Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-08-16
TO R
[ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
CHAPTER Lu.-DAN' S ESCAPE.

most luxuriant profusion, the figure OF
a man lay stretched, face downward
Mute and motionless as if he were
dead, the man lay there, amid the thick
shadows of the lately fallen night. The
wind soughed fitfully, eerily through the
dark trees, the tall grass, and strug-
Cling underground; not ray of light
struggled the through the waving
branches, and that PROSTATE form,
lying upon the sward, lent dra-
matic aspect to the gloomy picture.
The man was Dan Ashton. Half-a-
dozen yards from him was the ruined
mouth of the old adit. A few days be-
fore, the rotten timbers supporting the
roof had given way, and where the en-
trance TO the tunnel had been, there was
now only a confused heap of gravel,
soil, tufts OF grass, green brambles, and
brown snaky roots.
The story of Dan Ashton 8 escape
from his dread underground dungeon,
can be completed in few sentences.
With no tools save those God had given
him, he had attacked the mound Of soft
earth, which blocked up the adits mouth.
Dropping with his knee upon the slop-
ing heap of soil he began to cast the fall
len earth behind him, dragging, scrap
ing, throwing it into the old gallery at
his back with his hands, and putting all
his strength and vigor into the work.
But the task of piercing through that
mass of loose soil and gravel was heavier
than he had anticipated, for as quickly,
almost, as he threw the fragments of
stone and earth behind him, fresh
masses of freed debris came tumbling
down, sometimes half-burying him in
their fall.
Still he had toiled on, never abating
his efforts, although waves of despair
surged through his breast at times; scat
tsring the soil in showers with his hands
as a rabbit does with its paws when dig
giDg burrow.
Now and again, after hours of patient
half frenzied laboring glimpse of the
world, aboYe-blue skies, green trees
and sunlit grassland gladdened his ewes
through intersectics in the fallen pile;
and then the rotten earth "caved M
afresh, shutting out the bright daylight
and leaving him in the dark, for his re-
manning candle had expired some hours
ago.
But those fleeing visions of the upper
land towards which he was SO painfully
striving, had filled him with the uucon-
querable hope, and he toiled on with IN
tagging zeal, unmindful of his sacrificed
and bleeding hands.
And at last he had broken through the
gates of his prison, and stood in the
open air free man once more. But he
was completely exhausted then-was
weak as child, and after standing there
for moment in the twilit wood, he had
sunk senseless upon the green sward-
There he lay still, with the Ssilence OF
the wood and the blackness of the night
about him.
But he was recovering now; was with
ing in his sleep; his torn hands olutched
cOnvulsively at the grass; his lips parted
70 emit low means; his eyelids lifted
YEARLY, and then he struggled to a sit
ting posture aud gRZed about him.
What black confused dream the
stirring incidents of the past day and
night seemed now. 1t appeared to Dan
as if the experience and suffering of
years had been compressed INTO that
short period of time, which had elapsed
since he and Mark Eliot had met over
there at the other end of the wood
Slowly, painfully, he dragged himself
to his feet and left the spot. But weary,
1amished, distressed as he was at the
moment, he did not strike towards home
Walter Mayhem, and from him learn
what had transpired during the time he
had been imprisoned in the mine-must
discover what had become of his
maddened assailant, Mark Eliot.
And so with tired limbs and smarting
hands, hatless, his face dirt stained, he
dragged his fRltering feet towards the
residence of his confederate; following
no beaten track, but striking across the
grass in Ordor to escape observation.
CHAPTER LIu.-A FOUL BLOW.
About the time the policemen entered
Bob Cubby's cottage to arrest Mark
Eliot, Walter Mayhem shut the front
door of Westwood house behind HIM, and
turning up Warringham' lane sauutered
toward the residence Of Mr.. Richard
HARDWOOD.
During the whole of that day Walter
had not been able to see his employer;
and he had wished TO see HARDWOOD very
much. Before leaving HARDWOOD that
night their compact was effected, the
mill owner had pledged himself to havs
the deed of partnership drawn forthwith
by his solicitors, and TO have it ready for
signing and sealing on the following
night.
The events of the past night, however,
Dhu w dAACL llOLl 10
the matter-Mark Eliot's return and
Mrs. Mayhew's fight having driven
everything else out of his mind-but the
business was urgent, and he was seeking
HARDWOOD now TO settle it out of hand.
When that was done he could snap his
fingers at the world. Even if Nellie
never returned to him, a partnership in
HARDWOOD IS business would amply recon-
pense him for all his trouble and schem-
ing.
Mayhem found the cotton spinner at
home, and when they were closeted to-
gether, his first words after the refuno-
tory greetings, were:
81 suppose the deed of partnership ia
ready?''
"I'm sorry to say it is not, Mayhew,'
HARDWOOD replied with an apparent at
tempt to appear natural. ~ called
upon Peace and Ellis-my lawyers you
know-to- day and instructed them, but
they tell me that owing 10 the great
pressure of their business, they cannot
possibly do it before next week.
Mayhem smothered an oath in his
throat, but he said calmly:
"You promised-gave your solemn
word-that the business should be done
not to-day or tomorrow, or next
week-but yesterday. 1t is not done!''
"Blame the lawyers, not me, the
mill n.-uar rafnrfa1 With afTaofa1 nan