The Huttig news., 1910-01-22
KARL ENGEL.| |ADvENTURER|
 l By
 | DONALD kENNICOTT
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Copyright. by Bobbs- Merrill Co)

the deep sleep 0f n00ntide and of re- | pletion Within. Karl Engel himself leans back in his chair. with his pudgy hands clasped over his fat stom- ach. and-dozes. The young reporter | who stands on the street corner wait | ing for car which is to bear him down 10 his daily tasks. for the hun 1 dredth time tells himself gloomily | that the world is composed entirely of the bourgeoisie. and that Karl Engel in particular, dozing there in the butcher shop. is bourgeois to the nth power
 Whistling progressively. Karrs as sistant comes in from his belated luncheon and resumes his apron. The wholesalers wagon backs up to the sidewalk. and Karl, bestirring him. self to picker with the driver concern ing the choice of meats, presently staggeYs back into the shop under an imposing quarter of beef. With a mighty heave. he lifts it so that it shall catch the hook, and as it swings into place on the rack, he brings it to standstill with a resounding slap that is really caress. and murmurs to himself: sAch, he was a fine fel- low now. He came from out there"
 For though Karl's body was cab ined within the narrow precincts of a metropolitan meat market, his soul fa~ed far abroad into the celestial spaces of the western wilds- into that fair, free, fabulous land of Bret Harte and large pistols. of Mayne Reid and savage beasts, of Harry Castleman and mad Mexicans. Out there the good, brave beef cattle roamed up and down, paving the earth, until the circling ''lasso" laid them low; out there the ipsirlious Indian added arrows to ones person and rare zest to every enter p'ise; and there was gold and blood afd fire-a mans world Ach, him nel. some day he would go, even he. Karl Engel, of Market street would ga out there. away from beeyes which ware but stiff and bloodless simula- era, away from men who were but pa.e, soulless shadows, away from yes, one must be prepared to make some sacrifices-away from the big, brown glass at Kohlberg's on the l corner.
 With each recurring spring there came days when. occasion permitting Karl would shuttle uneasily up and | down the sawdusted floor of the shop, instead of dozing in his chair Al ways then, Paul Ludwig, the assistant, who was ambitious to possess a shop Of his own. would inquire quite perti- nently why. then, he did not go out there. But always Karl would sigf gioomily, and defer the day of depart ure until his bank-account should have reached the definite and delectable sum of s2.500; and gradually the springtime and the Wanderlust would wear away together.
 Yet, at last, on rare balmy day in March. there came news that the death of that far-away uncle which sets so many ambitions at liberty to vault. had placed to Karls credit a multi tude of marks, which, when trans lated into the good round dollars of the republic, brought the bank account
 
 was now his own man; and Karl. after pacing up and down in the sawdust for a stormy hour, thumped down his fist upon the cleaver-block and spoke with the stern voice of mighty resolve. He would go; tomorrow he would go and Paul Ludwig must run the shop and hire new assistant
 
 Sleepless hours of preparation en- sued. First the making of his will, in which as a childless widower. he bequeathed the bank account to his brothers little girl and the shop to the faithful Paul Ludwig. Next, the packing of the ancient leather trunk-an op- evation that for years he had re- fhearsed and secretly prepared for. Side by side in it's capaeious depths were tucked the Maekinac blanket suit which he had bought nine years be- fore, on hearing it's eold-resisting vir- tues praised by reformed lumber jack in Kohlbergs back room; the slashed Mexican trousers of black vel veteen which six years before he had seen worn at the masked ball of the County Democracy, and had astutely traced back to the costumers whence | they came, the low-heeled farmers boots which he had observed in the window of a shop near the Union sta ton, the harmless, necessary red handkerchief and the smoked goggles with which to combat the desert sun. With them, too were placed the ''lasso' which on a glad, golden day long ago, while over at the yards to. pay his bills, Karl had seen fall from the saddle of one of the yard herders; the big pistol upon which he had looked with coyeious eyes for months, as 1t lay i'll the dusty pawn shop window. until he had seen an- other customer considering it and had been frightened into immediate pur- ] chase; and last-but, oh. not least-- !. the long, brass-mounted target rife. with it's exaggerated butt-plate and fore-end handle, with which Karl. at the monthly meeting of the Schutzen- verein, given solid rest and six min