SYNOPSIS. Johm Valiant, a rich soclety favorite, suddenly discovers that the Valiant cor- poration, which his father founded and which was the principal source of his wealth, has failed frosted thistles, a mouth as for the corporation. ons consist of an old motor car, a lected estate in Virginia Damory court he meets Shirley ridge, an auburn-haired beauty, and de cides that he is going to like Virginia im mensely. Shirley's mother, Mrs. revealed iniscences during which it is and that the major, Vallant’'s father, man named Sassoon hand of Mrs. Dandridge In her youth. account in which the Valiant finds Damory court with weeds and creepers and ings In a very much neglected condition Valliant explores his ancestral home. He invades his estate. He recognizes Shirley at the head of the party. He gives sanc- tuary to the cornered fox . —— ————_ CHAPTER Xl.—Continued. “Wonders will never cease!™ the young man easily, sald say he's bolted into the house, » in and see.’ a leash on a dog-collar, “but I'm living in it at present.” fully trained mustache over the other's white teeth. It had the fectly courteous air of saying, course, if you say so. But—" not have disqualified a ling ox. On this particular morning neither the former having gone out nounced. Two of the green wicker rocking-chairs on the porch, however, were in agitant commotion, Mrs. Ma- son of Mrs. Napoleon Gifford. "After all these years!” the visitor was saying In her customary italics. broad “a” which lent a softness to the speech of her hostess Mrs. Poly, her own which the rich man reaches “We came here from Rich- mond when I was a bride—that's twenty-one years ago-—and Damory Court was forsaken then. And think what a condition the house must be in now! Cared for by an agent who comes every other season from New York. Trust a man to do work like hm 1 § “I'm glad a Vallant 1s to occupy included all. “If you care to dismount and rest,” he said, “I shall be honored, though I'm afraid I can't such hospitality as I should wish.” The judge raised his broad soft hat. | i i i letter "“r.” “But we mustn't intrude any further. the place has been uninhabited any number of years, and we had no idea it was to acquire a tenant. You will overlook our riding hope. I'm afraid the flute-like volce. the Valiants were gentlemen.” Mrs. Gifford sniffed. tleman? Why, he earned the name by the dreadful things he did My grandfather used to say that when his wife lay sick—he hated her, you know his hounds fullery after him under her windows. Then that ghastly story of the slave he pressed to death in the “1 know,” acquiesced Mrs. Mason “He was a cruel man and wicked. too In of no-man’'s land. It's a pleasure to know that the Court is to be re claimed, sir, Come along, Chilly.” he added the house, I reckon—hang the cunning ttle devil!” never been what he does, but who he But his grandson, Beanty Valiant, lived at Damory Court thirty He duel who twenty-five when the by side with the golden fter them trooped the others, horses walking wearily, riders talking in iow "He must have been brilliant.” sald the visitor, “to have founded that greatl corporation. It's a pity the son Have you seen the It seems that papers lately? swift bird-like glances behind to where the straight masculine figure still stood with the yellow sunshine on his face. They did not leap the wall this time, Then, as they passed from view the younger voices break out together like the sound of a bomb thrown into a poultry-yard. lagt rider was out of sight There was a warm flush of color in his face. At length he turned with a ghost and stalking a hundred yards away, sat down on the shady grass and be gan to whistle with his eyes on the door. Presently sudden, around he was rewarded the On a edge of the sill “With Your Permission I'll Take One of Them In and See.” zle. Then, like a flash of tawny light, the fox broke sanctuary and shot for the thicket. - - - . . . - . The brown ivied house in the vil lage was big and square and faced the sleepy street. A onestoried wing con- tained a small door with a doctor's brass plate on the clapboarding be- side it. Doctor Southall was one af Mrs. Merryweather Mason's paying guests—for she would have deemed the word boarder a gratuitous insult, no less to them than to her. Another was the major, who for a decade had occupied the big old-fashioned cor nerroom on the second floor, com panioned by a monstrous gray cat and ‘waited on by an anclent negro named Jereboam, who had been a slave of his father's. The doctor was a sallow taciturn man with a saturnine face, eyebrows thing to him Some technicality in the law, | suppose. But {f a man is rich enough they can't convict him of anything. Why he should sud only lI can’t With that old af- fair of his father's behind him, 1 should think he'd prefer Patagonia.” I take it, then, madam,” Doctor nen ‘that you are familiar The lady bridied. i bly tend to sweeten her disposition a * ‘People cibly ness and malice. he heard here his own grandmother.” “You will Mrs. Gifford If one believed all admit, I suppose,” with some spirit, it said "that “1 will, madam,” “When Valiant left this place (a mark of good taste I've always consid ered it) he left it the worse, If possi ble, for his departure. Your remark, however, would seem to Imply Was he the only lucky end of a dueling ground?” “Then it isn’t true that Vallant was “Madam,” sald fhe doctor, “I have The son seems to be get. they've made it so hot for him this county disappointing.” savagely. “No doubt he imagines he's that's entirely too ready to hack at his munity so full of dyedinthewool snobbery that it would make Boston look like a poor-white barbecue. I'm gorry for him!” Just then from the rear of the house came a strident volce: “Yo', Raph'el! Take yo' han's outer dem cherries! Don’ yo’ know ef yo' swallalis dem ar pits, yo' gwinete: hab ‘pendegostus en lump up en die?” The sound of a slap and shrill yelp { I | Puck, with his hands full of cherries, ! who came to a sudden demoralized | stop in the embarrassing foreground. | “Raph!” thundered the doctor. | “Didn't I tell you to go back to that | kitchen?” eg) “Yes, suh,” responded the Imp. “Fat didn’ tell me ter stay dar!” “If 1 see you out here again,” roared the doctor, I'll tie your ears back - 1 and grease you—and SWALLOW you!" At which grisly threat, the | apparition, with a shrill shriek, turned i and ran desperately for the corner of | the house “I hear,” sald the doctor, resuming, | ‘that the young man who came to fix the place up has hired Uncle Jeffer- son and his wife to help him. Who's | responsible for that interesting infor mation?” “Rickey Snyder,” said Mrs. Mason. | “She's got a spy-glass rigged up In a sugartree at Miss Mattie Sue's | and she saw them pottering around | there this morning.” “Little limb!" exclaimed Mrs. Gif-| ford, with emphasis. “She's as cheeky | path the doctor opened his office. | “How do you feel this morning, Ma- jor.” “Feel? rumbled the major: “the! way any gentleman ought to feel this Like hell, | sah.” The doctor bent his gaze on the “If 1 were you, Bristow,” he said | ing around to bridge fights with per fumery on my handkerchief every evening. It's the devil of an example behind the motionless, The rocking-chalrs screening vines became smiles. If the two gentlemen were ties, thelr mutual appreciation was in inverse ratio to its expression, and, the Elucinlan mysteries, cloaked before the world, In public the doctor was wont to remark that the major looked like a plano-tuner and was the only man he had ever seen who could strut sit ting down. Never were his gibes so and patri- clan calm, and conversely, never did undignified irritation as receiving the envenomed darts cynic. The major settled his black tie. "A be “You're looking a shade “Exercise!” the other the you exer- snapped as he pounded down “Ha, ha! 1 suppose to the Dandridges and the rest good cane-bot. paim-leaf fans and You'll go off with of these days.” “1 shall if they're scared enough to the major shot But the doctor did not pa down the out ilep and at the Feat you," after him, 166 on street without i Bristow at the Gate | Now.” “There's Major as a town-hog I can't imagine what Shirley Dandridge was thinking of when she brought that low-born child out of her sphere.” Something like a growl came from the doctor as he struck open the screen-door “1dmb!* I'll bet ten | doliars she's an angel in a cedar | tree at a church fair compared with some better-born young ones 1 know | of who are only fit to live when | they've got the scarlet-fever and who ought to be In the reformatory long | ago. And as for Shirley Dandridge, it's my opinion she and her mother and a few others like her have got about the only drops of the milk of human kindness In this whole aban- doned community!” “Dreadful man!” sald Mrs Gilford, | sotto voce, as the door banged vicious. “To think of his being born a Southall! Sometimes [ can't belleve Mrs. Mason shook her bead and smiled. “Ah, but that isn't Doctor Southall” she said only his shell” “I've beard that side,” responded guarded grimness, manage the real | “That's he has another the other with “but if he has | to show [t some times.” Mrs. Mason took off her glasses and wiped them carefully. “I saw It when husband died,” she said softly. That was before you came. They | He was gick almost a year, and the doctor | used to carry him out here on the | porch every day in his arms, like a | child. And then, when the typhus came that summer among the negroes, | he quarantined himself with them the | white man there—and treated | and nursed them and buried the dead | with his own hands, till it was | That's the real Doctor | Southall.” The rockers vibrated in sllence for a Then Mrs Gifford sald: “1! never knew before that he had any Was he sald Mrs. Mason; “and the major was the other. | was a little girl when it happened. [ can barely remember it, but It made a big sensa- tion.” “And over a loveaffair!” exclaimed “Yeu” whom romance was daily bread. “1 suppose it was.” For a time the conversation lan- guished, Then Mrs. Gifford asked sud- denly: “Who do you suppose she could have been f—the girl behind that old Valiant affair.” Mrs. Mason shook her head. one knows for certain-—unless, “No of wouldn't question either of them for worlds. You see, people had stopped gossiping about it before I was out of school, There's Major Bristow at the gate now, And the doctor's just com ing out again.” The major wore a sult of while linen, with a broad-brimmed straw nat, and a pink was in his button. hole, bat to the observing, his step . i § Ed The major lifted his to the ladies, whose pr just observed “Do sit down, ford “There's dying tg ask you : ’ i or interesting ¥ Me t gallantly essence he had Major,” sald Mrs. Gif- a question I'm just We've had such an conversation, You've heard the news, of course, that young Mr. Valiant is coming to Damo ry The major sat down heavily bright light pale and old “No? the lady's f« “Have all the of us ahead of you for once? There's some one there getting it rights here's There was a woman, of course, at the bottom of the Valiant duel. I'd never dream of asking who she was But which was it she loved, Valiant or Sassoon?” In the hig face seemed suddenly was arch really got Yes, it's true to question ne rest Now the you CHAPTER XIL. The Echo. When the major entered his room, body-servant, | was dawdling about putting things to rights, his seamed visage under his | white wool suggesting a charred stump beneath a crisp powdering of NOW “Jedge Chalmahs done telly- foam ter ax yo' ovah ter Glahden Hall “Tell him not the other wearily The old darky tonight, Jerry,” sald “Some other time.” ruminated as to the doctor's tele! “Whut de mattah now? He! got dat ar way-off-yondah look ergen.” | He shook his head forebodingly. | The major had, indeed, a faraway he look as he sat there, a heavy lonely that bright morning It had slipped to his face with the news of the arrival at Damory Court. He told himself that he felt queer. Buddenly he seemed to volces close to his ear: “Which was it she loved? or Sassoon?” It was so distinct that he started, vexed and disturbed Really, it was absurd He would be seeing things next! “Southall may be right about that exercise,” he muttered: “I'll walk more.” He began the projected re form without delay, striding up and down the room. But the little voices presently sounded again, shouting like nomes Inside a hill: “Which was it? goon?" “1 wish to God 1 knew!” sald the major roughly, standing still It = lenced them, but the sound of his own as though had been a pre concerted signal, drew together a hun dred images of other days here was the wellordered garden of Damory Court—it rose up, gloomy with night shadows his great clothes press ag with himself bench smoking candle Beauty Hghted library i waiting a Valiant Valiant or Bas voice, it inchoate : ACTORS the wall sifting Ee yO and heli 1 anc veiling a rustic him window with ‘aliant pacing up and down, r daylight There was between two b the stretch outhall and ground-~the grase all and an early thorn-bush Eight — nine meelf counting he measurin dewy robin teetering caught hi He wip forehead bhemic ing certainly, the the now were fac each her, one other 3 wo in some ¥ fob . yor ould see right thro the handle, E06 doctor's his own, its edge, holding a handkerchief ready to flutter down A silly mt I hterfugs umbrellas it IE" but there must be no s final act of a A silly % witnesses to gentiemen s meetlrs the wh ETON SABsOOn ug penning in But f it were Valiar The man y lift his hand against the i broken his sacred » had stained i who, having the net condone in read, forgi woman man” { send for him? The majo harshly m Wi she laughed out suddenly quiet room, and looked expects d to see that ing in his hand But the laugh could not still a regular puleing sound that was in his ears—elfin like the but sound as distinct--the of a horse's hoofs going from Damory down as letter still Jy voices Court He had heard those hoof-beats echo in his brain for thirty vears' (TO BE CONTINUED) Of every 200 persons who live to be forty years of age, 1256 are married —. The Following, Taken From Unwritten History, Proves George Washing. | ton Was Only Human. i On the afternoon of October 14.) 1768, George Washington stepped into | the private office of his good Philadel ! phia friend and dentist, Sillcum Stra- | dies. "Twas an elegant fall afternoon | and Chestnut street was alive with | colonial damsels out in their new furs, "“Good-day, friend George,” quoth the dentist, as he finished polishing a long, wicked-looking spear and picked up a gleaming crowbar, “What brings you downtown thus early?” pursued Stradles, as he laid down the crowbar and picked up an eight-pound monkey wrench. “Noth ing wrong with the teeth, I trust?” And he put down the monkey wrench and picked up a bonehandled Iron mallet weighing it carelessly In his hand. “1 beg pardon,” sald George Wash ington, rather nervously. “What did and picked up a pair of gas pliers. ‘N with a forced laugh. hand to his aching jaw and murmured guiltily: “Ah, well, just one little lie in a lifetime won't do any harm, and mayhap the historians will never get hold of it." Girls Do the Courting. tives believe in certain forms of wom: en's rights in the Philippines, espe cially when it comes to choosing a hue- band. For instance, the Bontoc Igo rotes leave all the courting to the girls. While the worldly goods of the pro posed fatherindaw have some bearing upon the ardor of the young lady's wooing, still there are certain require. ments which must be lived up to by the young man, namely, he must eith- er have secured the head of an enemy or he must be in the employ of an American; In other words, he must either be a brave man—according to Igorote standarde-—or he must be in a fair way to attain a good lhving, ATTORNNY APLAW CLEMENT BalR ATTORNEY -AT-LAW Penns Valley Banking Company Pa. Receives Deposits . . . Centre Hall, @ Discounts Notes ,. , ——————— —— B80 YEAR® EXPERIENCE Traoe Manes Desians CorrmianTs &a Anvone sen fing a eheteh and Stenporm wickly ssoerialn our opinion free w grantion 18 probably pstentable Com tons suriotly sonSdential. Handbook cu P pent free. Olfest ency for seonrs Patents taken through Mons & eprotal folios, Without Chargs inthe Scientific American, A handsomely fllostrated weekly. Jarre gu erms. 89 8 =m istion of any scientific journal ear : four months, SL by all mewsd MUNN & Co zeromeeem. New » ne SW A Waahirenan Th a a te Lean om FWiegr Mortgage H. @. STROHNEIER, CENTRE MALL, . . . . . Pn Manufacturer,ed and Dealer In in all kinde of Granite, = *®sh ey pee fr cope mp Ae. avo— metas vl see \0 accommodate the ory attached. OLD FORT HOTEL BVRARD ROYER a ly Vig tH Location |: One mOe Seoth of Osutre Mall PEETEREE - DR. SOL. M. NISSLEY, VETERINARY SURGEON, i —— A of the of atu University Bouts, Pa. Both ‘poses waraiing TO
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