Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-11-01
CHAPTER XIX.
The Challenge.

Lidgerwood was unpieasantly surprised
to find that the presidents daughter knew
the man whom her father had tersei!
characterized as "a born gentleman and
Ia born buccaneer." but the fact remained
When he came with Flemister into thu
circle of light cast by the smaller OF tn.
two fires Miss Brewster not only wei
coined the mine owner, she immediatel,
introduced him to her friends, and made
room for him on the fiat stone which
served her for seat.
Lidgerwood sat on q tie end q little
apart, morosely observant. 1t Is the ours:
Of the self-conscious soul to find itself
often at the meeting point OF compari.
sons. The superintendent knew F1em
lister a little, as he had admitted to the
president: and he also knew that some
Of his evil qualities were of the sort
which appeal. by the law OF opposites
to the normal woman, the woman who
would condemn evil in the abstract. per
haps. only to be irresistibly drawn by
some Of it's purely masculine manifesto
lions. The cynical assertion that the
worst OF men can win the love OF the
best OF women is something both more
and less than a mere contradiction OF
terms: and since Eleanor Brewster's
manly ideal was apparently builded upon
physical courage as its pedestal. F1em-
lister. in his daredevil character. was
quite likely to be the man to embody II.
| But just now the gentleman buc-
cancer was not living up to the full
devil field. as Lidgerwood was not slow
to observe. His replies to Miss Brewster
and the others were not always coherent
and his face, seen in the Pickering fire.
light, was almost CHASTITY. True, the talk
was low toned and fragmentary; desul-
tory enough to require little of any men,
Der Of the group sitting around the
smolderfng fire on the spur embankment
Death, In any form, insists upon its
rights, Of silence and of respect, and the
spread Pullman-car sheets on the other
side of the spur track We're not to be
ignored.
Yet L.dgerwood fancied that of the
group circling the fire. Flemister was the
one whose eyes turned oftenest toward
the sheeted figures across the track
sometimes in morbid starings, but now
and again with the haggard side glance
OF fear. Why was the mine owner afraid
Lidgerwood analysed the query shrewdIy
Was he implicated in the matter Of the
loosened rail? Remembering that the
trap had been set, not for the passenger
train.- but for the special. the superin-
tendent dismissed the charge against
to incur the mine owners enmity-ai
least. nothing to call for cold-b'ooded
murder in reprisal. Yet the man was
acting very curiOusly. Much of the time
he scarcely appeared to hear what Miss
Brewster was saying to him. Moreover
he had lied. Lidgerwood recalled his
glib explanation at the meeting beside the
displaced rail. Flemister claimed to have
had the news Of the disaster by phone
where had he been when the phone mes
sage found him? Not at his mine Lid
gerwood decided. since he could not have
walked from the Wire-Silver to the wreck
in an hour. 1t was all very puzzling, and
what little suppositional evidence there
was, was conflicting. Lidgerwood put the
query aside finally, but with a mental
reservation. Later he would 60 into this
newest mystery and probe it to the bot
tom. Judson would doubtless have a re-
port to make, and this might help in the
probing.
Fortunately. the waiting interval was
not greatly prolonged: fortunately. since
for the three young women the reaction
was come and the full horror Of the dis
aster was beginning to make itself felt.