Ladysmith news-budget. [volume] (Ladysmith, Rusk County, Wis.) 1907-1927, 1909-04-08
CHAPTER XVIII.
A House With Barred Gates.

John Craig, to give Lathom the
name by which he had called himself
to his two new acquaintance lay
awake that night long after he had
gone to his room at the George the
Fourth inn at Dalebrook-a pleasant.
low-ceiled room, with faded chintz
curtains over the little, narrow, bulg-
ing windows, and an old four-post to
the reign of the sovereign who gave
the old-fashioned hostelry it's name:
he could not shake off the insistent
sense of strangeness and unreality
that had tinged the crowded events of
the last thirty-six hours.
Yesterday afternoon to be the CEN
tr@l figure in the stuffy court house,
charged with murder, to listen to the
interminable evidence that seems to
weave a rope of fatal circumstance
about one, to hear the decision of the
magistrates that the nature of the
evidence leaves no course open but to
send the case up for trial; and within
twenty minutes to find ones self unex-
pectedly, almost impossibly, given a
chance of freedom-as the events de-
filed through the drift of his thoughts
they seemed strangely remote and
real.
Then the tingling madness of that
dash across the open country, with
pursuers behind, pursuers creeping up
swiftly and surely; and his escape by
a ruse, only to be followed by the sud
den danger again when he had gone
to snatch farewell with the girl he
loved; one bad moment when all
seemed lost, and would have been lost
but for Floyd-good old Floyd, the vii
lage constable, who for once had de
liberately regarded his duty. Could
he actually have been the man to
whom these things had happened? AS
he looked back, it seemed almost like
part of some other mans life, now
when the hunted fugitive of yesterday
"a man with no friends to whom he
dared to go, with no aim Or occupa-
ton to stand between him and the
misery of his brooding thoughts-sud-
denly found himself a man with
friends and an occupation, engaged for
Chatterton's tour.
81 suppose it's all true-but it's more
like a dream!" Jack Lathom told him.
self suddenly.
He was now definitely a member of
Chatterton's company; already he had
been more than repaid for his kind
ness to the two actors. There had
been something appalling in the
thought this morning, in the reaction
after the excitement of his escape and
fight, that with the wide ways of
the world before him he was cut off
from all his friends, had no aim or
purpose.
It had come about through a half
playful remark he had dropped to
Grisson, that he felt almost inclined
himself to apply for an engagement
with Chatterton, as scene painter, act
or-anything.
'You are not serious, of course?" Joe
had said.
1t seemed so unlikely to him that
this new acquaintance, well dressed,
evidently with means, and gentle
man, should really want to attack him
self to a travelling show.
"Why not? I should be serious If
thought there was chance. Not be-
cause of the salary-that would be
only a secondary consideration. I'm
a Bohemian with only myself to con-
suit, and I should enjoy the novel ex-
perience, the fun of it. Only l
shouldn't have the ghost of chance,
of course
"Pm not so sure of that. Quite
likely Chatterton hasn't filled all va
cancies yet" cried Joe, quickly
you're an artist; never been on the
boards, suppose?"
"Only in amateur theatricals."
You'd be right enough in minor