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Show i B13 U1CTOR ROUSSEAU J K7C SERVICE) (Copyright by W. O. Chapman.) . .g h-HM-I ! 1 I I I I !!! II I t H 1 1 1 II 1 ! I I I 1 I II II 111 I II- M M M M r-H-l-H-r-i-H 1 1 1 I I I I I I I I ' ' I ' ' '"l" DELIRIUM SYNOPSIS. Lee Anderson, Royal Roy-al Canadian Mounted Police sergeant, ser-geant, la nent to Stony Range to arrest a man named Pelly for murder. He la also Instructed to look after Jim Rathway, reputed head of th "Free Traders," Illicit liquor runners. At Little Falls he finds Pelly Is credited with having: found a gold mine, and ts missing. At the hotel appears a girl, obviously out of place In the rough surroundings. A half-breed, half-breed, Pierre, and a companion, "Shorty," annoy the girl. Anderson An-derson interferes In her behalf. The girl sets out for Siston Lake, which is also Anderson's ob iec-tlve. iec-tlve. He overtakes her and the two men with whom he had trouble trou-ble the night before. She Is suspicious sus-picious of him and the two men are hostile. Pierre and Shorty ride on, Anderson and the girl following. In the hills the road Is blown up, before and behind the two. Anderson, with his horse, is hurled down the mountain moun-tain side, senseless. Recovering consciousness. Anderson finds the girl has disappeared, but he concludes she is alive and probably prob-ably in the power of Pierre and Shorty. On foot he makes his way to Siston Lake. There he finds his companion of the day before, and Rathway, with a girl, Es telle, a former sweetheart of Anderson's, who had abused his confidence and almost wrecked his life. Rathway strikes Estelle, and after a fight Anderson, with Estelle's help, escapes with the girl. Anderson's companion's mind Is clouded and she is suffering suf-fering with a dislocated knee. Anderson sets the knee. CHAPTER VI Continued 5 The joint slipped into position, the tortured body ceased its protest, and Lee rose, the perspiration streaming down his face. Trembling in the nervous reaction from the struggle, Lee listened to the increasing noise of the motor boat again. It rose to a roar as it passed again along the channel immediately in front of his hiding place, and gradually dwind'ed away. Leaving tiie girl where she had fa'len hack into unconsciousness. Lee ascended one of the spruce trees and scanned the channel. ' The motor boat was moving up the shore of the island along the edge W the reeds. It contained con-tained Rathway and two other men. Another York boat was coming from the direction of the promontory, This contained three men also. Six on the trail; and Lee guessed that they would leave no nook un-searehed un-searehed in their determination to locate lo-cate himself and the girl. i The island appeared to be about a mile in length by a third wide. Lee, seeing that discovery was only a matter mat-ter of time, decided that it would be better to abandon the boat and take refuge somewhere in the underbrush. If the York boat had not been found by nightfall, he could return with the girl and try to escape to the mainland. If it were discovered, their situation would be no worse. He strapped one of the packs about his back, picked up the girl, and, thus encumbered, proceeded through the thick brush, making for the opposite shore, where he put the girl down In a small declivity where the growth was thickest. Removing the tin pannikin from the outside of the pack, he obtained ob-tained water and poured some down the girl's throat, lie noted that the swallowing reflex was present, a favorable fa-vorable sign In unconsciousness, as he had learned at the front. Toward the middle of the afternoon the sun, which had shone brilliantly throughout the morning, went permanently perma-nently behind the clouds. Another snowstorm was beating up. A few soft flakes began to fall. Suddenly a distant hubbub broke out and continued. There was no mistaking mis-taking what was meant. The York board had been discovered. The Free Traders began to beat across the island, calling to one another. an-other. Their voices gradually sounded nearer. Crouching beside the girl In the thick of the brush, Lee waited. At a distance he saw two of them pass through the trees and disappear. The shouting died away. As soon as they bad passed him, leaving the girl where she lay, Lee slipped softly through the undergrowth, under-growth, making his way back to the sandy spit. llis expectations were continued. The York boat had disappeared. dis-appeared. Koascending the spruce tree, he saw the two York boats moored to the motor boat in mid-channol, a man with a rille seated in it on guard. They wore trapped on the island. Lee made his way back, iind waited while the afternoon wore away. The snow fell thicker. lie took off his mackinaw and placed it over the girl. She was no longer in a coma, hut semi-conscious, and unaware of her surroundings. She muttered and tossed; sometimes It was all l.ee could do to quiet her. And the d sjointed fragments of speech that fell from her lips indicated the same mental anguish an-guish that she had revealed to him during their ride through the range. He shuddered to think of her mental agony If she had awakened to find herself a prisoner in Rathway's power at the promontory. And even in the darkness of their desperate situation, he drew new hope from his resolution. And gradually his plans formed In his mind. Then night began to fall, and Lee breathed a vast sigh of relief. Unless Un-less his plans miscarried, they should be safe upon the malnlnnd well before midnight. These depended, of course, upon his being able to capture one of the boats. The best plan for the Free Traders would have been to have withdrawn them to the promontory, knowing that Lee could not swim with the girl across that stretch of ice-cold water. Lee felt sure that, in their eagerness, feeling secure in their numbers, they would encamp upon the shore, either beaching the boats or leaving them anchored under the single guard in the middle ctiannel. About half an hour after dark he set out on his investigations. He moved through the brush as softly as any Indian, and, booted though he was, hardly a twig crackled under his feet. Making his way toward the central portion, wliere the trees were sparser and the ground undulating, he soon discovered what he was looking for, the distant glow of a camp fire. Four men were seated around the fire, drinking and conversing loudly. It was impossible to make out their faces in the darkness, but Lee waited patiently until the light of the fire fell upon each, and ascertained that none of them was bearded. Rathway, then, was either in charge of the motor boat, with the sixth man. or jhad been- forced to return to his headquarters, owing to his condition. Lee circled the camp, and discovered, dis-covered, to his joy, the York boat, beached on the shore about twenty-five twenty-five yards distant. The men had not troubled to draw It up on birch rollers, where it would have been a matter of time and labor to float it again; It lay with its keel in the mud, careening to the lap of the little waves. Lee cogitated. If the men got drunk that night, it might be possible to make off with the boat without arousing them. On the other hand the probabilities prob-abilities were that through fear of Rathway they 'would stay sober enough to guard it effectively. And the delay was telling upon his nerves. He decided that at all cost it was necessary to make the attempt as quickly as possible. He made his way back to the girl, strapped the pack on his back, and, taking her in his arms, began to approach ap-proach the encampment by 3 circuitous route through the trees. In the darkness, staggering over the uneven ground, and loaded as he was, the task was an all but impossible one. But, added to this, the girl awakened and began talking disjointedly, sometimes some-times crying out in fear. It was almost al-most Impossible to quiet her. She clung to him, moaning. For a whole hour he tried to assuage her terrors, until at last she dropped asleep again from weakness and weariness. weari-ness. Once more Lee took up his task. Now the campfire came into view. The four men were still visible about It, shouting and quarreling; they were drunk, but not drunk enough to render ren-der escape without a fight possible. Creeping, almost inch by inch, to the extension of raspberry brambles, Lee followed it down to the water's edge and laid the girl down. He looked at her apprehensively for a moment, but her eyes were closed in sleep and her breathing was soft and regular. Then coolly Lee stepped out Into the open space and made his way toward the group. He was within five and twenty yards of them before they perceived him, and then they seemed to take him for one of their party. Lee's impressions were ot confused shouting and challenging. His coolness disconcerted and bewildered bewild-ered them; he was almost upon them before Pierre recognized him. "By gar, it's dat d n four-llusher four-llusher !" be shouted. And on the instant Lee was into the thick of them. A tall ruflian grasped a ritle and rushed at him. Lee fired. The man, shot through the hand, dropped the rifle, and, uttering a howl of pain, took to his heels in the undergrowth. under-growth. A second man was aiming at him. Lee brought the butt of his pistol down upon his head, and the man, collapsing in a mumbling heap, lay face upward upon the ground. Shorty was nulling desperately at a gun. Lee swung at him, missed his skull, but kn."-k''d him sidewise with a blow lb,-!! laid his cheek open to the bone. Shorty dropped and lay still. I n-re. who had made no movement or iiggresslon, was staring at Lee sun 'diy. "Hands up, d n you!" Lee shouted. Pierre's arms went up to their full hei'.'ht. Lee frisked him, took Ids gun. took Shorty's and the third man's, and tossed them into the undergrowth as far as he could fling them. He stooped and picked up the rifle that the first man had dropped. And, within a few seconds of the opening relee, Lee found himself, by virtuo jf the surprise, master of the situation. But there was no time to be lost, for the tall ruflian who had fled was howling somewhere along the shore, and all depended upon the nearness of the motor boat. Lee, covering Pierre, backed quietly to the place where he had laid the girl. He picked her up and ran toward the boat with her. Instantly Pierre's figure was blotted out in the darkness. Lee had set down the rifle when he picked up the girl ; he placed her in the bottom of the boat, ran back and found It and threw it inside, together with the pack from his shoulders. He raised the heavy anchor. He threw all his weight against the boat, which receded re-ceded in a trail of viscous mud until it was afloat. Lee leaped in, seized the oars, fired another shot in warning. warn-ing. All the while the wounded man was howling along the shore. Lee pushed desperately with the oars till he was in deeper water. He pulled furiously for mid-channel. As he did so there came a sound that for one instant almost unnerved him, what with the psychological effect of that all-day listening to it the chugging of the engine. Then, as he reached open water, he saw by the light of the pallid moon that issued for a moment through the storm-clouds, the black speck of the motor boat trailing the second York boat dimly. But suddenly the rattling of the engine en-gine died In a splutter. The motor boat was about a hundred yards distant. dis-tant. The next instant the bang of a rifle confirmed Lee's hopes. The engine en-gine had either run out of gasoline or had become out of order. Instantly Lee was pulling as he had never pulled before. Again the rifle sounded. Twice more. Now the motor boat was almost invisible In the darkness. Then, simultaneously with another discharge, something struck Lee a violent vio-lent blow In the side that knocked him on his back. He was up in a moment, and pulling with all his might, though he knew he Lee Had Set Down the Rifle When He Picked Up the Girl. He Placed Her in the Boat, Ran Back and Found It and Threw It Inside, Together With the Pack From His Shoulders. was wounded. But at all cost he must reach that nenring, welcome shore. He felt the wet blood trickling down him. His breath was coming in short gasps. He bent to the oars with all his resolution reso-lution set upon the completion of that journey. At last the shore seemed tp reach out to him, the forests parted, the distant shouts died away. He ran the boat aground. Lee's brain seemed preternaturally acute. In that moment he did not forget for-get the pack, but, snatching It from the boa,:, leaped ashore, and, running some fifty yards, placed it carefully in the brush at the base of a tall pine. He ran back, picked up the girl, and, carrying her in his arms, began to make his way into the thick of the forest. And all the while he ran, lie was weighing everything. The Free Traders Trad-ers would not know that he was wounded, they would certainly abandon aban-don the pursuit as hopeless ; he must carry the girl a mile into the forest, where the light of their fire would not betray them, returning for the pack in the morning. He suffered no pain, and seemed momentarily endowed with some extraordinary vitality, hut there was a numbness in his side which seemed to be spreading upward. He had no idea how serious the wound was; everything that was himself him-self was set upon the completion of the last phase of his task, so that, if he died, the girl should at least come back to consciousness in the forest and not in Rathway's hands. He struggled on, felt himself weakening, weak-ening, felt himself choking, and set down the glri in order to draw iirenth. But as he raised her again, he feii a sudden stab of agonizing pain, and something grated beneath his heart. He realized then that the rifle bullet had split one of his ribs, probably-glancing probably-glancing off again, and that the bone had given way under the strain of the girl's weight. In a way this reassured him, .'or a glancing wound of that kind was not likely to be a serious one. On the other hand, the agony was growing unendurable. Every step was now torture. Three or four times, when it seemed impossible to proceed, Lee was forced to set the girl down and, leaning lean-ing against a tree, to gasp for breath. Eternities seemed to be passing. All his left side was now a flaming hell of pain, which radiated from the wound throughout his body, and this was becoming be-coming an automaton, driven by the will. He was no longer conscious of muscular control over it. A hundred times he felt that the next step must be his last. And yet some monitor in the back of his consciousness kept insisting in-sisting that he must complete the mile he had set himself, and would not let him drop in his tracks. And as he staggered on, he was surprised sur-prised to hear himself talking to himself, him-self, and he listened with mild interest, inter-est, as if he were overhearing the remarks re-marks of a third person. He heard himself solemnly addressing address-ing Estelle, thanking her for having relieved him of the last vestige of the love that he had once felt toward her. He had thought he loved her once, and that love, although unworthily bestowed, had not been wholly folly. Estelle had had many good qualities of heart; she was reckless and passionate, pas-sionate, but there was nothing petty or mean about her. She was the daughter daugh-ter of a well-to-do lumberman, and she had been well educated ; but there was some taint in her blood, some atavistic tendency that drove her upon wild and erratic courses. For a while she had been on the stage, and had earned some reputation reputa-tion as a clever mimic. For a long time Lee had known nothing of the stories that were being circulated by all the gossips of the town, nor that her name was associated asso-ciated with that of a man named Kean, whom he had never met. Kean was one of a gang selling liquor to the Indians, and he had a wife in Chicago. When, burning with anger, he went to confront Estelle, It was to find that she had been warned of his discovery, and had fled from the place to Kean, the gossips said. Lee never made any inquiries. As soon as possible he secured a transfer trans-fer to another post ; then he was sent to France, and his life had no room for feminine interests. About ten months previously, however, how-ever, while In the trenches, he had had a letter from Mrs. Kean, enclosing enclos-ing a copy of a marriage certificate. She was thinking of a divorce, and wanted to know whether he could give her any information about the couple. Lee knew nothing of either. But the letter had shaken him a good deal, as had the meeting with Estelle that day as well. What an end for her! It was a queer personality that talked, the fragments of the man whom he had once been, and Lee discovered that this lost portion of his personality was recalling to mind all sorts of queer things, quite trivial and unimportant unim-portant episodes of that unhappy entanglement. en-tanglement. And so one part of him held colloquy with the shade of the woman who was now nothing to him, while the other held the unconscious girl, and drove the lagging body onward. And to his horror, in that dim light the girl he clasped seemed to take on the aspect of Estelle, and he found it was to her that he was talking. But then he heard her moan slightly, and pulled himself together. This was not Estelle, it was his comrade of the range whom he was carrying. The phantom disappeared into the past, and once more Lee was aware of that odd sense of tender companionship. He rested her head more gently against his shoulder. At last, when he was satisfied that he had gone the mile he had set himself, him-self, he laid the girl down gently on the ground, and, breaking off some spruce branches, he made a bed for her and wrapped her In his mackinaw again. And with that It was all he could do to hold himself together while he examined his own wound as best he could. He saw that it was a mere flesh wound. The bone had taken the force of the bullet, which had glanced off, and one broken end was working into the flesh. He tore some strips from his shirt, and having brought the ends into position, po-sition, bound them tightly. And then lie dropped to the ground at the girl's feet and lapsed imniediaiely into a delirious slumber. CHAPTER VII The Girl Awakens Ami nil that night it was t he will 'ir.I sns'nined the worn-out body in uiai lighi up through tha darkness, and the knowledge that he must retain re-tain intact the thread of consciousness if he was to save the girl from the alternative between death in the forest for-est and recapture. At earliest dawn he must retrieve the pack, in case Rathway's men should decide to beat about the shore and so, perhaps, might find It. Beyond Be-yond that point he would not let his anticipations carry him. It was some time before the dawn when Lee heard the girl cry out suddenly, sud-denly, a moan of pain and of surprise as the body, heavy with its coma, struggled to convey the sense of distress dis-tress to the dazed mind. That cry drove the phantoms of delirium deli-rium from Lee's mind, pulling him back to consciousness, and in an Instant In-stant Lee was at the girl's side, perfectly per-fectly master of himself, and, as she stirred and murmured, he raised her, put his arms about her, and took her head upon his shoulder, as tenderly as if she were some boy comrade, mounded upon patrol. iut as he listened to her broken utterances ut-terances Lee realized that it was more than physical pain that was tormenting torment-ing her. "I cannot go on. It was too heavy a price. I must go back. If you won't kill him, save me and take me away. It is not that I didn't trust you, only you didn't understand. "No, I'm not sure that I trust him. He looks honest, but who knows that he is? He isn't a prospector, he hasn't a pick or a pan. What should he be doing In the range? Yes, I'll go through with It. I'll go with you when he's asleep, only don't harm him. You must promise me not to harm him. "Yes, he means well and wants to help me. He doesn't know who you are. You must swear that no harm shall come to him " She was living over again the events of the past. Her utterances became more broken, she moaned suddenly she lay quiet, relapsing Into the sleep of profound exhaustion. And Lee staggered to his feet and lay down once more. But this time it was neither to sleep nor to fall back into the nether depths of delirium. He saw that a titanic conflict had been going on within the girl, and It seemed to him now that she had been going up to Rathway. Something in the conversation between be-tween Rathway and Estelle what had It been? He pondered over it all in a disconnected dis-connected way as he lay there, still aware that another part of him was living over those days of long ago. Then at last the first light of dawn came creeping through the trees, and slowly this pain-racked, thirst-tormented being settled down into himself him-self again. As soon as it was half-light he was on his feet. After looking at the girl, and convincing himself that she was not likely to awake for several hours, he set off, aching in every limb,--toward the shore of the lake, in order to retrieve re-trieve the pack. In less than half an hour he emerged out of the forest,- and, after a careful survey of the lake had convinced con-vinced him that neither the Free Traders nor their boats were in evidence evi-dence he struggled down to the river, and bathed in the ice-cold waters, lapping lap-ping them up and feeling new life flow into his veins. He adjusted and tightened the bandages. band-ages. The broken rib was snugly held, and Lee felt that he had gone through the worst of it. He found the pack. It contained a blanket and waterproof sheet, tea, sugar, bacon, flour, cream of tartar, salt, corn meal, some dried apricots, matches, and nails; there were a pot, a pannikin, plate, knife, fork, and spoon, an axe and a small saw. His wound made it impossible to carry this on his back, but with the axe in one hand Lee sliced off a number num-ber of pine branches, out of which he constructed a rough framework on which to haul the pack. An hour's work and an hour's struggle through the woods brought him back . to the girl. She was sleeping naturally, and there was a faint tinge of color in her cheeks. After a short rest Lee set about the task of making camp. He gathered brushwood and built a fire, he put on to boil the pot which he had brought back full of water. And, having hav-ing on the return journey discovered a small, clear stream near by, be decided that that would be a safe camping place until they could proceed, and accordingly bent down some saplings and proceeded to thatch them wHh branches, to make a shelter for them. He had just begun when he heard a low call behind him. The girl 1 was awake and conscious at last. She was looking at him in wonder, but not in fear. Of course the girl's delirious utterances mean nothing. What will the forlorn couple do next? (TO B CONTINUED.) |