The daily star-mirror. (Moscow, Idaho) 1911-1939, 1914-11-16
CHAPTER H..
The Sign Of tho Three.

The Sign of tho Three.
Out-of-doors, high brazen noon, a
day in spring, the clamorous life Of
New York running as fluent as quick
silver through its brilliant streets.
Within-doors, neither sound nor sun
beam disturbed perennial quiet that
was yet not peace.
| The room was like wide, deep
well OF night, the haunt of teeming
shadows and sinister silences.
Little, indeed, was visible beyond
| the lonely shape that brooded over
J it, the figure Of an old man notion
less in great, leather-bound chair.
His hair was as white as his heart
was black. The rack of his bones,
clothed In a thick black dressing
gown with waist-cord Of crimson silk,
from the thighs down was covered by
black woollen rug. He stared I'm
| blfnkingly at nothing: a man seven
eighths dead, completely paralyzed
but for his head and his left arm.
Presently faint clicking signal dis
turbed the stiffness. Seneca Urine put
of row Of crimson buttons embedded
| in the desk Something else clicked
this time a latch. There was the
faintest possible noise of a closing
door, and a smallish man stole noise,
lessly into the light, paused beside the
desk and waited respectfully for leave
to speak.
"Well?"
"a telegram, sir-from England"
"Give it mel"
The old man seized the sheet of yell
low paper, scanned it hungrily, and
crushed it in his tremulous claw with
a gesture Of uncomfortable emotion.
Send my daughter Judith here!"
Two minutes later a young woman
in street dress was admitted to the
chamber of shadows.
"You sent for me, father?"
"Sit down."
She found and placed a chair at the
desk, and obediently settled herself
in it.
"Judith-tell me-what day is this?"
my birthday I am twenty-one."
"And your sisters birthday: Rose,
too, is twenty-one."
Eyes"
"You could have forgotten that" the
old man pursued almost mockingly.
do you really dislike your twin-sister
so intensely"
The girls voice trembled. "You
know" she said, 1--WE have nothing in
common-beyond parentage and this
abominable resemblance. Our natures
differ as light from darkness"
"And which would you say was
light?"
Hardly my own: I'm no hypocrite.
Rose is everything that they tell me
my mother was, while 1.-THE girl
smiled strangely-'T think-I am more
your daughter than my mothers"
A nod of the white head confirmed
the suggestion. "It is true. l have !
watched you closely, Judith, perhaps
more closely than even you knew.
Before I was brought to this"-the
wasted hand made a significant ges-
ture-"I was man of strong pas
sions. Your mother never loved, but |
rather feared me. And Rose is the
mirror of her mothers nature, gentle,
unselfsh, sympathetic. But you, Jul
dith you are like a second self to
me-"
An accent of profound satisfaction
his voice. The girl waited
in silence that was tensely expect
ant.
"Then, if on this your birthday
were to ask a service of you that
might injuriously affect the happiness
If your sister,"
The girl laughed briefly: "Only
ask it,"
"And how far would you go to do
ny will?"
Where would you stop in the serv-
ce of one you loved?"
Seneca Urine nodded gravely. And
liter brief pause, Rose is In love-"
lie announced.
ooh, I know know" the father
lffirmed with faint ring of satisfac-
ion. 81 am old, cripple, prisoner Of
his living tomb; but all things
hould know-somehow-I come to
NOW in course Of time!"
TITS true-that Englishman she
craped an acquaintance with on the
riviera last year-what's his manner
Jaw, Alan Law"
"In the MAN," the father corrected
mildly, you are right. Only, he's not
English. His father was Wellington
Jaw. of Law & Son."
She knew better than to interrupt,
ut her seeming patience was belied
y the whitening knuckles of hand
hat lay within the little pool of blood
ed light.
And presently the deep voice rolled
n: Law and were once friends; /