Five Mile Beach weekly journal., 1915-09-24

the old life and the new, lurid with
contrasts, and, as the pictures OF
things thousands of miles away rose
before his eyes as clearly as the ser
ried backbone of the ridges, he was
comparing and settling for all time
the actual values and proportions of
the things in his life.
He saw the streets of Paris and
New York, brilliant under their
strings of opalescent lights; the
Champs Elysees raj its smooth, tree
trimmed parquetry from the Place de
Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe, and
the chatter and music of it's cafes rang
in his ears. The ivory spaces of Rome,
from the Pincian hill, where his fancy
saw almond trees in bloom, to the
Piazza Venezia, spread their eternal
story before his imagination. He saw
buses and hansoms string through
the mud and fog of London and the
endless ~pot-pourri of Manhattan. All
the things that the outside world had
to offer; all that had eve stirred his
pulses to a worship of the beautiful,
the harmonious, the excellent, rose in
exact value. Then he saw again the
sunrise as 1t would be tomorrow norm
ing over these ragged hills. He saw
the mists rise and grow wisp-like, and
the disk of the sun gain color, and all
the miracles of ~cannoning tempest
and caressing palm-and, though he
had come back to fight, a wonderful
peace settled over him, for he knew
that, If he must choose these, his ma
tive hills, or all the rest, he would
forego all the rest. And Sally
Would she be changed? His heart
vas ~hammering wildly now. Sally
had remained loyal. 1t was a mir
acle, but it was the one thing that
counted. He was going to her, and
nothing else mattered.
He lifted his head and sent out a
long, clear whippoorwill call, which
quavered ON the night much like the
other calls in the black hills around
him. After a moment he went nearer,
in the shadow of a poplar. and re-
peated the call.
Then the cabin door opened. Its
jamb framed a patch of yellow candle
light, and, at the center, a slender
silhouetted figure, in a futtering, eager
attitude of uncertainty. The figure
turned slightly to side, and, as it
did so, the man saw clasped in her
right hand the rifle, which had been
his mission, bequeathed to her in trust.
She hesitated, and the man, invisible
in the shadow, once more initiated the
bird note, but this time 1t was so low
and soft that it seemed the voice of a
whispering whippoorwill.
Then, with a sudden glad little cry,
she came running with her old fleet
grace down to the road.
Samson had vaulted the stile and
stood in the full moonlight. AS he
saw her coming he stretched out his
arms and his voice broke from his
throat in a half-hoarse, passionate cry:
SALLY"
1t was the only word he could have
spoken just then, but 1t was all that
was necessary. 1t told her everything.
1t was an outburst from a heart too
full of emotion to grope after speech,
the cry of a mar for the One Woman
who alone can call forth an infection
more eloquent than phrases and POI
etry. And, as she came into his out
stretched arms as straight and direct
as a homing pigeon, they closed about
her in a ~convulsive grip that held her
straining to him, almost crushing her
in the tempest of his emotion.
For a time there was no speech, but
to each of them it seemed that their
tumultuous heartbeating must sound
above the night music, and the teleg-
raphy of heartbeats tells enough.
Later they would talk, but now, with
a g~loriously wild sense of being to-
gether, with a mutual intoxication of
JOY because all that they had dreamed
was true, and all that they had feared
was untrue, they stood there under
the skies clasping each other-with
the rifle between their breasts. Then
as he held her close, he wondered
that a shadow of doubt could ever
have existed. He wondered if, except
III SOLu0 nASuLlAdAO vi AdAluCl1dLlUu, II
had ever existed.
The flutter of her heart was like
that of a rapturous bird, and the play
Of her breath on his face like the
fragrance of the elder blossoms.
These we're their stars twinkling
overhead. These were their hills, and
their moon was smiling on their tryst.
He had gone and seen the world
that lured him; he had met its diff
culties and faced its puzzles. He had
even felt his feet wandering at the
last from the path that led back to
her, and now. with her 1.-THE figure
close held in his embrace, and her
red-brown hair brushing his temples,
he marveled how such an instant of
doubt aOi1Id have ovicfod HQ knQW