The Cook County herald. [volume] (Grand Marais, Minn.) 1893-1909, 1906-05-26


posted as a deserter, and they'll hang
have left him to my tender mercies."
CHAPTER v.
"A SoutherIy Wind and Cloudy Sky"
The gray day was drawing toward
it's hasty close, for it was at the sea-
son when the days are short. The
woods beyond the low-lying meadows,
with their fringe of alders and nut
bushes, were dim and indistipct with
creeping mist. The air was SO still
that a sound carried far and echoed
lingeringly before it died away. There
was a chill, drear look on leaf1ess
hedgerow and sodden grass and cholz-
ed ditch-the dreariness of the days
that are the saddest of all >the round
year.
!. Through gate that opened out
upon |the highroad from hill slope
with tangled copse behind, a girl
came slowly and despondingly-she
seemed to have reached the point of
excessive fatigue. Her hair was loose,
and one long tress lay on her shoulder;
the riding habit she wore was soiled
with mud, and had rent in the skirt
as she held it up. She still chung tn
her hunting crop, but the horse it had
been needed for was nowhere in sight,
and she did not seem to have, been
lately parted from him; she walked
with slight limp, and her face was
white. ,::,:
The distant cry of the hounds: had
echoed over those meadows and cepses
half dozen times earlier in the day:
Now the sound of yelp and horn alike
had died out of the sneig ighhprh ana
~ ag azt rang olatel
was Ursula Hamilton ST jrst exper1snee
Of the reverses of the hunting field.
She had been out with the hounds half
a score of times since she had been
staying with her cousins down in Dor
setshire. >:But-till: now she had had no
accident, no misadventure; and she did
not take to it with pleasure now that
one came.
It was all so unexpected, too, as such
accidents always: are. She had seen
an easy gap in the corner Of the field
they were pelting across. She was a
little behind the rest and anxious to
make up the distance. Her evil genius
h tn + hot q cI1, ,,f
would accomplish the desired end. So
she put; her little mare,' or rather the
mare that was her cousins, at the gap,
and found it a harder one than; shhS4,ad
ever tried. There was'a wide, wet
ditch On the farther sire Of the hedge;
she did not see it till she had risen to
the leap. Her mount. had not seen it.,
either, or, she would have. jumped wild
er. : .t,:,
The next event that. forced itself
upon the consciousness of Ursula was
picking herself up from the clay with
co infused wonder how she came
there, and seeing the heels and the
swinging stirrup of her frightened ami
NAL disappearing through the gate
that stood open into the next field. It
was in the opposite direction from the
one that the hunt had taken that her
independent minded mount had chosen
to retire. She crushed down oyer her
forehead the round had that had been
dashed oyer one eye, and she picked
up her torn and muddy habit and gave
chase But: when she: gained the. gate
she saw lane outside: 1t, and Of her
mare there was no sign. The faint,
rapidly-dying thud Of galloping hoofs
reached her for moment, and then
the"air was silent and. empty OF all
sound. :~.. .,,~..s:.s-.:r, -. ~.
:: She hurried: back to the other side Of
the field and eagerly ;clambered up the
pank:.> Ear away, like a bird over the
furEoWS, there SKINNED scarlet coat
the tail of:the hunt. Even as she
watched with imploring eyes it rose
to al hurdle, and then even the last
straggler was out of sight. No music
of horn Or hound came down the gray
and misty 'vista--she, was left :; dis
mounted and alone: !; The neighbo borhood
was as strange TO ner. as the Great
Unknown Land: itself, and she had not
the vaguest notion: which way home
lay. There: was no sun to tell her
even the points of the compass, Or to
give her a guide by which9to steer :
...'~. ITO BE continued.> :**>' =
- '-,. = --=->- : : 49, ~ j:
:. = Enough Commandments: s : : ! !
!: They are telling Of. an Atcheso ION;
Kan, girl who received a proposal by
telegraph. She went. to- the telegraph
Office and asked the clerk how many
words she could send for 4 quarter.
He said ten, and her answer was: !:
Yes; yes; yes, yes, yes, yes, yer, yes,
yes, !" IN i :::5 :s= n