The Ocala evening star., 1921-12-01
Waits and Strays.
III.

ward. While | was shaving In the
washroom I asked the colored boy If
nv smoklng-roOm chum of fhe night
before was mp vet.
.sYas. sab: he done been up an gone
for the longest z
or course This was mere idle Gues-
rioning on my part. Tracing fhe
brown-beartled mining engineer who
had used me az a convenient dumping
ground for his story was the leasf Of
nv intention Mt the moment. For flt.,f
matter. since we hadn't exchangad
cards, and / wasn't even sure that I'd
heard his name straight. couldn't
have traced him IL / had wanted TO.
Recalling the story in the garish
light Of another day. il seemed BIZ
less credible than it had while was
listening TO It. and ! began 70 wonder
if the teller of ii might not be a mem
ber Of the deathIess guild of smoke
room romancers. | buried the story
among the things to be smiled al and
forgotten. when 1 took a taxi for the
hotel. After an excellent breakfast
made few inquiries about the meri-
dian; the 105th, that the maps showed
as passing just west of the city. The
maps were right. The 105th meridian.
which is the one from which mountain
time is FeckOned ran little west of
the city proper. and. by consequence,
west of the two other principal cities
Of the state. Colorado Springs and
Pueblo.
7 found that the 105th meridian,
tracing Ii north from Denver. stops
short against the 10th parallel of lati-
tude just south OF a little town called
Erie. Traced south II tracks the D..
6 r. G. railroad for about twenty
miles and then takes TO the mountain
barely shutting out Manitou. and pass
ing, of course. well to the west
ward OF Pueblo. This simplified mat
ters-a little.
Yet this business Of wandering aim
lessly from post to pillar. combing the
face OF nature for hine-eyed maidens
and piebald horses and harlequin-faced
dogs was already beginning to strike
me as about the most fantastic thing a
body could conceive of doing. To at
tempt Ii without a plan of some kind
seemed worse than useless; SO, for per
haps the first time In pretty rattle
Drained life, sat down to do some
ground-and-lofty head work, with
Cousin Percy's letter for sort of
nexus.
The third paragraph contained the
meat OF the matter: "Your portion of
Grandfather Jasper's property was
worth. at its latest valuation. some
thing like $40 0OO0" What single piece
or property outside of a large city
could be worth any such sum as that?
| could think of nothing but mine of
some kind. unless 1t might be a cattle
ranch. or growth of standing timber !;
and In the area laid out for me, mines
would outvote cattle or timber about a
hundred to one, thought.
Then there was that other phrase i:
'sIt lies in a perfectly safe repository.
Repository" implied a recep-
tacle or container OF some sort brick
wall, or barbed-wire fence, or any in
closing thing you like TO imagine. Could
n mine be said to be repository?
As you see, / kept coming back TO
the mine idea, In spite of all | could
do; and at last, without word of
warning, and right out of clear sky.
as you may say, smack thing hit
me squarely between the shoulder
blades-B Brown beard and his eccentric
old gentleman
After got cooled off a bit had to
admit that there was something less
than one chance in a thousand that, al
| the price of a couple of cigars given TO
fellow traveller i'm distress, I had pur-
chased any real clue 70 my own puzzle
| Yet / couldn't get away from the
notion that was on the verge of dis
| eovery Oddly enough, the miraculous
| part of 1.-THE one chance In a million
/ that / should run across the one per
son i'm a hundred million who could tel
me that particular story-didn't i'm
i press me at the time. was too busily
| engaged in trying to fit the puzzle
pieces together to think of anything
else at the moment.
Come TO sum them up, they fitted as
toundingly well. Grandfather Jaspel
i had always been exceedingly close
mouthed when speaking of his invest
ments. Added to that, he would b,
| the last man In the world TO have con
fessed that he had been bitten. even in
directly. by "gold-brick" game. Then
too, the course he had pursued witt
the mining engineer always granting
the truth OF Brown-beards st0ry) wa
just like him; he would have wanted
year In which 10 think 1t over-or may
be longer Also, it was ike him {
keep all the identifying marks a
carefully hidden as a nut meat In 1t
she'll
At this point / began 70 think abou
getting action. One word from Bull
ton. or Bulletin, or whatever his nam
was. would settle the Identities beEOn
question, and that word was his aol
gentleman's" name. He hadn't mer
toned IL once In telling his yarn
which might have been by design, Q
Just happen-so. But. by heavens, /
make him mention it!
happened 10 think OF the Minin
r exchange. and to wonder IL somebod
: connected with il might not have lis
of engineers and mining experts.
hike through the streets brought me I
M