Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-05-19
1HARON OF LOST VALLEY
By TINCIE E. ROE
Author Of The Maid Of the Whispering Hs" THE Heart
Of Night Wind" etc.
BY TINCIE E. ROE

sumped In his chair. dead drunk and
asleep, Wylackie Bob was lighting
cigarette In his brown fingers, a smile
on his evil mouth, his slow. black eyes
in a speculative way, as il he dreamed
|cf making true his blasphemous lies.
Illen was sweet as flower In her open
Typed beauty, her painting despair.
Wylackie did not notice the slim man
beside her whose lips we're 80 tight that
they were a mere line across his face.
No one at the Stronghold noticed Cleve
Then Ben Garland was speaking, and
Ellen gathered her dim wits enough &c |
make out that he was saying strange
sn,i,nssssLawful af,,s s things-that had to do
Then she knew--swaying and cropping
with her blue-veined hands--that the
thing was done-that she was no longer |
sleep In the bend of Courtrey's arm as
she had slept in those golden days OF |
long ago--that she was an outcast, |
6lackened beyond all hope by the damn
Bob, Then the world raded out |
| for Ellen in merciful blackness.
The petty officials rose with laughter |
and clanking of boots on the board floors
silence. Never before had a crowd in |
Lost Valley gone out from a courtroom |
In that strange and bodeful silence.
the sight Of Ellen lying white and
like O. sack Of grain. as ne passed out
with the moving mass, had an odd effect
IL was partly the white dress that did
it-and the time was ripe.
Courtrey and his gang were toward
the fore--first out. They spread on TO
one side with Jest and uuip, with flash
OF bottle and slap on shoulder. The pop
J ulaee thinned a bit from the steps = -
Cleve Whitmore's voice rang out like a
| clarion.
d,,sS sWylaSkieF noas. y pealed across the sub;
hound. Turn roundv
There was death in It.
The gun man .whirled, drawing like
lightning. In the courthouse door
Cleve Whitmore, with his sisters limp
form on his shoulder beat him to IL.
He had drawn as he called. Before
the words were off his lips he pulled the
heart. '"'
AS his henchman fell Courtrey's good
hand flashed to his hip. but Dixon, of
the Vigilantes. shot out an arm and
kn1cked MIN forward from behind.
missed life because brave heart dared
him. Old Pete had paid the price for
that trick Dixon had no thought of 1t.
AND In one moment the chance was
that silent crowd which had poured from
the courtroom-the deep, bloodcurdling
sound OF the mob forming, inarticulate,
uncertain.
For the first time in his life courtrey
felt real fear grip him.
lie mad Killed and stolen and wronged
among these people and gotten away
NTH Tttn IT, so,, He had never feared them.
first deep rumble from the concrete
throat Of Lost Valley he got his first
instructive thrill Of disaster.
s,,a ne sto1d Tor q moment In utter
snapped, out an order, whiried en- his
heel and went swiftly to the near rack
where stood Bolt and the rest Of the
Iroinwoods, d.oirx Like q set Of puppets on
they left Wylackie Bob where he fell.
60 In g matter of seconds the whole
StrGngnoid sg gang was mounted and clat-
tering down the street--out of the town
And the killer on the courthouse steps?
he stood where he was and looked
with blazing eyes over the motley crowd
step toward him, looked round, wet his
lips and thought better of it.
AND then, in another second, the
crowd was a mob and the mob was the
Cleve's shoulder with careful hands and
carried her away. Then some one
reached down and picked him up bodily.
articulate mob cry swelled and deem
ened and rose to a different scund--a
shout that gathered volume and roared
out across the spaces where Courtrey
rode with a menace, a portent.
With one accord the mob started on
journey around Corvan.
:, White as Ellen, Cleve Whitmcre rode
blazing his lips tight. The town went
wild: Public feeling came out on every
band. Daring took the weak hope took
the oppressed, and they called Court
rey's reign right there. For three up
roarious hours the bartenders could not
wipe eff their bars.
A new regime was ushered in-and
she who had been its sponsor was not
When the hour Of change was strilS.
ing for Corvan and all Lost Valley.
was scaling False Ridge in the Canvon
country. Grim, ash-pale with effort, her
blue eyes shining. she climbed the Sc
cret Way that few had ever found.
tcrtyous cuts and passes was a marvel
of homing instinct--the heart that
homed to its object It had seemed TO
her all along this strange, tense journey,
that she had held her breath and shut
her eyes, as 1t were, and gone forward
in obedience to some strange thing with
in that said, turn here" go thus"
| with tight lips an da secret wonder.
Billy, following behind watched her
AS she had told him she would "go
| straight, Mary willing" so she had gone
straight-and 1t seemed, truly. as II It
were right that she should, no matter
how his heart ached to see this thing.
Verify there was something supernat-
ural about It all, something uncanny.
If It had been he, Billy whom Tharon
| loved, and had he lain, wounded In the
Cup o. God would the girl have been
given this blind instinct for direction?
Would she havesgon as unerringy to
the Secret Way?
Nay--there must be something in the
| old saying that for every heart In the
| world there was it's true mate,
Tharon had found hers In Kenset
But where would he ever find his?
| The boy shook his fair head hopelessly
| at the sliding floors For all perfection
| there must he sacrifice He was the
sacrifice for Tharon's perfection-a will
ing one, so help him
| That they had found the Secret Way
across False Ridge was perfectly plain,
for here In the living rock before them
were marks. the first marks they had
| found In the Canyons. Thin, small
| crosses cut In the stone of the walls,
began to lead upward from the last lift
| ings cut straight up the Rockface OF
False Ridge itself. II seemed, to look
at the. dim traces, that no living thing
without wings could scale that steep and
| forbidding cliff. but when they tried to
climb, they found that each step had
been set with artful cunning. The set
| of steps followed the form OF a switch
back" working from right to left, and
always rising a little, False Ridge IT.
| self. a towering, mighty spine, came
down in a swiftly dropping ridge from
somewhere In the high upper country at
the west of all the canyons, 1t was
/ known to lead deceptively down among
| the cuts and passes, as If IL went