The Cairo bulletin. (Cairo, Ill.) 1???-1928, 1914-02-09

dumped and fiuttered down upon the
door a long fiattish object wrapped
in paper, = newspaper clipping and
letter.
Puzzled he unfolded the crackiing
thing in his hands. Why he said
half aloud. ''its--it's deed made ever
to me-" He overran 1t swiftly. Part
of an old Colony grant 80 q
plantation in Virginia. twelve hun
dred odd acres, given under the hand
of Il viceregal governor In the elk
teenth century. had no idea tfties
In the United States went back so Ear
as that" His eye fed to the and,
"It was my father'st What couid n
have wanted OF an estate in Virginia
II must have come into his hands In
the course of business"
He picked up the newspaper clip
ping. 1t was worn and broken In the
folds as If IT had been carried for
months In pocketbook.
1t viii Interest readers of this sec
ton OF Virginia 1.-THE paragraph be
gam to learn, from a recent transfer
received for record at the County
Clerks office, that Damory Court has
PASSED to Mr.. John Valiant, minor"
He turned the paper over and found
a date; 1t had been printed In the year
OF the transfer to himself, when be
was six years old-the year his father
had died. Y"s
: John Valiant, minor. the son OF
the former owner.
There are few Indeed who do not
recall the tragedy with which in the
public mind the estate is connected
The fact, moreover, that this old home
stead has been left IN its present state
(for, as Is we'll known, the house has
remained with all It's contents aud fur
ntshings untouched) to rest during 50
long a term OF years unoccupied. could
not, of course, fail to be commented
on, and this circumstance alone has
perhaps tended to keep alive a melan
choly story which may well be for
gotten"
He read the elaborate, rather stilted
phraseology In the twenty. yearold pa.
per with a wondering interest AN
old house. he unused. with a bad
name. Probably he couldn't sell It,
and maybe nobody would ever live In
it. That would explain why 1t re-
NAMED SO long unoccupied-why there
are no records Of rentals. Probably
the land was starved and run down.
It's an Offset to the hall.bedroom
idea, at any rate he said to himself
humorously, 1T holds out an escape
from the noble army of rent.payers,
When my twenty-eight hundred Ia
gone, could live down there a landed
proprietor, and by the same mark an
honorary colonel, and raise the cab
bages | was talking about-sh, Chum ?
while you stalk rabbits. How does
that strike your"
He laughed whimsicalfy. He, John
Valiant, Of New York, nrstnighter at
its theaters, hail-fellow.weil-met In its
club corridors and welcome diner at
any one of hundred brilliant glass.
misunderstanding supper tables. en-.
tombed on the wreck of Virginia
plantation. would-be country gentle.
man, on an automobile and next to
nothing year! ~
He bethought himself of the fallen
letter and possessed himself Of 1t
quickly. 1t lay with the superscrfp-
ton side down, On it was written. in
the same hand which had addressed
the other envelope:
For my son, John Valiant,
When he reaches the age Of twenty
That, then, had been written by his
father-and he had died nearly twenty
years ago. He broke the seal with =
strange feeling as if, walking in some
familiar thoroushfare. he had STUN
bled ON . hchened and sunken tomb
stone