The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1902-03-10
The Globes Daily Short Story

to them; all to the father, grimly in
tent on the sea; all to the mother, sweep
ing tears from her eyes to peer into the
depths of the storm; all to still another,
daughter of the place, who had looked
to have wedding bells ring in her ears
that night, and not the wild menace Lat
mingled in the roar of the storm from
Fairway buoy. She mad joined in common
grief-weighted watching, with those who
waited for the one VINO was their all.
Until darkness completely yelled the sea
they watched, and hearts sank as the last
glimpse, as the first, revealed only the
handiwork of the storm, a sea, s~etning
till foam-capped waves vanished N the
depths OF the night Sobs from the women
marked the boundaries of hope. Silence
from the man.
Until now the wild changing of the bell
at the harbor mouth had Numbered in
cessantly its guiding voice out over the
waves, and one comfort chung to the
heavy hearts on the sands that there
was hope while the bell rang on, that
even the last hard-pressed fisherman
might lind way to safety, for AS boat
was stanch and his heart strong.
1t was not to be.
In the midst of the vigil made ferris Ole
by dread and storm and darkness, a new
terror was thrust, a terror that struck to
the heart of every watching seaman.
Ahe bell!' cry of terror, it passed
from lip to lip.
Fairway bell had broken from it's moor
ings and was drifting before the storm
Quick ears followed it's mad path as
with delirium of frenzy it set out
across the water. With every new sweep
of the gale it drove on with the changing
of the bell becoming a wild. maniacal
shrek, as the wooden structure pitched
freely without weight of chain and an
r.
en- until the Shrek came, an inaudible
chuckle to the daZed listeners and then
back, the taunts of it's voice coming near
er and nearer, and mingling in fierce
alteration with the demons of the air.
and now seeming to join with the gale
in laughter at some cruel jest To the
very harbor gate it makes a noisy pill
grimage, again and again, and then with
new whim of the wind, founders sea-
ward, always changing, until again the
voice is lost to the listeners.
Now its voice again Farther and far
Their away from the bar it plunges. and
still calls the seeker for safety. with a
treacherous note, that now means but
sure death, for relentlessly the storm
thrusts its new plaything away from
Pathways snug retreat to where sands
give way to pitiless rocks, and doom is
written large for craft that may come
on them.
one last long reach, and the maniac is
stranded fast, Its mad journey over. and
Fairway bell still booming through the
storm, though watchers prayed thai it
might be hushed, now bids the Iuckless
pilot, not to harborage, but to death.
Alas for Fairway and the Watchers for
the father and the mother and the lass.
The fisherman for whom they waited
sent his boat into that rock-set tran at
the bidding of the bell, and a last wild
shrek, as if a brazen demon and storm
demon eXulted in their traitor work.
must have rung in his ears as the waves
| closed over.
| Morning again. Heartaches that will
never be forgotten in Fairway. The tenn,
| pest is spent.
! Searchers found the battered hulk and
mangled body high among the rocks,
mutely eloquent of the tragedy of night
| Nearby, firmly held among jagged in
! struments of its maniac will, for such is
the story, rested Fairway bell The
| waves, fellows with the bell but a night
| ago, seemed to have shrunk away and left
| the monster, and it lay, still, its voice
| hushed in the presence of its victim. as
| if conscious, too late, of it's sin.
Fairway menfolk, when they tell this
tale soften their rough speech. There
is awe in the voices that tell of the bell
| and its mania, Of the man who was lureC
| to death, for all of them had bent an cal
for the sound of the bell that had doomed
! him. Fairway womenfolk will add to the
! tale that, from the Steeple of the little
| church about which the scattered towr
| nestles, and behind which fisherman ant
maiden are sleeping, wedding bells wer,
to have rung out, but that, mad from
envy of it's kinsman of the steeple, the
maniac bell of Fairway bar, murdered the
man and broke the heart of the maid.
AS the last bolts go home in the grea
steel light, watchers Oh the sands ar,
telling the tale that will live when ever
those bolts of steel have crumbled, AM
nohing remains of the old buoy that rot
ted in the sands.