Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-01-19
Continued from page 4

Continued from page 4
way,-the dim light that came from the
shaded lamp in that hospitable room where
on so many nights the toy game of war and
the ocular turn of the cards had entertained
them.
"Halt!" commanded the General. "Stand
you here, and wait!"
HE pulled the door open abruptly, even as
= l he spoke, stepped inside, closed it, and
stood with his back against it, harshly scowl
ing at the old Prussian, who, startled, indig-
nant, had half risen to face him. The chess
men were on the table laid for the game, the
penuchle deck scattered across the cloth be-
side it. From the edge of the lampshade,
low over the table, Herr Roth looked at him,
his face depicting bewilderment and con-
fused emotions. The unceremonious en-
trance in itself would have meant nothing to
one fortified by innocence; but the stern,
grim, accusing face spoke tragedies. For a
long time they remained thus, each reading
the other and understanding, the accuser
and the accused soundless. The very room
that had resounded to their shouts, exulta-
tons, alterations, and mirth partook of this
stiffness, as if waiting for the General to
speak and end it all, to write FINS to the
Book of Friendship.
His arm, the one honorably crippled at
Sedan, came painfully up. The fingers of
his hand that had never trembled before an
enemy shook as if palsied. The voice that
had roared its commands so loudly as to
shrek its message above the scream of shells
now faltered and stammered until it could
gain strength.
"And so-and so," it said, @you-my
friend, the man l had learned to love, are
lawbreaker!"
There was another instant's pause, and
the voice resumed, with sad censure, as the
veteran, old and gray and stiff, took a step
or two away from the door.
"A criminal in the eyes of all that is law,
and discipline, and organization"
He spoke with increasing vehemence,
more coldly, more incisively, as he made his
arraignment, and the gray eyebrows drew
down and frowned fiercelv over his steady
old gray eyes
"A living lie, are you," he went on with
scorn "a man under false name! You told
me that private reasons and love of de-
mocracy made you assume the very name
by which you are known,-yOu, a man of
that noble birth for which, from infancy,
have been taught respect! You, cousin of
Kings, in the veins of whose mother flowed
the blood royal,-the blood that is supposed
thing of the ugly, the dishonest, the base!
Count Won Walthall is petty thief from the
government that has shielded him, and para
site on the glorious country that has &C
cepted him as an honest MANA rogue, a
rascal betrayer of honesty! And | have
loved him, and called him friend who have
fought for law and honor until my body
bends beneath the burden of its scars! All,
God! That one of your blood should come
to this! That | should come to this, that
loved you! That l cannot 60 back to my
Kaiser and tell him, that fine old man, that
l met you, and that you have done well!
That can never again speak your name, or,
if compelled to do so, that the words cannot
be uttered without blush!'
For a moment, as he spoke, Herr Roth
tried to assume that dignity for which he
had been known throughout the mountain
side; then slowly he withered back under
this fierce torrent of denunciation, settled
slowly, like one stricken, into his chair,
lower and lower, all the character lines of his
jolly, finely bred face scanning, and aging,
and pleading, until at last he put his hands
I'D and bent over into them He lifted his