The Kimball graphic. (Kimball, Brule County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1905, 1890-08-01
to the room together. and Rose and h.rhus'

band were left outside.
There was one instant's silence, and then
a wild shliel, a shrek that might be terror,
grief, or joy. One could not tell what it
meant, outside the door.
Rose was in an agony. She would nave
dashed into the room, but Philip held her
back.
Let them be for a few moments" he
said. "Mortemar is alive. The mystery can
be only that-alive, and shut up in this
house, under watch and ward of that wo-
man."
Two minutes after, the door was opened
by Suzon, and the Durands went in. The
room was comfortable enough within, desc
late as the house looked outside. The furni-
ture was humble, but neat and decent.
There was a fire burning in the CRATE, a lamp
on the table.
In an casy-chair in front of the fire sat a
man with his leg in splints from the hip
downwards. lie was pale to ghastliness,
and had the look of one who had but begun
the slow progress of recovery from q sick
ness nigh unto death. His hair and beard
were long, his hands thin to Transparency.
yes, it was CASTOR Mortemar, and his
wife was kneeling at his feet, kissing the
wasted hands, murmuring sweetest words,
y ~ hbttb III q Doooiil, lltIldul
happy.
II give you back your dead" said Suzon
solemnly. "lIe was left for dead when l
picked him upand brought him in here, shot
through shoulder and hip and leg with half
a dozen bullets. The surgeon l brought to
him said it was q hopeless case; but for the
sake of surgery,as an amateur, he would try
to cure him. For two months he lay in in
slant danger. For seven weeks he was mad
with brain-fevcr-feyer that came from the
pain of his wounds. l have nurssd him
through all. The surgeon will tell you If l
have been a faithful nurse. And now 1
give him back to you, not healed, but on the
fair road to recovery; although he will be
lame all his life, poor soul; but that does
not count in a writer, does it? He will be
all the greater with his pen if he has less
temptation to roam.'
BLESS you! May God bless and reward
you for your devotionW cried Kathleen.
bah! There is no question of blessing
or reward. l have been q wicked woman.
i kept him like q bird in q cage, and | let
you think him dead, and / told him you had
persisted on the last day of the barricades,
and | let him mourn for you. He was help
less, in my power, and / lied to him and
cheated him. But | Snatched him from the
jaws of death the surgeon who has attend
ed him will tell you that. j dragged him
into this empty house, dragged him away
just as the last batch of Serizier's blood
hounds We're turning the cornero of the street,
whooping for more blood; and l kept him
here, closely guarded, hidden from all the
world, except the surgeon, who believed
that he was my brother. He could tell no
tales, poor fellow, for it is only within the
| lp,t tf.rAA ,-,1t-. y1nt 1n H. 49,. T. Al
right wis.,
Gaston's head was leaning forward against
Kathlecn's, the husbands haggard brow
against the wife's wasted cheek. Both faces
were the image of death, and vet radiant
with a newborn life-the sublime light of
happy love.
"She told me you were dead, Kathleen
he m,rmurcd.
Forgive her, dear. She saved you, and
have avenged you. O my love! my love!
God is good. He has given you back to me,
out of the grave"
How did you manage to occupy this
house. and to keep your existence here a
s~ecret":' asked Durand.
"Therc was no difficulty. l was not with.
out means. / went to the landlord, and of
fered him half the rent of the house for the
use of w or three rooms at the back. The
house had been inlet a year and a half-the
street is a failurc-so he was glad to accept
my offer, and the board was left up over
the door TO avert suspicion. The people
who saw me go in and out took me for n
caretaker; nobody asked any questions. l
had u van-ioad of furniture brought here
after dark from my rooms at the crCmeric,
and l made things as comfortable as / could
for my patient. If he had any knowledge
of those dark days he would know thai |
nursed him faithfully. For six weeks l
scarcely knew what it was to sleep for an
hour at a stretch. | had Il mattress at the
foot of his bed, and ! lay down now and
then like a dog, and slept n dogs sleep, with
my car on the alert for the first groan Of
pain"
God bless your cried Kathleen, taking
her land and kissing it.
you are a strange woman.''s said Durand;
but let no one say that you are wholly
bad"
II was q devil in those days of the bar
ricades. l was mad like the rest of them,
maddened with the thoughtof all the wrongs
that we cdnni{c have suffered fromthe be-
ginning Ofthe world. Yes, from the days when
Hcrod put John the Baptist in prison, and
cut off his head. to keep faith with a princess
who danced. Twas drunk with blood, like
the rest of them. Butt six weeks of watchfu!-
ness and watching one has time to think;
and, in the silence of the night, sometimes,
l used to wonder whether it was good for
a woman to be an esprit fort, whether it
was not better to be cheated, even, and to
believe in some one up yonder, who can set
the riddle of this world right when He
chooses-some Handwriting thegreat wheel
of destiny yonder behind the clouds. No,
Monsieur Durand, l am not all evil"
1t was not till tho end of the year that
CASTOR vas well enough to be removed to
the Rue Git lie C9ur, and, in the mean time,
he and his wife occupied the rooms in the
empty house near the Place d'Italie, with
that good natured busybcdy, Madame Schu,
bert-generally known as ct bonnie ScItu.
bcrt-to take of care of them. Suzon Michel
went straight from the house where those
two whom she had held apart were lost in
the bliss of IN unloped-for union, and gave
herself up to the police. The account against
her name was heavy, and payment in full
' was exacted. She was despatched with q
= gang of Commlnards on board Il rotten ole
ship bound for Cayenne, and in the unut
: terable miseries of that dreadful voyage she
, was like an angel of mercy to her fellow
. sinners. And at the convict settlement
y the pctrolcuse, the amazon, became tlt
nurse and ministering angel of the feyel
stricken wretches IN the prison hospital, a
, source of comfort and of hope to many a
dying captive, till the deadly climate did its
work, and the pestilence struck her down
as 1t had stricken others-a woman young
, in years, but old in strange and sad expert
ence; a sinner, but not without hope of par.
!, don.
! The dark days of November an Deem
a Der were blissful days for Kathleen. Health
!. and strength returned to her as if by magic;
and in a week after her restoration to hap
piness she was able to help in waiting upon
= her husband. Another week and she would
hardly allow Madame Schubert to do any.
thing for him.. In the third week she was
I walking to and from the printing Office Of
i Gaston's old journal, which had been re-
n suscitated under q new name, as Thu
a Friend of Freedom, and the proprietor OF
which was enraptured to receive copy
from the brilliant pen of his old contributor
y given up as lost to literature for ever.
Yes, those were happy days. That pool
Sbottar,t lau of Eocfpp1e bol .hr,,J- ~,