Charlevoix county herald., 1914-11-21
THE BLUE BOMB
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Of Hun1or, Mystery, Romance, and Adventure"
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expatirate. Perhaps that was the
mutual tie which attracted. White
Kate was the only person in the
Orient who knew who GaffOrd was.
Like Gafford, Kate had past
which dated well-niph even with his
own. Gafford had known the woman
in his cadet days, when she babe fair
to rise to the dramatic armament
as star.
He remembered her eclipse and the
hue and cry which followed her
name at the time she disappeared,
leaving a dead man behind her and
seemingly no trail. Dropping into
the House of Moon Faces for the
first time, some years before, he had
recognized her with a start, and
realized that. like himself, she was
a bit of human flotsam cast up on
the shore of the Orient.
Recognition had been mutual. She
had come to his table and they had
talked. He had found her living her
life as she found it, with an openly
expressed contempt for men and
their ways.
She had found a man without a
country-cynical, bitter, democrat
lied, nursing a fostering wound of
the spirit, and brazenly saying that
he did not care-half persuaded
that he told the truth-without aim
or object or ambition; a creature of
circumstance, as he frankly declared
yet not without a certain courage,
exhibited at time when he had
saved her from a drunken brawler's
knife.
Something of all this fitted in
broken fragments through Gafford's
mind as he sat on the pier. After
time he lifted his eyes and brought
them back to the distant yacht.
Despite their narrowed pupils.
their sight was good. Keen sight
was a Gafford inheritance. Conse-
quently he made out tiny white
dot, which shot out from the vessels
counter and made in toward the pier,
and recognized 1t as motor-driven
launch.
He watched it idly as it cut across
the oily roll of the ground swell
letting his eyes drop as it lessened
the perspective. SO at last he made
out its lines with distirctness, and
caught the flutter of the flag on the
stern, where it stood bravely out in
the breeze, created by the passage
of the launch.
Something rose tor a moment in
his throat. The next instant he
gathered his feet inward and made
to rise. Yet quite inexplicably he
paused.
A sudden stubborn opposition laid
hold upon him. "Why," he asked
himself, SHOULD he rise and stink
from observation because d bit of
colored BUNTING snapped in the
wind?"
Like hell I'll rum growled CAT
ford, and squatted down in mute
defiance of things and men.
The launc. came on, lost head
way, and swung in to the foot Of the
landing stairs. From the pier CAT
ford watched with sullen eyes. They
marked the trim uniform of the
boatmen, avoided the now dropping
flag, and swung to the other occu-
pants Of the launch.
They were two in number wo-
man and man. The latter was of
massive figure and a commanding
presence. There was a quiet dignity,
StilSt VI ItStINt itfCC dDOul IllIn
which Gafford felt.
Beneath his hat he caught a
glimpse of hair turning from brown
to gray, and face which, while
heavv, was strong. The nose was
well archcd and slightly aquiline
The eyes wide apart and set deep in
their sockets were open and clear,
and Gafford sensed rather than saw
that they were gray.
But it was the girl who drove some
Of the sullenness from the watchers
eyes end awakened interest in It's
stead. She was hardly what he could
call slender, yet he might not de-
scribe her as stout. Willowy was the
somewhat hackneyed term which
came into Gafford mind.
He guessed her as possibly five feet
five in height, and, having appraised
her stature, forgot all else in l.er face.
1t was fresh, clear, clean. It's eyes
were blue, and the swift harbor dash
had brought .inge of beauty to her
cheeks and lips. Hair, soft and
brown, had whipped out from under
Ter scarf trimmed hat.
She pushed it back into place as
the boat rounded to the steps and
stopped. Gafford always remembered
her in that first glimpse as glorious
specimen of American womanhood.
"Here, boyW
Gaffvrd became conscious that tie
large man had risen, picked up a
couple of suit-cases, and was extend
ing them toward him, in the evident
expectation that he would come for
ward and accept their burden.
For a moment resentment surged
hot within him. The man had adj
dressed him in the same tone he
would have used to a native bearer
a porter back home.
A profane and insulting refusal
trembled on his tongue, an .ddied as
his eyes fell again on the girl. He
rose and shuffled quickly down the
stairs. His hands received the out
stretched cases. and he stepped back
with his load.
The large man turned and assisted
the girl to land. And in that moment,
as she stepped to the stone Of the
quay, Gafford heard her speak in a
tone meant only for her companions
ears: "Father-the man is 7hite."
"Eh 2" said the other and turned
to stare at Gafford. "Oh-so he is"