The new era., 1910-11-10

It's affairs. He came armed with letters of in
PRODUCTION that opened the most exclusive
homes of the aristocratic English families to
him. Among the many young girls that he
met was the village belle, the affanced of the
young Scotch-American. 1t was another vara-
ton of that old triangle the and two
men, From the first the friends of young Thomp-
son could that his cause was hopeless His
affianced wife and the young stranger spent more
and mere Of their time together Little rumors
began to find their way about the village The
gossips, ever ready In small town.
busy. Thompson, moody and hurt by her sys-
tematic neglect was the last to hear and the last
to countenance the whispered talk that was go
ing the round OF the village loaing places.
Ihere was great hue and cry along the
quiet old streets summer morning. Thomp-
sons bride to be had disappeared. Her mother
had gone to her to awaken her and found
her gone. She had gone with the young man
ager of Albions latest business house. and from
that day to this neither of them have been heard
from
Young Thompson changed in a day from a
cheerful. happy lad to grim-faced man. He
became moody and silent. He neglected his work
and never went near the home to which he had
expected to lead his bride. Less than a month
after the flight OF the elopers there was more
excitement In Albion. 1t reported that Ed
ward Thompson had disappeared. The strain and
the shame of living in a town where every man.
woman and child knew the story of his Hitting
had proven too much for his sensitive, high-strung
nature.
While life flowed in the same uneven cur
rent in the village of his nativity he wander
Ing here and there among the emerald islands,
the lagoons and the coral reefs of the seas that
behold the Southern Cross.
All the islands that lie off the familiar track
OF the steamers knew him first and last In the
three or four years that he spent with the traders
and copra buyers. The Philippines, the Ladrones
the Solomons and dozen other island groups of
the southern Pacific were visited by him in the
epic years of his Odyssey. Finally he and his
trading companions touched at the island of Mai
keva in the Fills. One of the eternal civil wars
that are always disruptng the peace of the little
island Kingdoms was brewing in Naikeva when
the tramp schooner dropped anchor inside the reef
of coral that formed the harbor breakwater A
new claimant had risen for the throne and he
and his followers We're demanding the scepter
and the head of the old king.
Thompson had left Illinois, had put the states
behind him to escape the constant reminder of
MS lost love that he saw in every woman. The
wandering life of three four years had cleansed
his heart of but little bitterness against woman
kind. He had put the old life behind him and
dreamed only of adventure and never of bright
eyes and loving lips. 1t a mixed crew of
kanakas Malaysians and halfcastes aboard the
little trading schooner. They cared but little for
the kings and chieftains of the islands, but 1t
was part of their policy to be polite to the ma
tive rulers. An audience was arranged with the
native sovereign and a part of the ships COMPANY
attended laden with calicoes, mirrors and brass
rods as gifts. 1t was in the royal hut Thompson
Hrst SOW the Princess Lakanita. She stood at the
side of her fathers throne when the white men
entered the palm hut for their talk with the old
king.
Some indefinite attraction seemed to draw the
white adventurer and the brown-skinned princess
to each other They met many times while the
schooner was taking on its load of native prod
ucts. There was more than a little Spanish
blood in the veins of the old kings daughter Her
mother was half-caste Spanish woman and
much of the languorous beauty of the maids of
old CASTLE was the heritage of this barbaric
princess of the remote isle of Naikeva In the
half twilight OF the cocoanut groves he heard her