Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1909-05-21

accounts with the dead man. Miles"
O'FerraI stared at him, listening
closely.
There were more of them and they
were better off before the war. But that
cleaned them out in more ways than
one. Ny father and Uncle Miles were
the only two of the old stock left at the
roll call I'm rs, and they were very hard
pushed after that to make both ends
meet.
MY father was the elder brother. The
old home was his. though it was of no
value then. My uncle had nothing.
They fell I'm love presently with an
equally penniless southern beauty, and
she turned Miles down.
He left home on their wedding-eve,
swearing that he would make her rue
the day she had Tilted him.
They heard no more of him for a long
time after that. They were very happy
together.
But in other ways my father was
most unlucky. and mortgage succeeded
mortgage until at last he found himself
in the direst straits.
. But he made a plucky fight for IL,
till, the first year the crop showed prom
/ Use Of paying expenses, the mortgages
Z were called in wholesale, not only in his
case, but from all his neighbors That
bred a regular panic throughout the dis
trict. and. since there was no help for
| it. the old home had TO go. But my IA
/ Their died in II first. OF a broken heart,
not knowing that it was his brother Miles
who had struck the blow which killed
/ him. That came out later.
| I was a very small boy then, but 1
learned in time that my healthy uncle was
| the best hated man in Covington county.
and why? He had never set foot in it,
either, since he had started for San Fran
cisco, where he made his pile How he
made IL, 1 have no earthly idea.
| After my father was dead my mother
suffered all sorts of petty prosecutions at
L Miles Quaintance's hands. / found that
| out too late, O'Ferral. but / give you my
/ word that a more malignant scoundrel
il would be difficult to conceive. And
| she, all the time, was sacrificing herself
to give me an education. And 1 didn't
know
"She even managed out Of the pittance
she had TO live on, to send me across
TO the School of Mines in Paris, and,
when 1 go home again, 1 heard for the
| first time of the man who had made life
a burden TO her for so long. 1 wanted to
| go west and cast accounts with him
then, but she wouldn't have that ow-
ed il to her to do as she wished, and
| waited.
II had not been with her for more than
! a month when had the offer of an open
ing with what seemed very brilliant pros
poets in the diamond fields Of South Afri-
ca We talked 1t over, and she thought
/ that / should take il. / believed now
that she was only anxious to see me safe
beyond the sphere Of my uncle's influence.
She feared for me. after what had be-
fallen my father. But she herself would
not leave the cottage at Covington where
| she had lived. She'd rather wait there,
| she said. until I was ready to buy back
our home, and that wouldn't be very
long.
1t wasn't so very long, either. for I did
well in Cape Colony, butt was too late
after all. She had been dead and buried
for six weeks before I heard of it, and
that hit me harder than anything else I've
ever had to put up with"
His voice shook slightly.
II couldn't stay on in Kimberly after
that. and I didn't care TO come back to
America. I wanted to get away from ev-
erything. I didn't much care what hap
pened to me. So I went off north. MAX
ing more money I did not need by the
| way. / wandered on through Central
| Africa, exploring and shooting, doing
anything to kill time. II had been a lit
tie less careless it might have killed me-
as I sometimes half hoped it would. But
the more foolhardiness 1 displayed the
more miraculously did 1 scrape through
II was when lion, whose mate I had
shot, chased me into a crack in the
ground and kept me there all one after
noon that I came across the rose dia-
mOnds. Some day I'll go back there and
look for more in the Lobisa country, not
far from the old Loangwa trail. Don't
forget that. O'Ferral, If you're ever hard
up and I'm not on hand TO help you out. -
OFerral shook his gray head decided
". He. too, had had his fill of African
wilds.
II needn't bore you with all the details
of my wonderings during those years
But after you and 1 had met and parted,
! put northwest The carriers had with
me struck and turned tail when we
reached the Baghirmi country, but as
luck would have it, I ran across a French
convoy and so got to Fort Bretonnet. II
seemed that I couldn't lose myself, no
matter how hard I tried.
Il had arranged some time before to
have my mail sent up to the fort from
the coast, and when 1 arrived I found
a letter awaiting me.
1T was from my precious uncle, a
post-mOrtem message, forwarded by my
own lawyers, ana naQ Deen IOllOWlnB me
about for a long time. wish it had
never found me.
My uncle was dead, and, dying, he
wanted to purchase dissolution by pay
ing blood money to me, the son Of the
man he had murdered.
And that wasn't all. There was a con-
dition attached in the shape of his adopt
ed daughter, the orphan child of a SOU
thern soldier, whom l must marry in or
der TO inherit his millions. And he in
formed me that IL failed TO comply with
his wishes within a twelvemOnth, the
money he had amassed would all go TO
charity. while the girl. whom he had
brought up in luxury, would be left pen
niless.
There was an Internal arrangement
for youi He was as cunning as he was
cruel. lie must have known that nothing
would tempt me to touch a penny of his,
and how it would hurt me to harm an in
nocent girl.
Il wanted to get back into the wiTds
by myself and think. The life I had been
leading had left me half a savage. In
my hurry got together a worse gang
OF rascals than those who had just de-