Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1910-09-10
OTTUHN.AyUDUnIE0F
/. Il was the one to have leaped in

II was the one to have leaped In
after him.
"Poor boy! We should not have
come to the water"
With that she turned away and
commenced taking her garments
down off the hooks and folding and
packing them.
When the son could control his
voice he stepped to the telephone and
asked for his bill and ordered car
riage for the depot. Two hours later
mother and son were on their way
home. When they talked 1t was not
of what had happened on the wharf.
Don't you see he couldn't have
done anything else?" queried DR..
Hargraves at lunch, when some one
said that "the coward" he'd departed,
"IIe passes out Of our lives, of
course"
And it so comes about. When the
doctor again visited the safe deposit
company he saw young Mr.. Parker,
but neither bowed. Some one else
waited on the patron. People who
had met the young man socially at the
doctors residence inquired about him
in a careless way, and were as care
lessly answered. Now and then the
father wondered If the daughter had
been interested enough to care or be
up his mind. The affair had never
been referred to again after the first
day.
A whole year passed. Father and
daughter we're again bound for the
same hotel, but this time they were
motoring part of the way, the car
being driven by chauffeur.
In the middle Of the afternoon, on
broad highway, four foreigners who
had struck work in quarry not far
away and were ripe for mischief,
halted the auto to commit highway
robbery. The chauffuer was q
poltroon. He could have run them
down, but he halted the machine.
The doctor was not armed, but he
refused to leave the car, and struck
at the fellows who sought to pull the
daughter out Such one-sided con.
flict could not last long, and must
terminate in victory for the at.
tackers. They were pushing the ad.
vantage of numbers when a second
auto rolled up quietly behind them
and a young man leaped out. With.
out any weapons but his bare fists he
sailed into the four. They drew
knives on him, but he struck one after
another and fought f1ercely and 81
lently. The battle ragged up and down
the road for five minutes, and then
the used-up men retreated to the
woods.
The doctor and his daughter had
watched it without word They
knew the attacker, and they saw
blood on his face and hands as he
waved to them that the road was
clear and walked back to his own
machine.
at is Mr.. Parker!!" whispered Miss
May.
Hanged If it isn't!" replied the
father.
"But folks said he was coward.
"Um! I was among those who said
so. Cues we made a mistake some
where"
Ell hope SO!
"Eh? Eth? You hope what?"
The words were not repeated.
A week later, at the Haroor hotel
the doctor called his daughter into
his room to say:
I wrote to a friend Of mine in the
city and asked him to do me favor.
He had an interview with Mr.. Park
ar's mother. Say, dear, while the
public has a notion that your father
is a great doctor, want to admit to
you that he is a great fool"
''Why, what it Isl!
81 ought to have suspected some
thing of the kind from the first.
When Mr. Parker was child of two
his nurse let him fall into the water.
He had a close call from drowning.
It gave him a dread and horror
of the water and it will always be
with him. He's no coward. He sim
ply fears the one thing. Plenty OF
cases like it. I'm writing him very
abject letter this afternoon. Don't you
want to inclose something? II he'll be
sensible and forgive, I'll take him for
a son-in-law about year hence. Eth
Eth? That makes you blush, doesn't
it? believe you've been his champion
right along!"