Show 4 1 9 h rI HALLIC ALLIE ERMINE EP RIVES illustrations ai LAUPEN STOUT ey I 1 ICY ay aoah awn 1 L coryy f SYNOPSIS john valiant rl a rich society favorite rud suddenly denly disco verti that the alia valiant corporation po por ration atlon which his father founded and nah ell was vaa the principal source of ills hlf weal t ii lins ham failed ito ho voluntarily turns over its hla private fortune to the receiver vei 4 ifor tor the corporation ilia hla entire remaining remal i alono consist of an old motor cur car a n I 1 iwhite bull dog dof and Damo demory court court a neg MK estate in virginia on n the lie way to tc mamorv court he hafl meets shirley dand annd aldge an autian haired beat beatify ity and dle die lidge clata den t that hat he Is going to like virginia immensely men sely an old negro tells telli Shir shirleye shirleys leys B fortuno fortune anil and predicts great trouble for her hei on account ot of tt a roan man CHAPTER VIII what happened thirty years yeara ago i when shirley shir ley came across tho the lawn nt rosewood noso wood major montague bristow sat eat under ilio ilia arbor talking to her mother tho the major was vas massive framed with a strong jaw and a rubicund complexion tho the sort that might be supposed to have attained the utmost benefit to 40 be conferred by a consistent indulgence in mint juleps ills blue eyes were piercing and arched brows like sable rainbows at 1 var variance carlance lance with his heavy iron gray hair band and imperial ilia hla head was leonine otnel fund hoi ho looked like a king who ha has 0 ia 1 V 4 ithac humbled hla his enemy it may bo be added imbat his linen men was waa fine and late his black string tie precisely tied t itulid d a pair of gold rimmed eyeglasses eye glasses ung by a flat black cord against ft his 1 l white waistcoat S birley said her mother the majors ir brutal and ho he shant have his I 1 imant mant julep 11 IB I 1 what has he been doing asked 4 athe other her brows wrinkling in a 1 i I 1 delightful way she had f M he ha has reminded me that im growling ing old fasl shirley looked nt at the major for his chivalry was un lif doubted during a long career in law vand jand legislature it had bad been said of ih ahlm him lm that he could neither speak on 4 athe 1 the tariff question nor defend a man r a lor for murder without first paying a r tribute to the women of the south sah ah nothing of the sort ho he rumbled mrs airs Dand ridges face softened to wistfulness shirley am IV I 1 she lj asked with a quizzical almost a droll uneasiness why ive got every emotion ive ever had I 1 read readell re adall all tho the new french novels and aad im even thinking of going go inglin in for the militant suffragette s movement the girl had tossed her hat and I 1 crop on the tuble and seated herself il by her nl bothers pothers po othero chair what was it he said dearest ile ho thinks I 1 ought to wear a wor sted shawl and her mother p i thrust out one little thin foot W with its slender ankle gleaming h through its openwork open work stocking like mother of pearl imagine 1 in may and he be knows im vain of my feet I 1 it if you had ever had a wife you would have learned wisdom but you ou mean well wall and ill take back what 1 I 1 said about the julep T you ou mix it sharley yours Is even better than Rans tons wi mf silo she makes mak esme me one every day monty 10 she continued as shirley sharley went lin unto to the house and when she aal looking I 1 pour it into the busu bush there n major majo bristow laughed as he bit end ant off W a 0 all all the tl same aada he said in his big rumbling voice t you need am I 1 reckon you need JJ lanore than mint juleps too you leave t shirley said he her r mother the majors brutal B 11 I 1 the whiskey to me and the doctor and J i xou take shirley and pull out for 3 italy why not A year there would j do you a heap of good II 11 she shook her head no monty it what you think its here ashe lifted herlit her hand ind and touched her heart its been so tor for a long time C but it may it cant go on forever ai ayou X you see nothing carf can 11 the major had leaned forward in his chair judith he said eald and his P av hand twitched it truel true and 1 I then how do you know I 1 she ambled at him you remember h when that big surge surgeon from vienna il 1 caiane to see the doctor last jart beart bedr 4 well the doctor brought him to me I 1 fid T id known it before in a way but it had gono farther than I 1 thought no me inne can tell just how long it may be it may be years yeara of course but im not I 1 staking taking any sea trips monty lie ho cleared his throat and hla his voice w was as husky when ho he spoke shirley know certainly not she and then in sudden sharpness you shant tell her monty you w darel rio no indeed he assured her quickly of course not its ICs just among us ua three doctor southall and you and me we three have had our secrets before oh eh monty yes judith we wa have she bent toward him her hands tightening on the cano cane after all its true today I 1 am retting old I 1 may look only fifty but I 1 feel sixty find and ill admit to seventy five its joy that keeps us young and I 1 got get my fair share of that monty for just one little week my heart had it all all and ana then well then it was finished it was fished nl shed long bc before I 1 married tom dandridge it that im empty headed its that ive been an empty hearted woman woman monty as empty and dusty and desolate dacso as aa tho the old house over yonder on tho the ridge 1 11 I know judith I 1 know youve been empty IF in a way too she said nut its been a different way you were never in love really in love I 1 mean certainly not with me monty though you tried to make me t think hink so once upon a time before sassoon bassoon came along and beauty valiant the major blinked suddenly startled it was out the one name neither had spoken to the other for thirty years ile he looked at her a little littie guiltily but her bar eyes had bad turned away everything changed then sh she continued dreamily everything the he majors fingers strayed across his waistcoat tumbling fumbling uncertainly for his eyeglasses eye glasses for an instant he too I 1 was back in the long ago past when he and valiant had bad been comrades it had been ft a curious three sided affair he and valiant and bassoon bassoon with hla his dissipated flair and ungovernable temper and strange fits of recklessness clean high straightaway straight away valiant and he a Bil brostow stow neither better nor worse than the tha rest of lits hla name ile he remembered that mad strained season when lie ho had grimly recognized lits hla own cause as hopeless and with burning eyes had watched sassoon bassoon and valiant racing abreast lie he remembered that glittering prodigal danco dance when ho he had come upon valiant and judith standing in the shrubbery the candlelight candle light from some open door en an gol denIng their faces hers smiling w a little flippant perhaps and conscious of her spell his grave and earnest yet wistful you promise john 1 I give tny my sacred word whatever tho th provocation I 1 will not lift my hand against him never never then the same bolce vibrant appealing Judi judith it because because you care for him lie he had plunged away in the abo dark nese nesa before her answer came what had bad it mattered then to him what she had replied and that very night had bad befallen the fatal quarrel 1 the major started how that name had bad blown away the distl A long time ago judith thirty years ago tomorrow they fought she said softly valiant and bassoon every woman has her one anniversary I 1 suppose and tomor rows mine do you know what I 1 do every fourteenth of may blay monty I 1 keep my room and spend the day always tho the same way theres a little book I 1 read and the theres theresaa an old haircloth trunk that had since I 1 was a girl down in the bottom of it aro are some things that I 1 tako take out and set round the room 0 0 0 and there Is a handful of old letters I 1 go ivr from first to last almost worn out now but I 1 could repeat them all with my eyes shut then theres a tiny old straw basket with a yellow wisp in it that once was a bunch of cape jessa mines I 1 wore them to that last ball the night b before it happened the fourteenth of may used to bo be sad but now do you know I 1 look forward to it I 1 always have a lot of jessa mines that particular day ill havo have shirley sharley get me some tomorrow and in the evening when I 1 go downstairs the house Is full of the scent of them all summer long its roses but on the fourteenth of may it has to be jessa mines shirley must think me a whimsical old woman but I 1 insist on being humored ile he smiled a little bleakly and cleared his throat it strange for me to be talking this way bowl sho she said bald presently another proof that im getting old but the date brings it very close it seems somehow closer than ever this year monty you tremendously surprised when I 1 married tom dandridge dandradge 1 I certainly was ill tell you a secret I 1 was too I 1 suppose I 1 did it because of a sneaking feeling that some come people were feeling sorry for me which I 1 never could stand well he be was a man any one might honor ive always thought a woman ought to have two hus husbands banda die oie to love lova and cherish and the other to honor and obey I 1 had the latter at any rate and yaure youre licad judith he said bald yes she aho agreed with a little sigh ive lived ivo ive had shirley and ashes twenty and adorable and ive had people enough and books to re read ad and plenty of pretty things to look at and old lace laca to wear and ive kept my figure and my vanity im not too old yet to thank the lord for that so dont talk to me about worsted shawls and horrible F for or I 1 wont wear eni em not it if I 1 know myself here comes shirley ashes made two juleps and it if youre a gentleman distract her attention till ivo ive got rid of mine in my usual way 0 0 4 0 0 0 tho the major at the foot of the cherry bordered lane looked back across the box hedge to where tho the two figures sat under the rose arbor the mothers faco turned lovingly down to Shir shirleye shirleys leys at her knee lie ile stood a moment he inserted the key in the rusted lock watching them from under his slouched hat brim never looked at me ma that way judith did youl you he sighed to himself its been a long time too since I 1 began to want you to most forty years when it came to the showdown I 1 even as aa fit as tom dandridge CHAPTER IX damory court dars camry coot smack dab suh euh john valiant looked up facing them at an elbow of the broad road was an old gateway of time nicked stone clasping an iron gate that was quaint and beavy and red with rust ile ho put out his hand walt wait a moment he said in a low voice and as a the he creaking conveyance stopped tie ho turned and looked about him facing the entrance the land tell fell away sharply to a miniature valley through which rambled a wallow bor dered dared brook in whose shallows short horned cows stood lazily beyond whither wound the red road he ha could see a drowsy village with a spire and a cupo laed courthouse court house and farther yet a yellow gorge with a wisp of white smoke curling above it marked the course ot of a crawling crawlin g faraway far away railway ets er fine ol 01 place suh mid dat big revenue ob trees said uncle jefferson Jet ferson but ali ah et aln got none ob de modern congiv ances As valiant jumped down he was possessed by an odd sensation of old acquaintance as it if he had seen those tall white columns before an illusory half vision into some same shadowy fourth dimensional landscape that belonged to his subconscious self or that glimpsed in some immaterial erial dream picture had left a faint etched memory then on a sudden the vista vibrated and widened the white columns expanded and shot up into the clouds clouda and from every bush seemed to peer a friendly black savage with woolly white hair wishing house ho he whispered the hidden country which his fathers thoughts sadly recurring had painted to the little child that once he was in the guise of an endless wonder tale ills eyes misted over and it seemed to him that moment that his father was very near leaving the negro to unload his belongings he traversed an overgrown path of gravel between box rows tro frow sted like tho the manes of lions gone mad and smothered in an accumulation of matted roots and debris of rotting foliage and presently the bulldog at his heels beets found himself in the rear of the house bouse mine aline he said aloud with a rueful pride and for general rundown run down ness its up to the advertisement lie he looked musingly at the piteous wreck and ruin his bis gaze sweeping down across acroca the bared fields and unkempt forest All mine nel he repeated all that I 1 suppose for it has the same earmarks ear marka of neglect between those cultivated stretches it looks like a wedge of sahara gone astray 11 his hia gaze returned to tho the house yet what a place it must musi have been tn in its ita time timal lle lie went slowly back to where his conductor sat eat on the lic honed horse block wes ves heah called uncle jefferson cheerfully wo we do nex suit ah better go ovall ter miss bliss Dand ridges place ler far er crowbar crow bah landl I he be added 0 lot o he aln got de koyl keyl yo think ob dat now john Valian Vallan looking closely at tho big key for there were war words which lie he had not noted before engraved in tho the massive flange friends Fr lenda all hours ile ho smiled the sentiment sent a warm current of pleasure to his fingertips finger tips here was the very text of hospitality A Lilliput lilliputian lan spiderweb spider web was stretched over the preempted keyhole and lie ho fetched a grass stem and poked out its tiny gray striped denizen before ho he inserted tho the key in the rusted lock ile ho turned it with a curious sense of timidity all the strength of his fingers was necessary before befaro the massive door swung open and the leveling sun sent its ita late red rays raya into the gloomy interior ile ho stood in a spacious hall ball his blo nostrils filled with a curious but not unpleasant aromatic odor with which the place was strongly atron gly impregnated the hall ran the full length of the tha building and in its center a wide double staircase led to upper darkness the floor where his footprints had disturbed tho even gray film of dust was of fine close parquetry and ana had been generously strewn everywhere with a mica like powder ile he stooped and took up a pinch in his bla fingers noting that it gave forth tho the curious spicy scent dim paintings in tarnished frames hung on the walls from a niche on the break of the stairway looked down the face of a tall dutch clock and on one side protruded a hugo huge bulging something draped with a yellowed linen sheet from its shape he guessed this to be an elks head dust undisturbed lay thickly on everything ghostly floating cobwebs crawled across his face and a bat flitted flirted out of a fireplace and vanished squeaking over his head with uncle jeffersons fer sons help he opened the rear doors and windows knocked up the rusted belts of the shutters and flung them wide but for the dust and cobwebs and the strange odor mingled with the faint musty smell that pervades a sunless interior tho the former owner of the house might have deserted it a week ago on a wall rack lay two walking sticks and a gold mounted hunting crop and on a great carved chest cheat below it had been flung an opened book bound in tooled leather john valiant picked this up curiously it was 1 LucIl Lu ill he noted that here and there passages were marked with penciled unas lines some light and femininely delicate del cate some heavier as aa though two had bad been reading it together noting their individual preferences ile he |