Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1914-10-04

of trains to one living near a railroad. | The guns went on while tea was be- ing served; they ushered in dawn and darkness; they were going when sleep came to those whom they later awak- ened with start. Fights as desper- ate as the one around the house be- 1 came features of this period, which | was only warming-up practice for | the war demon before the orgy Of impending assault on the main line. Marta began to realize the immen- 1 sity of the chessboard and of the 1 forces engaged in more than the bare statement of numbers and distances. If first attack on a position failed, the wires from the Galland house re- peated their orders to concentrate | more guns and attack again. In the end the Browns always yielded, but grudgingly. calculatingly, never be- ing taken by surprise. The few of them who fell prisoners said, God with us! We shall win in the end!" and answered no questions. Gradually the Gray army began to feel that it was battling with a mystery which was fighting under cover, falling back under cover-a tenacious, watchful mystery that sent sprays of death into every finger of flesh that the Grays thrust forward in assault.
 Another position taken. Our ad- vance continues" was the only news that Westerling gave to the army, his people, and the world, which forgot it's sports and murders and divorce cases in following the progress of the first great European war for two gen. erations. He made no mention of the costs; his casualty lists were secret. The Gray hosts were sweeping for ward as slow, irresistible tide; this by Partow's own admission. He an- nounced the loss of position as promptly as the Grays it's taking. He published a daily list of casualties so meager in contrast to their own that the Grays thought it false; he made known the names of the killed and wounded to their relatives. Yet the seeming candor of bis press bureau included no straw of information of military value to the enemy.
 Westerling never went to tea at the Gallands' with the other officers, for it was part of his cultivation of great ness to keep aloof from his subordi- mates. His meetings with Marta hap pened casually when he went out into the garden. Only once had he made fn ho their interview in the arbor.
 T am winning battles for you!" he had exclaimed with the thing in his eyes which she loathed.
 To her it was equivalent to saying that she had tricked him into sending men to be killed in order to please her. She despised herself for the way he confided in her; yet she had to go on keeping his confidence, re- turning tender glance with one that held out hope. She learned not to shudder when he spoke of loss of "only ten thousand" In order to rally herself when she grew faint-hearted to her task, she learned to picture the lines of his face hard-set with five against-three brutality, while in com fort he ordered multitudes to death, and, in contrast, to recall the smile of Dellarme, who asked his soldiers to undergo no risk that he would not share. And after every success he would remark that he was so much nearer Engadir, that position of the main line of defense whose weakness she had revealed.
 "Your Engadir!" he came to say. "Then we shall again profit by your information; that is, unless they have fortified since you received it."
 "They haven't. They had already fortified!" she thought. She was al- ways seeing the mockery of his words in the light of her own knowledge and her own part, which never escaped her consciousness. One chamber of her mind was acting for him; a sec and chamber was perfectly aware that the other was acting.
 "One position more-the Twin Boul- der Redoubt, 1t is called" he an- nounced at last. We shall not press hard in front. We shall drive in masses on either side and storm the Hanks"
 This she was telephoning to Lan- ! stron a few minutes later and having. in return, all the news of the Browns. The sheer fascination of knowing what | both sides were doing exerted it's spell l ill keeping her to her part.
 They've lost four hundred thousand men now, Lanny," she said.
 And we only a hundred thousand l We're whiting them down." answered I Lanstron.
 "Whittling them down! What a ghastly expression!" she gasped. You are as bad as Westerling and I am worse than either of you! I-I an. nounced the four hundred thousand as if they were a score-a score In a game in our favor l am helping Lanny? All my sacrifice isn't for nothing?" she asked for the hun. dredth time.
 "1mmeasurably. You have saved us many lives!" he replied.
 And cost them many?" she asked. 1 "Yea Marta no douhf oha admitted.