The Huttig news., 1908-07-25
Copyright. 1907. A. c. Meclurs O.. Chicago
CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK.
CHAPTER xxVI. Gjdeon,s Sforv


 another until Alfred appeared He was never her escort; yet if he came to party or theater she claimed him at once. Esther became convinced that the barrier that had once separated herself from Alfred now existed be- bel's sake he insisted on her perfect freedom in the eyes of society This conviction did not bring tranquility; and Esther asked herself bitterly, why in all the throng that followed her. there was not some brave and honest soul that could dslodge Alfred from her heart. As the winter waned she found herself very weary of the mo- notonous round of the days and nights that loomed before her, stretching to blank, gray years. And when the warm sunshine adorned the hills with rioting bloom, more and more she spent solitary hours on the road with her smart team, her most conspicuous extravagance.
 Valentines day she unused this morning, as she leaned out of the open window to the brilliant, close-bending sun of California. Fuchsia and nastur- tium yied with perfumed heliotrope and jasmine in the long climb up the houseside; but purple and white won through their fragrance. and she gathered a feathery cluster for her belt.
 mo hnr Tn ha dining room, and looked over the at trsctive heap brought by mail and messenger; valentines of the old lace paper sort. hiding tiny mirrors and ar dent poetieal requests to Took on my fair;" flowers, books, gems which she would never accept-all the what-not of sentimental Valentines day 40 years ago. One offering charmed her. It was golden arrow of delicate Mex ican filigree, light. graceful wonder. fully brilliant; brilliance Esther did not at first discover as coming from many tiny diamonds, each hardly larger than pinpoint, set very close ly together.
 How exquisitei" exclaimed Mrs. Crockett, who was friend as well as housekeeper. 'I never saw anything like it. For your hair, isn't it?" She took it from Esther and shot it through her big brown coil the feathered end standing high, the pointed shaft shin. ing just back of her ear, Its the most beautiful ornament you have. Won't you keep it?'
 q see no way to return It." Esther said, searching wrappers and box for a clew to the sender There isn't a word, letter-not even the merch- ants name on the box. How did it come?'
 The Chinaman said a small boy brought it this morning before seven o'clock" Mrs. Crockett replied, as she left the room.
 The trinkets did not interest Esther. She took up her paper instead. At the first glance she cried out.
 Gideon Ingram Anthony-His Ro- mance," were the first words she saw She stared uncomprehendingly for g moment then read on feverishly. It was strange tale, pieced together from many sources, and confirmed by appended interviews with several old est settlers;
 The story of Gideon Ingram, of the well-known freighters, Ingram, Finn & Gould, reads like one of Mrs. South worth's novels yet it is only one of the many dramas resulting from the clash of Latin and Anglo-Saxon in California.
 Tn the early '40s young New Eng land teacher, William Anthony by name. sea-voyaging for his health, dropped into Monterey out of curiosi- ty, and remained, entranced by the climate and bewitehed by pair of beautiful Spanish eyes. Influential letters opened the best doors of the capital to him: and his own fine per sonality soon won him popularity. Lolita, the spoiled and only child of Senor Hernando Guerrero, heiress to half a county and the toast of the town, fell in love with the young Puri- tan, a love he returned as ardently as any swain of her own people. Those who know the Monterey of that day say that the blood of a prairie princess mingled with the blue Andalusian or the Guerreros in Lolita's veins. Whether true or not, she had the i'm periousness of dozen royal maidens; and overriding all objections. she set wedding day less than two months after the pair first met.
 Meantime the groom's brother, a lively young officer of Boston merchantmen, hove into port week before the nuptials. with a budget of news and an appetite for diversion With characteristic reserve the elder brother did not at once confide his