred scrutinized © the pene. wouldn't be nothing to us—end next letter will likely have it once.” ‘Wilfred resumed the broke in Willock, “Can't you of that letter? “Ive made out the name of widower who's paying court’ te id sweetheart,” said, growled; “it’s Gledwarel” had grown strangely dark and agined it could be altered by “What of it?” reiterated Bill, Dose it ie Gledware; whe is he?” “Do you know euch a maa?” fred demanded. “Out with it!” orted Bill, wrathful as tho other glowered at fire, “What's come ever you? . here, Brick Witlock, Lahema te cousin, but I claim my share ta’ Kittle girl and I ask you chazp. fat"— “Oh you go to —— I” erted lock fiercely. “All of you.” The Indian chief who had brought Lahoma to Willock had dropped t= for @ visit at the dugout. Now Be rose ailently and left the room, Wile lock said haltingly: “That there Gledware—well! maj {t ian’t this one Lahoma writes abewt, but the one I knew is just about mié« dle age, and he's a widower, all right, — or the next thing to It—I didn’t ithe — Gledware. That was all. I hate Lahoma to be throwed with by of the name—but I guess it's all right, > Lahoma ain’t going to let nobedy gat off-side, when the wind’s Bill inquired anxiously, “Did, thai Gledware you knew live near * City? “He lived over in Indian last time I heard of him, But i ‘was a roving devil—be might be where, Only—he wasn't rich; didn’t have nothing on earth Uttle—yes, except a little.” “Then he can’t be the owner big estate,” remarked Wilined, rellef. ‘i “I don't know that. Folks goes the Territory, and somehow they trives to come out loaded dows. § T hope to the Almighty it’s a» Gledware!” (To Be Continued):