Chapter II: Part 2

On this June morning Shingles’ mother, who was to-day engaged in scrubbing at one of the big insurance buildings on Broadway, left the youngster with his charge on the roof, screaming back strict injunctions to the boy to keep the baby amused. To this task Shingles addressed himself with an ardor born of the beautiful day and the necessity for some occupation for the long hours that stretched between now and supper-time. What could he do to amuse the baby and incidentally himself? Why, “play fire,” of course. His engine house experience, joined to his observations from the roof, had given him a familiarity with the fire laddies’ modes of operation that resulted in the most stirring realism. The baby seemed pleased, and listened with open-mouthed wonder, while big brother imitated the clatter and clangor of the engine gong or the hoarse shouts of the firemen, and gazed with special delight at Tim’s astonishing climb up an imaginary ladder as foreman of the Rescue Corps. Indeed, he was so much amused by this new game that he did not wince while Shingles tied one end of the clothes-line around the tiny figure, puffing and blowing laboriously for imaginary smoke the while. Baby even thought it great fun, until brother bore him over to the edge of the roof and began to let him down, down,—a tiny morsel of humanity dangling five stories above the pavements of Miggles’ Alley. Then fun changed to fright, and baby set up a lusty howl. It was this scream that aroused Shingles from his realistic play to the grim earnestness of the situation. There was no ladder waiting below; there were no brave comrades,—only himself, a mite of ten, clutching in his small hand the very end of the rope from which dangled the helpless figure of his tiny brother. Real fear gripped at the little fellow’s heart. Slowly, painfully, he began to pull in that endless length of line. Inch by inch he brought that tiny, swaying figure nearer to the housetop. Then suddenly a knot in the rope caught in the iron railing. Cold perspiration rolled down the little fellow’s cheeks. Already his strength was failing him. To slacken a single foot meant to loosen his hold altogether. He tried to call for help, but the shrill little voice attracted no more attention than had the baby’s feebler wail. In the neighborhood of Wiggles’ Alley children lift up their voices in lamentation so often that nothing short of an alarm of fire or murder excites special notice. Suddenly, in this moment of agonizing terror, the boy was seized by an inspiration. On his left rose a large chimney. Around this the little fellow drew the taut rope, making it fast to the clothes-hook in the masonry. Then he rushed to the edge of the roof, and shouted, “Fire, fire, in Miggles’ Alley!”

At this sound the firemen lounging in the street below leaped to their feet. Looking up, they recognized the figure on the roof’s edge as that of their little comrade, and, convinced that this was no false alarm, rushed into the engine house. A moment later the street below resounded with the rumble of trucks, the whang of gongs, and the rush of the surging crowd. In this focal point of cosmopolitan New York, where a quarter of a million people are located within a stone’s throw of a common center, the elements of a stirring scene are always at hand. At the sound of the alarm, Chinamen crept from their basement bunks in Mott Street,—reeking with opium, and dazed by the noise; long-haired Hebrews tumbled into the alley from their sweat shops; swarthy Italians came pell-mell from their hovels; and the Arab lost his fez, which, in the surging crowds, was trampled under foot. By the time that the engines and hook-and-ladder company reached the alley they found it jammed with a mass of excited humanity, whose eyes were focused upon a tiny white bundle that swayed in mid-air, seventy feet above the pavement. At once the firemen realized that they had been duped; but the necessity for effort did not escape them. Up shot the great ladders, one above another, and then an agile rescuer began the swift ascent. The crowd cheered in a babel of tongues; but as the climber reached the last few rounds, and began creeping out over the slender threads towards the precious prize, a hush fell upon the multitude. Now he was almost there—now he stood directly under the dangling mite—now he put forth his hand with extremest caution. The crowd stood on tiptoe. Not a soul breathed. Then, just as the strong hand touched the hem of the little frock, the child began struggling once more, this time so violently that, in the very moment of apparent safety, it slipped from the noose and fell.

In that moment even the hardened faces of the multitude below, accustomed to sights of all degrees of danger and wickedness, blanched with terror; eyes bleared by drink or opium were shudderingly averted from the awful scene that seemed inevitable. Meantime the tiny bundle of humanity, in its wild plunge downward, struck a rope stretched across the alley, hanging full of wet clothes. The strand broke with the strain, and the child was lost in the flying mass of white. A few stray rags fluttered down—but the baby—? It had disappeared like a wraith. Strong arms outstretched to make a desperate effort to catch the flying waif fell helpless at many a side. The vast crowd stood speechless, dumfounded.

An instant later a deaf old Irish woman in the second story tenement looked up from her work and gave a shrill cry of surprise as she saw crawling through the window that led from the fire-escape where she had just laid her feather-bed to air, an almost naked child with scarlet bars around its little body. “By all the saints together!” she cried, dropping on her knees, “if thot kid didn’t rain down from heaven oi’ll niver say another _pather noster_ as long as I live!”

And it took the combined eloquence of Shingles and his distracted mother to convince the old lady of the child’s earthly origin.

The Missing Link.

BY JAMES BUCKHAM.

When it was announced that Frederick Henderson had given twenty-five thousand dollars towards founding a library in Woodville, his fellow townsmen were not merely surprised, but amazed. Every one knew that Henderson was in receipt of only a fairly comfortable salary, that he had no private fortune, and that he had received no recent bequest. They knew, also, that he, with his wife and children, occupied a rented house, kept no servants, and, in short, lived after the usual fashion of small clerks’ families. Where, then, could he have obtained twenty-five thousand dollars, and why did he give it for a library instead of using it to feather his own nest? For five days town gossip buzzed about this mystery like bees in a clover patch, until finally, on the sixth, one man, bolder than the rest, went to Henderson and asked pointblank the meaning of his strange munificence.

To him the founder of the Woodville Library told the following story:—

“There were five of us who went, early last June, for a camping trip in the Flat-top Mountains, away up in the northwest corner of Colorado. We were all young fellows—the oldest still considerably on the frisky side of forty—and it is hardly necessary to say that the object of our expedition was a good time. Incidentally, of course, we expected to acquire a surplus fund of health and enough game to make our friends glad to welcome us home again. Furthermore, I hoped to bring back as much of the scenery of Northern Colorado as could be sandwiched between some two hundred photographic plates.

“Our outfit for camping was complete. We had a canvas-covered mountain wagon, drawn by two horses, and filled with nearly a ton of provisions and baggage. In addition, every man was mounted and equipped in true cowboy fashion,—furnished with everything _en regle_, from rifle and revolver to ‘slickers’ and lariat.

“For two weeks we journeyed leisurely up through that wonderful mountain country northwest of Denver. In the clear, dry, bracing air the very breath of life was an infinite joy. Our eyes feasted continually upon some of the most marvelous scenery and atmospheric effects in that wonderland of the West. Our route lay over Berthold Pass into Middle Park and Twenty-mile Park, great successive terraces of rolling woodland and prairie, shut in by higher and ever higher ranges of the Rockies. By gradual stages we reached Steamboat Springs, six thousand feet above the level of the sea; then Trapper’s Lake, four thousand feet higher, its clear, cool waters rippling at the base of volcanic cliffs, seamed and stained by centuries of conflict with frost and storm. Ever higher and higher we climbed, through grand and gloomy cañons, shaded by forests which had never echoed with the woodsman’s axe,—on and up, till at last we reached the second step of the mighty mountain stairway. And here we camped, on a fair meadow, at the foot of the last and highest range of the Flat-tops. On all sides save one our little meadow was surrounded by an almost impenetrable timber-fall. On the left the land lay open, and sloped steeply up to the crowning range of cliffs.

“On that last and loftiest plateau the first chapter of a strange story began.

“We had been in camp a week or more, and had shot a couple of deer and caught several goodly messes of trout, when one day the impulse seized me to take my camera, climb to the top of the last and highest range of Flat-top Mountains, and capture some bird’s-eye views of the surrounding country. I started early one morning, carrying with me only my camera, three double plate-holders, and some lunch.

“The ascent proved longer and harder than I had anticipated. I was obliged to make my way up to the level of the last plateau through a deep and tangled ravine, down which brawled a mountain stream. There was no sign of path. The high and thickly wooded sides of the ravine made a perpetual twilight, and as I toiled upward the way grew steeper and narrower, till at last there was scarcely room for the roaring brook. I was obliged to enter its bed and wade, sometimes knee-deep in the icy water, climbing now and then over some slippery rock that blocked the way, at infinite pains lest I should drop my camera or my precious plates.

“Finally, however, I reached the top of the slope and came out into a grove of scattered pines, through which I could see a clearing that lay just beyond. I was about to leave the fringe of trees and step into the open ground, when a rifle-shot not far away startled me. It was followed, in a minute or two, by another shot from a slightly different direction. The next moment a wounded deer bounded into the little mountain meadow, sprang with convulsive leaps across it, and fell dead on the opposite edge.

“Scarcely had the deer fallen, when a hunter, rifle in hand, came running through the clearing to the spot. Just as he drew his knife to bleed the animal a second hunter appeared. He also was running, but stopped as he saw the other man bending over the deer, and approached him more leisurely. All this took place in a very brief space of time, while I stood watching, just within the edge of pines.

“I saw the first hunter, who had finished bleeding the deer, rise and confront the other man as he approached. Then I heard excited and heated talk between them. As they stood wrangling over the little gray mound on the edge of the forest, the sudden inspiration seized me to take a picture of the vivid scene. Up to this moment I had been a perfectly passive observer. I had not even removed the tripod of the camera from my shoulder. So great had been my surprise at seeing the deer bound across the clearing and fall dead, and then the two strange hunters rushing in to claim it, that for a few minutes I totally lost the consciousness of self. My whole being was absorbed in wonder and curiosity. But when the quarreling hunters began to wrangle the spell was broken, and I said to myself, ‘There is a forest picture worth taking!’

“Screened by the overhanging trees, and with no further thought than to add to my collection a unique bit of backwoods life, I hastily swung the tripod from my shoulder, affixed the camera, focused, inserted a plate-holder, made the exposure, and secured a view of the two hunters as they stood wrangling over the fallen deer.

“Suddenly, as if moved by ungovernable anger, the men locked arms and began to struggle fiercely. My first impulse was to rush out and separate the angry contestants. My second impulse—when I realized that I was unarmed and alone—was to slink away into the shadow of the woods and let the men settle their own difficulty. My third impulse (a compromise between the two, but cowardly still,) was to take advantage of the absorbing passion of the contestants and possess myself of another and still more striking photograph,—a phase of real life seldom presented to the manipulator of lenses. This, accordingly, I did.

“What followed almost froze the blood in my veins. I saw the smaller but more active of the two men, by a sudden and swift backward motion of the right hand, draw a flashing knife from his belt. The next instant it was buried in the breast of his antagonist. The stricken man tottered, took a step backward, and fell, apparently tripping over the horns of the deer. The long arms, thrown backward, remained outspread in the grass; the body, after a few convulsive movements, lay still. I could see the shaft of the murderer’s knife sticking out of the breast of the dead man’s coat.

“I can hardly explain the impulse which led me, at this point, to slip another plate-holder into my camera, and with trembling hand remove the cap! The former pictures had been taken chiefly from curiosity, though that feeling was combined, in the second instance, with a certain restless mental recoil from the inertia of cowardice. But the third photograph was due to an entirely unaccountable impulse. I do not know what inspired me to take it. I hardly understand how I was able to break the spell of horror which had seized me as I saw the murderous blow of the knife and the fall of the dying man. I seemed to perform the act under a kind of hypnotic influence. I obeyed dreamily, as under the spell of another’s will.

“The moment of exposure for the third plate was strangely opportune. The slayer bent over quickly and withdrew the knife from the heart of his victim. In the very instant consumed by the act my camera did its work. This was proved by the subsequent development of the plates.

“As quickly as possible I reversed the plate-holder and exposed another plate. The murderer had gathered his rifle under his arm, and, half averted in the attitude of flight, stood looking back at his victim. The pause was but momentary, yet long enough for swift-registering light to record. Then the guilty man turned and ran rapidly away through the woods.

“I calmly took the second plate-holder from the camera and replaced it in the box. Then I did what some men of more physical bravery than I possess would, perhaps, have shrunk from doing. I walked out into the presence of Death—alone in that great listening, mysterious wilderness—knelt down, and placed my finger upon the pulse of the murdered man. I knew, before I did it, that he was dead. His flesh was still warm, but the last fluttering spark of life had departed.

“Back to my camera, and down the steep ravine, with its brawling brook, I went; though every step I took seemed like a step in a dream.

“It was early afternoon when I reached camp. The boys were stretched out smoking, after their noonday meal. As I gazed into their unsuspecting, friendly faces an impenetrable wall seemed to rise between me and the full confession which I had intended to make. How could I tell them what a coward I had been? Would they not turn from me? Would they not despise me? I strove hard to overcome this reduplicated weakness—this cowardice upon cowardice—but could not. I simply told the boys that I had found a dead hunter, with a knife thrust through his heart, on the plateau above. Even then they would scarcely believe me, till I had minutely described the dead man.

“‘Why, it’s that big Chicago tenderfoot, Stetson!’ exclaimed George Lincoln. ‘I saw him down at the settlement the other day. He is the fellow, you know, who came out here for his health and liked it so well that he bought up a claim and started in to ranching. He tallies with your description of the murdered man to a T.’

“‘He must have friends in the settlement,’ I replied. ‘We must report the case at once.’

“Two hours later George Lincoln and I rode into the little village, six miles below our mountain meadow. We dismounted at the store, which was the only public gathering-place in the settlement, and soon had a motley crowd about us listening to our story,—Americans, Mexicans, Germans, and half-breeds. There was no constable, no coroner, no public officer of any kind in the village. But a searching party was organized, to report at our camp next morning, at daybreak, when I was to guide them to the spot where the murdered man lay.

“Sunrise of the next morning found us entering the gloomy pass where the brook came foaming down from the heights above. We had to ascend the narrow ravine on foot, as horses would have been useless in such a place. When we reached the clearing beyond the pines I led my party directly to the spot where man and deer lay stretched side by side in the strange companionship of death. The dark, stern faces circled round, and for some minutes no word was spoken. Then the storekeeper, a huge, sandy-whiskered Yankee, exclaimed:—

“‘By God, boys, it makes my blood boil! Stetson never drawed his knife—see it there in his belt? The damned coward that was raslin’ with him stabbed him unawares. Some sneakin’ Mexican, I’ll bet my head!’

“One or two dark faces in the group grew darker as the impetuous Yankee spoke. There were Mexicans in the searching party.

“‘I’ll take my oath it was Marcelino!’ continued the big storekeeper loudly. ‘You all know he had a grudge against Stetson. He came into my store to get some ca’tridges for his Winchester yestiddy mornin’. Said he was goin’ out huntin’ on the Flat-tops. Him and Stetson was up here together, and it stands to reason he done it. The’ ain’t one of ye das say he didn’t!’

“No one dared contradict the big storekeeper, and no one cared to, for, in spite of the lack of positive proof, we all felt that he was right.

“A litter was hastily put together, and we carried the dead man down to the settlement. That afternoon a swift rider started for the nearest telegraph station, to wire Stetson’s brother in Chicago. The latter had been to see Stetson twice since he had settled down on his mountain ranch, and was well known in the village.

“Meanwhile suspicion had fastened more and more strongly upon the Mexican, Pedro Marcelino. As the storekeeper said, he had gone hunting on the very morning of the murder, and in the same direction as Stetson. Since then he had not returned.

“On the morning of the fourth day after the tragedy the murdered man’s brother arrived, bringing with him a detective from Denver. After attending to the obsequies of his murdered brother, and leaving instructions with the detective to spare no expense in tracing the murderer, Cyrus Stetson returned to Chicago.

“About a week later our party broke up camp and returned home. The tragedy had cast such a gloom over us that we no longer had any zest for sport. I was especially glad to get away from the spot with my oppressive secret. The longer it was concealed, the less I felt like disclosing it, and yet the more painful and remorseful it became.

“As soon as I reached Woodville I immersed myself in business cares, and for a time succeeded in drowning the reproachful voice within. But one morning, about two months after my return to the city, I picked up a paper and was confronted by the following paragraph:—

“‘WAS HE THE MURDERER?

“‘HAHN’S PEAK, COLO., Sept. 28.—The Mexican, Pedro Marcelino,
who was arrested in the southern part of the State two weeks
since and brought here for trial, on the charge of having
murdered Albert Stetson while the two men were out hunting,
last June, seems likely to escape conviction, as the case now
in progress before the County Court fails to develop evidence
sufficient to convict the suspected man. All who are acquainted
with the facts of the case believe that Marcelino was the
murderer, but, as only circumstantial evidence can be adduced
to prove his guilt, it is more than likely that he will escape
the noose. Every attempt is being made by Cyrus Stetson, the
brother of the murdered man, to obtain evidence which will lead
to the absolute conviction of the guilty party. The case,
which is the most important on the docket, will probably be
given to the jury before the close of this week.’

“By the time I had finished reading this item I was actually trembling from head to foot. But I made a resolve. I would develop those negatives, and if they proved to be as graphic and exact as I had every reason to expect I would overcome my cowardly self-shielding reticence, tell my story as an eye-witness of the murder—for to me it seemed murder, and not manslaughter—and submit my photographs as evidence.

“I went immediately to my ‘dark-room,’ developed the negatives, and examined them closely. They were surprising even to myself, not only in their clearness and distinctness of detail, but in the marvelous nicety with which they had caught and fixed the very moments of the tragedy which would be most convincing as evidence.

“The day, fortunately, was bright, and I secured two or three good prints from each negative in the shortest possible time, packed a small strap-bag, and, without saying a word to anybody, took the train for Glenwood Springs, the nearest point by rail to Hahn’s Peak. Here I procured a good horse, and by riding all night reached the county-seat early the next morning. I turned in at the little hotel for a few hours’ sleep, and, bidding the landlord call me without fail at half past eight o’clock, threw myself on a bed without removing my clothes, and was asleep inside of five minutes.

“The harsh little bell in the court-house tower was proclaiming the hour for the morning session when I rose from my hastily eaten breakfast and passed into the village street. Already little groups of men, coming from all directions, were centering at the court-house. I gathered, from scraps of conversation which I overheard, that it was the last day of the murder trial. The last available testimony had been taken. To-day the arguments were to be made, and the case given to the jury, who, it was feared, could not possibly return a verdict of ‘guilty’ upon the scanty evidence so far produced.

“I entered the court room a few minutes before nine o’clock. A group of lawyers stood talking within the bar. I asked to have the State’s attorney pointed out to me. He was a small man, with a plump waistcoat and a boyish, closely shaven face. I stepped up to the bar and beckoned him. A few moments’ conversation served to acquaint him with the purpose of my trip and the nature of my evidence. The round, cheery face of the State’s attorney fairly shone as I finished my story. Then the sheriff’s thunderous rap called the court to order, and the State’s attorney had only time to say, ‘Hold yourself in readiness to be called to the witness stand,’ when the preliminary exercises began.

“The clerk’s monotonous monologue was succeeded by a rustling, sibilant pause; and then began the deep, slow voice of the judge: ‘Evidence having been completed in the case of State _versus_—’

“‘May it please your honor!’ exclaimed the State’s attorney, starting briskly to his feet. ‘Having come into possession of new and important evidence in the case now before the court, the counsel for the State requests permission to submit the same before the case is closed.’

“The judge turned his keen gray eyes curiously and inquiringly upon the State’s attorney. Every head in the room was bent forward in an attitude of keenest attention.

“‘We have been so fortunate,’ continued the State’s attorney, ‘as to discover, at the last moment, an eye-witness of the murder of Albert Stetson. The evidence which this witness has to offer is absolutely convincing in character. May it please your honor to call to the witness stand Mr. John Henderson, of Woodville, Colorado?’

“There was a moment’s absolutely breathless pause. Then the deep tones of the judge’s voice broke the silence:—

“‘Mr. Henderson may take the stand.’

“The prisoner at the bar eyed me keenly as I came forward. I recognized his face the instant my eyes fell upon it. It was the same which had looked back, half fearfully, half exultantly, at the dead man stretched in the grass of the clearing. A moment’s uneasiness in the deep-set eyes gave place to a stolid stare of defiance, as I took my place on the witness-stand. What proof could the new accuser bring, beyond his own unsupported statement?

“There was a kind of fierce, yet calm, exultation in my heart as I told my straightforward story,—exultation not due alone to the thought of bringing guilt to justice, but, also, and, perhaps, even more to the thought of my own triumph over myself, in that most manly atonement which a coward can make for his cowardice,—the confession of his own weakness.

“I could not resist noting the effect of my story on the prisoner as I proceeded. When I first mentioned the fact that I carried my camera with me up the mountain I detected a slight start and aversion of face on the part of the Mexican. When I described the bounding of the wounded deer into the clearing, its fall on the opposite edge, and the appearance of the two hunters hastening to the spot the prisoner seemed to tremble slightly. But when I confessed the natural timidity which led me to take a photograph of the struggling hunters, instead of rushing out to separate them, a deathly pallor overspread the man’s face, and he clutched at the railing before him for support. Then, as I kept relentlessly on, describing the knife-thrust, the fall of the murdered man, the withdrawing of the weapon from his bosom, and the snap-shot photograph of the murderer while engaged in that very act, then the backward look of mingled triumph and terror, perpetuated by the relentless camera, and, finally, the hurried flight through the woods, the man’s chin sank upon his bosom, and his whole frame shook with abject fear.

“The most intense excitement now reigned in the little court room. Attention was divided between myself and the prisoner, until I drew forth the photographs and held them out to the State’s attorney to be submitted to the jury. At this stage of the proceedings, impelled, it would seem, by a strange, ungovernable fascination, the prisoner, though almost palsied with fear, stretched out his hand and snatched one of the photographs as they were being passed to the jury. It happened to be the one which represented the murderer drawing the knife from his victim’s bosom, while the light fell full and strong upon the pale, upturned face of the murdered man. As his eyes fell upon this awful portrayal of a scene which he supposed was pictured alone in his own haunting and accusing memory, the superstitious Mexican shrieked with terror and fell heavily upon the floor. I shall never forget the horrible intensity of fear and despair in that cry, nor the picture of the round-faced State’s attorney standing over the prostrate form, with accusing finger pointed downward, and cheery countenance for once tragically solemn as he bent his triumphant eyes upon the jury.

“Of course the jury pronounced a verdict of guilty without leaving their seats, and the Mexican, abject, cowering, and self-convicted, was hurried away to jail, hemmed in by a howling mob. The brother of the murdered Albert Stetson came to me as soon as he could force his way through the crowd, intent upon obtaining a sight of the strange, pictured testimony, seized my hand, and fairly overwhelmed me with grateful acknowledgments.”

At this point Henderson stopped short, as though his story were finished.

“But what in the name of common sense has all this to do with your endowment of the Woodville Library?” asked the mystified listener.

“Oh, yes; on the day after my return to Woodville I received a letter from Cyrus Stetson, notifying me that he would call the next morning to pay the reward of twenty-five thousand dollars offered by him for the apprehension of his brother’s murderer. Now, I had known nothing of any such reward. My testimony in the case had been given simply with the idea of convicting the murderer and at the same time partially atoning for my own cowardice. But it isn’t every day that twenty-five thousand dollars is thrown into the hands of a man in my circumstances; and I may as well confess that the thought of all that the money could do for my family and myself was a strong temptation. On the other hand, to accept it was to accept a reward for my own cowardice and so to forfeit my last shred of self-respect. Between these two courses I could see no middle way. Well, you can imagine how fierce the battle was between conscience and self-interest when I tell you that I never breathed a word of all this to a soul, even to my wife, but lay awake all night, my mind oscillating like a pendulum between two decisions. In the end, however, conscience conquered. I determined to refuse the reward, with the request that Mr. Stetson keep it for the family of the murdered man. But when Stetson arrived the next morning he simply wouldn’t hear of a refusal, declared that the dead man had left no family, pooh-poohed all my objections, and, in short, so far overcame my scruples in the heat of the conversation that when he left his check for twenty-five thousand dollars was in my pocket.

“No sooner was he gone, however, and my excitement was cooled than all my doubts of the night before returned threefold. For the five days that I was the secret possessor of that twenty-five thousand dollars I was the most unhappy man on the face of the earth. And it was only when I had converted the entire sum into an endowment for the Woodville Library that I finally felt at peace with myself and the world.”

Unchallenged.

BY KATHERINE MORROW.

The moonlight fell through the climbing roses over the wide piazza of a country house where some people were sitting. It was midsummer in the foot-hills of the California Sierras, and the insects, the dogs, and the water in the ditch had their voices in the air with the people.

The talk, uninfluenced by the beauty of the night, had been mostly of murders and scenes of blood. Then a girl shook it off quickly.

“Alice and I sleep outside now. Also Ned, the restless, takes to a hammock. It’s glorious.”

There had been too many tales of an abnormal nature for the equilibrium of the timid ones. A voice came from the corner:—

“It isn’t safe.”

Ned Carter laughed with his sisters.

“I’ve a little revolver—a beauty,” he said, “and nothing could come within half a mile! Besides, there are the dogs.”

“Yes,” the three admitted in chorus, “we’re too much on the alert for impressions. We’re too anxious to waken for anything to escape.”

“Oh,” said a girl from the steps, “I’ve heard this sort of thing before. I’ll venture you snore profoundly all night.”

“I advise you not to test us in disguise,” they retorted. Ned added with vigor: “I’d bet my twelve-mule threshing machine that neither man, woman, child, nor animal could pass our front gate at any hour of the night unchallenged.” He laughed: “Ah, the gleam on my pistol in the moonlight!”

At eleven that night two who had been guests of Ned and his sisters sat together, scheming.

“We’ll do it,” they said as they separated.

The next afternoon two girls in a cart drove a fat mare over hot stretches of brown meadows and along dusty roads that lay over the hills. They darted into stray coverts, and drove among the stones of dry creek-beds. As they rattled home in the twilight a collection of bleached cattle bones lay at their feet.

Under the awnings of a little gray cottage a woman waited.

“You’re late,” she said as they came up. “But here’s Joe.”

“Bring up the riding-horses to-night, Joe, and put on men’s saddles,” called his young mistress as she went in the house.

“And now, mother, may we have tea? We want to be ready by midnight.”

As the clock struck twelve Mrs. Head laughed her apprehension and her sense of the effect of light opera. The girls were in men’s canvas suits and summer sombreros. Bulky bundles were tied to their saddle strings and they supported others on their shoulders.

“But we’ve really no sign of defense,” they suddenly exclaimed, looking at each other.

In a moment Mrs. Head had produced two huge leather pistol cases. When they were strapped on, no belligerent cow-boy or primitive desperado could have hit a more happy effect of emphasizing independence.

The girls strode out to their horses and, tightening the girths, took their mounts quickly.

“We’ll stay out on the haystack when we come back, remember; so please go to sleep and forget us.”

The moon was full in the heavens and the unwooded part of their hilly road lay bright before them. The horses felt their bits resentfully,—kept to a walk along the crest of the hill and down the rocky, pine-dotted slope of the flat. Everything but the soft brilliance of the night seemed to fall away. The soul of summer hovered.

“Let’s give the horses their heads the first two miles. We’ll creep the last half—near the house.”

The beasts went forward at a bound. A level road shut in by the hills lay before them. There was a strange specter sense of being at one with power as the horses raced neck and neck through the silence. The caressing radiance was an intoxicant.

Finally they reached the stony hill which lay between them and the main road. The heated horses took it slowly, climbing through the shadow and rousing the uncanny wail of a wandering coyote and the hoot of a curious owl.

They reined up as they swung into the stage road, and gave the horses a mouthful of water from a tiny spring.

If there was anybody to meet, this would be the place.

The horses’ ears were in constant motion, though there seemed nothing but the easy pace of their own hoofs to give attention to. Suddenly, from an obscure bridle-path, three horsemen came into the road, and toward them. There was no time to arrange concerted action. The beating of their hearts made suffocation an experience, until one was visited by an inspiration.

“Answer anything in Mexican,” she gasped; “that will pass us.”

It suddenly dawned upon their consciousness that under the shadow of this very oak, on this awkward turn of the winding grade, the mail stage had been held up and robbed, just a month before. There had been shooting, and a wounded driver and passenger dripping blood over the wheels into the dust.

But the men had reined up before them.

The instant of silence compassed eons of apprehension before one of the men spoke.

“How far to Mokelumne Hill, partners?”

Promptly it came, though burdened with an unnatural guttural inflection:—

“_Quien sabe!_”

Daring to risk no more, the girls pulled out and, passing the horsemen, rode quietly down the road.

The men watched them disappear, ignoring an impulse to follow, before they continued on their journey.

“A couple of suspicious-looking greasers up to no good,” said one, as they trotted ahead through the night.

The outbuildings of the Carter ranch appeared ahead. The girls grasped each other’s hands.

“The pistol cases,” they whispered. “They saved our lives!”

At a little weather-beaten cabin used as a smithy the girls dismounted. It was as if they pledged themselves in epic measure, standing there, silent, in the spirit of the adventure.

Tying their horses, they loaded themselves with the bundles, and walked cautiously, slowly, towards the gulch they must cross before they reached the road lying in front of the house. They crept through its thick, uncertain shadows with the animal stealth of the forest, and found themselves up in the high light of the roadway. Forty yards lay between them and the gate which shut in people, and dogs, and a little revolver that was pretty in the moonlight.

Their watch showed one o’clock.

Step by step they accomplished with almost suspended breath. Of a sudden a dried fig leaf under foot filled the air with a sharp crackling. Transfixed with a horror that raised their hair, one balanced on the ends of her toes, the other crouched low on her knees.

But the moments returned no echoes of an alarm.

Nearer they moved and almost imperceptibly nearer. The breath from their lungs seemed a thousand voices. At last they stood together at the gate, looking up at the white house spreading its piazza over three who were in slumber.

With motion so fraught with care it seemed motionless, they managed to arrange a series of things on its fence pickets. Then they salaamed low in a burlesque of social mockery, and waved their hands in a pantomimic farewell.

Little by little, they moved up the road again, through the gulch, and on to their horses. Not a note from the throats of the dogs followed them.

Mounting, they walked the half mile to the spring before they even dared express their elation.

“It’s too good to go to sleep on,” said one.

“Let’s ride on it,” said the other.

They chose the black depths of the twisting stage road, and, leaving the moon-bathed open, took four miles of wooded riding. The farm dogs below in the valley barked greeting, but no one else seemed abroad in the land. The spirit of the night was wholly theirs.

At three o’clock they were home. They stabled the horses and walked back to a lonely haystack. Ginger beer, crackers, and blankets had been stowed there, so they made festive toasts to their success before they settled to sleep with the dews of the morning.

The sun was hurrying on toward the breakfast hour when a girl at the Carter farm wakened her companions.

“Horrors!” she cried aloud.

All three sat up in their hammocks. Visions of Ku Klux, White Caps, and midnight assassins ran riot in their minds. A certain terror stiffened their very joints.

Facing them from the inside of the gate hung a long white placard, printed in letters of flaming red:—

“We are Iron-Jawed Hyenas of the West and our food is Gore.”

Two red hand-marks decorated each end. Underneath hung a calf’s skull and cross-bones, livid with fiery symbols. Along the fence were rows of bones bearing the same ghastly stamp, and on another post hung another placard:—

“Thirty years have we been on your track and at last we have found you!”

In a moment a contagion of laughter reached even the kitchen. The truth had dawned! As they swayed in the clutches of a mild hysteria, a mounted messenger appeared with a note addressed to Mr. Edward Carter.

The young man read it aloud to his sisters:—

“Mr. Carter will please deliver to the bearer his twelve-mule
threshing machine.

“_Merciless Ben, the Hairlifter_
“_Tomahawk Tom, of Toyone._”

Aidu.

BY HERO DESPARD.

In the early fall of 1880 I was in Dahbol, India, having run down from Bombay, upon a sister who had set up a little bungalow there.

Dahbol is charmingly situated between the sea and the wooded heights of the Western Ghauts, and as nothing pressed me at the time, I remained there, spending my time rambling about the place and sometimes running into a chance adventure. Thus it happened that the following strange experience befell me.

One evening, in the cool of the late twilight, I was strolling about through the sea-end of the town, and, stopping before a small temple which was a little removed from the houses around, stood studying out the lines of the usual grotesque figures cut upon its face. Dense shadows cast by the rising moon threw the entrance into such obscurity that nothing could be seen within. In fact, I thought the place deserted for the time, and was about to obey an impulse to step up into the shadows banked in the doorway, when, suddenly, a human figure hurled itself upon me from out the darkness with such force that I staggered back and almost lost my footing. I had instinctively thrown out my arms and clasped the figure for support, and now, as I recovered my balance and looked down, it was into the face of the fairest woman I have ever seen in any land.

The marvelousness of her beauty served to steady my faculties where ordinarily I should have felt bewildered, and, still holding her close, for she trembled as if she would fall from my arms, I said in such Hindustani as I was capable of:

“Something has frightened you. You are fleeing from danger?”

“Sir,” she answered, in a voice soft and rich, though broken by low gasps, “I must hasten;” and she pulled against my arms for release.

From my knowledge of the country, I felt sure no woman like the one who stood before me could safely venture into the streets at this hour, and, having an Anglo-Saxon’s feelings for all womankind, I acted on a quickly formed resolve.

“I do not know what sends you out into the night, nor what pursuit you fear, but I am ready to take you where you wish to go,” I said.

“I must go far from this place,—and alone,” she answered, speaking agitatedly.

“We will go,” I said reassuringly. “I will take you to your own people.”

Upon this her slender body trembled anew, and replying, “I have no people. I cannot stay here,” she turned from me and began to walk quickly away.

I as quickly followed, walking behind her through street after street, she choosing the deserted by-ways, until we came out through some suburban orchards, and finally reached the edge of a stretch of thick forest which belts the eastern side of the town. Here she stopped suddenly, and, turning to me, said entreatingly:

“Leave me! You cannot help.”

I looked at the town behind, at the forest in front, and felt it a moral impossibility to obey.

“I think I can,” I ventured, “if you will confide in me. I have a sister here in whose care I can place you, and if anything is threatening you I can hide you with her. She is an English doctor, and is devoting her life to work among your countrywomen.”

It would be impossible to describe the changes of expression which flashed over her face at this. Relief, questioning, consent, and doubt arose from the depths of her dark eyes and looked out at me. For some time she stood thus, inwardly debating, and at last answered:

“Yes, if I may come out alone once in seven days.”

“You shall have perfect liberty, of course,” I eagerly assured her.

This promise seemed so completely to allay any lurking feeling of fear or doubt that at once she laid her hand upon mine, saying, “I will go with you.”

Now, I had no hesitation whatever in taking this girl to my sister, who, as I had said, lived in India for the purpose of dealing with the conditions of life surrounding the Oriental women. Indeed, no sooner had she seen Aidu and heard her story than she insisted upon taking this beautiful waif into our household as one of ourselves; and as time passed and the lovableness of her nature was fully revealed to us, we found that we had rescued one of the rarest of pearls from the depths of the human sea around us.

She was pathetically gentle, and when the first constraint of the situation wore off showed herself possessed of a brilliant though unformed mind.

My sister built many hopes upon Aidu—for that was the name of our waif—as a future coadjutor in her chosen work; though I may as well confess at once that I had other intentions about her.

After only a few weeks spent in her society, I found myself deeply in love, and but for one singular, inexplicable circumstance would have begged her then and there to become my wife.

The mystery was this:

While she looked the perfection of sweet and elastic health and possessed an unusually pure vitality, no one ever saw Aidu partake of food. At first we thought that perhaps she shrank from burdening us, and believed that in some way she secretly procured cheap food outside. To all questions on the subject she returned a jesting reply, or else remained pleadingly silent. Once only, during each week, was she seen to leave the house, when she went upon those twilight walks for which she had stipulated. And the mystery of her sustenance, puzzling at first, grew darker and denser every day, the more so as Aidu steadily became more radiant in health and tinted like a ripe pomegranate from a fountain of rich vitality. Indeed, she seemed the incarnation of some flawless vital force consciously masking itself in human form.

But there came a day when I could restrain my love no longer.

My jealousy of those walks, during which she went I knew not where nor whom to see, became at last unbearable, and I determined to push my misgivings to a conclusion by questioning her outright.

Late in the afternoon of one of these seventh days of the week, on which she never failed of her twilight walk, I sought her where she sat in the shade of a trellised veranda, and, seating myself beside her, took her hands in my own.

“Aidu, you must know how I love you!” I said impetuously.

I could wipe out the fact of my own soul sooner than I could forget the measureless depth and meaning of the look she gave me, straight from her lifted eyes! Oh, cold and reasonable Westerner! Never, even through eternity, will you know the infinity of meaning hidden in the lotus-heart of love, never having looked into the eyes of Aidu raised in a pure and perfect confession!

“I love you!” she murmured. Echo of my own words only, but enough.

“You will not go out alone again, now, Aidu?” I questioned pleadingly.

“I would _try_ to do what you ask, even that which I cannot,” she said wistfully.

Having gained so much, I was in a measure satisfied; but I determined, in virtue of my now undoubted right, to follow her should she again go on her secret errand. This I hoped she would not do; but later I saw her steal out from the house and walk away, not briskly, as was usual, but with a certain languor, as if pulling against her will. It was an easy matter to follow her at a little distance, for she went straight forward, as to a well-known goal, never once looking back. On she went, past the houses of the town, out into a stretch of the suburban orchards, until we stood again upon the edge of the same tangled forest where we had stopped on the evening I first found her. Surely, it could not be that Aidu would venture within those dense shadows!

Yes, even here she did not hesitate, but forced her way through the gloomy thicket, deftly stepping over obstructions and pushing away the drooping vines as if the path were a clear and familiar one. And all the while I followed, possessed by an intensity of curiosity and feeling which must have given me the eyes of a night animal, for I never for a moment lost sight of her; but, while she walked easily and swiftly, I rushed on, panting through excitement, until when, at last, she halted and leaned back against a tree in an attitude of expectation, I stopped, trembling and weak from agitation.

And now that happened which is burnt into my memory forever.

As she stood there, motionless, her slight figure in its snowy garments dully outlined against the dark tree trunk, I noted that Aidu’s eyes were fixed upon a certain spot in the ground before her, whither mine followed. At first I saw only a faint glow in the grass at her feet, like the light of two phosphorescent insects side by side, but as this rapidly grew and widened, the shape of a dark head was outlined within the rays. Brighter and brighter the light grew until—yes, a cobra’s hooded head appeared! and from the glowing eyes streamed the rapidly increasing light in a coruscating flood.

Horror-stricken, I looked at Aidu! She was gazing down into those burning, venomous eyes, whose radiance was momentarily intensified until her rapt face and figure, the coiled length of the serpent, and even the grass and trees around were illuminated as by the shining of two small suns.

Under this compelling gaze Aidu’s languor melted. Her form dilated and changed in my sight as if the very crucible of vital life were there, purging away the particles of mortality and building her form anew out of imperishable materials. Her glowing beauty was indescribable; it was a revelation.

And now the monster slowly raised himself, stretching up out of his coils, until his scintillating, fiery orbs were on a level with the smiling, dewy eyes of the woman whom I loved. She leaned gently forward and softly stroked the mottled neck. A tremor shook my whole body. In that moment I was overwhelmed by the horrible certainty that here I beheld the rites of the ancient mystic serpent worship still practised in certain parts of India; and that Aidu, my Aidu, served as the unwilling instrument of the priests of the temple, from whose fearful power she had vainly attempted to escape on the night of our first meeting.

Crazed by a fury of conflicting emotions, I seized a stone that lay near and hurled it upon the erect serpent. It struck his neck just below the level of Aidu’s matchless chin, and as the ugly head dropped suddenly down upon the coils of his body, slowly settling to the ground, the wonderful light faded, and a heart-rending shriek from Aidu rang through the woods. I sprang to her side, and lifted her in my arms!

“Aidu! my love!” I cried, “speak to me.”

But the exquisite form hung relaxed in my embrace, and the white lids slowly shut down over the eyes of my love.

The fearful spell had been broken, but at what cost! By arresting too suddenly that strange, magnetic current, I had checked the fountain from which her life was fed.

Aidu was dead!

Mrs. Emory’s Boarder.

BY C. MARIE MOTT.

I saw him pass every day; not that I watched for him, but it’s against human nature that a woman should sit at a window all day and never look out. Besides, it was winter and I was watching the passers-by creep over my slippery sidewalk, with all a property-holder’s anxious solicitude for their safety.

I was turning away when he appeared and sped over the ice without the slightest fear. How we women love courage! And he was not only fearless, but handsome and well built, with just such broad shoulders and such an assured carriage as a frail little spinster with her own way to make in the world most admires.

I’m sure a dressmaker ought to appreciate a fine figure, if any one can. To-day, sitting there watching the familiar figure disappear in the distance, I felt my heart flutter like a girl’s. Well, well, the sensation was strange and new; it was late, too late, perhaps, in coming,—and yet it was not all unpleasant.