Highland recorder. (Monterey, Highland County, Va.) 1877-1972, 1908-08-21
lCHApTER
! THIRTEEN

| HMAXN ~~~S~~ II fNWLS
"HE heat, which had been severe
in June, driving the last fash
| ionable loiterer into the coun-
L try, continued fiercely through
out July. August was sitting.
Nobody who was anybody remained
| In town except some wealthy business
men and their million odd employees,
but the million, being nobodies. didn't
count
Quarters huge limestone mansion.
| looming golden in the sun. was tenant
less. Its owner, closing even The
Sedges, his Long Island house, and,
driven northward for breath OF air,
was expected at ShOtover.
The house Of Mrs. Mortimer was
closed and boarded up. A caretaker
apparently guarded Major Belwether's
house, peeping out at intervals from
behind the basement windows. AS for
Plank's great pile Of masonry edging
the outer hundreds in the north, sew
eral lighted windows were to be seen
In 1t at night, and big yellow and
black touring car whizzed down town
from its bronze gateway every morn
ing with perfect regularity.
For there was a fight on that had
steadily grown hotter with the wealth
er and Plank had little time to con-
Germ himself with the temperature or
to mop his red features over the
weather bureau report. Harrington
and Quarter were after him-horse.
foot and dragons. Harrington had
even taken a house at Seabright In
order to be near In person, and Quar-
rier's move from Long Island to Shot
over House was not as fippant as it
might appear, for he had his private
car there and a locomotive at Black
Fells Crossing station, and he was
within striking distance Of Rochester,
Utica, Syracuse and Albany, which
was what Harrington thought neces-
sary.
The noise of the fray in the papers,
which had first excited then stunned
the outside public, continued in de-
lirium of rumor, report, forecast and
summing up at the weeks end.
Scare heads involving everybody and
everything. from the district attorney
to Plank's Office boy, succeeded one
another. Plank's name headed col
umn after column. Already becoming
familiar in the society and financial
sections, it began to appear In neigh
boring paragraphs.
Plank scarcely noticed what the
press said of him. He was too busy;
his days were full days, brimming
over deep into the night Undaunted,
memorable, slow to the verge of stu
pidity at times, at times swift as a
startled tiger, this new, amazing per-
sonality steadily developing, looming
higher, heavier, athwart the financial
horizon, in stature holding his own
among giants, then growing gradual
ly, inch by inch, dominated his sur
rounding level sky line.
Harrington, old, hoary, scanned,
SCARED, MANNED in onslaughts of long
forgotten battles, looked long and hard
upon this weird of his own dead youth
which now rose towering to confront
him. menacing him with the armed
point of the same shield behind which
he himself had so long found shelter
the law! IT
The closing Of the courts enforced
armed truces along certain lines or
Plank's battle front, the adjournment
of the legislature emptied Albany.
Once 1t was rumored that Plank had
passed an entire morning with the
governor Of the greatest state In the
Union and that the conference was to
be repeated. A swarm Of newspaper
men settled about the governors sum-
mer cottage at Saratoga, but they
learned nothing, nor could they find
q trace of Plank's tracks In the trod-
den trails of the great spa.
Besides, the racing had begun. Des-
mond, Burbank, Sneed and others OF
the gllded guild had opened new club
houses. There was plenty of copy for
newspaper men without the daily spec
ulatiye paragraph devoted to the DO
ings of Beverly Plank. Some scandal,
too-but newspapers never touch that
And after all 1t was nobody's affair
that Leroy Mortimer drove a large
yellow and black touring car, new
model, all over Saratoga county. Per-
haps the similarity Of machines gave
rise to the rumor of Plank's presence;