Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1885-05-20
SYLVESTER'S WIFE.

to been taken in the proceedings sud
denly developed into Something near
~ akin to excitement. The Jury had
just returned a verdict of culpable
homicide against dozen out of some
fifty Shangaans who stood huddled
together, helpless and frightened, in
the dock, charged with participation in
afatal tribal ARRAY at the Lone Star Di.
almond Mining Company's compounds
the Judge had duly sentenced the gap.
ing unfortunates, and the jailers were
endeavo1ing to sort them out from
among their unconvicted but proba-
bly, no less guilty comrades, when the
Crown Prosecutor a fresh-colored
young Englishman, with no small idea
of his own Importance, turned in his
seat at the barrister's table, and whis.
pered to the official who sat behind
him to put forward Dirk Sylvester.
The official arose and repeated the
name aloud; a hum of expectancy ran
through the little crowd of spectators,
and passed on to the loungers outside,
who eagerly crowded into the CORFU.
gated iron temple of justice; gentle.
men OF the long robe and members OF
the press hurried over from '"The Vel.
low Bur-" just opposite and the stall.
wart Zulu, attired in canvas marked
with the broad black arrow, paused
in his nonotonous Jerking of the pun
kah cord in order to catch a glimpse
of ..Baas" Sylvester, as he stepped in.
to the dock.
Tho nr;conor u,os q Toll hool.>,
colonial, with dark cleaning eyes,
black beard, and skin the paleness
of which had been ripened into swarth.
mess by the fierce African sun. He
was erect and fearless; he threw a
glance of defiance at his enc
mics; he nodded with q smile
to his friends, and then as the
door ola private entrance to the body
of the court opened, and a figure draped
in purest white. with bright golden
hair ripping in rich profusion over the
shapely shoulders: glided in, softly and
quietly like q sunbeam from the free
world outside, he leaned over the rail
which interposed between him and
liberty, and hoarsely whispered her
name-the dearest name on earth to
him.
1t was Sylvester's wife. She re.
sponded quickly. with u look more
eloquent than words: and then the
prisoner drew himself up to his full
height, folded his arms, and listened
intently as the clerk OF the court, an
old friend with whom he had spent
many q registering evening in his
bachelor days, droned through the in.
dictment, and in a clear voice replied
to the charge OF wilful murder, mot
guilty."
The Crown Prosecution, in slow and
measured tones began to sketch the
history of the crime; the Judge lounged
back in his chair and leisurely sought
for the clean pages in his record book;
the counsel for the defense pushed
back his wig from his perspiring brow,
and hunted out q reference in an al.
most forgotten work on the Roman.
Dutch law; the spectators hushed
their mumurings; the punkah swayed
regularly to and fro overhead, and Syl.
westerns wife, sitting there in the well
OF the sitting court, with her sweet
blue eyes riveted on the prisoner, and
her luxuriant locks rising and falling
with the artificial breeze, looked to me
even more beautiful than two years
ago, when she nj Chilly ravished the
hearts OF susceptible diggers in the
make-shift theater in the Dutoitspan
road.
In those memorable bygone days
she was Mademoiselle Marie La Cour
and the star OF q travelling theatrical
company, which, like most other
combinations of talent" visiting the
Diamond Fields, never, as awhole, got
any further. The proprietor made SO
much money III a short season that he
left to assume the lesseehip of a biz
Australian house, and Marie's father
took over the management of the
sheep thus bereft OF their shepherd
How divinely she danced and sang
how she brought the tears into the
eyes OF great rough fellows, or made
them shake the rafters with thei,
sonorous laugh how she fluttered
the heats of the bank magnates and
the Jew diamond merchants, and how
she caused the Treasury" to overflow
with fatness-are not all these things
written in the tablets of the memory
of every dweller on the Fields? In the
zenith of her fame she married Dirk
Sylvester, and If ever a man deserved
his bride he did, for his passion wore
him almost to q shadow, and his
dark eyes cleaned dangerously if a
rival presumed as much as to speak
to her; and before Dirk came upon the
scene there were rivals in plenty; but
though Marie 81 pped the champagne
they proffered, and even accepted their
diamonds, she laughed openly at all
OF them. Dirk was proprietor of one
OF the richest claims at the New Rush,
and the moment he and Marie met the
host OF more or less hopeful suitors
saw their chances were over. She
seemed to have fallen in love with him
quite as much as he had with her, and
would have married him long before
she did but that her father besought
her to continue ON the stage q little
longer for his benefit. At last the
old gentleman drank himself into the
Carnarvon Hospital. and only came
.ANA>S ~ oSSupy OhCOA VIC graves
which are always yawning, ready dug
in the Kimberley. Cemetery, for vic.
Tins to fever and alcohol; and then
Marie La Cour became to us and all
our world "Sylvester's WIFE"
They took Il little villa at the ex-
tremity of Dutoitspan road; a
neat veranda-surrounde residence,
screened from the dust and heat by
tall blue gums, and half covered with
creepers and tropical flowers. After
that We saw little OF the once 80 we'll.
known Marie La Cour. Occasionally
at long intervals they would invite q
few bachelor friends-myself included
to witness their bliss, and on such
evenings the great bullfroes which in,
vaded the garden of 1.-The Oasis" as
their place was rightly named, would
hush their vile croaking as Sylvester s
wife trilled forth megay chansonette
to the accompaniment of the Broad.
wood which Dirk specially imported
for her from Europe or sometimes the
happy pair would ride over to q picnic
on the banks of the meandering Mod.