The Caldwell watchman. (Columbia, La.) 1885-1946, 1915-04-16
CHAPTER !.
The MESSAGE From the Deep.

cycling the unrespOnsive blue envelOp
that lay on the end Of the long tabl
nearest the fireplace, where a merr
but unnoticed bed of Goals crackle
fiercely in the vain effort to cry dow
the shrieks of the bleak Decembe
wind that whistled about the corner
Of the house.
There was something maddening il
the fact that the envelope would haV'
to remain unopened until young Fred
erick Brood came home for the night
They found themselves wondering i
by any chance he would fail to come
in at all. Their hour for retiring was
ten o'clock, day in. day out.
Up to half-past nine they discussed
the blue envelope with every inmate
of the house, from Mrs. John Des
mond, the housekeeper, down to the
voiceless but eloquent decanter of port
that stood between them, first on the
arm of one chair, then the other. They
were very old men; they could solilo
quize without in the least disturbing
each other. An observer would say
during these periods of abstraction
that their remarks were addressed to
the decanter and that the poor decan.
ter had something to say in return.
But, for all that, their eyes seldom left
the broad, blue envelope that had lain
there since half-past eight.
They knew that it came directly or
Indirectly from the man to whom they
owed their present condition of COM
fort and security after half a century
of vfcissitudes; from the man whose
life they had saved more than once
In those old, evil days when comforts
were SO few that they passed without
recognition in the maelstrom of
events. From midocean James Brood
was speaking to his son.
Twenty years ago these two old GRO.
MES had met James Brood in one of
the blacklist holes Of Calcutta, dere-
lict being swept to perdition with the
sWlftness and sureness of a tide that
knows no pause. They found him
when the dregs were at his lips, and
the stupor of defeat in his brain.
Without meaning to be considered
Samaritans, good or bad, they dragged
him from the depths and found that
they had revived man. Those were
the days when James Broods life
meant nothing to him, days when he
was tortured by the thought that it
would be all too long for him to en-
dure, yet he was not the kind to muir.
der himself as men do who lack the
courage to go on living.
Weeks after the rescue in Calcutta
these two soldiers of fortune and an
other. John Desmond, learned from
the lips Of the man himself that he
was not such as they, but rich in this
worlds goods, richer than the Solo,
mon Of their discreet imagination.
What Brood told them of his life
brought the grim smile of appreciation
to the lips of each. He had married a
beautiful foreigner-an Austrian, they
gathered-of excellent family, and had
taken her to his home in New York
city, to the house in lower Fifth ave.
nue. where his father and grandfather
had lived before him-the house in
which two Of the wayfarers after
twenty years, now sat in rueful con.
temptation Of blue envelope.
A baby boy came to the Broods in
the second year Of their welded life.
but before that there had come a
mana music master, dreamy.eyed.
handsome, Latin; a man who played
upon the harp as only the angels NAV
play. In his delirious rawlings Brood
cursed this man and the wife he had
stolen away from him; he reviled the
baby boy, even denying him: he
laughed with blood.curdling glee over
the manner in which he had cast out
the woman who had broken his heart
and crushed his pride; he walled in
anguish over the mistake he had made
In allowing the man to live that he
might gloat and sheer in triumph. This
much the three men who lifted him
from hell were able to CLEAN from Inns
that knew not what they said. and
they were filled with pity. Later on
In a rational weakness, he told tbom
more, and without curses. A deem
silent, steadfast bitterness succeeded
tue violent rawlings. He became wav.
farer with them, quiet, logged fatal.
where they went he also went; what
they did, also did he. Soon he led and
they followed. Into the dark nlacoo
OF the world they plunged, for peril
meant little to him, death even loco
They no longer knew days of nrivs.
tion-he shared his wealth with them.
but they knew no rest, no peace. no
safety Life had been a whirlwind be.
fore they came upon James Brood. II
was a hurricane afterward.
Twice John Desmond, younger than
Danbury Dawes and Joseph Riggs
saved the life of James Brood nv
acts of unparalleled heroism; once in
a South African jungle when lion.
ess fought for her young. and again
in upper India, when single-handed
he held off a horde of Hindus for
days while his comrade lay wound.
ed in a cavern. Dawes and Riggs
IN the Himalayas, crept down the