Newspapers / Asheville Citizen (Asheville, N.C.) / Nov. 3, 1922, edition 1 / Page 12
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t y H' TWELVE ...E ASHEVILLE CITIZEN, FRIDAY MORNING, NOVEMBER 3, 1922. THE LOST LADY By MELVILLE DAVISSON POST. Copyright, IIJ1, hf The Wwkt Newnpapr-r KrntllraU'. AU RlfrJiU Hfurnwl. IT waa a remark of Carrlngton that inrll venture. "It Is son remark of old Major riled tills ad- gmo distance .trh the wood 1 'lu'to fafeT" " (t via a triers .reflection as he L it very late. I ! not kndw how the dinner, or rath it the after hours of It, huil lengthened, it muat have been the Incomparable charm of the worn tn. She had come. this night, lu minously. It seemed to tie, through the hate that had been on her (he amoke haie of a strange. I, lightening fortune. The three of Us had been carried along In It tth no aense of time; my sister. Tie ancient Major Carrlngton and f. He turned back In the road, hla i decayed voice whlpeed by the s ailnmlua of her Into a higher note: 'Runni.se the village coachman hould think her aa lovely a we do what!" ., He laughed and turned heavily lip the road a hundred yards or o to hla cottage set In the pine wood. I etood In the road wan n- Ing the wheels of the absurd vii i. vehicle, the vellow cut-under, disappear. The old Major called hack to me: hla voice aeemed de inched, eerie with thin laugh In a "I thought him a particularly villainous looking creature. It waa an abaurd remark. The man waa one of the natlvea of the Island, and besides, the Innkeeper was a person of sound, sense; he would know precisely about hla driver. . I ahould not have gone on thia nd venture but for a further lncl lent. When I entered the house my . 'ster waa going ud the stairs, the tiutler waa beyond In the drawing room, and there waa no other ser vant visible. Bhe waa on the first step land the elevation gave pre ' fiselir the height that my lister ought to have received In the ac cident of birth. Bhe would have Is-en wonderful - with ' those four Inches' added lacking beauty, she t'.ad every other grace. 8he spoke to- me aa I approach ed. "Winthrop," she said, "what was in the package that Madame Bar- ras carried away with her to jilgJitT" The query very greatly surprli ed me. I thought Madame Burras had carried this package away lrith her several evenings before when I had put her English bank jtiotea In my box at the local bank. !.My sister added the explanation Iwhlch I should have been embar rassed to seek, at ,the moment, I "She asked me to put It some lw here on Tuesday afternoon, . . . v lit was forgotten, I suppose. . . . i'I laid it In a drawer of the library (table. . . , What did it contain?" j l managed an evasive reply, for (the dlsoovery opened possibilities It hat disturbed me. "Soma . certificates, I believe," I 'aid. i My sister made a little pretend- ' l-d gesture or dismay. "I should have been more care - I.'ul; such things are of value." j Of value Indeed! The certificates , 1 Madame Burras' package, that ! t lain about on the library ta 1. . were gold certificates of the ? ilted States Treasury ninety of ft "Km, each ot value of one thou ! and dollars.' My sister went on: -,' "How oddly life has tosasd her n bout. ... Bhe must have been Ja. njiers infant at Miss Page's. ' The tmachment of incoming tots to4he 'older girls was a custom. . . Vio not recall her. . . , There waa ;nlways a string of mites with shiny installs and big eyed wistful faces. , ;The older girls never thought very : much about them. One has a jKwarm memory, but individuals j escape one.. The .older girl, in . 'ihose schools, fancied- herself Im mensely. The little satellite that l.iittached Itself, with Its adoration, had no Identity. It had a nlck ' name, I think or a-number. ... I have forgotten. We minimized these midgrs out.' of everything that could distinguish them. . . . tancy one of these turning up In Madame Burras and oomiruj to tne on the memory of It." "1t was extremely lucky for her," 'f said. "Imagine arriving from ifhe Interior of Brazil on the in . vitation of Mrs. Jordan to ind that Judy dead and buried; with no fiiend, until, by chance, one hap pened by chance on your name In , lie social, register, and ventured .1 school attachment of which ifliere might remain, perhaps a ..'tiiemory only on the Infant's side." i My slater went on up the stairs. ,. i "I am glad we happened to be here, and, especislly, Winthrop, If ou have been able to assist her. " . . She is charming." j Charming was the word desrrlp of my elster, for It Is a thing 'bf manner from a nature elevated tnd noble, but It was not the word for Madame Burras. The woman ?Vas a lure. I mean the term in ..its large and catholic sense. I 'mean the bait of a, great cosmic impulse the most subtle and the jnost persistent of which, one has 'jnv sense. i The cunning Intelligences of that impulse had decked her out with every atlractlveneiw as though they had taken -.nought to confound all masculine resistance; to sweep Into (heir service these refractory units that withheld themselves from the common psrpose. She was lovely, as the aged Major Carrlngton had uttered great violet eyes In a deli cate skin aown with gold flecks, a skin so delicate that 0110 felt that a kiss would tear II 1 do not know from what source I have that expression, but it at taches Itself, out of my memory of descriptive phrases. 10 Madame Hurras. And It extends Itself as wholly descriptive of her. You will say that the long and short of this Is that I waa In love with Madame llarrss, but I point you a witness In Major Carrlnrton. He had the same ImpresslySi". and he had but one passion In his life, a distant worship of my d.-ter tuat burned steadily even bote at the end of life. During the few evenings that Madame Hurras had1 been In to dinner with us, he sat In hla chair beyond my slate In the drawing room, perfect In hla early-Vlctorlan man ner, while Madame Hurrai and I walked on the great terrace, or jut outside. One had a magnificent sweep of the world, at night, from that ter tace. It looked out over the for est of pines to the open sea. Madame liar ras confessed to il.e pull of Uus vista. She asked me bt whut direction the Atlantic en tered, and when she knew, sio kept it alwaya In her sight. It had a persisting fascination for her. At all times and in near ly anv position, she was somehow sensible of ihU vista; ahe knew the lights almost Immediately, and the common small craft blinking about. Tonight shs had sat for a long time In nearly utter silence here. There was a faint light on the open sea as she got up to take her leave of us; what would it be she wondered. I replied that It was some small craft romhg in. "A fishing boatt" o "Hardly that," 1 ild. from Its lights and position It will be some swifter power boat, ana, i snouiu say, not precisely certain about the channel." I haye been drawn here Into reminiscence that did not, at the time, detain me in the hall. When my sister had discovered me, fol lowing Major Carrlngton's remark, loft ma distinctly uneasy. It waa very nearly two miles to the vil lage, the road waa wnony ioresi and there would be no house on the way. for my father, witn me utter disregard for cost, had sought the seclusion ot a large acreage when he had built this absurdly elaborate villa on Mount Desert Island. Besides I was in.no mood lor sleep. And ovar ail proDaDiiuy. mere might be some not entirely Imag inary danger to Madame Barras. Not precisely the danger presented In Major carnngton s pieasamiv, but the always possible danger to ops who Is carrying a sum of money about. It would be con sidered, in the world of criminal activities, a very largs sum of money; and it had been lying there aa of no value, in a drawer ot the library table since the day on whioh the gold certificates had ar rled on my check from the Boston bank. Madame Barras had not taken the currency away as I Imagined, It was extremely careless of her, but was it Jtot an act In charac ter? What would such a woman know of practical concern? I spoke to the butler. He should tut wnll .UP, I would let myaeif in, and I "went out. I remember that t a-ot a cap and a stick out of the rack; there was no element of selection in the cas. but there was a decided sub conscious direction about the selec tion of the stick. It was a heavy blackthorn, with an Iron ferrule and a allver weight set In the head; picked up by my father at some Irish affair a weapop in fact. It waa not dark. It was one or those clear hard nights that are not uncommon' m this island In midsummer; with a full moon, the road was visible even In the wood. I swung along It with no particular precaution; I was not expecting anything to happen, and in fact, nothing did happen on the way in to the village. Hut In this attitude of confidence I failed to discover an advent of this night that might have given the whole adventure a different ending. There was a point near the vil lage where a road enters out pri vate one; skirts the border of the mountain, and, making a 'great turn, enters the village from the south. At this division of the road heard distinctly a sound in the wood. it was not a sound to Incite in qulry. It was the sound of some considerable animal moving In the leaves, a few steps beyond the road. It did not Impress me at the time; estrays were constantly at large In our forests In summer. and not Infrequently a roamlna buck from the near preserves. There was also here, Jn addition to the other roadr, an abondened winter wood-road that ran west ward across the Island to a small farming settlement. Doubtlesss 1 took a slighter nolle ot the sound because trays from the farmers' fields usually tresspassed on us from this road. At any rale I went on. I fear that I was very much engrossed with the memory of Madam Bar ras. Not wholly with the feminine lure of. herx although aa 1 have written she was the perfection of that lure. One passed women, at all milestones, on the way to age. and kept before them one's sound estimates of life, but before this woman one lost one's head, as though Nature, evaded heretorfore, would not be denied. But the wlerd fortune thut bad attended her was In my mind. Marjled to Senor Barras out of the door of a convent, carried to Hip de Janlero to an unbearable life, escaping with a remnant of her Inheritance In ICngllsh hank notes, she arrives hero to visit the one old, persisting friend, Mrs. Jbr dan, and finds her doad! And what seemed strange, lncrellble beyond belief, was that this creature Bar raa had thought only of her for tune which he had depleted In two years to the something less than twenty thousand pounds which I had exchanged for her into our money; a mere fragment of her great Inheritance. I had listened to the atory en tranced with the alluring teller of It: wondering as I now wondered. on the road to he village, how unythlng pretending to be man could think nf money when she was before hla eye. What could he buy with money that equaled herl .And yet this curious jackal had seen in her only the key to a strong box. There was behind it In explanation, shadowed outthe glamor of an empire that Senor Barras would set up with the mil lions in nis country or revolutions, and the enthusiasm of a foolish mother. And yet the Jackal and this wreckage had not touched her. There was no stain, no crumpled leaf. She was a fresh wonder, even after this, out of -e, chrysalis. It was this amazing newness, this virginity of blossom from which one could not escape. I The word In my reflection brought me up. How had she es caped from Barras? I had more than once in my re flections pivoted on the word. The great hotel was very nearly deserted when I entered. There was the glow of a cigar where some one smoked, at the end of the long porch. Within, there was only a sleepy clerk. Madame Barras 'hsd not arriv ed. ... he was quite sure; ahe had gone out to dinner somewhere and had not come In! I was profoundly concerned. But I took a moment to reflect before deciding what to do. I stepped outside and there, coming up from the shadow of the porch. I met Sir Henry Marquis. It was chance at its extreme of favor. If I had been given the solection, in all the world. I should have asked Sir Henry Marquis that decisive moment. The-relief I felt made'my words extravagant. "Marquis!" X, cried. "Tou here! "Ah, Winthrop," he said Jn his drawling Oxford voice, "what have you don with Madame Barras? I was waiting for her!" I told him, In. a word, how she had set out from my house my concern the walk down here and this result. I did not ask h m at the moment how he happened to be h,ere, or with a knowledge of our guest. I thought that Mar quis was in Canada. Rut one does not, with success, Inquire of a c I. 1). official even In his own conn try. One met him in the. most tin expected places, unconcerned, and one would have said, at. leisure. But ho waa concerned tonight What I told hlni hrouaht him nn. He stood for a moment silent. Then he said Softly, ln order that the clerk behind us might not over hear. - "Don't speak of it. I will get a Dr. Celia T. Shelmire CHIROPRACTOR Other virtues mselt a crown, but perseverance alon Is crowned Palmer Method X.Ray Equipment m Phone 242 221-22 Haywood Bldg. Ret. 329 n DO LITTLE THINGS TIRE YOU OUT? ARE you "all run down", w eak and languid ami thin in flesh Irott summer heat and fall colds i Is your appetite gone, your nerves or. dee, your digestion poor? You need Gude's rcnto-Miincan It renews the cupply.of rich, red blood . Onngs back the lust energy and amma tion, tones up your nervous system nd helps to build firm, solid, healthy Sesh and strong muscles. Your druggist has Gude's liquid oi tablets, as you prefer. Gude's Pepto-jangan Tonic and Blood Enriches WE BUY ANYTHING and . SELL EVERYTHING Structural Materials a Specialty. All Sizes and Lengths of I Beams S. Sternberg & Co. I lliht and go with you!" He returned !n a moment and we went out. He asked me about the road, waa there only one m-ay !1iwn; and I told him precisely. There was only one road Into the village and no Way to miss it un less one turned Into the public road at the solnt where It entered our private one along the moun tain. He pitched at once upon this point snd we nurriea naca. We had hardly a further word on the way. I was decidedly un easy about Madame Barras by now, and Marquis' concern waa hardly less evident. He raced along In his Immense stride, and I had all I could manage to keep up It may seem strange that I should have brought such a man as Hlr Henry Marquis Into the search of this adventurs with so little explanation of my guest or the affair. But one must remem ber, Marquis was an old acquain tance frequently seen about in the world. To thus, on the spot, so to speak, draft into my service the first gentleman I found was pre cisely what any one would have done. It was probable, after all, that there Mad been some reason why the rut-under had taken the other road, and Madame Barras was quite all right. It was better to make aura be fore one raised the village and Mnrquls, markedly, was beyond any aid the village could have fur nished. Tills course was strikingly Justified by every after event. 1 have said that the night was not dark. The sky was hard with stars, like a mosaic This white moonlight entered through the tree tops' and In a measure illuminated the road. We were easily able to see. when we reached the point, that the cut-under had turned out Into the road circling the moun tain to the west of the village. The track was so clearly visible In the light that I must have ob served It had I been thinking of tne road insteud ot the one who had set out upon it. I was going on quickly, when Marquis stopped. He was stoop ing over tho track of the. vehicle. He did not come on and I went back. "What la It?" I asked. He answered, still stooping above the track. 'The cut-under stopped here." "hSw do you know that?" I asked, for it seemed hardly possi ble to determine where a wheeled vchlolo h;id stopped. "It's quite clear," he replied. "Tho horso has moved about with out going on." I now saw it. The hoof marks of the horse had displaced the dust where it had several times changed position. "And that's not all." Marquis continued. "Something has hap penod to the tut-under here!" I waa now closely beside him. "It was broken down, perhaps, or some accident to the harness?" "No," he replied. "The wheel tracks are here broadened, as though they had skidded on a turn. This would mean little if the cut-under had been moving at the time. But it was not moving; th horse was standing. The cut under had stopped." He went on as though in a re flection to himself. . "The vehicle must have been vllently thrown about, here, by something." I had a sudden Inspiration. "I see it!" I cried. "The horse took fright, stopped, and then bolt ed; there has been a runaway. That accounts for the turn out. Let's hurry!" But Marquis detained me with a firm ha,nd on my arm. "No," he said, "the horse was not running when it turned out and It did not stop hers in fright. The horse was entirely quiet nere. The hoof marks would show any ilirm In the animal and, more over, if it had stopped In fright, there would have been an Inevit able recoil .. which would have thrown the wheejs of the vehicle backward out of their track. No moving animal, man Included, stopped by fright, falls to register this recoil. We alwaya iook tor ii In evidences of vllent assault. Foot. prints invarlliabjy show It, and one lesrns thereby, unerringly, ins ui rectlon of the attack." He rose, his hand still extended and unon rnv arm. "There Is only ons possible ex planation." hs added. "Bomethlng happened in the rtit-out to throw it vllently about in tne roaa, ana it happened with the horse undis turbed and the vehicle standing still. The wheel tracks are widen ed only at one point, showing a transverse but no lateral move ments in the vehicle." "A struggle?" I cried. Major Carrlngton was right. Madame Barras has been attacked by the driver!" Marquis' hand held me firmly In the excitement of that realiza tion. He waa entirely composed. There was even a drawl In his voice as he answered me. "Major Carrlngton, whoever he may be," he said, "la wrong; ir we exclude a third party, It was Madame Barras who attacked the driver!" His fingers tightened under my obvious protest. "It Is quite certain, he contin ued. Taking the position of the standing horse. It will be the front wheels of the cut-under that hnve made this widened track; the wheels under the driver's, seat, and not the wheels under the' guest seat, In the rear of the vehicle. There has been a violent struggle In this cut-under, but It was a struggle that took place wholly n the front of the vehicle." He went on In his maddeningly Imperturable calm. "No one attacked our guest, but some one here, at this precise point, did attack the driver of this vehicle." "For God's sake," I cried, ""let's hurry!" He stepped back slowly to the edge of the road and the drawl In his voice lengthened. ."We do hurry,' he said. "We hurry to the value of knowing that there was no accident here to the harness, no fright to the horse, no attack on the lady, and no change In the direction which the vehicle afterwards took. Suppose we had gone on, in a.dlfferent form of hur ry. Ignorant Nof these facts?" At this point I distinctly heard again the sound of a heavy ani mal in the wood. Marqula also heard it and he plunged Into the Constipation Is Relieved Prompt-Permanent Relief CARTER'S LITTLE LITER flLLf rarely (ail. Purely v etc table act surely u gent. CADTPDQ var. iwnni a.s w Iron the liver. Relieve after . dinner di tresa re lieve indiges tion; improve the complexion brig btea thcreyee. 8 nun fQI 8staII Dee taaO Pries) IITTLE IXIZR PILLS thick bushes. Almost Immediately we were at the spot, and before us some heavy object turned Ip the leaves. Marquis whipped an electric flash out of his pocket. The body of a man, tied at tne nanas ana heels behind witn a nncning simp aild with a linen carriage lap clotli wound around his head and knotted, lay there endeavoring to ease ths rigor of his position by some. movement. . We should now know. In a mo ment what desperate tning nau happened! I cut the strap, while Marquis got tho lap-cloth unwouna iram about the man's head, it was ins driver of the cut-under, out we got no- gain from nis amcuvtrj. As soon as nis iace was c, " tore out of our grasp and began to run. He took the old road to 'the westward of the island, where per haps he lived. We were wholly unable to slop hlni, and we got no reply to our shouted queries except his wild cry for help. He considered us his assailants from whom, by chance, he had escape. It was folly to think ot catching up with the man. He was set desperately for the westward of the Island, and he would never stop until he reached It. We turned back into the road. Marqula1- method now changed. He turned swiftly Into the road alon- the mountain which the cut under had taken after Its capture. I was at the extreme (fa dead ly anxiety about Madame Barras. It seemed to me, now, certain, that some gang ot criminals hav ing knowledge of the packet of money had waylaid the cut-under. Proud of my conclusions, I put the Inquiry to Sir Henry as we ICMtimmtd NeM .'sol Honest Advertising THIS is a topic we all hear now-a-dayi because ao many people are inclined to exaggerate. Yet has any physician told you that we claimed unreasonable remedial properties for Fletcher' CastoriaT Just aik them. 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Asheville Citizen (Asheville, N.C.)
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Nov. 3, 1922, edition 1
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