Democratic watchman. (Bellefonte, Pa.) 1855-1940, February 16, 1923, Image 2

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

    SYNOPSIS
CHAPTER 1.—Gabriel Warden, Seattle
eapitalist, tells his butler he is expecting
$, aller, to be admitted without question.
informs his wife of danger that
threatens him if he pursues a course he
considers the only honorable one. War-
den leaves the house in his car and meets
man whom he takes into the machine.
en the car returns home, Warden is
found dead, murdered, and alone. The
er, a young man, has been at War-
den’s house, but leaves unobserved.
CHAPTER I1.—Bob Connery, conductor,
ives orders to hold train for a party.
e men and a girl board the train
The father of the girl, Mr. Dorne, is the
§irton for whom the train was held
ilip D. Eaton, a young man, also
rded the train. Dorne tells his daugh-
ter and his secretary, Don Avery, to find
out what they can concerning him.
CHAPTER II1.—The two make Eaton's
acquaintance. The train is stopped by
snowdrifts,
CHAPTER IV.—Eaton receives a tele-
gram addressed to Lawrence Hillwara,
which he claims. It warns him he is
being followed.
CHAPTER V.—Passing through the car,
Connery notices Dorne’s hand hanging
outside the berth. He ascertains Dorne’s
bell has recently rung. Perturbed, he
investigates and finds Dorne with his
11 crushed. He calls a surgeon, Dr.
clair, on the train.
CHAPTER VI.—Sinclair recognizes the
fnjured man as Basil Santolne, who, al-
Jiough blind, is a peculiar power in the
ncial world as adviser to “big inter-
ests.” His recovery is a matter of doubt
CHAPTER VIIl.—Eaton is practically
placed under arrest. He refuses to make
explanations as to his previous move-
ments before boarding the train, but
its he was the man who called on
arden the night the financier was mur-
CHAPTER IX.—Eaton
t Santoine to withhold judgment, tell-
her he is in serious nger, though
nocent of the crime against her father.
feels the girl believes him.
CHAPTER X.—Santoine recovers suffi-
efently to question Eaton, who refuses
to reveal his identity. The financier re-
Quores Eaton to accompany him to the
toine home, where he is in the posi-
tion of a semi-prisoner.
CHAPTER Xl.—Eaton meets a resident
of the house, Wallace Blatchford, and a
young girl, Mildred Davis, with whom
apparently he is acquainted, though they
oonceal the fact. Eaton’s mission is to
secure certain documents which are vital
w his interests, and his being admitted
the house is a remarkable stroke of
ek. The girl agrees to aid him. He
becomes deeply interested in Harriet San-
toine, and she in him.
CHAPTER XI1.—Harriet tells Eaton she
and Donald Avery act as ‘‘eyes” to San-
toine, reading to him the documents on
which he bases his judgments. While
walking with her, two men in an auto-
mobile deliberately attempt to run Eaton
down. He escapes with slight injuries.
The girl recognizes one of the men as
having been on the train on which they
came from Seattle.
CHAPTER XIIl.—Santoine questions
Eaton closely, but the latter is reticent.
The blind man tells him he is convinced
the attack made on him on the train was
the result of an error, the attacker hav-
ing planned to kill Eaton. Santoine tells
Harriet she is to take charge of certain
papers connected with the “Latron prop-
erties,” which had hitherto been in
Avery's charge. :
CHAPTER XIV.—Avery seeks to influ-
ence Harriet, as his wife to be, to give
the papers to him. She refuses. Harriet
is beginning to feel that her love belongs
to Eaton.
CHAPTER XV.—At the country club
Eaton reveals a remarkable proficiency’
at polo, seemingly to Avery’s gratifica-
tion. Eaton induces Harriet to allow him
to leave the grounds for a few minutes
that night
(Continued from last week).
She led the way downstairs and, in
the hall, picked up a cape; he threw
ft over her shoulders and brought his
overcoat and cap. But in his absorp-
tion he forgot to put them on until,
as they went out into the garden to-
gether, she reminded him ; then he put
on the cap. The night was clear and
cool, and no one but themselves
seemed to be about the house.
“Which way do you want to go?’
she asked.
He turned toward the forested
acres of the grounds which ran down
to a ravine at the bottom of which
a little stream trickled toward the
lake. As they approached the side
of this ravine. a man appeared and
leads with Har-
Ir
ii
rm i
HTT
VIL
“It's All Right, Willis,” She Said Qui-
etly.
fovestigated them. He recognized the
girl's figure and halted.
“It’s all right, Willis,” she sald qui-
etly.
“Yes, ma'am.”
BLIND MAN'S
EYES
BY
WILLIAM MACHARG-EDWIN BALMER.
[Mustrations by R.H.Livingstone
COPYRIGHT BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.
aney passed the man and went
down the path into the ravine and up
the tiny valley. Eaton halted.
“You don’t mind waiting here a few
moments for me?”
. “No,” she said.
here?”
“Yes,” he saia; and with that per-
mission, he left her,
“You will return
Both had spoken so that che man '
above could rot have heard; and Har-
riet now noticed that, as her compan-
he went almost
She stood still, shivering |
fon hurried ahead,
unoiselessly.
a little now in the cold; and she lis-
tened, she no longer heard his foot-
steps.
then just as she was telling herself
that it must be niany moments before
she would know whether he was coni-
ing back, she heard him returning;
at some little distance, he spoke her
name so as not to frighten her. Sle
knew at once it was he, but a change
in the tone surprised her. She stepped
forward to meet him. i
“You found your friend?”
“Yes.”
“What did he teil you? 1 mean
what is wrong that you did not ex-
pect ?”’
She heard his breath come fast.
“Nothing,” he denied.
“No; you must tell me!
roa o Can't you
st me?” '
“Trust you!” he cried. He turned
to her and seized her hands.
ask me to—trust you!”
; “Yes; I've trusied you.
“You
beli~ve as much in me?”
“Believe in you. Miss Santelpe!”
He crushed her fingers in his asp.
“Oh. my God, I wish I could!”
“You wish you could?’ she echoed.
The tone of it struck her like a blow,
and she tore her h-nds away. “What
do you mean by that?”
He made no reply but stood staring
at her through the dark. “We must
go back,” he said queerly. “You're
cold.” &
She did not answer but started back
up the path to the house. le seemed
ta) it e caught himself together
against some impulse that stirred hin
strongly. “The man
saw us?
ther, Miss Santoine?”’ he asked un-
steadily.
“Reports for Father are first made
to me.” *
“I see.” [He did not ask her what
she was going to do; if be was assum
ing that her permission to exceed his
set limits bound her not to report to
her father, she did not accept that
assumption, though she would not re-
port to the blind man tonight, for she
knew h- now bho o=v
new h° must 22% D2 Slee. But
she felt that Eaton was no longer
thinking of this. As they entered the
house and he helped her lay off her
cape, he suddenly faced her.
“We are in a strange relation to
each other, Miss Santoine—stranger
than you know,” he said unevenly.
She waited for him to go on.
“When the time comes that you
comprehend what our actual relation
is, I—I want you to know that I un-
derstand that whatever you have done
was done because you believed it
might bring about the greater good.
I—I have seen in you—in your father
—only kindness, high honor, sympa-
thy. If I did not know—"
She started, gazing at him, what he
said had absolutely noe meaning for
her. “What is it that you know?” she
demanded.
He did not reply; his hand went out
to bers, seized it, crushed it, and he
started away. As he went up the
stairs—still, in his absorption, carrying
cap and overcoat—she stood staring
after him in perplexity.
CHAPTER XVI
The Fight in the Study.
Eaton dismissed the man who had
been waiting in his rooms for him; he
locked the door and carefully drew
down all the window shades. Then he
put his overcoat, folded as he had
been carrying it under his arm, on
the writing table In the center of the
room, and from its folds and pockets
took a ‘“breast-drill” such sas iron
workers use in drilling steel, an auto-
matic pistol with three clips of car-
tridges, an electric flashlight and a
little bottle of nitroglycerin. He
loaded the pistol and put it in his
pocket; then he carefully inspected
the other things.
He raised a shade and window, and
sat in the dark. The night was
clbudy and very dark. He gazed at
the south wing of the house; the win-
dows of the first floor were closed and
the curtains drawn; but tonight there
was no light in the room. Then in the
dark he moved to the table where he
Yad left his overcoat, and distributed
in his pockets and within his clothing
the articles he had brought; and now
he felt again in" the overcoat and
brought out a short, strong bar of
steel curved and flattened at one.end—
a “jimmy” for forcing the windows,
Eaton slipped off his shoes and went
i
What she had done was done; |
Can't you i
out there who |
He will report ta your fa- .
to his room door; he opened the door
and found the hall dark and quiet.
He stepped out, closing his door care-
fully behind him, and with great cau-
tion he descended the stairs. He went
to a window in the drawing room
which was set in a recess and so
placed that it was not visible from
other windows in the house. He
opened this window and let himself
down upon the lawn. He gained the
south corner of the wing, unobserved
or at least without sign that he had
been seen, and went on around it.
He stopped at the first igh French
window on the south. As he tried to
slip his jimmy under the bottom of
the sash, the window, to his amaze
ment, opened silently upon its hinges;
it had not heen locked. The heavy
curtains within hung just in front of
him; he put out his hand and parted
them. Then he started back in aston-
ishment and crouched close to the
ground; inside the room was a man
moving about, flashing an electric
torch before him and then exploring
an instant in darkness and flashing
his torch again.
Eaten had not been at all prepared
for this; now he knew suddenly that
he ought to have been prepared for it.
If the man within the room was not
the one who had attacked him with
' thie motor, he was closely allied with
that man. and what he was after now
was the same thing Eaton was after.
i He drew his pistol, and loosing the
safety, he made it ready to fire; with
his left hand, he clung to the shot
heavy jimmy. He stepped into the
great room through the curtains, and
treading noiselessly in his stocking
feet, he advanced upon the man, moyv-
ing forward in each period of dark-
ness between the flushes of the elec:
trie torch.
Now. at the further side of the
room, another elecirie torch
| out. There were at least two men in
i the room, working together—or rather
one was working, the other super-
vising; for Faton heard now a steady.
almost Inaudit:ile grinding noise ns the
second man worked. Eaton halred
again and waited; if there were two,
| there might be others.
His pulses were beating faster and
| hotter, and he felt the blood rushing
| to” his head and his hands growing
| cold with his excitement: but he was
| conscious of no fear. He crouched
and crept forward noiselessly again
oe other light appeared in the room,
| and there was no sound elsewhere
| from the darkness; but the man who
| supervised had moved closer to the.
iother. The grinding noise had
i stopped ; it was followed by a sharp
! click; the men, side by ‘side, were
| bending over something: and the light
(of the man who had been working,
| for a fraction of a second shot into
"the face of the other. He muttered
! some short, hoarse imprecation, but
| before Eaton heard the voice, he had
stopped as if struck,’ and his breath
| had Zone trot Bim. > re tees hn
' His instant’s glimpse of that face
astounded, stunned, stupefied him.
He could not have seen that man! The
fact was impossible! He must have
heen mad; his mind must have hecome
unreliable to let him even imagine it.
the voice of the man whose face he
had seen! It was he! And, in place
of the paralysis of the first instant,
now a wild, savage throe of passion
seized Eaton: his pulses leaped so it
seemed they must burst his veins. and
he gulped and choked. He had not
filled in with insane fancy the fea-
tures of the man whom he had seen;
the voice witnessed too that the man
in the dark by the wall was he whom
Eaton—if he could have dreamed such
a fact as now had been disclosed—
would have circled the world to catch
and destroy; vet now with the de-
struction of that man in his power—
for he had but to aim and empty his
automatic pistol at five paces—such
destruction at this moment could not
suffice ; mere shooting that man would
be petty, ineffectual. Eaton’s fingers
tightened on the handle of his pistol.
but he held it now not as a weapon
to fire but as a dull weight with which
to strike. The grip of his left hand
clamped onto the short steel bar, and
with lips parted—breathing once, it
seemed, for each heartbeat and yet
choking, suffocating—he leaped for-
ward.
At the same instant—so that he
could not have heen alarmed by Ea
ton’s leap—the man who had been
working moved his torch, and the
light fell upon Eaton.
“Look out!” the man cried in alarm
to his companion; with the word the
torch vanished.
The man toward whom Eaton rushed
did not have time to switch off his
light; he dropped it instead; and as
Eaton sprang for him, he crouched.
Eaton, as he struck forward, found
nothing; but helow his knees, Eaton
felt a man’s powerful arms tackling
him; as he struggled to free himself.
a swift, savage lunge lifted him from
his feet; he was thrown and hurled
backward.
Eaton ducked his head forward and
struggled to turn, as he went down.
go that a shoulder and not his head
or back would strike the floor first.
He succeeded in this, though in his
effort he dropped the jimmy. He
clung with his right hand to the pistol.
and as he struck the floor, the pistol
shot off; the flash of flame spurted
toward the ceiling. Instantly the grip
below his knees was loosed; the man
who had tackled him and hurled him
back had recoiled in the darkness
Waton got to his feet but erouched
and crept about behind a table, aim-
ing his pistol over it in the direction
in which he supposed the other men
must be. The sound of the shot had
ceased to roar through the room; the
gases from the powder only made the
air heavier. The other two men in
the room also waited, invisible and
flashed
Then came the sound of the voice—'
J struggle which preceded it, must have
silent. The only light, in the great |
curtained room. came from the single
electric torch lying on the floor. This
lighted the legs of a chair, a corner
of a desk and a circle of books in the
cases on the wall. As Eaton's eyes
became more accustomed to the dark-
ness, he could see vague shapes of
furniture. If a man moved, he might
be made out; but if he stayed still.
probably he would remain indistin-
guishable,
The other men seemed also to have
recognized this; no one moved in the
room, and there was complete silence.
Eaton knelt on one knee behind his
table; now he was wildly, exultantly
excited ; his blood leaped hotly to his
hand pointing his pistol; he panted.
almost audibly, for breath, but though
his pulse throbbed through his head
too, his mind was clear and cool as
he reckoned his situation and his
chances. He had crossed the Pacific,
the continent, he had schemed and
risked everything with the mere hope
of getting into this room to discover
evidence with which to demand from
the world righting of the wrong!
which had driven him as a fugitive for |
five years: aud here he found the man '
who was the cause of it all. before
him in the same room a ‘few paces '
iway in the dark!
Far it was impossible that this was !
got that man: and Eaton knew now |
that th’s was he who must have heen
hehind and arranging and directing :
the attacks upon him. Izton had not |
only seen him and heard his voice, but
he had felt his grasp; that sudden, in-
stinctive crouch before a charge, and
the savage lunge and tackle were the .
instant, natural acts of an old lines-
man on a championship team in the
game of football as it was played
twenty years before. That lift of the .
opponent off his feet and the heavy !
lunge hurling him hack to fall on his |
head was what one man—in the |
rougher, more cruel days of the col- |
lege game—had been famous for. On |
the football field that throw sufficed
to knock a helmeted opponent uncon-
scious; here it was meant, beyond |
doubt, to do more. 4
Upon so much, at least, Eaton's
enemy "whom he must destroy if he |
himself - were not first destroyed.
Other thoughts, recasting of other re-
lations altered or overturned in their |
bearing bv the diseovery of this man |
here—everything else could and must
wait upon the mighty demand of that
moment upon Eaton to destroy this !
enemy now or be himself destroyed. |!
Eaton® shook ' in his passion; yet
coolly he now realized that his left |
shoulder, which had taken the shock:
of his fall. was numb. He shifted his ,
pistol over to cover a vague form
which had seemed to move; but, if it
had stirred, it was still again now.
Eaton strained to listen.
It seemed certain that the noise of
the shot, if not the sound of the
|
|
1
1
|
mind at once was clear; here was his
i
i
1
|
raised an alarm. ‘Basil Santoine, as
[Caton knew, slept above; a nurse
must be waiting on duty somewhere
near. Eaton had seen the row of but-
tons which the blind man had within
arm’s length with which he must be
able to summon every servant in the
house. So it could not last much |
longer now—this deadlock in the dark.
And one of the two, at least, seemed
to have recognized that.
Eaton had moved, warily and care-
fully, but he had moved; a revolver
flashed before him. Instantly and
without consciousness that his finger
Eaton’s Pistol Flashed Back.
pulled the trigger, Eaton's pistol i
flashed back. In front of him, the |
flame flashed again, and another spurt
of fire spat at one side. {
Eaton fired back at this—he was
prostrate on the floor now, and
whether he had been hit or not he
did not yet know, or whether the!
blood flowing down his face was only
from a splinter sprayed from the table |
behind which he had hid. He fired |
again, holding his pistol far out to one
side to confuse the aim of the others;
|
he thought that they too were doing
the same and allowed for it in his aim. |
He pulled his trigger a ninth time— |
he had not counted his shots, but he |
knew he had had seven cartridges in
the magazine and one in the barrel— |
and the pistol clicked without dis-
charging. He rolled over farther
away from the spot where he had last
cred and pulled an extra clip of car-.
fridges from his pocket.
The blood was flowing hot over his |
face. He made no effort to staunch
it or even to feel with his fingers to
find exactly where or how badly he
had been hit. He jerked the empty
cartridge clip from his pistol butt and |
snapped in the otlier. He swept his
volved his honor no less.
sleeve over his face to clear the blood
from his brows and eyes and stared
through the dark with pistol at arm’s
length loaded and ready. Blood
spurted over his face again; another
sweep of his sleeve cleared it; and
he moved his pistol-point back and
forth in the dark.
Surely now the sound of firing in
that room must have reached the man
in the room ahove; surely he must be
summoning his servants.
Eaton listened; there was still no
sound from the rest of the house. But
overhead now, he heard an almost im-
perceptible pattering—the sound of a
barefooted man crossing the floor;
and he knew that the blind man in
fore him, he left the wall and stepped
toward the center of the room. He
took two' steps—three, four—with no
result; then his foot trod into some
fluid, thick and sticky and not cold.
Santoine stooped and put a finger-
tip into the fluid and brought it near
his nose. It was what he supposed it
must be—blood, He could hear now
someone breathing—more than one
person. From the house, still shut
off by its double, sound-proof doors,
he could hear nothing; but someone
outside the house was hurrying up to
the open window at the south end of
the room.
That one came to, or just inside the
|window, parting the curtains. He was
the bedroom above was getting up. '# 'breathing hard from exertion or from
CHAPTER XVII
Under Cover of Darkness.
Basil Santoine was oversensitive
sound, as are most of the blind; .u
the world of darkness in which he
lived, sounds were by far the most
significant—and almost the only—
means he had of telling what went on
around him; he passed his life listen
ing for or determining the nature of
sounds. So the struggle which ended
in Eaton’s crash to the floor would
have waked him without the pistol
shots immediately following. That
roused him wide-awake immediately
and brought him sitting up in bed. for
cetful of his own condition.
His hand went at once to the bell
board, and he rang at the same time
for the nurse outside his door and
for the steward. \
Santoine did not consider the pos
sibility of robbery of plate or jewelry
fong enough to have been said to con-
sider it at all; what he felt was that
the threat which had been hanging
vaguely over himself ever since Wear
den’s murder was being fulfilled. But
it was not Santoine himself that was
being attacked; it was something San
toine possessed. There was only one
sort of valuable article for which one
might enter that room below. And
those articles— :
Santoine pressed all the hells again
and then got up. He had heard abso-
tutely no sound outside, as must be
made by anyone escaping from the
room below; but the battle seemed
over, One side must have destroyed
the other.
The blind man stood barefooted ou
the floor, his hands clasping in one of
the bitterest moments of his rebellion
against, and defiance of, his helpjess.
ness of blindness. Below him—as he
believed—his servants had been sacri-
Acing life for him; there in that room
he held in trust that which afrecied
the security. the faith, the honor of
others; his guarding that trust In
And partic-
ularly. now, he knew he was bound,
at whatever cost, to act; for he dld
not doubt now but that his half-pris-
oned guest, whom Santoine had not
sufficiently guarded, was at the bot-
tom of the attack. The blind man be-
lieved, therefore, that it was because
of his own retention here of Eaten
that the attack had been made. his
servants had been Killed, the private
secrets of his associates were in dan-
ger. Undoubtedly there was danger
below; but that was why he did not
call again at the other door for some
one else to run a risk for him.
He put his hand on the rail and
started to descend the stairs. He was
almost steady in step and he had firm
grasp on the rail ; he noticed that now
to wonder at it. When he had aroused
at the sound of firing, his blindness.
as always when something was hap-
pening about him, was obtruded upon
him. He felt helpless because he was
blind, not because he had been in-
jured. He had forgotten entirely
that for almost two weeks he had not
stirred from bed; he had risen and
stood and walked, without staggering.
to the door and to the top of the
stairs before, now, he remembered. So
what he already had done showed him
that he had merely again to put his
injury from his mind and he could
go on. He went down the stairs al-
most steadily.
The blind count stairs, and he had
gone down twenty-one—and realized
fully his futility; but now he would
not retreat or merely call for help.
“Who is here?” he asked distinctly.
“Is anyone here? Who is here?’
No one answered. And now San-
toine knew by the sense which let him
feel whether it was night or day, that
the room was really dark—dark for
others as well as for himself; the
lights were not burning. So an exal-
tation, a sense of physical capability,
came to Santoine; in the dark he was
as fit, as capable as any other man.
He stepped down on the floor, and
in his uncertainty as to the position
of the furniture, felt along the wall
There were bookcases there, but he
felt and passed along them swiftly,
until he came to the case which
concealed the safe at the left side of
the doors. The books were gone from
that case; his bare toes struck against
them where they had been thrown
down on the floor. The blind man, his
pulse beating tumultuously, put his
hand through the case and felt the
panel behind. That was slid back,
exposing the safe; and the door of
the safe stood open. Santoine’s
hands felt within the safe swiftly. The
safe was empty.
He recoiled from it, choking back
an ejaculation. The entry to this
room had been made for the purpose
which Ive supposed; and the thieves
must have succeeded in their errand.
The blind man, in his uselessness for
pursuit, could delay calling others to
«ct for him no longer. He started
toward the bell, when some scrape on
the floor—not of the sort to be ac-
counted for by an object moved by
the wind—sounded behind him, San-
toine swung toward the sound and
stood listening again; and then, grop-
4 |
xcitement,
“Who is it?’ Santoine challenged
+ clearly.
“Basil!” Blatchford’s voice ex-
claimed his recognition in amazement.
“Basil; that is you! What are you
doing down here?” Blatchford started
forward.
“What brought you here?’ Santoine
demanded instead of reply. “You were’
running outside ; why? What was out
there? What did you see?’
“See? 1 didn’t see anything—except
the window here open when I came
up. But I heard shots, Basil. What
has happened here?’
Santoine felt again the stickiness at
his feet. “Three or four persons
fought in this room, Wallace, Some—
or one was hurt. There's blood on the
floor. There are two here I can hear’
breathing; I suppose they're hurt.
Probably the rest are gone. Get help.
I think these who aren't hurt are
gone. Tliey must be gone. But—get
help first, Wallace.”
“And leave you here?’ Blatchford
rejoined. He had not halted again;
the blind man heard his cousin stil}
moving along the wall. The electric
switch clicked, and Santoine knew
that the room was flooded with light.
Santoine straightened, strained, turn-
ing his head a ttle better to listen.
With the flashing on of the light, he
had heard the sharp, involuntary start
of Blatchford as he saw the room;
and, besides that, Santoine heard
movement now elsewhere in the roem.
Then the blind man heard his friend's
ery. “Good Gea!”
“What is it?’ Santolne cried.
“Good God! Basil!”
“Who is it, Wallace?” the blind
wan knew now that his friend's inco-
herence came from recognition of
gonmieone, not alone from some sight’
of horror.
“Basil! It is—it must be—I know -
him! It is—"
A shot roared in front of Santoine.
The blind man, starting back at the’
shock of it, drew in the powder-gas
=
NN
/ 77
A Shot Roared in Front of Santoine.
with his breath; but the bullet was
not for him. Instead, he heard his
. friend scream and choke and half call,
half cough.
“Wallace!” Santoine cried out; but
his voice was lost in the roar of an-
other shot. This was not fired by the
same one who had just fired; at least,
it’ was not from the same part of the
room; and instantly, from another
side, a third shot came. Then, in the
midst of rush and confusion, another
shot roared; the light was out again;
then all was gone; the noise was out-
side; the room was still except for a
cough and choke as Blatchford—
somewhere: on the floor in front of the
blind man—tried again to speak.
Basil Santoine, groping with his
hands, found him. He was still con-
scious. Santoine knew that he was
trying his best to speak, to say just
one word—a name—to tell whom he
had seen and who had shot him; but
he could not.
Santoine put his hand over a hand
of his cousin. Blatchford’s fingers
closed tightly on Santoine’s; they did
not relax but now remained closed,
though without strength. The blind
man bowed and then lifted his head.
His friend was dead, and others were
rushing into the room—the butler, one
of the chauffeurs, Avery, more men-
servants; the light was on again, and
amid the tumult and alarms of the
discoveries shown by the light, some
rushed to the windows to the south
in pursuit of those who had escaped
from the room. Avery and one or
two others rushed up to Santoine;
now the blind man heard, above their
cries and alarms, the voice of his
anaghter. She was beside him, where
he knelt next the body of Blatchford,
and she put back others who crowded:
about.
“Father! What has happened? Why
are you here? ©h, Father, Cousin
Wallace!”
(To be Continued.)
mm ——— iin iis
ing with his hands stretched out be-
—8ubscribe fer the “Watchman.”