New-York tribune., 1920-11-07

Il to the main range. Dark had
come. the enormous. cruel dark
Of those untamed equatorial lands,
which is to the dark of the settled
countries as IS the night-stalking,
fire-eyed bison to the farmyard steer
that wanders softly, dreaming and
cropping grass.
AS always, Joan and I were awed
by it, though we had never confessed
so, much to one another. We sat
side by side on log, and looked at
the comfortable fire. | don't know
why, but there seemed to be more
company in it than in my ten Papuan
police boys, who were sleeping close
at hand under their calico fly.
Some time tomorrow afternoon
the magistrate, Bert Copeland, would
marry pretty, pretty Joan with the
copper hair and the blue eyes Shin
ing out Of small, tanned, pointed
face, to Harry Laverty, patrol officer
of the Boroma River Division, Papua,
New Guinea. And my name, bad
luck to the hour that | was born in,
was not Harry Laverty but David
Brown.
That was how matters were. It's
a situation that has occurred thou
sands and thousands Of times since
first man gave troth to maidens of
stranger lands, and (unwisely) left
it to other men to bring the bride
to her mate. Princes daughters,
journeying to wed with kings, used
to- fall inconveniently in love with
their knightly escorts. In modern
times the bride of the rich "civilian"
travelling by P. and 0. to India sees
true love in the eyes Of the second
officer, telegraphs regrets from the
port of Alden because radio men
sometimes talk, and has a hurried
wedding at Bombay. Take it from
one who knows, it is wiser-even at
cost Of much inconvenicnce-to 20
and fetch your bride Think what
happened to Tristram and Iseult.
must have said it aloud. Joan
drew back her shapely lnickcr-
bockered legs (she was, like most
modern girls, entirely unself-con-
scious about ber hmbs) from the fire,
so. that she could crook her knees
and set her elbows on them Then
she looked up at me from under her
waves of copper hair, elGshly, and
asked me;
what did happen to Tristram and
Iseult?"
"You new girls never read poetry"
was my only answer.
made up the fire with shove
and a kick. did not want to dis
cuss the faithless bride of King
Mark-herc, we two alone, unslecp-
ing in the sinister forest lands, with
all the world we knew as far as the
fixed stars. had not wished to
undertake the task of guiding Miss
Lyndon up to the station, even
though she had arrived unexpectedly,
by coastal schooner, at the store
on the beach where | was making
ready to march to Boroma Letters,
it seemed, had gone wrong, as they
often do in that country Of scant
Communications; Laverty, who was
to come down and meet the girl at
the beach, and be married to her by
local missionary, had not turned
up and did not seem likely to.
Yet | was curiously reluctant-I
did not know why--when We started
on our long march, with our tents
and our boys and our sacks of pro-
visions and stores of cartridges and
rifles. But o-night-to-night. alone
fer the last time in the Wilderness
that we had traversed through six
long days and nights, our tents
raised for the last time, our last
campfire burning its last brands, |
hHSN--pll. n hlcW 700 wen. j or all
that | was siX-and- thirty, and had
lived the wild, hard life of a Papuan
patrol officer so long that civilization.
white women. good houses and soft
living seemed like a dream Of an
other world-for all that this blue
eyed maiden was but twenty-four,
engaged to and (of course) in love
with another man, had struck the
misfortune of which my guardian
spirit unavailingly had warned me.
had come to love Joan Lyndon
to-morrow's bride
am big beyond common. tough
beyond common; have lived
through and endured hard things.
This. l told myself, was but one
more. What We're those lines
whose were they-IIenley's?
You sccre ol1eays G fghtcr; so one
f0ht more,
The best ond the last.