Courier Democrat. (Langdon, N.D.) 1891-1920, 1901-03-21
: CHAPTER I,

stone walls of Grey Oaks, the country
residence of Donald Markham, and the
show place of the neighborhood.
Within the elegantly appointed dining
room, around a table artistically gar
: nished With fruit and flowers, fingered
three persons. .'.- .....
One was Grey Oaks owner and mas
ter-a tall, superb-looking man of six
ty-five winters, whose frosts had whit
ened his hair and beard, but failed to
bow his powerful frame. -.
Twenty years before, the society
world, already looking upon Donald
Markham as a. confirmed old bachelor.
had been startled by being SUMMONED
to welcome, on his return from an 'eX-
tended foreign tonr,-a young and beau-
tiful woman of Italian birth, whom he
presented to them as his Wife. -.
Who she was. where he had met her,
and how she had conquered this hither-
to unconauerable, We're matters for Gu
rious speculation. of which there was
no lack.
f. Some said that she was the daughter
of Roman noble, and chat she had
brought her husband a dover of almost
incredible magnitude; others declared
that she was panniless. her only dover
her exquisite beauty and winning
grace.
Whoever, whatever Donald Mark
hams wife may have been before he
thus had honored her, as Mrs. Donald
Markham. she was too great a local
power not to reign as social sovereign
had she SO ordained. Society's pet
grievance was that she did not so or
'dain.
She adored her husband. and he APP
peared to lavish all the pent-up flood of
years upon her.
For year their happiness was I'M
marred, and then, one perfect May
morning, the heaviest sorrow of Donald
Markham's life fell upon him. They
put into his arms an infant daughter,
and whispered to him that his wife was
dead.
His grief was something terrible in its
silent, hopeless intensity.Iron bands
seemed at that moment to lock them
selves about his heart-would have re-
manned so locked forever but for the
tiny fingers of his little girl, who, as
the years went by, one by one loosed
them.
On her he concentrated all fathers
tenderness. No other woman's smile
ever allured him. Reticent and grave.
his child alone reveled in the inner
warmth and sunshine of his nature, I'M,
til. advancing from babyhood to child
hood-from childhood to girlhood-she,
now standing on the threshold of wo-
manhood, appeared to him the imper-
sonation and idealization of the past.
If her dead mother had left her no
other inheritance than her exquisite
loneliness, that, at least, was full, COM
plete and perfect. -.
The light, streaming full upon her
face, revealed no flaw. The figure was
rounded into beauty which defies all
criticism. Hers was a face no pen
could describe. Her eyes We're gray
The straight regularity of the little
nose, the rebellious. willfu1 rings ;of
rudy gold upon her white brow-tfis
until she smiled; and then you would
have sworn it was the smile to which
she owed her rarest charm,
Yet now, sitting opposite to her father
and toying with, rather than eating, the
bunch of dollhouse grapes upon her
plate, the lashes were sweeping her
cheeks, the dropping head half-shad-
owed it's bloom. The smile was absent
indeed, a tiny frown puckered her
brow; but the beauty still was there,
and on it gloated the eyes Of the third
member Of the party.
Randolph Chester was the nearest
relative Donald Markham could boast,
but it was difficult to believe even re-
mote tie of blood connected two men
whose expression rendered them SO dis
similar, g.,
The face of the younger man was at
once singularly handsome and singu-
larry. repellant. One recognized in him
the fascination possessed by the SER
pent. 81
His eyes We're dark and glittering:
his hair and mustache black; his skin
fair as, a Woman's. There was subtle
grace in every movement. His voice
was low and musical
At the time Of his COUSINS marriage.
twenty years before, he had been boy
of fourteen, and already looked upon
! himself as Donald Markham's pre-
Sumptive heir. -: '>' - -
For years he had nourshed deadly
hatred against this innocent destroyer
of his fond vision; but, as the child, de-
veloped into the most perfect woman
hood, a new idea had burst upon him,
by which his early disappointment
might yet be wiped out, and his early
ambition attained.
Over Donald Markham;he already ex-
ercised a Strong and peculiar influence
tfat+fnffuence he: 6ostered by. every
care. until he knew that to no man
would his cousin more willingly intrust
his NEST precious treasure than him
self. J. E''' fa''
But an unexpected obstacle lay in his
path. 1t was one thing to WOO Beatrice
Markham-another to win her; and the
girl usually SO sweet, so gra cious to all.
!; took no pains to disguise toward him
her aversion and-she was in love with
another. u .if'@ ~:
Bertram Talbot. holding a salaried
position in his cousins employ. aspired.
to the hand of his COUSINS heircss. 1t
was he who had caused Donald Mark
ham to look at this thing in it's proper