The Blackfoot optimist. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1907-1918, 1916-02-17

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as she found herself separated from
these powerful friends? Once more
she found herself alone-and once
more in the blind instinct for self
preservation she did what she could
for her own safety.
She dared not think of the fate of
her friends. She mourned them now
as dead. but still in her subconscious
mind kept bitterly fighting the convic-
ton even as it came. And as she ar
gued, she found herself swept away
farther and farther from the place
where last she had seen them.
In some way, she knew not how
Kitty found herself among many 9th
ers upon the same considerable piece
of wreckage where Roleau and Fred
ericll had endeavored to place her
soon after the explosion Many others
now chung to this. She shuddered as
she cast a glance about her over the
water, and drew closer to the center
Of the raft. One after another she
saw them lose their hold; one after
another she saw them carried away
by the waves. AS for herself, pre-
served miraculously, she knew not
how, she fastened herself as best she
could to the frail floating floor and
ceased to struggle. Mercifully her
senses left her for time.
When she came once more slowly
and painfully to realizing sense oil
what had befallen, she looked about
her YEARLY.
She was alone upon the sea. Of
those who had been about her. none|
now survived! Not far from her al
body or two floated, but not a living
being was to be seen, not a SURVIVOR
save herself had found this means OIL
safety.
There was no food. There was no
fresh water for her. There was mol
means of raising a SAIL or using AM
oar, even of hosting a signal had she
had one. And yet the sky above her
was so blue and gentle. the sea around
her so kind, that all now seemed less|
terrible than it had been but now.
Hungry and thirsty as she was she,
shuddered as she thought OF the added
pangs that might be hers. She called
aloud in her distress, her despair
There came no answer, save in the
shrieks of the circling birds which
lowered, ghostlike, above her.
The waves bore her onward she
knew not where, and cared not how,
for how many hours she could not tell.
Face to face with herself, her past, her
future, the unhappy girl passed a
period of unknown duration, engaged
in her own reflections.
1t was not her own life she feared to
a little thing, temporary passage at
best. But if only she might have
lived now for the sake of that which
she felt in her own heart-for the
sake of that uncompleted period of her
own life whose dawn she acknowl-
edged to have seen but now!
He was gone! She had seen him
swept away before her very eyes. He
was her enemy, who had SO often
tainted her and deled her, who had
fought her in every contest of wits
yet in turn he had aided her to escape
and saved her but now-instead of
enemy he had turned into friend or
more than friend-and he was gone
The sunset of her day came even with
it's dawn
yes" she said to herself, che saved
me at the cost of his own life" And
the life of that other faithful friend
Roleau, the dauntless, it, too, had
been wasted to save her own-the life
she now could hold but worthless,
since it must be lived alone. They
were dead-and she had been the
cause of that! What could life hold
further for her?
Kitty Gray bent her head down upon
her knees. Her hair fell about her
face. And thus she sat, she knew not
how long, resigning herself to her
fate, making her peace with what she
felt now must come. Now" said she,
"let me die!" And when once more
the sleep of exhaustion came upon her
she thought it that of death itself :
She wakened, none the less, in /:
time-fOr strong indeed are the ties
that bind us whether or not we like !
to this life into which we are born :
without our asking. She wakened and
stared with hollow eyes about her at .
a world which she neither knew nor
loved. But even so, at length her gaze
found something to cause her eyes to
kindle her breath to come trifle
faster.
Far in the distance she had caught
sight Of the shore of distant land
the same sight which in turn had met
the gaze Of that friend whom now she
mourned. 1t lay there low on the sea
and distant-land, some sort of land,
she knew not what.
She looked at it duly, alphabetically
In truth, she was too far gone to care
Whether or not she retained con-
seriousness through the remainder OF