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Show THE VALE OE ARAGON fred Mclaughlin Author oj "The Blade of Picardy" Copyright by Bobbs-Mcrrill Co. (WNU Service.) THE STORY At nightfall, in the old city of New Orleans, In the year 1821, Loren Garde, recently an oflicer under General Jackson, Is surprised sur-prised by the appearance of three figures, in ancient Spanish costume, cos-tume, two men and a woman whose beauty enchants him. Resenting Re-senting the arrogance of the elder of the two men, Garde fights a duel with him with swords, and wounds him. Afterward After-ward he learns his opponent Is Adolfo do Fuentes, colonel in the Spanlnh army in Venezuela. Garde Gar-de flees from qens d'armes, taking tak-ing refuge In a garden, where 1 e overhears a plot to overthrow Spanish rule in Venezuela. Discovered, Dis-covered, he fights, but Is overpowered, over-powered, recovering consciousness conscious-ness to find himself a prisoner on the Santa Lucrecia, Spanish ship bearing contraband arms and ammunition for the Venezuelans Vene-zuelans under Bolivar. in the n i ' h t a voice a clear and as pure as the note of a mocking bird. It brought back to me remembrance of all the mad things of that wild New Orleans night. That voice had transformed the Santa Lm-reeia from a prison ship Into a paradise. As the days and nights went by I listened for her footsteps on the after-deck after-deck ; I pictured again and again the exquisite face In its frame of dark curls, the soft curve of her cheek, the sweetly pointed chin, and I lost my-self my-self In the Immeasurable depths of eyes tnat could change to purple the silver glory of moonlight. One night I heard her voice lifted in an old Trench song that I knew and loved, and one that my mother used to sing. Francisco and .Santini were out. I tried the door and found, to my great surprise, that it was unsecured, for they had been in the habit of locking me in. I slipped out, my heart thudding thud-ding in my throat, and seeking the protecting shadow of the mizzenmast, crouched, listening, looking. Scarce thirty feet away she stood beside the starboard after-rail, a golden-tan mantilla over her hair and across her slim shoulders. Her face was raised toward the slars, and the music that came from her lips was such as I had always Imagined the angels' might produce. A slim boy, I'olito, was near her, and on her right stood the massive figure that I had last seen dressed as Charles V. One of his arms was strapped against his side. His rasping rasp-ing voice broke into the middle of the melody: "Why do you sing in French, Carisima ; is not the Spanish language sufficient?" "No one language, 'Dolfo, is sufficient suffi-cient for a night like this. Every language lan-guage has its own love songs, never does a translation quite suffice." I found myself laughing softly in the gloom. She would sing a iove song in French to her Spanish lover ! Even Polito was laughing now. "Adolfo," "Adol-fo," he said in gentle raillery, "console thyself that she does not sing in English, Eng-lish, which might bring to her mind the moon-madness of that tali Americano Ameri-cano with the fair hair and the clever wrist." Adolfo uttered something in his beard that must have been an oath, for her voice was gently chiding: "Poor 'Dolfo, he has had an evil time, and we should be good to him during this, his first hour on the deck. I think the Americano must have had a touch of the moon, which does amazing amaz-ing things to us. I suppose he is laughing, somewhere, over the madness mad-ness of that night." "Unless," said De Fuentes lamely, "there have been other nights." Now I wanted to deny that; I wanted want-ed to tell her that her image had filled my dreams. I had a wild desire to cast myself at her feet and to cry my love aloud to the world, yet I knew that such an act of insanity would only add confirmation to Francisco's charge of madness against me. While I waited, hot and cold by turns, listening to her voice and devouring de-vouring her with eager eyes, two figures fig-ures came along the rail and stopped. The taller one, Francisco, bowed, and Adolfo Jerked his heavy body awkwardly. awk-wardly. When she spoke to Francisco and Santini there was an easy frankness frank-ness In her manner, as though she had been In the habit of talking with them often. "That mysterious patient of yours, Doctor Villard," she said, "has filled me with a consuming curiosity; is it forbidden that I satisfy it?" Santini laughed uneasily, and Francisco Fran-cisco answered her : "It has been ordered, or-dered, Senorita, that our patient be left in the strictest privacy. His people peo-ple in Caracas will hold us " Now De Fuentes laughed, laughed harshly, laughed long and loud, a huge guffaw that beat out over the quiet sea. "Caracas," he cried, "how will you two reach Caracas?" "Ah, Adolfo," she said, "what do you mean ; has the close confinement, and the pain of your wound ?" "No," Adolfo yelled, "a hundred noes!" He went off into another paroxysm of unholy glee, in which I fervently hoped he might expire of apoplexy, but he survived. "Doctor Villard," he jeered, "Doctor Villard indeed ! He is Santini, the soldier and Bolivar is going to lose a patriot! And as for you, Francisco Perez, there will be a rope " Francisco emitted a shrill whistle, and figures, running swiftly, emerged from the gloom. I dashed toward the milling group, caught sight of Santini, San-tini, with a knife upraised, and threw myself upon him. The evil blade clattered clat-tered to the deck and the soldier turned to face me. He rasped a hitter oath, swinging his fists the while, which crashed against the side of my head and filled the heavens with shooting shoot-ing stars. Before Santini could strike again the lithe form of Polito intervened, inter-vened, lie threw his slim body like a lance at the soldier's throat and the two went down, a grotesque figure of writhing arms and leg?;. Now I saw the dark Manuel, a pistol is his hand and his mouth open in an expectant grin. Before lie could raise the weapon I closed his mouth with a driving fist, behind which I had put all the power of my muscles. With tiie sailors pressing around us I turned to find Francisco. There was no enmity in his eyes, and he made no move to attack me. "Francisco," "Fran-cisco," I said in one of those sudden, unaccountable hushes that every battle, bat-tle, large or small, will develop, "you have committed a grave blunder." Trembling hands caught my arm and whirled me around. The Senorita Lamartina raised on tiptoe, and her pale face was less than eight inches from my eyes. "Your Your Majesty," I faltered. "Mother of 0 d," she whispered, "the moon-wraith !" A western sun tilled the upper half of my tiny cubicle with a lurid glow, a still, oppressive heat presaging a storm bore upon me ; bonds that cut me cruelly held my arms and legs, and black thoughts of injustice filled my brain. I had fought to save him and her and I had come to this prison cell. Was this the Spaniard's idea of gratitude; grati-tude; could there be in the heart of Adolfo de Fuentes so perverted a sense of right and wrong, in his plan of life so poor a piclure of sportsmanship? sportsman-ship? Ah, I was to learn many things about the Spaniards. I wondered what had become of Manuel ; I wondered what they had done to Francisco and Santini, for I remembered that Spanish justice was swift. But one ray of light showed in the gloom of my despair. Riding upon that fervent whisper of the "moon-wraith "moon-wraith 1" had come, so I believed, a definite note of joy. . . . I heard the grating of a key in the padlock, and the rattle of a chain. The door opened and two armed sailors sail-ors came in. They loosed my bonds and I stood up, moving my arms and legs so that the numbness passed away. The sailors eased out in single file and stationed themselves In the channel, guns ready for any attempt that I might make to escape. I stood wondering, eyes upon tie uneven un-even floor, until the consciousness of a presence came to me. I was afraid to raise my eyes until I heard her voice and there has never been another voice like hers, never another face so exquisite, nor a form so graciously fashioned. "Will the Senor Moon-wraith ?" Now a palsy seized me. I was afraid afraid that I was dreaming. I heard her light step as she crossed the narrow way, and I felt the touch of a tentative hand upon my arm. I raised my eyes and drank deep of the beauty of her face. "Senorita," I said, "ah, Senorita, you have come thus to my poor prison." She turned her head and glanced over her shoulder, where in the gloom of the channel, dim outlines of the sailor guards were visible. "Monsieur, "Mon-sieur, you know the French?" "Perfectly," I said ; "it is my mother tongue." "Your mother tongue? I thought you were Americano." "Yes; though my mother is French." Standing close to me she raised her face toward the glow of the tiny porthole. port-hole. "Will you tell me, Monsieur, who you are?" Tell her? I would tell her anything, anything to hold her here, to give me further time to fill my eyes with her loveliness and my soul with the joy of her presence. "My name is Loren." "Loren," she repeated, accenting as she should have done the last syllable, "Loren what?" "Loren Garde, the good Norse name that my father, a youth just out of his teens, brought to New Orleans after his campaign under the brilliant Gen. Nathaniel Greene. With faith in himself him-self and the new nation to which he had offered valiant service, he has managed by hard work and careful saving and Investment to gather vast .acreage of Mississippi valley lands." "If your father is wealthy, then why in the name of all the saints, Monsieur Mon-sieur did you thus throw away your life by serving that arch-rebel and conspirator, Simon Bolivar?" Now a bit of Francisco's patriotism touched me, so that I refrained, for the moment, from telling her that I had spurned the offer of the revolutionists. revolu-tionists. "The rebel of today, Your Majesty, may be tomorrow's liberator. Do you not know that, already, they are calling this Bolivar the Washington Washing-ton of South America?" (TO BE CONTINUED.) CHAPTER II Continued ! 3 "We go to La Guaira," said Francisco Fran-cisco solemnly, "and there, God willing, will-ing, we join forces with Simon Bolivar, Boli-var, who will be, some day, the savior of his country, just as your own George Washington was." "A thing," said I, "which I hope will come to pass, for the western world Bhould be free of Spain, and will be, some day, I am sure. That, however, Interests me less at this moment than ray safe return to New Orleans, where my father and my mother will be waiting wait-ing for me." "You think, then," Francisco urged, "that, for certain compensation,-you could not add to the experiences of your life by joining ?" "Compensation? My father, Senor, Is the richest man in the lower valley. What can a campaign in Venezuela add to my life? I have spent two years with Gen. Andrew Jackson." "Yet we cannot set you free, Senor, you know too much." "You cannot hold me." Francisco smiled. "We have arranged ar-ranged it. You are mad ; a violent insanity in-sanity has possessed you, and the good Doctor Santini, whom, in one of your fits of madness, you have already al-ready attacked, must attend you at all times. We are taking you to your home near Caracas." "You have told the captain all that?" "Assuredly; it was gentler by far than dropping you into the river, for pur plans must not go astray." "Bah !" I cried. "Suppose I get word to the captain that the coils of tobacco tobac-co conceal firearms, that the kegs of tobacco are powder, that the corn contains con-tains bullets, and that machetes may be found in the pork? Francisco laughed softly, while Santini San-tini swore out of the side of his mouth. "If you managed to get such word to Captain Alvarez, Senor, and he should look and find nothing, he will be assured that you are mad ; if he should find contraband he would have no proof against us, for shipment has been made in proper form from Diego Martinez to another merchant In Caracas. If the captain questions our innocence, and even becomes so suspicious as to confine us, pending examination ex-amination at Caracas, there Is yet Manuel and the mixed crew' of this ship. We cannot do things by halves. Only Spanish ships may trade with Venezuela, therefore we put them to our use" I marveled at the daring of the thing, and marveling, I was filled with admiration. "Simon Bolivar must depend de-pend upon you greatly, Senor," I said. Francisco bowed. "lie has effered me that signal honor, and you may rest assured that nothing shall swerve me from my service to him and, through i him, my service to Venezuela. One life, Senor, or a score of lives, shall not stand in my way. We brought you alive to this ship Instead of killing you as we should have done because I har-ibored har-ibored a faint hope that a man of your courage might see his way clear to aid us, but as you cannot offer service I shall see to it that you do not interfere." inter-fere." "I think, of the two of us, Francisco, the charge of madness should not be laid against me!" The days went by, slowly enough, while the Santa Lucrecia skimmed the quiet waters of the Gulf, and my head healed, and the face of Santini became less like that of a gargoyle. We touched at Vera Cruz, where a letter I had written to my father and mother was posted, a letter telling them that I had gone to Venezuela with friends, and would return to New Orleans at a later date. This, I knew, would relieve their worry over my non-arrival from France. At Coatzacoalcos, In the tranquil harbor of which we spent a night, the wily Francisco offered me a chance to escape, but, having experienced a change of heart, I refused to take advantage ad-vantage of It, for I had heard a voice |