The Tupelo journal., 1912-01-19
Cay,ey looked at the assassin curl.

the others, u seemed very mucn
bigger; seemed to walk with less OF
a SLOUGH, and had, even to Cayley's
limited view of him, an air of authori-
ty. Cayley was surprised at his not
being armed with a bow, for he knew
OF no other way in which a dart could
have been propelled with power
enough, ever at close range, to have
transiiXed a mans throat. The assas-
sins only weapon, except for a CULVER
full of extra darts, seemed to be q
short blunt stick, rudely whitfield,
perhaps ten inches long.
Obedient, apparently, to the order
of the new arrival, the party changed
it's direction, leaving what was EVIL
IDENTIFY a well-known path to them, for
a seemingly more direct but rougher
route. And they moved now with an
appearance of haste. Presently they
scrambled over a precipitous ledge OF
ice and, in a moment, were lost to
Cayley's view.
The world was suddenly empty
again, as if no living foot had eve
trodden it; and Cayley, lowering
there, a little above the level of the
ice, rubbed his eyes and wondered
whether the singular, silent tragedy
he had just witnessed were real, or a
trick the mysterious arctic light had
played upon his tired eyes. But there
remained upon that vacant scene two
material reminders OF the tragedy to
which 1t had afforded q setting. One
was smudge of crimson on the snow;
the other, a little distance Oh, just
this side of the icy ridge over which
the last of the party had gone scram-
bling a moment before. was the
strange looking blunt stick which he
had seen In the assassin's hand.
Cayley few Q little lower, his wings
almost skimming the ice. Finally,
reaching the spot where the thing had
fallen, he alighted and picked 1t up.
Whether its ~possessor had valued it,
or not, whether or not he might be
expected to return for It, Cayley did
not know, and did not much care.
He stood for some tins tasnfnG the
thing over In his hands, pushing ever
1t, trying to make out how 1t could
have been used ~ the instrument Of
propulsion to tA3t deadly ivory dart
with q small ivory plug at the end.
The other end was curiously shaped,
misshapen, rather, for, though It was
obviously the end mi held. Cayley
could not make it fit his hand. what
ever position he held it In.
Giving up the problem at fast. Re
tucked the stick into his belt, slipped
his arm through tine strap in the
framework of his aeroplane and pre-
pared for flight. He had q little diff
Guilty getting up, owing to the absence
of a breeze at this point. Finally ne
was obliged to climb. with a good deal
OF labor. the icy ridge up which he
had watched the little party Of MUIR
derers scrambling.
At the crest he cast q glance
around, looking for them, but saw no
signs of them. Then, getting a favor
able slant of the wind, he mounted
again into the element he now called
his own.
Five years before Philip Cayley
would have passed for a good exam
pie of that type OF clean-limbed, clean
minded. likable young man which the
best of our civilization seems to be
Towering into. Physically, 1t would
have been hard to suggest an improve
ment In him, he approached 90 near
the ideal standards. He was fne
grained, supple, slender, smalljointed.
thoroughbred from head to heel.
Intellectually, he had been good
enough to 90 through the academy at
West Point with credit, and to grad
uate high enough In his class to be
assigned to service in the cavalry. His
standards OF conduct. his ideas OF hon.
or and morality had been about The
same a. those Of the best third Of his
classmates. II his fellow officers in
the Philippines. during the year Oh
two he spent in the service, had been
asked to pick . flaw In him, which
they would have been reluctant to dc,
they would have said that he seemed
to them a bit too thinskinned and
rather fastidious; that vas what his
chum and only intimate friend, Perry
Hunter, said about him at any rate.
But he could afford to be fastidt-
Gus, for he had about all a man could
want, % would think. For three
generations they had taken wealth
for granted in the Cayley family. and
with 1t had come breeding, security
of social position, simplicity and cas-
in making friends. both among men
and m In short, there could b
no doubt at all that up to his twenty
ninth year Fate had been ironically
kind to Philip Cayley. She had given
him no hint, no preparation for the
stunning blow that was to fall upon
him, suddenly, out Of 50 clear . sky.
When 1t did fall. It cut his life
clean across so that when he thought
back to that time now, 1t seemed to
him that the Lieutenant Cayiey Of the
United States army had died over
there in the Philippines. and that he,
the man who was now soaring in those
great circles through the arctic sky,