Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1915-09-16
CHAPTER X.
Lost-Ths Diamond From the Sky!

Lost-Ths Diamond From the Sky!
land. what of the diamond from
IA the Sky? Torn from the fair
IA throat of Vivian Marston, it
: lies In a mail box. With no
light to gleam upon it and be reflected
back Intensified. With letters and
packages and newspapers folded tight
lies the diamond from the sky without
a stamp to make it mail Of any class.
! linen comes the busy mail collector,
with his mail collecting car. Their" is
some excitement at the Randolph man
sion close by. Police whistles are
blowing and q laundering fight is going
on on the sidewalk.
But Bob Adams is one Of Uncle
Sans mail men. Way for the U. S.
mail, which has no time to stop for
police, police whistles or shindies OH
the street. But it attracts his atten-
ton, as do some hurrying passersby.
and he opens the mail box and me.
chanically drags its contents into the
open rlawsOf the drawstring regula-
ton canvas mail bag. Into the sack
while Bob Adams, mail man, looks
with avcfted head toward the elegant
scrap goes the mail from box 413, and
with it goes the diamond from the Sky.
Bob Adams gets back from his col
lection route to the postoflice an hour
later. His work is through, and he
stops In to see his friend, the sergeant
at police headquarters, to learn what
the row was all about that caused such
a commotion and evidently put a crimp
in the swell ball given by that grande
dame Of Richmond, Mrs. Burton Ran
dolph.
Meanwhile on the sorting tables at
the postofice the local collections arc
being dumped from the mail bags. The
clerk Losses the drawstrings and holds
the bags up from their bottom corners
and shakes out the mail with deft and
practiced rapidity. On the floor the
emptied mail bags pile. They see hard
service, and some are rent and frayed.
The Inspector ZONES on his rounds
and goes over the empties, marking
briskly with a large piece of chalk
Repair" on those that need mending
and renovation.
Out to the loading platform go for
the time being the condemned mail
bags. and there all night they lay in
tie arc light, with only the eye Of the
night. Waterman upon them OCCASION
ally.
Dawn breaks at a small way station
forty miles from Richmond. Here the
freight train halts for ORDERS. and here
Arthur, so clamped and sore that ev-
cry fiber Of his being aches. crawls
from his perilous perch and creeps
from under the car into The dusky day
light. Choked With dust. marked and
matted with grease and dirt, DISNEY
eled and ,pitiful in what was his mas
culine tinery OF the. night before, Ar
thur limps toe a small pool OF water
between the tracks and is not too
dainty to throw himself down beside
it and suck up its refreshing GOODNESS
to his cracked lips and parched and
feverish throat.
The trainmen are busy with their
own concerns at water tank and tele-
graph station. far up the track. and on
the other side Of the, train. Across
from him is aSfreight, going out on a
branch line. The open door Of a freight
car seems to call him to its shelter
ing haven Of escape. Arthur darts
across the track, realizing what a ridic-
ulous figure he must seem in his stain.
ed and disheveled dress suit, a mark
ed and battered silk hat still clamped
tightly on. his head.
The outgoing freight is gaining mo.
mentum as Arthur filings himself half