The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-01-26

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, talk ing as if she were in a trance, Mrs. Borden must "a heard her Jims voice downstairs, cause she kinda tried to pull up out of the chair and then when I was halfway down the steps I heard shot and something falling.
 Downstairs, in the barroom, it was all shouting men, with women crying on their shoulders and little children hanging frightened to their mothers And l heard big Jim Borden asking Jake about his missus and then jump ing up the steps three at a time with a look like the smile of heaven on his stone-cut face.
 But in all the crowd I couldn't see MT. Travis and I began to be afraid, thinking of that woman who loved him laying unconscious in bed upstairs and the baby. So, when no one was looking, I ran out on the street-and there I found him-Mr Travis-shot through the heartr'
 My father, My own poor father, who never even held me in his arms,' murmured June, her eyes filling with tears.
 q don't know how long I was there beside him on my knees" the nurse went on, wiping her eyes. 'I remem Der while I was there I heard someone 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 I heard the weak, little vail of a newborn child. But I didn't notice much, just then
 T just wandered back into the sa- loon like I was in a nightmare and stumbled up the steps, falling over my skirts and picking myself up; until I got into the bedroom. There, in the middle of the room, hanging over the table, with her eyes glassy staring and her chin dropped, was Jim Borden's wife-dead! Over in the bed laid Mrs Travis, still unconscious, 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 l<nuckles were white and livid.
 'It was hours before I got the strength to get up from the chair again. It was only when I remembered how queer it was that the baby in the grip didn't cry that I jumped up sud- den and went to get it. It was gone, The grip was empty. There was noth- ing 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 1t was and ours had been a boy"
 Her voice broke off with a sudden dry gurgIe in her throat. As June shrank away from her a dawning hor- TOT 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 I never found out-till too late"
 For moment there was a silence more compelling than sound. Sudden ly, flinging her arms wide, June cried historically:
 What does it mean? Don't stop there. Go on, Go on. What are you try ing to make me believer"
 T did as I thought best at the time,' Mary went on tonelessy, weary in heart and body from the purgatory ordeal.