Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1891-09-18
CHAPTER /.

VII T> t0o no q ef0
ll& coast of Califor-
mia. Back Of
him great stairway Of forest-covered
ridges climbed into the coast range,
with all their tumbled ocean Of tree
tops turning golden olive in the sun
set On his left the earth sank sharply
down to meet the waters of the bay,
while just before him, with . sheer
drop OF quite hundred feet, the head
hung over the deep with its granite chin
brushed by the buffeting flood Its
whole face was solid rock; the forehead
trenched and furrowed like . giants
muscle-lknotted breast, the cheeks rent
and eroded by uncounted storms, while
vast slab of stone hung pendant in
the center like a nose, with others fall
en- endwise in the surf below, and lean
ing against the wind-worn lips like
shattered monoliths.
From the crest the view was wide
and beautiful, the sea spreading out its
ever changing plain to the horizon;
here, as the sky's moods came and
went, a silver track, there a fold Of
violet, and beyond it level emerald. In
OAAo 49, oouSh"Sce a group IA AoAo4SAo A0y
low In the sea, like blue monsters
swimming outward, and beyond them .
feet of lumber schooners was fading
in the ofing. The boy drew a long
breath of WEAKNESS as he watched
them. He could not help feeling how
sweet 1t would seem to be sailing away
from all the heart-breaking trouble that
tore his own and other bosoms there on
Beaver head.
He was leaning against tumble
down wall which crossed the crown Of
the cliff few rods from where It
dropped off to meet the sea. Near by
there was gap in the wall. evidently
once gate, and a little way back along
the path an old stone house. A tall
man could almost touch the caves, but
It was wide and long, being divided into
two low but rather reomy halves,
while its walls were thick, but cracked
and matted with moss, through which
tNo small, square windows peered out
Ike sunken eyes. About the yard were
Q number of redwoods, massive and
strsight, with the sea winds purring
among their branches and the sunshine
following on their tops.
The house had been built, 50 tradf.
ton said, years before by weather
beaten old tar named Beaver. who,
strangely enough, deserted the sea for
a Indian wife and this queer shelter
On the head. only to forsalke them in
turn to take to the sea again. Then
the seasons had flown on, and presently
. village had sprung up about the inlet
bay, with great sawmills at its inner
end, where a little river brought the
logs down from the redwood forests.
Here Trave Armor, the boys father,
drifting westward through the pineries
of Michigan and Wisconsin, and max
ing now and then futile stand against
drink. M-luck and poverty, had come to
work in the mills, but failing, through
4oclk,' into the old stone hut upon the
heAd.
Their progress had been pitiful
enough. and Paul, the eldest Of the five
children, bearing its scars upon his
body, and its infamy in his memory,
he'd felt, with every season as he pro
Creased toward manhood, a growing
sense Of blight and degradation. He
knew whence his lameness came; that
whsn he was child his father once
came home in storm of drunkenness,
and being pleaded with by the boys
mother, splintered his flask of liquor
on the hearth in an ecstacy Of rage,
and that he, baby crawling round the
CRATE, had Tapped at the liquid like q
Hons cub licking greedily at blood, and
that his father had caught him up in
drunken fury and dashed him into the
fire, from which he had come limping
thus far ON the road of life.
Often he had felt something like NOR
tai hatred of his father rise within him,
and that day when he turned from
waAching the lumber schooners 60 down
over the blue food, and saw his mother,
worn with toll and faded with bitter
care. bending over her washtub that
her children might have bread, an an
Rer rose in his heart that was almost
q for taking human life. But when
his mother spoke to him in tender cheer.
fulness - she always did. it vanished in.
. moment.
81 need some rinsing water, Paul."
6he said, Strengthening up with difficult
~ IN the steam Of the tub, and stripping
the glinting bubbles from her thin,
tired arms. IF Jimmy or Carl would
only stay round I'd have them do It, but
It SEEMS like they're most always of
when needed"
ooh. I'll do 1t, mother; I'll do i'll" said
the boy with half pathetic smile. I'm
stronger than they are, only my legs
amt SO good!' And taking up a wood
en- yoke with bucket attached to either
shoulders, and went limping down the
hillside, whistling little that his weary
mother might hear.
The woman stood a moment, leaning
with her soap-eaten hands upon the
tubs edge, and looked after him with
tender eyes. Then she glanced at little
Gabe, six years old. and three-year-old
Lannie, who were playing under the
trees, and began washing again. Hes
the best of them ALL" she murmured as
she rubbed. His hearts as soft Is q
girls; he'd help me more than he does
If he could. Oh, If his father had only
never done that awful thing to him."
And tears slipped down her cheeks and
fell into the suds.
The boy stopped at spring half way
down the bluff, and, filling the pals,
booked q moment at the mills back Of
tho bay. Red-shirted logmen were
working with their cant-hooks
among the brown ricks, their
sing-song cry of ''He-o-he-e-e!" as they
lifted, coming in mellow waves across
tho water with the long-drawn, never
ceasing whine of the feeding saws
Presently he labored back up the hill
With the water, and when the tubs
were filed and his mother had thanked
him gratefully, he sat down ON q bench
near By and watched her dreamily.
s1(other," he said at last, do You
aposs we viii always live heref"
u hope not, dear"
--arltSS - ALL I lenza >eu4e