Vernon Parish Democrat. (Leesville, La.) 1917-193?, 1921-07-07
CHAPTER II-continued.

Sf1AF IN lI-COnIlnuSQ.
3
Yes Steele knew Bill. Bill weighed
two hundred pounds, and he would
choose the biggest of the steers he
drove down to the lower levels in the
winter and, twisting its horns, would
make it lay over on its side. Besides,
both of the men assumed that Dan
must be only in the first stages Of his
malady.
And even as the men talked, the
train that bore Dan Failing to the
home of his ancestors was entering
for the first time the dark forests of
pine and fir that make the eternal
background of the Northwest. He was
wholly unable to understand the
strange feeling of familiarity that he
had with them, a sensation that in
his dreams he had known them al
ways, and that he must never go out
of the range of them again.
Dan didn't see his host at first, For
Che first instant he was entirely en-
crossed by a surging sense Of disap
pointment-a feeling that he had been
tricked and had only come to another
city after ALL He got down onto the
gravel of the station yard, and out on
the gray street pavement he heard
the clang of a trolley car. Many au-
tomObiles were parked just beside the
station, some of them foreign cars of
expensive makes, such as he supposed
would be wholly unknown on the
frontier. A man in golf clothes
brushed his shoulder.
Dan looked up to the hills, and he
felt better He couldn't see them plain
ly. The faint smoke of a distant for
est fire half obscured them. Yet he
saw fold on fold of ridges of a rather
peculiar blue in color and even his
unframed eyes could see that they
were clothed in forests of evergreen.
Over the heads of the green hills Dan
could see a few great peaks; Nc
Laughlin, even and regular as paint
ed mountain; Wagner, with queer
white gashes where the snow still lay
In its ravines, and to the southeast
the misty range of snow-covered hills
that were the SickeyOus. He felt de-
cldedly better. And when he saw old
Sllas Lennox waiting patiently beside
the station, he felt he had come to
the right place.
1t would be interesting to explain
why Dan at once recognized the older
man for the breed he was. Silas Len
nox was not dressed in way that
would distinguish him. It was true
that he wore a flannel shirt, riding
trousers and rather heavy, leathern
boots. But spOrtsmen all over the
face of the earth wear this costume at
sundry times. Mountain men have a
peculiar stride by which experienced
Iersons can occasionally recognize
them; but Silas Lennox was standing
still when Dan got his first glimpse of
him. The case resolves itself into a
simple matter of the things that could
be read in Lennox's face.
Dan disbelieved wholly in a book
that told how to read characters at
sight. Yet at the first glance of the
lean, bronzed face his heart gave a
curious little bound. A pair of gray
eyes met his-two fine black points in
a rather hard gray iris. They didn't
look past him, or at either side of him
or at his chin or his forehead. They
looked right at his own eyes. The skin
around the eyes was burned brown by
the sun, and the flesh was so lean that
the cheekbones showed plainly. The
mouth was straight; but yet it was
neither savage nor cruel. It was sim
ply determined.
Lennbx came up with light, silent
tread and extended his hand. "You'rC
Dan Failings grandson, aren't your
he asked. 'Tm Silas Lennox, who
used to know him when he lived OF
the Divide. You are coming to spenC
the summer and fall on my ranch"
{ The immediate result of thes'
words. besides relief. was to set Dan
wondering how the old mountainee
had recognized him. He wondered /
he had any physical resemblance Il
his grandfather. But this hope wa
shot to earth at once. His Telegram
had explained about his malady, ant
Of course the mOuntaineer had pickle,
aim out simply because he had tn