Custer County Republican. (Broken Bow, Neb.) 1882-1921, 1902-06-05
A Singular Episode.
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60 HE steamer had already started

L
slipping along through silky blue wa
ter, below n sky frescoed here and
there with little fantastic pearly
clouds, like hocks of vagrant swans.
There were not many passengers, and
none of them knew.
But all seemed as gay as the wealth
er-all save her. She sat on deck, hav-
Ing chosen one of its rear wooden
benches.
Her dress was very simple; some
thing white cleaned at her throat, and
browns and blacks vested her slender
frame.
She might have been five and TWEEN
ty, but you had to scan well the wan
dclicacy of her face before you quite
decided that suffering alone must have
made her seem older.
Both dark-gloved hands rested in her
lap. She appeared perfectly needless
of everything about her.
She had the most beautiful eyes
have ever seen-large and gray and
fathomless; they glorified her face, and
they were infinitely pensive
1t shot through my mind: How
many tears they must have wept."
They looked straight ahead, too, plain
| ly seeing nothing of the jocund and
| scintillant sea that fronted them.
| | wondered If other people would no
tlce their hopeless and helpless gaze
Unconsciously and with simplicity
that pierced my soul. she appealed to
] me in terms of absolute despair.
| Every line of her figure, too, accord
ed, by some mysterious sympathy, with
| this rapid impression of her wretched-
ness.
Till nightfall she sat there, immov-
| able. The faultless weather continued
There was no moon. but the starlight
shone almost vivid enough to mimic
one, and kept getting glimpses of her
fixed, coloress face, which now haunt
ed me more and more.
Often since that night | have been at
sea, and never do | hear the peculiar
harmonious kissing and rushing sound
which vessel gives when it sails
through placid stretches of ocean, with
out memories of those desolated fea-
lures, that plainttess yet woe-begone
air.
Meanwhile l had got to know a GER
tain table companion, ard had told him
OF how this ladys evident misery had
touched me. He was Frenchman,
who gave me his name as Guijean,
dapper little person. with fiorid cheeks,
big curvilinear mustacnes and teeth
sparkling white.
HG spoke English with great fluency,
and / could readily believe him when
he Informed me that he had mastered
several other tongues.
"She is evidently a most unhappy
woman" he had told me, after having
glanced, during the afternoon, at this
forlorn object of my sudden and acute
sympathy.
Something in his tone made me start
and clasp his arm. felt certain, just
from those few words, that she was
now the object of his sympathy, no less
than mine.
In rich, intuitive fash. l felt more
that he, whoever he was, had a ma
ture amply receptive to compassion.
Il have crossed before on this line"
he said, after the tragic stranger, who
now equally concerned us both, had de-
parted from her shadowy lodge below
the huge smokestacks and their con-
comitant masses of iron equipment,
and while the bland marine June stars
seemed to drop lower like mellowing
fruit from invisible boughs. Frankly,
| have grown to dislike our captain
very much; he is man of hard, harsh
disposition; he is capable of cruel acts.
II know that on this same ship he
has committed several which have
made him unpopular both among his
fellow officials and the common sailors
beside. But the second officer, ME-.
Gladwyn, is OF widely different type.
OF him | will make certain inquiries,
and join you later"
And later that same evening, Mon
sieur Guijean did join me- in the smok-
ING room.
"Gladwyn tells me-" he said, "that
she has registered simply as Mrs.
Ncrschoyl. She has a cabin all to her
self, ana neither he nor any one else
knows the faintest item concerning her.
As we have observed. she has not yet
appeared in the dining room, and since
her retirement into lower quarters she
has given no order whatever to any of
the servants"
This information reached me at about
| o o'clock.
Before 10, while sat with novel in
one of the upper saloons, Guijean APP
| peared at my side. All the ruby had
slipped from his cheeks; all his galliard
| jauntiness had gone; he still looked
like the Frenchman he was, and yet
| like that most mournful of things, a
Frenchman who has lost his gayety.
1T is TERRIBLE" he stammered, lean
ing down and brushing my cheek with
| one still curve of his mustache. do
you-can you-dream what that poor
| woman has done to herself2"
rose. can hear now the soft rat
Ting thud of my novel as 1t fell upon
| the floor
| "Not-suicideW