The Glenwood post., 1916-06-24

AleUer uFUppeu lu0 Sueet anu went
OF to the kitchen. Gerry and Kemp
covered the stripped body and tucked
many blankets over it. Lieber came
back and took of half the blankets.
Mustn't tire him with weight" he ex-
planned. "If he's going to sweat, he'll
sweat all right. Malaria-mallgnant
fever-is the tiredest disease in the
world. When they get too tired to
breathe, that's the end" He took hold
of Alan's wrist. ITO feel his pulse,
you'd say he was dead now"
"'Bout time we was startn'," re-
marked Kemp with his eyes toward
the declining sun.
Gerry's first impulse was to say he
would stay. but he suddenly remem-
bered Margarita. How far away from
life she seemed! Alan and Margarita
could not crowd into one day or even
into one world-it was against the or
der of things. But facts do not stand
on the order of their coming. they sim
ply come, and against the protest of
mans will they present his fate:
against the cry of the troubled and
displaced soul they voice the eternal
~ suis, ~ reste of inanimate things.
Ono cannot 60 around . fact One
must either break ones head against
1t or swallow 1t and let 1t take Its
course through the mental gorge.
Gerry longed to stay by Alan's side,
and through his returning conscious.
ness, as through magnlfying glass,
gaze upon the world he had foresworn
the heritage he had abandoned. But
the fact of Margarita and her boy
suddenly declared itself-demanded
digestion-and Gerry turned his back
on Alan. He mounted, and with the
silent Kemp reversed the drive they
had made together months before.
Lieber did not go with them. When
he had seen them OF, he busted him
self giving orders for the tidying up
Of the veranda, the feeding Of Alan's
convoy, beast and man, and the prepa-
ration of room for the selflnvited
guest. From the pile Of dusty pillows
a servant was picking up, fell board.
Lieber glanced down at it. Words
were cut roughly but clearly into itt
surface. They spoke to him. They
held his eyes. He stopped laboriously
and picked up the board. He took II
into his private room, propped 1t up
against some books on the table and
sat before 1t with his face dropped
In his hands. To his closed eyes the
words seemed no longer carved in
wood. Against the inward darkness
of his brain they shone out in points
Of light. He could not shut them out.
"Qui de nous ma pas eu ga terre
promise, son jour d'extase, ct sa fin en-
exil"
At sundown Lieber came out to his
patient. He had him moved, settle
and all, into room whose windows
opened upon the veranda. Lieber sat
beside him and nursed him through the
long, hot night. To the deftness Of
his hand had been added tenderness
and into his face a new determination
had cOme-a resolve to win Alan'e
battle for him whatever the odds.
! Gerry did not sleep that night. He
lay on the little extra bed he had made
upon his sons arrival and. proppine
himself on his elbow, gazed around
him. The moon shone through great
cracks in the warped shutters and
filled the room with glow that, as his
eyes dilated, became a revealing light.
In one corner was an iron wash-stand
with its vessels of coarse enameled
metal, a recent purchase. In another
corner stood grotesque clothes-rack.
1t looked like young pine with irreg.
ular branches and top Topped OF. On
the stubs or pegs hung his clothes and
Margarita's and, on the lowest peg Of
all, the Lilliputian garments of the
Man. The floor was bare and rolling.
for the boards, roughhewn from hard.
wood giants of the forest, had warped
steadily through many years. In its
center stood the great rustic bed that
Gerry had made from the twisted
limbs Of trees and Bonifacio had plait-
ed with thongs. By raising himself
to the full length of his arm Gerry
could see Margarita lying uncovered
on the coarse, yeilowish homespun.
On her bare, brown arm lay the black
head Of her son. @ "A
Gerry shuddered at the nsafnsss-
the familiarity-of everything. The
seams Of elementary life stood out bru-
tally. For the first time he saw them.
From the touch of the coarse homespun
that covered him, his mind went back
to the feel Of Lieber's Ane linen, and
from that 1t poised on Alan and then
dew back to Alix-Alix, who, seen
through the years, became doubly ethe-
real and dowerlike. Where was Alix?
What had Alan done with herr He
must ask him. That, at least, he must
know. But before he could ask he
must decide about Margarita and steel
himself to his purpose. He thought Of
the long, still days at Fazenda Flores
before Alan had come to Lieber's-the
struggle and the reward that had been