The Forrest City times., 1913-04-11


 had put him and his dory ashore at our first landing, and had forthwith forgotten him.
 Macleod had been inclined to con tinue the search, but I argued that any further efforts in that direction would be only a waste of time The craft we were looking for might have come from any one of a thousand places and returned to any one of a thousand more Some more effective, general and far-reaching steps must be taken, 1 held, and taken quickly. Indeed l felt now that to keep secret longer the conspiracy, as indicated in those mystic letters, would be little short of criminal The aid of the po- lice and the press must be invoked at once. and nothing left undone to trace the crime to its source.
 But my first and most onerous task was to acquaint Evelyn Grayson with the facts as I knew them. How l shrank from that duty is beyond any thing l can put into words. l know it would have been far easier for me to have carried her definite news of her uncle's death. What I had to tell was horrible in it's stark obscurity. And yet, if I could have foreseen just what was to follow, I might have spared myself a goodly share of dis tress.
 l imagined I knew Evelyn Grayson, before this I thought 1 had sounded the profundities of her fortitude and courage on the night that l spread be fore her and read with her that third and last letter. But my fancy did her an injustice. She was even more of woman than I dreamed.
 Recently I chanced upon these lines by Thomas Dunn English, which must have been inspired by such a one as she:
 So much is clear,
 Though little dangers they may fear. When greater perils men environ. Then women show a front of iron; And gentle in their manner, they Do bold things in a quiet way.
 Evelyn Grayson did bold thing in a quiet way that morning. l have not yet forgotten how marble white she was. and yet how bravely she came, with springing step and lifted chin and fearless eyes. l had waited her coming in the music room, with it's score of reminders of happy evenings in which he had participated. The chair he usually chose, in the corner near the great bow window against which the east wind was now driving the rain in gusty splashes, took on a pathos which moved me to weakness. The Baudelaire lyric, spread open paged upon the music rack of the pi- ano, stirred memories scarcely less narrowing 4 photograph, an ash tray, a paper knife, all commonplace objects of themselves, but so linked to him by association, became, sud. denly, instruments of emotional tor ture.
 In this environment, under these influences, 1 rose to meet her, word less Yet my expression and attitude must have spoken loudly enough to confirm the dread that was in her heart, for even before she spoke I was sure that she knew. And then she had taken my two outstretched hands in hers and raised her brave eyes to mine, and low-voiced, but sure and tremorless, was saying:
 q feared it. Philip. From the very first, l feared it."
 And when I told her all, to the smallest detail, 1t was as though she were the man and I the woman for the recital had been for me very painful confession of my own incom- petence, and its conclusion left me more nervously unstrung than at any time since the night of the strange catastrophe. With what heroic forti- tude she heard the narrative may best be indicated by the statement that throughout 1t all she sat calmly atten- tive, but unquestioning, and with no sign of emotion beyond her continued pallor and a recurrent tensing of her small white hands. At the end l leaned forward and with left elbow on knee rested my forehead in my palm. She sat beside me on the same settee; and now she drew closer, and laying her cool right hand over my own dis engaged one. began stroking my hair with her left For a full minute she said nothing. Then, in soothing ac- cents:
 ''I am glad you didn't find the boat. That means he is on it. If you had found 1t, it would have been some or dinary thing having no connection with this affair. whatever"
 It was odd reasoning, but very fem mine, and in an esoteric way, forceful.
 But you made one mistake, Philip" she went on. You should not have let that fisherman, Peter Johnson, go"
 At this raised my head and regard ed her with something like astonish- ment
 He was one of them" she explained in a tone of conviction.
 How can you say that?' I asked. a little nettled. It annoyed me that she should be so positive, knowing no more of the man than that which I had told her.
 T feel it." she answered. And that