The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1890-04-27
eleep? You win be so much brighter to-

comes of it all, shall not forget your
kindness"
So he turns away, and she still stands
at the foot of the staircase, watching him
uneasily. He has aged greatly in the
past few months. She is shocked to see
how gray, how fitful, nervous, irritable
he has become. As he moves towards
the doorway she notes how thin his
cheek has grown, and wonders at the ir-
resolution in his movements when he
reaches the broad piazza. He stands
there an instant, the massive doorway
forming frame for picture en- sill
houette, his tall, spare figure thrown
black upon the silver sea beyond. He
looks up and down the now deserted gal
leries, fumbles in his pockets for his
cigar case, bites off with nervous clip
the end of huge "Regalia," strikes a
light, and before the flame is half applied
to his weed throws it away, then turns
sharply and strides out of sight towards
the Office.
Another instant, and, as though in
pursuit, a second figure, erect, soldierly,
with quick and bounding step strides
across the glittering moon streak, and
Mrs. Rayner's heart stands still.
Only for an instant, though. She has
seen and recognized Lawrence Hayne.
Concealed from them he isfollowing Mr..
Van Antwerp, and there can be but one
purpose in his coming here-Nellie. But
what can he want with her-her right
full lover? She springs from the lower
step on which she has been standing,
runs across the tessellated floor, and stops
short in the doorway, gazing after the
two figures. She is startled to find them
close at hand-one, Van Antwerp, close
to the railing, facing towards her, his
features CHASTITY in the moonlight, his
left hand resting, and supporting him,
on one of the tall wooden pillars; the
other, Hayne, with white cIinching fists,
advancing upon him. Above the low
boom and roar of the surf she distinctly
hears the clear tenor ring of his voice in
the tone of command she last heard I'M
der the shadows of the Rockies, two
thousand miles away:
:'Haltr'
No wonder gentleman in civil life
looks amazed at so peremptory sum-
mons from q total stranger. In his high
Indignation will he not strike the imper-
tinent subaltern to earth? AS q well
bred woman it occurs to her that she
ought to rush out and avert hostilities by
introducing them or something; but she
has no time to act. The next words
simply take her breath away:
''Sergt. Cover, 1 arrest you as a de-
serter and thief! You deserted from F
troop, -th cavalry, at Battle BUTLER
She sees the fearful CLEAN ON the dark
mans face; there is a sudden spring,
clinch, straining to and fro of two
forms-one tall, black, snaky, the other
light, 1.-THE, agile and trained; muttered
curse, painting breath, and then, sure as
fate, the taller man is being borne back
ward against the rail. She sees the dark
arm suddenly relax its grasp of the gray
form and disappear an instant Then
there it comes again, and with it a
CLEAN of steel. With one shrek of
warning and terror she springs towards
them-just in time. Hayne glances up,
catches the lifted wrist, hurls his whole
weight upon the lettering figure, and
over goes the Knickerbocker prone upon
the floor. Hayne turns one instant: $50
indoors, Mrs. Rayner. This is no place
for you. Leave him to me-
And in that instant, before either can
prevent, Steven Van Antwerp, alias
Cover, springs to his feet, leaps over the
balcony rail and disappears in the depths
below. 1t is descent of not more than
ten feet to the sands beyond the dark
passage that underlies the piazza, but he
has gone down into the passage itself.
When Mr.. Hayne, running down the
steps, gains his way to the space beneath
the piazza, no trace of the fugitive can
he find.
Nor does Mr.. Van Antwerp appear at
breakfast on the following morning, nor
again to any person known to this story.
An officer of the til cavalry, spending a
portion of the following winter in Paris,
writes that he met him face to face one
day in the galleries of the Louvre. Be
ing in civilian costume, of course, and
much changed in appearance since he
was a youth in the straps of second
lieutenant, it was possible for him to
take good look at the man he had not
seen since he wore the chevrons of a
dashing sergeant in the Battle Butte
campaign. "He has grown almost
white wrote the lieutenant, ''and I'm
told he has abandoned his business in
New York and never will return to the
United States"
Rayner, too, has grown gray. a tele-
gram from his wife summoned him to
the seaside from Washington the day
after this strange adventure of hers. He
found her somewhat PROSTATE, his sister,
in-law very pale and quiet, and the clerks
of the hotel unable to account for the
disappearance of 5Ir. Van Antwerp.
Lieut.. Hayne, they said, had told them
he received news which compelled him
to go back to New York at once; but the
gentlemans traps were all in his room.
Mr.. Hayne, too, had gone to New York;
and tllither the captain followed A let
ter came to him at the Westminster
which he read and handed in silence to
Hayne. TWAS as follows:
BY the time this reaches you I shall
be beyond reach of the law and on my
way to Europe to spend what may be
left of my days. / hope they may be
few; for the punishment that has fallen
upon me is more than 1 can bear, though
no more than 1 deserve. You have heard
that my college days were wild, and that