The Yale expositor. (Yale, St. Clair County, Mich.) 1894-current, 1914-11-26

ldAeu NlRllauCe. lie btOOu Inere pos
sibly thirty seconds, then a sharp fu-
sillade of clear reports barked out and
was shattered by the hills into a long
reverberation. With a hand clasped
to his chest. Purvy turned, walked to
the middle of the floor and fell
The henchmen rushed to the open
sash. They leaped out and plunged
up the mountain, tempting the assas-
sins fire, but the assassin was salts
fed The mountain was again as
quiet as 1t had been at dawn. Inside,
at the middle of the store, Jesse Purvy
shifted his head against his daugh-
ter's knee and said as one stating an
expected event:
We'll. they've got me-"
An ordinary mountaineer would
have been carried home to die in the
darkness of a dirty and windowless
shack. The long-suffering star of Jesse
Purvy ordained otherwise. He might
go under or he might once more beat
his way back and out of the quick
| sands OF death. At all events he would
| fight for life 10 the last gasp.
Twenty miles away in the core of
the wilderness, removed from a rail
road by a score of semi-perpendicular
miles, a fanatic had once decided TO
| found a school.
Now a faculty of ten men taught
such as cared to come such things as
they cared to learn. Higher up the
hillside h,,k
pital, with a modern operating table
and a case Of surgical instruments,
which, it was said, the state could not
surpass.
To this haven Jesse Purvy, the muir
der lord, was borne in litter carried
on the shoulders of his dependents.
Here. as his steadfast guardian star
! decreed. he found two prominent med
ical visitors, who hurried him to the
operating table. Later he was re-
moved to a white bed, with the June
sparkle in his eyes. pleasantly modu-
lated through drawn blinds. and the
June rustic and bird chorus in his
ears-and his own thoughts in his
brain.
Conscious, but in great pain, Purvy
beckoned Jim Asberry and Aaron Hol-
lis. his chiefs OF bodyguard, to his bed
side and waved the nurse back out OF
hearing.
"It don't get WELL" he said feebly
there's a job for you two boys.
reckon you know what IT isl"
They nodded, and Asberry whis
pered a name:
Samson South"
YES" Purvy spoke in a whisper;
but the old vindictiveness was not
smothered You got the old man,
reckon you can manage the cub. II
you don't he'll get you both one day
The two henchmen scowled.
I'll git him tomorrer," growled AS
berry. Thar hain't no sort of use
in a-waitin'."
moi" For an instant Purvy's voice
rose out of its weakness to its old
staccato tone of command, a tone
which brought obedience. III gel
we'll have other plans. Never minC
what they are. That's my business
| II i uOu ule, lCdNC dlOhGt uuNl
l give other orders.
IF get we'll and Samson South II
killed meanwhile | won't live Ions
either. II would be my life for his
Keep close to him. The minute yoJ
hear of my death-get him." He
paused again, then supplemented
you two will find something mighty
interestin' in my will"
1t was afternoon when Purvy
reached the hospital, and, at nightfal
of the same day, there arrived at his
stores entrance, on stumbling, hard
ridden mules, several men, followed
by two tawny hounds whose long ears
tapped over their lean jaws, anC
whose eyes were listless and tired, bu
whose black muZzles wrinkled anC
| shifted with that sensitive instinc
which follows the man scent. The ex
sheriff's family were instituting pro
ceedings independent of the chiefs or
ders. The next morning this party
plunged into the mountain tangle anC
heat the cover with the bloodhound
in leash.
The two gentle-faced dogs picked
their way between the Towering rho
dodendrons, the glistening laurels, tn,
feathery pine sprouts and the moss
covered rocks They went gingerl,
and alertly on ungainly, cushioned
feet. Just as their masters were de
spairing they came to a place directly
over the store, where a branch haC
been bent back and hitched to clea
the outlook and where a boot hee
had crushed the moss. There one o
them raised his nose high into tn,
air, opened his mouth, and let out
long, deep-chested bay of discovery.
CHAPTER ".
| George Lescott had known hospital