Newark evening star and Newark advertiser., 1916-01-03

| slightly. Don't forget any of it now
you mustn't do you hear? You
mustn't You left off where you went
| downstairs"
And when I was going out of the
room" continued the old woman,
! talking as if she were in a trance,
Mrs. Borden must "a heard her Jim S
! voice downstairs, cause she kinda
/ tried to pull up out OF the chair and
| then when I was halfway down the
steps [ heard a shot and something
! falling.
| Downstairs, in the barroom it was
! ali shouting men, with women crying
on their shoulders and little children
hanging frightened to their mothers.
And I heard big Jim Borden asking
Jake about his missus and then jump
ing up the steps three at a time with
look like the smile of heaven on his
stone-cut face.
But in all the crowd l couldn't see
Mr.. Travis and | began to be afraid,
thinking of that woman who loved
him SO, laying unconscious in bed
upstairs-and the baby. So when no
one was looking, ] ran out on the
street-and there ] found him-Mr.
Travts-shot through the heart!"
MY fatheri My own poor father,
who never even held me in his arms, -
murmufed June, her eyes filing with
tears.
II don't know how long / was there
beside him on my knees" the nurse
went on, wiping her eyes. al remem-
Der while was there l heard some
one come out, heavy, on the porch
of the roadhouse and kind of stagger
across the road. He must "a passed
close, because it seemed to me [
; heard the weak, little wall of a new
born child. But | didn't notice much
just then.
Il just wandered back into the
saloon like | was In a nightmare and
stumbled UP the steps, falling over
my skirts and picking myself up;
until l got into the bedroom. There,
in the middle of the room, hanging
over the table, with her eyes CLASSY
staring. and. her chin dropped, was
Jib Borden's wife-dead! over in the
bed laid Mrs. Travis, still uncon-
Scious, with baby beside her."
June Slipped again to her knees be-
side Mary, her eyes fixed on the old
woman's face, her hands so tightly
clasped that the knuckles were white
and livid.
1T was hours before I got the
strength to get up from the chair
again. 1t was only when l remem-
in the grip didn't cry that [ jumped
UP sudden and went to get it. 1t
was gone! The grip was empty.
There was nothing but the dent it's
little body had made in the soft,
woolly things-and over on the bed
was the other one-Jim Borden's-
a girl it was, and ours had been
boy
Her voice broke off with a sudden
dry gurgle in her throat As June
shrank away from her dawning
horror in her eyes she stretched out
two worn. trembling hands in an
effort to draw the girl back.
+"You see, it must have been like
this: Jim Borden had leaped into
that room with his heart all bursting
with love and pride, and he found his
wife dead before him, lying near the
baby in the grip, and, looking over
he saw the other woman on the bed
with her baby beside her. He took
the baby he thought was his own and
went away--where, no one knew
and never found out-till too late"
For a moment there was silence,
more compelling than sound. Sudden
ly, fiinging her arms wide, June cried
Historically:
What does it mean? Don't stop
trying to make mo believer"
"I did as l thought best at the
time," Mary went on tonelessly,
weary in heart and body from the
purgatory ordeal. MIR. Travis was
dead. When Mrs. Travis came to,
what could l tell her. A baby was
there No one but me knew it wasn't
hers. 1t would "a killed her to tell her
I never told. She didn't know-she
doesn't know-no one knows"
"And IL am" June gasped out
the words.
Mary looked steadily into her ter
rified eyes and gripped her hands
firmly.
"On the back of Jim Borden's right
hand" she said heavily, there was a
queer Red Circle-they called him
Circle Jim out there. Just, as later.
they"
"No! MOI don't believe tim
not-I'm not" June crumpled into