Five Mile Beach weekly journal., 1914-02-27
CHAPTER TX.
Damory Court.

Oars Danny Coot
ahaid, sub"
John Valiant looked up. Facing
them at an elbow of the broad road,
was an old gateway of time-nicked
stone, clasping an iron gate that was
quaint and heavy and red with rust.
He put out his hand.
wait a moment" he said in a low
voice, and as the creaking conveyance
stopped, he turned and looked about
him.
Facing the entrance the land fell
away sharply to a miniature valley
through which rambled a willow-bor-
dered brook, in whose shadows short
horned COWS stood lazily. Beyond,
whittier wound the Red Road, he
could see a, drowsy village, with a
spire and a cupolaed courthouse; and
farther yet a yellow gorge with a
wisp of white smoke curling above
it marked the course of a crawling
far-away railway.
FITS er moughty fine oil place. sub,
mid dat big revenue OBJ trees" said
Uncle Jefferson. But All reck'n ct
ain got none OBJ de modern comfy
ances."
AS Valiant jumped down he was
possessed by an odd sensation Of old
acquaintance-as If he had seer those
tall white columns before-an illu-
sorry half-vision into some shadowy,
fourth-dtmensional landscape that be-
llonged to his subconscious self, or
that, glimpsed in some immaterial
dream-picture, had left a faint-etched
memory. Then, on a sudden, the vista
vibrated and widened, the white col
M expanded and shot up into the
clouds, and from every bush seemed
to peer a friendly black savage with
woolly white hair!
"Wishing-Housei" he whispered.
The hidden country which his fathers
thoughts, sadly recurring, had painted
to the little child that once he was,
in the guise of an endless wonder
talei His eyes misted over, and 1t
seemed to him that moment that his
father was very near.
Leaving the negro to unload his be-
1ongings, he traversed an overgrown
path of messed gravel, between box
rows frowsled like the names of lions
gone mad and smothered In an ac-
emulation of matted roots and debris
of rotting foliage, and presently, the
bulldog at his heels, found himself
In the ear of the house.
"Minel" he said aloud with a rueful
pride. And for general rundown
ness, it's up to the advertisement"
He looked musingly at the piteous
wreck and ruin, his gaze sweeping
down across the barred fields and UNI
kempt forest. "Minel. he repeated.
~AIl that, I suppose, for it has the
same earmarks of neglect. Between
those cultivated stretches it looks like
a wedge of Sahara gone astray." His
gaze returned to the house. yet what
q place it must have been in its timel"
he went slowly back to where his CON
ductor sat on the lichened horse
block.
yves heah," called Uncle Jefferson
o~heerfully. Whit we gwinter do
mex, sub? Reck'n All better go oyah
ter Miss Dandridge's place fer er
crowbah. Lawd!" he added, "ef he
ain got de keyi Whut yo' think OBJ
dat now?"
John Valiant was looking closely at
the big key; for there were words,
which he had not noted before en-
graved in the massive iange. Friends
all hours" He smiled. The sentiment
sent a warm current of pleasure to
his inger-tips. Here was the very
text of hospitality!
A Li1liputian spider-web was
stretched over the preempted keyhole,
and he fetched a grass-stem and poked
out its tiny gray-striped denizen be-
fore he inserted the key in the rusted
lock. He turned 1t with a curious
n Of timidity. All the strength of
his fingers vas necessary before the
massive door swung open and the lev
cling Jul sent its late red rays into
the gloomy interior.
| He stood In a spacious hall. his nos