20 ■jJil ike KmijJ J^j] f The' Yukon Trail By William MacLeod Kaino s ' (Continued) Macdonaid's lieutenant got busy at onee with plans to abduct llolt. "We'll send the old man oft on a prospecting trip with some of the boys," explained Selfridge to How land. "That way we'll kill two birds. He's back on his assessment work. The time-limit will be up be fore he returns and we'll start a con test for the claim." Howland'made no comment. He was an engineer and not a politi cian. In his "position it was impos sible for him not to know that a good deal about the legal status of the Macdonald claims was irregular. But he was a firm believer in a wide open Alaska, in the use of the ter ritory by those who had settled it. "Better arrange it with Big Bill, then, but don't tell me anything about it. I don't want to know the details," he told Selfridge. Big Bill Macy accepted the job with a grin. He had never liked old Holt: anyhow. Besides, they were not! going to do him any harm. Holt was baking a batch of sour- : dough bread that evening when there caine a knock at the cabin ( door. At sight of Big Bill and h's j tv.o companions the prospector! closed the oven and straightenedj with alert suspicion. He was not on visiting terms with any of these men. j Why had they come to see him? "We're going prospecting up Wild Goose creek, and we want you to go along. Gid," explained Macy. "You're | an old sour-dough miner, and we-all 1 agreed Ve'd like to have you throw j in "'ith us. What say?" The old miner's answer was direct | but not flattering. "What do T w*>.nt' 1o go on a wild-goose mush w""i a. biipi li of bums for?" he shrilled. n "l Ma"v scratched his hook nose I :>'-d looked reproachfully at his host, i At Holt thought he was looking : ii' him. One could not be sure, for Bill's eyes did not exactly track. "What's the use of snapping at >ll e ] like a turtle? Burden says Wild i Goose looks fine. There's gold up I there —heaps of it." "Let it stay there, then. T ain't; : >v-T. That's flat." Holt turned to adjust the damper of his stove. i "<>h. T don't ltn"-v. T wouldn't say t' ' " firnwied Bill insolently. Til® pan at the stove caught the f ' iniro in tone and turned quickly.! ]! wis too late. Macy had thrown himself forward and the weight of; his body flung Holt against the wall. | Before the miner could recover, the j other two men were upon him. They] V>ore him to the floor and in spite of his struggles tied him hand and j foot. Big Bill rose and looked down, derisively at his prisoner. "Better | change your mind and go with us, j Jlolt. We'll spend a quiet month up] i.t thp headquarters of Wild Goose, j Say you'll come along." "What are you going to do with demanded Holt. "I reckon you need a church to f;'ll on you before you can take a; hint. Didn't T mention Wild Goose creek three or four times?" jeered his captor. Holt made no further protest. He v. us furious, but at present quite helpless. However it went against the grtiin. he might as well give in, xi:* ti 1 rebellion would do some good.) Ten minutes later the party was! j'loving silently along the trail that led to the hills. The' pack horse I vent first, in charge of George Hoi-! way. The prisoner walked next, his l ands tied behind him. Big Bill fol lowed. fliHi the man lie had called Dud brought up the rear. Macy had released the hands of his ; 1 risoner so that he might have a chance to fight the mosquitoes, but] he kept a wary eye upon him and never let him move more than a ! few feet from him. The trail grew | steeper as it neared the head of the I canyon till at last it climbed the left' wall and emerged from the gulch! to an uneven mesa. The leader of the party looked at j his watch. "Past midnight. We'll! 1 1 ■ I If I I 1 It's Good 1 ® y Every Carton Stamp | Order a Carton Today • |< fe Swill & Company k | „ i FRIDAY EVENING, Bringing Up Father Copyright, 1917, International News Service *— * • By McManus ( VILL XOU WOP YOUR ( DOEWT THE Jfe HT \T A WONDERFUL II [ 1 A 1 bOME BCOX I? | nH [ WHILE THEY ARE S ' THEY ' L WH^ RE ("n THREW THEM S, T WEDDING- V -J sLI jAVlN'<ood-BYE TO TtlßEv ENOUdH Rir P Hm , E _ - &R\DE ! j " '' X t VE >- ' camp here, George, and see if we j can't get rid of the 'skeeters." They built smudge fires of green wood and on the lee side of these an- ] other one of dry sticks. Dud made coffee upon this and cooked bacon While George chopped wood for the fires and boughs of small firs for, bedding. Big Bill sat with a rifle across knees just back of the! prisoner. "Gid's a shifty old cuss, and I j ain't taking any chances," he ex-, plainejJ aloud to Dud. Holt was beginning to take the | outrage philosophically. He slept | peacefully while they took turns] l watching him. Just now there would! be no chance to escape, but in a few days they would become careless. ' The habit of feeling that they had, him securely would grow upon them.; Then, reasoned Holt, his opportunity! would come. One of the guards! would take a chance. It was not j reasonable to suppose that in the! next week or two he would not i I catch them napping once for a short' ten seconds. , There was, of course, just the pos-' sibility that they intended to raur- j der him, but Holt could hot associate Selfridge with anything so lawless. The man was too soft of fiber to I carry through such a program, and as yet there was need of nothing so drastic. No, this kidnapping expedi tion would not run to murder. He would be set free in a fev*weeks, and if he told the true story of where he had been his foes would spread i the report that he was insane'in his hatred of Macdonald and imagined all sorts of persecutions. They followed Wild Goose creek all next day, getting always closer to its headwaters near the divide. On the third day they crossed to the other side of the ridge and descend ed into a little mountain park. The country was so much a prime val wilderness that a big bull moose stalked almost upon their camp be- j tore discovering the presence of a I strange biped. Big Bill snatched up j a rifle and took a shot which sent the intruder scampering. From somewhere in the distance came a faint sound. "What was that'."' asked George. - "Sounded like a shot. Mebbe it i was**an echo," returned Dud. "Came too late for an echo," Big Bill said. Again faintly from some far cor ner of the basin the sound drifted.' It was like the pop of a scarcely heard firecracker. The men looked at one another j and at their prisoner. "Think we better break camp and' drift?" asked Dud. "Xo. We're in a little draw here. —as good a hiding place as we'd be ' likely to find. Drive the horses into j the brush, George. We'll sit tight" Dud had been busy stamping out i the campfire while Holway was driv-j | ing the horses into the brush. 1 (To be Continued> j "THEIR MARRIED LIFE" ! | Copyright by International News Service "There's the telephone now," said Warren. "For hoaven's sake stop' crying and go and answer it." Helen, who had finally succumbed to tears, lcoked at Warren indig nantly. "Haven't you any regard at all for .my feelings?" she began. "Warren shook his head. "Xot in tiiis case. You know vei*y well you aren't the type of woman to bear ir.alice —you couldn't if you tried. You know you're dissolved with curiosity this minute to find out why she acted this way and cut you as she did. and you know that in the end you'll forgive her. So why the use less tears and protestations?" Helen was too angry and hurt at Warren's lack of sympathy to stop and reason that nearly everything he had said was true. Women sel dom stop to reason when they are angry, and the fact that Warren could think the thing out logically and reasonably seemed to Helen un fair. The fact that he was seeing ahead a short distance to the point where Helen herself would see it the same way did not occur to her. Just now she was certain that Warren was all wrong and was simply talk ing to wound her further. "Aren't you going to answer the telephone?" Warren asked calmly. "You know I'm not," Helen said quickly; "I'll ask Mary to do it." "That's right; that's the woman ot it for you: let your servants In on the most private of your affairs." And Warren strode across to the tel-. ephone quickly. "Warren, don't you dare to say that I'm at home," said Helen in a half whisper. Warren had already taken the receiver off the hook and was talking in his usual brusque w ay. "Yes, yes; helld! Oh, is this you again. Laura? Yes, Helen is home; do you want to speak to her now?" There was evidently a frantic ap peal from the other end, and Warren held out tiie rectlver to Helen im peratively. "I'm not going to talk to her," said Helen firmly. "Come on," said Warren: "come on and get the thing over with." Helen felt unspeakably foolish. She knew that Warran had caught her fairly. If she had answered the telephone in the beginning at least her pride would have been saved, but if she refused to go now her attitude would be ridiculous. She might have known that Warren would not stand by her. "Hello, Laura," she said, speaking coldly; "did you want to speak to me?" "Oh, Helen." came Laura's voice HAFLRISBUK.G TELEGRAPH across the wire; "you don't know how frantic I have been since that afternoon. I don't know what you must think of me." Helen by this time had conquered her tears and was aniJrry again, but | this time it was a cold, calculating I anger, and she was able to think. • | "Well?" was all she vouchsafed. | "Oh, Helen, I couldn't help tt. 1 j was afraid of what you might say, ' j and 1 didn't daro encourage you to ■ 1 sit down for fear you would make a i j break of some kind." j "I didn't know that I was in the | habit of making breaks," Helen re : | turned. "However, it doesn't make j any difference, Laura, not the least I in the world now." | "You mean you won't understand, • that you intend to be hurt?" i i Laura's idea that she could db any ! thing in the world and then explain ! it away afterward with a few words • amused even while it infuriated 1 Helen. I " Imean that there is absolutely no need of our talking any more about ; the matter. Laura; it was a direct snub for no particular reason, and • one I do not Intend to overlook, 1 : could never feel at liberty to speak i to you In public again without a rep • etition of your action. It's not my idea of friendship." > "But, Helen, you don't understand. This man" Laura began, but I Helen cut her short. "You needn't tell me anything mortt, Laura; I don't want to listen, i I am not Interested In the man nor ' In your reasons for not wanting me to 'make breaks', as you call it, be fore him. We have drifted apart, ■ | anyway. In the last few years, and i j we might Just as well end it right here. Good-by, Laura." And Helen hung up the receiver and turned ' - away. I I She had intended in her first anger ; | to do this very thing, but now that I ! she had actually done it, there was' j a solemnity about breaking a long j j friendship that left a decided rcac- - i tion. But it was too late to do any- ] j thing now. She had done this thing ! i impulsively—or had been forced into ! II it, rather, by Warren—before she had j had time to think it out, and now she j i would abide by it. j "Well," Warren was saying, not J j without a tinge oC admiration in his. j voce, "you did go through with it, j | didn't you? I was testing you to > ! see if you actually had the nerve. | j You knew all along what I have i : thought of Laura and the way she ] has acted since her marriage." Warren was giving Helen the sup port now that he had denied her a ■ few minutes ago, and she felt the | 1 unfairness of it all. He had managed 1 the entire situation and she had been | 1 forced into doing as she had done, j Whether or not she would be %orry afterward for her Impulsiveness, for i her quick action, remained to be seen. It might be that if she had forgiven Laura this time the worst possible thing would have happened j both to Laura's character and her own pride,'but still there remained the faint regret that she had not given Laura a chance to explain, no Daily Dot Puzzle So • • Vt "2*** - •! 34- ,"' 4 ' " i *2© r? . s -\ I f 18 ) | \ 16 1 7 • IS . J 37 • y Z 4 3* "3 M 4 f• < ' ? 'IS Hi Hi*-"". W\ ' • Forty-eight lines quickly draw, See a from Arknnsaw. Draw from one to two and so on to the end. * i matter how weak and wobbly the ex- 1 1 planation. Watch for the next Instalment f thl* hlKhly Interesting Merle*.> • ; Advice to the Lovelorn Xot Too Great a Difference DEAR MISS FAIRFAX: I am nineteen and in love with, and loved by, a man thirteen years older than I. He wishes me to marry him, but my father strictly forbids, as he thinks the difference in our ages is too great. Is it wrong for a girl to marry a man so much older? PUZZLED. • Thirteen years is by no means too great a difference between the ages of a man and the woman he desires to marry. I cannot conscientiously advise you to disobey your father, but I want to appeal to him. A man of thirty-two is young, just arriving at years of maturity, nt a splendid age to guide his wife and to give her a feeling of having married a man on •vyhom she can lean, a man of mature, sane judgment—one who is not just a romantic boy with whom she is having a love affair, but who is a splendid, strong man in whom Can Desperate Germany Break Through? Germany's prof est contempt for America's war preparations is somewhat belied by evidences of her desperate determination to win before our soldiers arrive in force. Thus dispatchs tell of westward-moving German troop-trains congesting the roads to Flan ders, of Austrian forces shifted to the French front, and of a growing intensity of Teu tonic artillery-fire along the whole Western line. Advices that leak out from Germany all indicate that the Kaiser's only hope of victory lies in delivering a "knock-out" blow, before American forces can get into the field. In 1 HE LiTERARY DIGEST for December 22d, one of the leading articles deals with the possibilities in the German drive on the Western front, and how it may affect the Allies chances of victory. Other features are: Turning the Light On Our War Activities Editorial Opinion Upon the Charges Before Congress of a Lack of Efficiency in Our War Administration , Is the U. S. Government Competent to A Revenue Tax That Passeth Under- Run the Railroads? standing Germany's Deep-Laid Plot Against U. S. Fixing the Blame For the Halifax , When the Germans Awake „ X ra gedy Building Cities While You Wait German Wails Over Submarine Failure \*/ . j a /""l ii a j •• . . • * ransportation tivils and Remedies Wanted. A Clothes Administration (Prepared by the U. S. Food Administration) Daylight in the Workshops The Best Food to Fight On Fooling the Enemy's Eye Good Results From Poor Fuel Christmas in the Redeemed Jerusalem Heifetz: New Wizard of the Violin India's Christians For Free India When the Soldier "Goes West" News of Finance and Industry Best of the Current Poetry Many Striking Illustrations, Including the Week's Best Cartoons. This Week's Digest Cover Is Unusually Attractive, Depicting American Jackies Receiving Their Christmas Boxes at Sea "The Digest" For Your Children " 1 lie Digest' will prove to be the most educating blended with education. The interest of THE influence in your child's life. Seven thousand high- LITERARY DIGEST will bring your boy's and girl's school teachers have adopted it in their classes for ' attention to the wealth of information and instruction - their pupils, and the United States Goverpment, recog- [\ * ontain . s - Th . is , is magazine thai will help train ... . ii, • , . the growing minds of your children; that will direct nizmg its universal school use, is supplying special war- them to the best kind of reading; that will equip them tune lessons for every issue. Give your children the ad- better for their school work; that will lead them to vantages of this worthwhile magazine. It will delight form the habit of keeping well informed on the big as well as benefit them, for in it fascination is equally questions of the day that vitally concern them. December 22d Dumber on Sale Today—All Neiws-dea|ers —10 Cents |g) Jiterdiry Digest 0 FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY (Publishers of the Famous NEW Standard Dictionary), NEW YORK 1 she can have faith and confidence. This is not a mating of May and December, hut of a young woman with a man who is just reaching ma turity, who is at the very best age to marry and make a good husband. You Must Decide DEAR MISS FAIRFAX: I am twenty-one and deeply in love with a man who is a widower, and has three children. Now these three childrtm are nine, sixteen and twenty, so you will see the oldest is almost my age. They object to their father's marrying mo on account of my youth, but as he loves me, and I love him, do you think I ought to brave their displeasure and marry him just the same? I hope you will answer "yes," but I will follow whatever advice you may give me. CLARA. What will be your attitude toward this man's children if you married their father? Are you going to es trange him from them, or will you try to win them, to keep the house hold together and to take a respon sible interest In them and to mother the youngest? Are you just think ing of this marriage in terms of your own ehiotions and selfish desire? Are DECEMBER 21, 1917, you imagining that you must have this man's love in order to be happy? Or are you seriously willing to be a helpmate and to justify yourself for disregarding tlio natural fears and prejudices of his children? Think it over. Make a fair decision. I can not look into your heart and his, and, above all, I cannot guarantee the outcome of any situation, you know. Don't DEAR MISS FAIRFAX: I am a stenographer in a law office where it occasionally happens that I am required to work late in the evenings, making it necessary for me to have my dinner near the office. Will you kindly advise me wheth er on such an occasion it would be improper for me to accept an invi tation from my employer (a married man) to dine with him. Such an in stance has arisen, but I refused his offer, feeling that I would be doing wrong were I to accept. UNCERTAIN. A sensible, practical middle-aged woman with no romantic notions might safely go out to dine with her married employer just on a business basis. But you are. I suppose, young and emotional, and I honestly be- lieve that the sensible tiling for you to do is to dine quietly by yourself when you work late In the evening and not let yourself drift into a dan gerous situation. Probably your em ployer could afford to take you tc expensive restaurants such as youi own friends could not patronize. Anc even if it did nothing worse, dining with him might get you Into luxur ious habits it would be better for yoi not to form. FIGHT FOR TREE A battle for the life of Souther: California's most famous tree bega to-day, with the most noted cltru experts of the world on the firin line. After bearing the first nav oranges ever grown in the Unite States and being parent to grove producing $67,600,000 in choice fru annually, the tree at the head t Magnolia avenue in Riverside is be lieved to be dying. The tree was planted in 1873 b Mrs. C. L. Tibbetts, who obtaine it from the government horticulture gardens at Washington. It came or ginally from Bahia, Brazil. The VE riety of fruit was named Wusliinf ton navel, in honor of the nation' capital.
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers