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Show | FROEF sei SAR An fe AGA Aerie Fy Journal ~ = of Current Literaturé, News, Art and Science for s THOUGHTS. hoof BY through beats, growing fainter and fainter again in the distance, soon died away en- LINDA. tirely. Sweet is the solace of a friendly smile Impelled by human sympathy and trust; Tis dear to know, not allof earth is guile; Some hearts are warm, some souls are pure and just. Deep in the precincts of the sordid breast, The once fair temple of man’s hope divine, In long neglected solitude still rest The emblems of God’s desecrated shrine. Fame .- Dismal and bleak appear the world and sky, And barren is the once rich laden field, ~ Yet deep within earth’s somber bosom lie What stores of wealth and beauty unrevealed! Though drear the mead streams, and seared the smiling Cheery and bright beneath the frozen waste Life’s tide runs quick, and bounteous nature teems With®>fruits drest. and tlowers in! vernal Beyond the mind’s infinity of night, Where longing eyes discern no splendor answering ray, Hope’s faithful beacon burns forever bright’3 & {_To cheer the silent wanderer on his way. {3348 : ed thy,fond{ mercy. O benignant Hope, poe “Earth's [blindydesponding souls to bless and save! Without thy - grope beams through pain we boonless Where life’s a shadow and the end a grave. a> — < [For_the Western Weekly.] Brought to Light; * He * 2 * About amile out of the village stood the home of Squire Cloyermoor, the wealthiest man in the county, from whom the village took its name, and who dwelt there alone with his only child, Lucille. Another member of the family there had been, a nephew of the Squire’s who had gone abroad several years beforge to finish his education, and who had never returned. Rumor had it that his continued absence was due to the fact that. his uncle had disowned and disinherited him for the mad played, and the vicious pranks he habits he had had formed during the first years of his sojourn in foreign parts. The mansion was a great, rambling structure, built of grey sandstone, -surrounded by a smooth, sloping lawn, great trees, trim gardens and shrubbery, and well kept gravel walks, and the whole in- gate, he vaulted lightly over the low wall and strode rapidly along the broad walk tothe house. He paused at the massive, carved door of the entrance, and raised the heavy brass krocker in his hand. At that moment there cameasudden, BY ay oeomattoeseh Sate hire allits fury. CHAPTER, The I. It was a £wild, dark night in early spring.. The wind howled and roared across the open fields, and moaned ony neem through the leafless trees, shrieking and whistling in the hedges and among the dry willows that grew along the bank. The sky was {filled with river frag- ments of the gathering storm, while off in the west a solid, massive wall of omi- ak a nado sag heavy gust of wind, a dazzling glare of lightning followed by a deafening clap of thunder, and the storm broke loose in IVAN. pre mel 1S ing their ;doors, {and the streets were silent.and deserted. Darker grew the night. The wind howled ‘and roared, and sobbed, and sss moaned, and shrieked with renewed vio- E a i lence, till suddenly, in the very height of its fury, it died away with sullen fits and starts, as if reluctant but compelled " s ™ age ES i. ae rpg lo arn togive =Waa Re stranger, seeming to realize the sound completely that of the knocker would be drowned in the wild noise and tumult of the elements, desisted from the attempt, and pushing the heavy door open, passed inside, and by exerting all his strength, managed to close it again in spite of the wind. Then he passed along the dimly lighted hall to another door, and pausing again, he rapped sharply upon it with the nons clouds, blacker than the night, but butt of his heavy riding-whip. Instantly lighted up at ever shortening intervals a voice within bade him enter, which he _ by flames of jagged lightning, rose stead- did without any hesitation or cereily {higher and higher upon the hori- mony. i e zon. At a table near the center of the room In ‘the village, early as it was, the sat an old gentl2man with iron-grey hair shopkeepers, with anxious glances at the sky and grave shakings of their heads, were putting up their shutters and clos- : Nope o ~ hws Ss up its fierce sport for a time. ‘Then followed a dead calm, oppressive and pregnant with vague impressions of impending evil. o In the sudden stillness the beat of horses’s hoofs was heard, faint and far away as yet, but rapidly growing nearer {sand more distinct, until at length horse Bow For a moment the stranger remained silent, haired and and stood, tall, handsome, swarthy, sleekgazing at the other with a smile that was half upon his face. tone strangely Then he a sneer answered ina soft and sweet, and ex- and mustache, holding a paper in his hand. The apartment was lighted by a large oil lamp which stood on the table, and warmed by asmouldering fire which not make anxious the servants hear, to escape the first storm. fury was of the . “Spare less and yourself apologies the other. the trouble of need- or explanations,” replied ‘This will be our last inter- while his brows contracted grew Crimson with anger. “You!” he cried. and his face against while the window, his face grew slightly pale. “And further,” continued the old gentleman, “I wish to wran you that an- decline to hold any communication. with a thief.” “A thief!” exclaimed the stranger, hisface twitching with surpressed passion. “Yes,” repeated the other firmly, “a forger and a thief.” te Quick as thought the stranger raised and folly of your course and change it flame what I am accused, as that, I presume, dazed seemed “Times without number you have used my name to obtain credit and money to pay your reckless debts and cover up your evil acts, and I have for- given you. At last you have descended to and partially fill the room. And stunned though he and starting eyeballs in then all was dark again. the doorway, “Are you-sure there asked the is no mistake, stranger, the lurking devil showing more plainly in his face. “None,” replied the other. ‘“None.: And if the circumstances had been different I would never have looked upon your face again. But you have lived in expectation of sharing with Lucille the wealth I shall leave at my death. And I am responsible for this belief, which would have been realized if your conduct had ever justified it in the least, and felt it my duty, in common justice, to warn you that you now have nothing to expect from me except a sum sufficient to keep you from actual want, and which will be paid you through my !aw yer’s hands.” “Truly a pleasant prospect for one acstranger. “You would have been kinder and more just if you had tuned me out years ago when my habits might have been formed to suit my circumstances. I have always been led to un- derstand that you had made a will—” “So I had,” interrupted the old gentleman. “But another has been drawn up and is waiting for my signature at my | lawyer’s office now. Tomorrow I shall other like questions at him with which were hurled. repetition that would have men ¥ eax an impetuosity and reckless driven some frantic. But the old doctor was proof. against excitement, and calmly whipping up the lazy little pony, replied to each anxious group of questioners as they assailed him: “Jones will be along in a few minutes. He can tell you.all about it better than ~ Ican. Come along there, Dan! Come along, now!” or And then, as another vehicle, containingMr.. Jones, the village apothecary, (who was also the coroner) and three other eminently respectable members of the community, drove up and halted at the tavern hastened large door, the there, crowd, little and groups melting abgorbed and his companions, the and all into one apothecary 4 were in turn absorbed by the tavern bar-room. Meantime, tthe doctor continued the uneven teno? of his pony’s way down the street, hlating at length in front of a neat little cottage, ERMA surrounded by Pee The moment Recovering himself then he ran to one of the windows, and opening it, stepped outside, and closed it carefully after him. Then jumping on the hard gravel walk beneath, he made his way quickly out of the gronnds to where his horse stood still hitched to the iron gate, and mounting, rode swiftly away again in the darkness. a oe Ce he stepped out of the gig, the door of the cottagé tlew open, and a tall, spare, keen-faced, sallow-skinned woman, with short curls flying wildly around her head, ran down to the gate © to meet him. This maiden sister, Jane. doctor’s. the was “Oh, John!” she cried in a shrill voice. ‘Was it murder? Will she die? Do tell | me, or I shall go frantic.” CHAPTER “Now, III. me a Jane,” replied the doctor, “give chance to get in the house and The morning after the storm dawned bright and clear on Clovermoor. Only catch my breath, and I'll tell you all about it. But not another word will I for a wrecked chimney here and there, or a great tree torn and twisted from its say tillthen.” base withthe damp earth still clinging to to the level of the common thief and its roots, one might easily have imagined forger. Nay, make no denial. The that here, at least, nature slumbered in evidence, the forged note itself isin my ‘perpetual peace. possession.” , sir?” et’ whitewashed picket fence and a wilderwas,he saw for ene instant,a white robed ness of budding plants, shrubs and trees figure’standing with terror-stricken.fage. is the object of this interview, and the sooner it is ended the better for us both.” 3 | the glanced around him. At his entrance, the old’ gentleman looked up, started, and sprang to his feet, dashing shuddered, ‘on the temple, while his other arm coming in contact with and upsetting the lamp, extinguished it, just as he heard the door swing open, and a crashing, actof yours has severed the sole remaining tie of friendship or blood between grinding, jarring roar of thunder shook the old mansion to its very foundations, us. I had always hoped till now that, and a blinding, seething sheet of livid sooner or later, you would see the sin somely and luxuriously furnished, from the soft velvet carpet on the floor to the rich, heavy curtains which concealed the tinctness upon the stranger’s mind as he and sleet and stranger calmly. hnageeia “T sent for you,’ continued the old gentleman, “to inform you that this last customed to my mode of living,” sneered ious apartment, and the wild, dark night without, forced itself with startling dis- room. He heard the wind moaning through the street outside, and the rain view. I’ desire it to bevas brief as pos-j. the heavy riding whip in his hand and sible.” a struck the old gentleman a savage blow “With all my heart, sir,’ replied the: burned in the open grate, and was harid- low windows facing the west. The contrast between the warm, bright, luxur- Oa 25 other act like this will not be overquisitely modulated: . looked. But you will be pursued and “Yes itis I. I came in answer to your -banished for it like any other criminal. summons received two months ago. And: remember that in the. future I Pardon my abrupt entrance. I could closed by a low stone wall. The build- for a better one at last.. That hope Is i; ; dee S a J. ear ¥ +o ing faced the south, and entrance to the | gone.” grounds was through a great, arched “Ana whieh partionlae Wott is thie 10. iron gate in front. which you refer?” asked the stranger, At this gate the rider who had dashed his black shining eyes fized intently on so swiftly through the silent streets of the other’s face. PRE oul 4 the village, reined in his panting and “Good heavens!” exclaimed the old. trembling steed,and called loudly and gentleman. “Are you then so hardened impatiently several times. No one an- that you can ask me to speak of it to swering, he glanced at the threatening your face?” sky, and witha muttered imprecation “That point, sir, it is needless to dissprang to the ground. Then hitching cuss. I simply wish to be informed of his horse to one of theiron palingsof the OR The Mystery of Clovermoor. CHAPTER II. - the main thoroughfare of the village and on to the country road beyond, where the 19, 1880. But, passing along the main the village, any one acquainted street of with the sober, quiet ways and habits of its inhabitants, would have known in a moment that something had transpired to rufiie the calm current of their lives from shore to shore. This was apparent in the little knots. of men standing together around the office, the store and on the porch in front of the village tavern, eagerly discussing with grave faces, but excited mein and gestures, some evi- dently interesting and important subject, while from time to time anxious and expectant glances were cast in the direction of the up the street Squire’s domain. Presently an old fashioned gig hove in sight, occupied by a grey-haired, portly, ruddy cheeked gentleman, who, with brows contracted, lips puckered up, and Entering the house, the doctor paused deliberately in the hall and removed hat and gloves. Then going study, he sat down in his easy with a sigh of relief, said: the vagaries and eccentric gait of the little, lazy, fat absent minded looking grey pony to which the vehicle was attached. This was the village doctor. He was aroused from the deep oblivion of his surroundings, as he reached the fizst group, at the tavern, by the sign it.” : storm of interrogations with which he The stranger’s eyes left the old gentle- was greeted. “Was it murder? Was it the lightman’s face foramoment and wandered Are they both dead?” and many around the warm, bright, luxurious ning? chair, and “Now, Jane, what is it?” “Tell me all about it,” she answered impatiently, sinking into a chair beside him. “Well,” he said, “it seems Squire was stunned which struck a tree window, and that the by the lightning near the library in falling struck his head on the brass fender of the grate. It must have killed him instantly. Miss Lucille, must have been in the very act of entering the library when the flash came, and was also stunned by the shock, and fell insensible on the where the was still un- conscious when I arrived there, and was servants threshold, found her. She delirious and totally when I left. And—” “But will she out of her mind live, John? his whole face drawn into an expression get over it?” interrupted his of puzzled anxiety and deep concern, ap- | peared entirely careless of his into his Will sister. “How can I tell?” he replied. she “There is every indication that brain fever will ensue, and her nervous system is terribly shattered. And more than that, I am afraid, in blind.” fact, I know, she is totally “Blind!” cried his sister. “Yes,” replied the doctor. “Tt may be only temporary, but it complicates the case, to say the least. And now, I am : ready for breakfast. Re Re z and rider dashed furiously [Written for the Western Weekly.| City, Utah, January ee Salt Lake 20. 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