Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1920-05-27
CHAPTER I,
OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES.

~ CHAPTER I. NJ
THE 1RoN-GRAY-woMAN.
A young man stood on the. after
deck Of a small and verx dingy house.
boat filing a fish spear. Riding at the
end of a storm-blackened rope strung
from a .cleat at the bow to a tree on
shore, the boat rose and fell with the
pulse Of the river, lazy and languid
under the beat Of the hot afternoon
A narrow gangplank sawed
back and forth, and worked itself in
to the grayelly shore margin. 4,
He was so tall, with such a spread
of shoulder, that he seemed half out
Of place upon SO small a deck. Wind
season and weather-wear had worked
their will upon him. But there are
forces that grave deeper than wind
and weather. Youth can hold wind
and weather at bay. 1t is powerless
against those other forces-those in
ner forces that grave the soul. Tn
the chafe OF them his face had
become the face of a man who had
upon life and found it. not to
his liking. A certain bitterness seem
to have permanently frightened the
line of his lips. His eyes held. the
keen, quick hardness that comes to
eyes that see only life's sterner side.
The Pearlhunter they called him.
the river men, not that he had found
his pearl, possibly because he hau not
found it. Failure names men, as we'll
as success, in the wilderness.
The space between the fore and
decks Of the house-boat was &C.
cupied by a kind Of cabin. with a cur
tanned entrance fore and aft and q
small window on each side.
The nan suddenly stopped. films the
fish spear and glanced with quick
anxiety toward this cabin. A woman
was coughing. Leaning the spear
against the hand rail of the boat and
dropping the file by it, he crossed the
the soiled and rumpled curtain and
entered. A dark, iron-Sray woman
sat bumped forward in q. rickety old
rocking chair by the window on the
side. AS If conscious of his in
ability to help. possibly callouseu by
long familiarity with similar e
he stood looking down upon her. with
expression of sympathy other
than a vince OF pity in his eyes.
She Strengthened after a time, and
lay back against the bed quilt spread
the chair. spent and quivering, the
shell of what had once
been a very beautiful woman. The
crossed the cabin, dipped Up a
tinful Of water out Of a bucket by the
cook stove and offered it to her. She
waved it away.
Its so warm-and fiat! It has
been long from the spring."
Without a word he set the lineup
back on the bench, picked up the
crossed the narro gangplank. and
hurried away up the slope toward
the cliffs that ose above the trees a
few rods back from the river shore.
In the very shadow of these cliffs,
at a considerable elevation above the
river and half hidden by the trees,
stood al old cabin of notched, IN
hewn logs and now much fallen into
decay. The man paused an instant in
what might be styled, for want of a
better term. the d%ooryard of this
charm of the place into allowing his
eye to stray owe the teasing land
scape, half concealed. like a bashful
maid.
To such a man as the Pearlhunter
the view was worth coming far to
see: The river slipping along at the
of the slope and winking up
through h trees at every opening:
the wide bottoms on the other side.
VIII lne co!H Pio"s Crawling up anu
down the dim, green rows; the blue
haze of the hills beyond. The spot
was known the length Of the Wabash.
who has not heard of Fallen
with the broad. thin waterfall
pitching over the sharp-edged shelf
between its two breasts and tapping
tor e-strewn pool at it's base?
And the spring breaking out from I'M
der the shale lodges of the cliff near
the west end of the old cabin and
trickling its waters down a little sui
phur-stained. gutter into the pool
who has not heard of it?I Not to have
of it's waters. was considered a
in the Flatwoods, just as
in ancient Greece it was considered a
calamity to die without having seen
the statue of Olympian Zeus.
Fallen Rock is the highest front of
naked stone along the Wabash. At
present day seven towns car be
seen from its. summit; in the late
two: Buckeye, a mile up the
river, and the City twenty miles far
on. Considerable underbrush
c'uttered the trees on thes slope all
way from the cliff down to within
q few yards of the shore line. There
the un%derbrush had been killed out,
probably by some tribe of an age
long gone, n on what small clean
strip the blue ras grew green and
right down to the waters
edge. The place had been a camp
ground for hunters since white men
first came to the F1atwoods, and.<n0
how many generations before
for rowing Indian bands. The old
cabin itself was not without its bit Of
interest, having been occu-
pied for a night and a day by Cen
eral Harrison on his famous cam
paign against Tecumseh and the
Prophet, a campaign that ended in
the famo1s Battle of Tippecanoe. =.
The spell Of the place came over
the man as he fingered a half reluct-
ant moment, a chance intruder upon
the tranquil scene. The grave, some
severe lines of his face soften
ed. The shadow that had come to
rest there habitually lifted@and in THE
tempered light that filtered through
the trees It became rapt, fne-the
beyishlface it had a right to be.
A thought crossed him; the cloud
came back-like drawing q blind be-
fore a sunny window. He strobe half
around the west end Of
the cabin, took down the guord al
ways to be found there: and hastily
flied his bucket.
- When he returned to the house
boat, the Iron-Gray-W!oman still lay
In the shaky rocking chair.
Dipping the battered lineup full OF
fresh water, the man stepped to her
side. -
your cool drink mother" IS
The thin lids raised. The eyes she
toward him must have been,
wonderfully beautiful In her day
and deep and lustro1s. fThe