Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1917-01-05
CHAPTER X.
The Spy.


The Spy.
Already the sun was warm, the faint
breeze bland. Standing at the window
and shading his eyes against the glare
Whitaker surveyed world new
washed and radiant; the landlocked
bay dimpled with vagrant catspaws
and smitten with sunlight as with
scimitar of fire; the earth fresh and
fragrant, steaming family in the ar
dent glow of the dawn.
In another moment he was at the
kitchen door, interrupting Sum Fats
first matutinal attentions to his teeth
with demand for a bathing suit.
Three minutes later, from the end of
the small dock, he dived neatly, COM
Ing to the surface with his flesh tin
Cling with delight of the cool water;
then, with the deliberate and powerful
movements of an experienced swim
mer, struck away from the land. Two
hundred yards out he paused, rolled
over on his back, and, bands clasped
beneath his head, floate1 sereneIy, sun
light warming his uDturned face, his
body rejoicing in the suave, clean, fluid
embrace.
Then something disturbed him-a
dull fiuttering, vibrant upon his sub
merged eardrums. Extending his arms
and moving his hands gently to pre-
serve his poise, he lifted his head from
the water. From the landing stage on
the Ffske place a motor boat was
standing out. The churning of its pro-
peller had aroused him. He could see
but a single person for all it's crew.
Seated astern, dividing her attention
between the side steering wheel and
the engine, she was altogether ignorant
OF the onlooker. Only her head and
shoulders showed above the canning
her head with it's shining crown, her
shoulders clOaked witn light wrap
gathered at the throat.
Whitaker admiring, wondered ;.
Sweeping in wide arc as it gath
cred speed, the boat presently shot out
smartly on a straight course for the
barrier beach.
Why? What business had she there?
And at an hour so early?
No affair of his-Whitaker admitted
as much freely. And yet he was be-
ginning his fourth day on the Great
West bay without having set foot upon
its Great South beach! Ridiculous
oversight And one to be remedied
without another hours delay.
Grinning with amused liberation of
his own perverse sophistry, he turned
over on his side and struck out in the
wake of the motor boat. When at
motor boat moored in shallow water
at the end of long and substantial
dock. He patted the TANKS of the YES
sci as he waded on.
"Good little boati" said he.
Walking rapidly, very soon he stood
e the head of rude flight of wooden
steps which ran down from the top #
a wave-eaten sand bluff, some ten or
twelve feet in height, to the broad and
gently shelving ocean beach. Midway
between the sand bluff and the break
ing waters stood the woman Whitaker
had followed. (There wasn't any use
mineing terms-he had followed her
in his COMPOUNDED, fatuous curiosity y
Her face was to the sea, her hands
clasped behind her. Now the wind
modelled her cloak sweetly to her body,
now whipped its skirts away, disclos-
ing legs straight and slender and gra-
ciously modelled. She was dressed il
seemed, for bathing.
Whitaker turn to go, and turning lei
his gaze sweep up from the beach ant
along the brow of the bluff. He paused
frowning. Some twenty feet or so dis
tant the legs of a man, trousered anC
booted, protruded from a hollow be
tween two hummccks of sand. AnC
the toes of the boots were digging int
the sand, indicating that the man wa
wing prone; and that meant Gf h
were neither dead nor sleeping) tina
he was watching the woman on tn
Beach.
Indignation, righteous indignation
warmed Whitaker's bosom. 1t was a
verv well for him to eaten slgnt q
ssa wnmap through her cottage VIII