Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1913-07-31
CHAPTER III.
rhe Neyer-Neyer Land.


The Never-Never Land.
UsK had fallen that evening
III when John Valiant's Pannaro
~ turned into a cross-street ana
circled into the yawning mouth OF
his garage. Here, before ne oes-
cended. he wrote a check ON ms
knee with a SOLDERING fountain pen
Lar" he said to the chauffeur
"as / dare say you've heard, things
have not gone exactly smoothly
with me lately, and I'm uncertain
about my plans I've made arrange
ments to turn the car over to the
manufacturers, and take back the
old one. must drive myself mere
after. I'm sorry. but you must look
for another place"
The dapper young Swede touched
his cap gratefully as he looked at
the checks figures. Embarrassment
was burning his tongue. live
heard sir. I'm sure it's very kind,
sir, and when you need another
Thank you, Lars said Valiant,
as he shook hands, and good luck.
I'll remember"
Lars, the chauffeur looked after
him. "Going to skip out he Isl /
thought so when he brought that
stuff out of the safe deposit. Afraid
they'll try to take the Doodle away
from him, l guess. The papers seem
to think he's rotten, but he's been
mighty good boss to me-. He's a
dead swell all right, anyhow" he
added pridefully, as he slid the car
to it's moorings, land they'll have
to get up early to catch him
asleep,"
A little later John Valiant. the
bulldog at his heels, assembled the
steps of his club where he lodged
he had disposed of his bachelor
apartments fortnight ago. The
cavernous seats of the lounge were
all occupied, but he did not pause
as he STROBE through the hall. He
took the little pile of letters the boy
handed him at the desk and went
slowly up the stairway.
He wandered into the deserted Ii
brary and sat down, tossing the let
tiers on the magazine-littered table.
He had suddenly remembered that
it was his twenty fifth birthday.
In the reaction from the long strain
he felt physically spent He thought
of what he had done that afternoon
with sense of satisfaction. A re-
versal of public Judgment, in his
own case, had not entered his head
He knew his world-its comfortable
faculty of forgetting. and the multi
tude of sins that wealth may cover
To preserve at whatever personal
cost the one noble monument his
fathers genius had reared, and
TO right the wrong that would
cast its gloomy shadow on his
name - this had been his only
thought. What he had done
would have been done no matter what
the outcome of the investigation. But
now, he told himself. no one could
say the act had been wrung from
him. That, he tancied, would have
been his fathers way.
Fancied-for his irecollections of his
father were vague and fragmentary.
They belonged wholly to his pinafore
years. His early memories of his
mother were. for that matter, even
more unsubstantial. They were of a
creature of wonderful dazzling gowns
and more wonderful shining Jewels,
who lived for the most part in an
oversee city as far away as the
moon Che was later to identify this
as Paris) and who. when she came
home-Which was not often-took him
driving in the park and gave him
chocolate macaroons. He had always
held her in more or less awe and had
breathed easier when she had depart
ed. She had died in Rome a year
later than his father. He had been
left then without a near relative in
the world and his growing years had
been an epic of nurses and caretak-
ers. boys school on the continent,
and a university course at home. AS
far as his father was concerned he
had had only his own childish recol-
lections.
He smiled-a slow smile of rem
iniscence--for there had come to him
at that moment the dearest of all
those memories-a play of his child
hood.
He saw himself seated on a low
stool, watching a funny old clock
with a moon-face, whose smiling lips
curved up like military mustachios,
and wishing the lazy long hands
would hurry. He saw himself steal
ing down long corridor to the door
I of big room strewn with books and
papers, that through some baleful
and mysterious spell could not be
made TO open at all hours When