6 The Trouble on the Torolito. CHAPTER I. ANGUS THE FIRST. It was a crystalline evening of a «ort unpaintable in any poor word pigments of mine; an evening vibrant with the harmonies of the altitudes, unspeakable for me, and altogether indescribable to any who have never looked upon the soul-quelling glories of a Colorado mountain sun set. Macpherson had propped me with two bear-skins and a spare poncho on the squared log which served as a door-stone for the ranch house, and had given me the field-glass wherewith to amuse myself. It was my first sane glimpse of the shel tered upland valley watered by the Torolito. Three days before, when Macpherson had brought me up from Fort Cowan swathed in blankets and Sashed lengthwise on his buekboard, I had been too ill to know or rare greatly about the whence or whither. It was a stockman's paradise, the park-like little valley shut in by lofty mountains, and from the heaving pwell crested by the ranch buildings and corral the metes and bounds of Macpherson's small kingdom were well within eve-sweep. Eastward, no more than a rifle-shot from the home ranch, a black gash in Gringo moun tain marked the portal of Six-Mile canyon, the only gateway to the par adise; and from thence the inclosing ranges diverged to meet again in the «now-eoifed summit of Jim's peak at the head of the valley. The "X-bar- Z" men, with the exception of the mild-mannered desperado who cooked for us, were still out; and Macpher son sat beside me, naming the mighti nesses in their order, and pointing them out with the stem of his black ■cutty pipe. When I lowered the field glass in sheer weariness, he told me about the single fly in his pot of oint ment. Now it may chance that when one has given hostages to death, pano ramic sunsets and friendly confidences ■may become alike mere flotsam and jetsam on the ebbing tideway of time; but Macpherson was too good a fellow to be flouted in his time of asking. Wherefore, when he had made an end, 1 was fain to put a little life, galvanic or otherwise, into the moribund body of human inter est. "Then you think this land company will ultimately drive you out of the Torolito?" said I. "Sure. It's only a question of time if the syndicate once gets hold. The stock-raiser is like the Indian; he must move on when the farmer ■comes." "The relentless march of civiliza tion, and all that, eh?" quoth I, lying in wait to spring upon him. "Yes; it's the survival of the fit test, I suppose." A near-hand view of eternity is subversive of many theories, and I lashed out in fine scorn. "What an infernal lot of cant we •can swallow when it's sugar-coated with the ipse dixit of the theorists! Why don't you call things by their right names and say that when the strong man comes, the weak have to Sfive him the wall? You drove up liere five years ago when everybody said that the first winter in this alti tude would cost you every hoof you owned. Vou proved the contrary; nnd now, when you've set up your little kingdom in one of the waste places of the earth, a lot of capital ists come along and invite you to abdicate. I'd see them hanged first!" Macpherson made a riumbfshow of applause. He is a latter-day re crudescence of the physically-fit he ro*'* of the Homeric age, with square shoulders and legs like posts; a man who can bend nails in his bare hands, and who has never found the bottom of his well of strength; but he has laughing brown eyes with a woman ish tenderness in them—eyes that may glow with righteous indigna tion, but which know not vindictive ness. "Oh, you be damned," he said, af fectionately. "What would you do?" "I'd be governed by circumstances and fight for my own to the last You can do that as well as unother, can't you?" He took time to think about it."l don't know. If Selter would stand by me—" "Who is Selter?" As I have said, ft was only my third day in the Toro lito. and the first two had been spent in the spare bunk of the ranch house. "I'll have to begin back a bit to account for him. Three years ago a rattletrap of a prairie schooner oi:t say; you're sick, and I don't want to bore you with folk-lore." "Goon; I'm three planetary orbits beyond the boring point." "Are you? Well, as I was going to say, a shaekly old schooner drifted wp Six-Mile canyon and into the park. Jake Selter was its skipper, and the crew consisted of a wife, a half grown daughter, and a flock of little ones. Tliey were homesteaders look ing for a bit of prairie with a stream convenient which could be dammed And ditched, and the old man drove up to ask me what I thought of the Torolito from the point of view of potatoes and the small grains." Now I submit that anyone save A signs Macpherson would have di vined at once that this was the en tering edge, of a wedge which would BY FRANCIS LYNDE. (Copyright, 18V8, by Francis LjimJm ) ultimately split him in twain, and I said as much. "You should hnve told liini the alti j tude was prohibitory, but I suppose | you didn't." Macpherson grinned. "Xo; I have my weaknesses, same as other peo j pie. 1 was the king of the Torolito, I as you have remarked, but I had only I the 'X-bar-Z' men for subjects and I | was lonesome for a sight of women : and children. You don't know what 1 that means now, but you may, some -1 time. I piloted the schooner to the I head of the valley, helped Selter ' stake up his claim, took the boys up one day and knocked him up a cabin, and another and built him a dam, and I there he was, a fixture." ! "Of course. Goon." "Well, the potatoes were a success. | That summer, Selter pot word to ' some of his old neighbors in Tennes see, and more prairie schooners came jup Six-Mile. We built a bigger dam i and dug a longer ditch; and in the ' course of time the settlement at Valley Head named itself and built a schoolhouse." The crimson and gold in the sky fire over the shoulder of Jim's peak faded to fawndun and ashes of roses, and 1 waited for Macpherson to drive on. When it became evident that he had stopped at the schoolhouse, I gave a tug at the halter. "That accounts for Selter; but you haven't told me how he figures in tke syndicate matter. 1 should think he and his neighbors would be a unit with you in trying to keep the land grabbers out." "You would think so. They'll be between the upper and nether mill stones if the big company ever gets control of the water. Jsut human nature is pretty much the same the world over—short-sighted and easily fooled. The promoters tell the set tlers that the big ditch will jump their land from nothing 1 to SIOO an acre, and so it would if they could contrive to hold onto their own water-right." "Why can't they?" I had been born and reared in a land where the form er and the latter rains fail not, and irrigation is unknown. "Because the syndicate is too sharp to take chances. It must control the water absolutely and exclusively in order to make the scheme successful. As the first homesteader to prove up 011 his claim, Selter has the prior right to the water, much or little, — owns the present ditch, in fact, in I fee simple. So long as he stands in j the way, the money-people will do I nothing but talk; but I'm afraid "IT S HART KILGORE." they're talking to some purpose. If Selter sells, that settles it." "Can't you buy him out and hold the whip in your own hands?" "I thought I could at one time, but latterly he's been dodging me; just why, I don't know." "Perhaps the syndicate has overbid you." "I've thought of that; but in that case you'd think Selter would whip saw back and forth between us. He is an avaricious old sinner." I remembered the half-grown daughter—whole-grown, doubtless, by this time—and looked askance at the handsome young athlete whose guest I was. "Family coolness all around?" I queried, feeling my way. Macpherson was bronzed and sun burned like any son of the wilder ness, but I saw the red blood goto his face. "West if I don't believe you've hit it. Since the school-ma'am came— but that's another story." "Out with it," said I. "Dead men tell no tales, and I'm as good as dead, you know." The half jest went nearer to the loving heart of him than I meant it should. "Drop that, old man,"he said, with a hand on my shoulder. "It hurts me, and it doesn't do you any good. You must believe that this clean air | and the out-door life are going to ■ make a man of you again." ".Not in a hundred years, Angus, my boy; I've put it oflf too long. But tell me the story—the other story. What has the school-ma'am to do with it?" Macpherson is Scotch only in name. His manner of attacking a tiling is more like that of an English trooper charging a masked battery with the odds against him. CAMERON COUNTY PRESS, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 12, tgoi. "The school-ma'am isn't, to blame," he made haste to say. "She is an angel, pure and simple; and, as I happen to know, she has been try ing all along to make peace. Hut since she came, the Selters have been offish, —mulish is the better word, — and for no reason on top of earth, that I can understand." I smiled in my beard. When an angel, pure and simple, is set over against any daughter of the soli tudes, a casus belli with a handsome young athlete like my friend is not far to seek. "You used to visit the Selters pret ty often along at the first?" 1 ven tured. "Why, yes; we were neighborly." "Gave the daughter a pony, let us say, and taught her how to ride?" Macplierson laughed. "Now how the mischief did you know that?" "if 1 had lived a century or so ago, your ancestors would ha\e said that 1 was fey and had the dying man's gift of second sight. Hut never mind that. You made yourself agreeable to the Tennessee girl—gave her the pony and went a-gallop with her, and all that. Hut when the angel, pure and simple, came—" lie threw up his hands. "Let up on that, old man,"he said, with a little laugh of embarrassment. "I'm no woman's man—wasn't in the old high flying college days, if you happen to remember. I've been no more than decently civil to Nancy Selter; and as for Miss Sanborn—" The interruption was a scurrying dust cloud whirling up from the porta! of Six-Mile canyon; a cloud which presently resolved itself into a horseman, riding as if for life. MacPlierson picked up the field-g'.ass and focused it. "It's Bart Kilgore, coming back from his regular after-pay-day spree at Fort Cowan," he said. "Just lean back against tlie door-jamb and hold your breath when he gets here. I shall have to give him the usual cussing out, you know." CHAPTER IT. THE INVADERS. I obeyed orders literally, leaning back and closing my eyes when the dust-begrimed range-rider galloped up and swung out of the saddle. But Kilgore proved to be a bearer of tid ings; and when he had opened his budget the breach of ranch discipline and its merited out-cursing were alike forgotten. "You're sure you know what you are talking about, Bart?" said Mac plierson, eying his man suspiciously. "You know I've a good right to be doubtful of anything you say you see or hear at the fort after pay-day." The scourger of dumb brutes grinned and turned his pockets in side out. "I reckon that calls the turn. Cap'n Mac., six times in the haffen dozen, but I'm jug-proof this evenin'; no dust, no drink. An' I'tn givin' it to you straight. Ther' ain't no kind of a balk on it this time; Selter's ! sold us out, lock, stock and barrel, i The deal's done dealt, papers signed, gradin' outfit on the way, and the in gincers a-comin' up the canyon this identical minute, —tepees, tele scopes, barber-poles, and all." A far-away look came into Mac pherson's eyes, and the pipe between his teeth began togo up and down in a way that swept me back through a decade to a stuffy little college dormitory, with a big-limbed young son of Anak sitting across the table j from me, hammering away at his | mathematics. "Who is it, Bart? —the English men?" "I reckon." "And they're on the way in now, you say?" "Yep." "I guess that settles it," said Mac plierson, half absently. "We might as well round up and drive over the range." His seeming reluctance to fight for his own nettled me past endurance. "You'll do nothing of the sort if 1 j can help It," I cut in. "You're going to contest this thing from start to finish; and when your money's gone, you can have mine." lie shook his head. "It's no use. I can give and take with the next fel low when it's worth while; but I'd have togo, in the end. These people are well within their lawful rights, if they've bought Selter's ditch; and I—l'm only a squatter." "Law be hanged!—you've right and possession. And in the last resort, you can at least make them pay you to go." Knowing Macplierson as I did, I should have said that he was the last man in the world to take the sen timental point of view in any matte! of business, but surprises lie in w r ait for one at every turn in this vale of incertitude. "If it were only a question of profit and loss, I shouldn't, mind," lie said. "Hut it's just as you said awhile back; I've been the Macplierson of Torolito, and I've come to look upon the park as my own particular little kingdom." T wheeled promptly into line with the sentimental point of view, and spoke to the matter in hand. "Put it upon any ground you please, but don't give up without trying a fall or two with them. I'll I back you, as I promised; you iniyht as well have the patrimony as the charity-people who will scramble over it after I'm gone. We can home stead a quarter-section or two on their line of ditch for a beginning, and pull down a few injunctions on them if they try to cross. I'm far enough past qualifying and going into court for you, but I can be your consulting attorney while 1 last." He shook his head again, as one whose mind is made up. "It wouldn't do any good. There isn't a gliosi a snow for 'is in any legal fight. It would be your bit, of money and mine against millions." Kilgore took the short-barreled rifle from its sling under his saddle flap and flicked the dust from it with his soft hat. He had a trick of look ing tired and sleepy upon occasion, and at such times, as I afterward learned, those who knew him best watched his pistol-liand. [To Be Continued.] WIT WEIGHED WITH WISDOM. Some Ilrlulit Xtnrlra of tin- I.nte Hlah o|i Stublm, of Oxford I'nl vemltj-. Among the clergy generally, says a writer in the London Spectator, the late Bishop Stubbs, of Oxford, was perhaps best known for his wit, which was brilliant without being ill natured, and of a heartening quality. When some gloomy soul csme burdened with parochial troubles the bishop invariably sent him home with a smile on his face and a lighter heart. Bishop Stubbs even grumbled wittily. He was not willing to be moved from Chester to Oxford, and he said, as lie left the chapter house: "I am like Homer; I suffer from translations." In his new diocese a well-meaning but rather tactless archdeacon con tinually informed him of what, un der similar circumstances, his prede cessor, Bishop Samuel Wilberforce, would have done. At last he said: "Archdeacon, you remind me of the Witch of Endor, for you are not contented unless you raise the ghost of Samuel." At a prize-giving which he attend ed at a school in Oxforl, after his fame as a historian was assured, the head master expressed his great, sense of indebtedness. lie only hoped that the fulfilment of such en gagements did not so intrude on the bishop's leisure as to diminish the prospect, of his publishing another great book. The bishop, in acknowledging the kindly tribute, said that, far from writing books, he scarcely had time to open a book. "When I say that," ho added, "there is one book which as a bishop I must study. T need hardly say that the book to which I refer" (here a stillness fell on the audience) "is—Bradsliaw." There was a ripple of laughter at his mentioning the Railway Guide; everybody had expected him to say the Bible. Bishop Stubbs was a firm friend, and knew very well how to defend his friends stanchly and wittily. Some one said to him: • "There's that bishop of Manches ter. If there is a stone wall he runs his head against it." "So much the worse for the stone wall!" retorted Hisliop Stubbs, and that closed the conversation. All MnHKiilinniiH Secure Convert*. Europeans habitually forget that every Mussulman is more or less a missionary—that is, he intensely de sires to secure converts from non- Mussulman people. Such converts not only increase his own chance of heaven, but they will swell his own faction, his own arm}-, his own means of conquering, governing and taxing the remainder of mankind. All the emotions which impel a Christian to proselyte are in a Mussulman strengthened by all the motives which impel a political leader and all the motives which sway a recruiting ser geant, until proselytism has become a passion, which, wherever success seems practicable, and especially suc cess on a large scale, develops in the quietest Mussulman a fury of ardor which induces him to break down every obstacle, his own strongest prejudices included, rather than stand for an instant in a neophyte's way. He welcomes him as a son, and what ever his own lineage, whether the con vert be negro or Chinaman, or In dian, or even European, he will with out hesitation or scruple give him his own child in marriage, and admit him fully, frankly and finally into the most exclusive society in the world.— From"The Brown Man," M.Townsend. ScnrliiK the Shepherds. There is an irrepressible satisfac tion in finding that a great philoso pher is, in the innocent ways of life, very much like other men. Marcus Aurelius Antonius, whose "Medita tions" have been the guide of think ers for centuries, wrote some exceed ingly human letters to his friend and teacher, Marcus Cornelius Fronto. One of them contains the following spice of boyish fun: When my father returned home from the vineyards, I mounted my horse as usual, and rode on ahead some little way. Well, there on the road was a herd of sheep standing all crowded together, as if the place were a desert, with four dogs and two shepherds, but nothing else. Then one shepherd said to another shepherd, on seeing u number of horsemen: "I say, look at those horsemen! They do a deal of robbery." When 1 heard this I clap spurs to my horse and ride straight for the i sheep. In eonsternatiou the sheep j scatter. Ilither and thither they are | fleeting and bleating. A shepherd I throws his fork, and the fork falls on the horseman who comes next to ine. ! We make our escape. \ Distinction, Son—What is the difference between ! an investment and a speculation? Father —When you put up the money for yourself it's a speculation, but when a friend advises you to put it up it's an investment.—Town and Coun try. When Blood DoemM Toll. Blood never tells very much when it meets a pooy relation.—Chicago Daily News. SURPLUS IS WIPED OUT. Bank Teller I'ltcliam'a Strut I'.i tended Over a I'erlod of go Venn. Ballston, X. Y., Dec. s.—Bank Ex aminer Graham was busy yesterday examining deposit, certificates pre sented to the First na ß, >nal bank by holders for verification. There are 400 interest-bearing certificates out standing, and it will be several days before all can be brought in and veri fied, and the actual defalcation in that line fully ascertained. Next will be examined the depositors' books subject 'to sight checks. In the lat ter line no discrepancies are. yet ap parent. Several new developments increas ing the default in interest-bearing certificates have been found. Several certificates were presented yestrday tlia't are marked on Teller Fitcham's books as paid and the account closed. The bank officials assert that the bank cannot reopen next week on a sound basis, admitting that their SIIO,OOO surplus is wiped out by Fitch am's embezzlements. Fitcham's peculations are now known to have extended back 20 years. His individual deposit ledger balanced to a cent when he closed it Sat urday. Fitcham remains at home under a strong guard and was too ill to be arraigned yesterday. lie said the "stimates of the bank's loss were ex aggerated that that, he had not taken more than half the sum mentioned, lie said he was not a stock gambler, but that his trouble was due to fam ily extravagance. KILLED HIS PLAYMATE. A Sellout Boy H Yeura Old In Stabbed to Meatli by » Companion, Ajred 11. Cincinnati, Dec. 5. —The shocking scene o.f a school boy 8 years old stabbed to death by a schoolmate, aged 11. was witnessed on the streets of Newport. Ky., at noon Wednesday. Joseph Creelman, the victim, had had a quarrel in the school room with Eddie Armines, and when on their way home it he quarrel was renewed. A third boy, taking the part of Creel iman, threw a piece of brick which struck Armines on the head. At that moment. Creel man ran up to him, and was stabbed. He. soon fell, and in 15 minutes was dead. The Armines boy walked rapidly j away, carrying the pocket knife in his hand. He went to the fire engine house, where his uncle ia captain, and threw t'lie knife into an outhouse, but said nothing about the murder until the news of the lad's death. His uncle then surrendered him to the police, to whom the boy told his story of the crime: "Creelman missed his reading les son and was sent to the foot of the class. The teacher made him sit at the blackboard and I laughed at him. When school was out lie cursed me. I started for the engine house, and PJumme-r threw a brick at me and Creelman ran up and grabbed me by the arms. I did not think the brick was thrown at me until it hit me on the head. Then I stuck the knife out easy and heard his coat rip." AGAINST SCHLEY. A New York Paper ( Inlnx that lie linn llcen Found at Fault on five Count*. New York. Dec. 0. —A special to the Press from Washington says: "Rear Admiral Schley has been found at fault on five counts by the court of inquiry. This comes from a person who is in a position to learn the opin ion of the three admirals on the dif ferent specifications of the precept." "It is understood that the court finds against Schley: "First, for the delay of the flying squadron off Cienfuegos. "Second, for misrepresentation of the reasons for returning to Key West to coal. "Th'rd, for disobedience of orders in making the retrogade movement. "Fourth, for failure to destroy the Colon. "Fifth, for conduct unbecoming an officer and gentleman in the Schley- Hodgson controversy." lluzcd by Cadet*, Harriman, Tenn., Dee. s.—Four members of the senior class at the American Temperance university on Tuesday night bound and gagged Cadet Lester, carried him to the woods near by, tied him to a tree and whipped him. Then they placed him under a hydrant near the dormi tory, turned on the water and left him in a semi-conscious condition, 'i he officer of the guard reported that he fouiul four cadets besides Lester out of their rooms. Lester is said to have reported many little misde meanors. Lester will proceed against his assailants in the courts. MolUcr«lii-t,a\v Hjild Prince'* Debt*. London, Dec. 6.—The Dutch govern ment and the Dutch court are again strenuously denying the stories of matrimonial quarrels between Queen Wilhelniina and the prince consort, but the scandal has been too public for any hope to hush it up to remain. According to reports a reconcilia tion between the queen and Prince Henry was effected through the influ ence of Emperor William, and the queen's mother even paid the prince e.msort's debts. Shot Four Hcopto. Weit City. Kan., Dee. s.—Roma ine Taubatix, a Frenchman, while intoxi cated last night shot and fatally wounded his wife and son, Oiraurd Taubaux, and seriously wounded two other persons at his home in this city. Knvorn the Nicaragtiit itoiite, Washington, Dec. s.—The report of 1 the isthmian c..nao*<- new Hay-Pa uneefote treaty providing for the construction of an isthmian canal. Tile A. ol 9.. r