Rocky Ford enterprise., 1911-11-17
The Woman at
the Bottom OF It
- By GEO. II. TAYLOR -
Continued From Last Week.
PART ~.

Lieutenant SaStrO was Ill tHe par
lor OF the Sanford villa an evening or
two later. Miss Sanford was saying,
why should we not help to. free
from the handful OF men who are
tyrannizing over her and Dlundering
her This is your country and mine; (;
what have we to do with the Iberian
peninsula? Why should not man
born here rule use? Are not we pat
riots the rebels and these rebels the
patriots? What end but purely SEN
timental one have we to serve in sup
porting the claims OF Spain as against
the claims of the insurrectos?"
Treason, treason!' interrupted the
young Lieutenant My story from
Eva Camel has infected you with her
virus"
What Eva Camel told lou proves
to be true. know that the nephew
of our late Commando loves me.
What Eva Camel said about loyalty is
also true. The character of the narra-
tor of fact may affect somewhat Our
belief OF it, but does not affect the
fact itself
But | must say goodnight. You
may trust me to keep Captain Nogales
gently at arms length and not precip-
time yet. The situation grows more
acute between our country and-I
mean between Spain and the United
States. Father says the crisis cannot
be much longer delayed. All it needs,
he says, is that some Cuban should
add a spark OF hatred OF Spain to the
magazine OF sympathy for Cuba that
the Americans have been developing
so fast i'll their present Congress and
the war is on. ] do not know whcth-
er to hope for it or fear it. only
feel that it is time this brutal civil
war was somehow brought to an end.
Goodnight
PART V.
Lieutenant Castro's hand rested
rather uneasily upon small solid ta-
: BILE that stood on the floor of an un-
dcrground chamber of the foriifca-
tions that overlook Havana harbor.
The table formed the focus of laby-
rinth of electric wires that led by i'm
dcrground conduits to the water side.
He was alone.
In the harbor there swung at her
anchor one of the fine ships of the
United States navy.
Rising to his feet the young man
strobe with the dignified step of a
citcment lie could not altogether dis
window through which could be had
glimpse of the bay.
another fifteen minutes and she
will have swung across the quarter
circle and her bow will be directly
over the mine he mused. III the
wind would veer and carry her the
other way round could knock her
propellers off with little other dam
age
He went back to the table and
again his hand rested SO that his two
first fingers were suspended over an
electric key, while his feet resumed
an uncomposed attitude partially un-
der the table.
Shall | touch it?" he asked him
self rs it true that all is fair in
love and war? Shall defeat Weyler
and his nephew at one stroke? shall
probably send FIVE hundred souls,
more or less, into eternity. But wha,
is five hundred sudden and almost
painless deaths by drowning to the
long drawn out misery of the thou
sands dying by inches of starvation in
the Island? Measured simply by
numbers this will be merciful act.
the enemies of these thousands. On
the contrary, they are friends as far
as they dare be- Shall l make them
unconscious martyrs to our cause?
Greater love hath no man than this
that he lay down his life for his
friends. How many of them would
willingly lay down their lives for the
reconcentrados? Some few might do
so. Their countrymen are clamoring
for war that will free Cuba. Do
they mean it? Will their Drofessedly
unselhsh purpose ever rise to the oc-
casion? Not unless it is mixed with
little vengeance. Shall | supply it?
1t looks as if had but to press this
button and by that act give the need
ed impulse. / was not revolutionist
until last Sunday. How rapidly a man
may undergo mental transforma-
ton. If the General had not evolved
his despicable purpose to marry his
favorite nephew to Madeline | should
have remained loyal subject of the
thing of the sentiments of either his
nephew or of Madeline? Not bit of
it. He only knows that her father
owns ten thousand fertile acres of
this fair island. He knows that the
easiest way to keep those acres under
the SpanisfiSdominion is to marry the
Senorita to loyal Spaniard To
marry her to his nephew would be
killing two birds with one stone. That
is why he has made this proposition
to her father. That is why he has
intimated that il his plan is not ac-
quiesced in he will secure the passage
of law in the Cortes that will disin-
herit every American of his estate in
Cuba
He rose and walked again to the
loophole in the heavy rampant of the
| fort.