The Holbrook news., 1921-01-07
CHAPTER II-continued.

CHAPTER II-continued.
 -31
 A sudden impulse seemed to sweep fhe man. Involuntarily his hand felt for the pistol at his hip; he whirled toward the door. The woman clutched his arm. He caught the appeal in her eyes; bowed his head; turned back to the table
 A tense bit of pantOmime it had been, full enough of meaning. of hu- man interest, to anyone able to trace back through the years the snarled life-threads of the actors: the two river waifs staring down at the mask; the hard man striding away up the river road.
 The woman went back to her chair and resumed her quick, nervous rock Ing.
 And so he has come to this!'' she muttered. "My poor. poor cousin What must have been her fatei"
 She leant forward and sat still and thoughtful. her face propped in her palm. The man stood by the table, lingering the bit of cloth, his eyes, stern and severe, still irresistibly drawn in the direction the intruder had gone.
 A hail came up from the housebOat. The sudden cry half startled them both, coming so close as it did on the heels of that tense moment barely gone.
 "It's the Boss. promised to go spearing with him tonight" Stepping to the door, he opened 1t and answered the hail came back; slid the teakettle off the fire; closed the damper of the stove; and snuffed the candle
 'NOw, mother, don't attempt to clear away the dishes. Leave them till I get back. I'll only be gone q lit tie while'
 The woman made no answer. The red mask still lying upon the table caught his eye. Rolling it up. he hid it under a loosened chink in the cabin wall picked up his hat and started for the door; hesitated; came back to the rocking chair.
 You won't be-afraid-?"
 She looked up at him in quick sur prise. A half frown clouded the luster of her eyes.
 What a question:
 He turned and left the cabin; closed the door after him and strode down the slope to the hOuseboat
 The men who hunted the river mus sel along the Wabash before the days of the button industry hunted it for the pearl sometimes found imbedded between its flesh and shell. Struggling up and down the streams, often singly, sometimes in crews, they were a shift less, fiery, reckless breed-of a feather with the buccaneers of other days, and led on by the same lure; a chance fling at fortune. A pearl of great | value was sometimes found-even run ming well up into the thousands. But the chance of finding such pearl was small Still there was the chance, and | 1t is surprising what certain type | of men will endure for such chance, when the same ends might be at | tained, certain and sure. by patient in- | tluStry.
 A grizzled old river man sat with | ihe nose of his skiff jammed up on the | gravel by the bow of the houseboat | when the Pearlhunter came down the | slope. The Boss they called him, the | liver men, because in his long years in | the industry he had managed to | scrape together an 'outfit" and work | a crew of 'clammers' too poor to hunt alone. His hands were still upon the | oars. The Pearlhunter pushed the | boat off and sprang in, directing the | Boss to row around by the stern of the | hOusebOat after the fish spear he had | been filing that afternoon.
 'See y'u've moved" the Boss ob- served as the skiff slipped out into the stream.
 "Mother's cough,'' was the answer. "She thought 1t would help her to get up there under the trees"
 "That cough-it'll git away with Ger, If she hain't keerful. She oughta have medicine"
 q told her so, but she won't have It."
 The Boss did not pursue the point. A woman's will was something he never took the trouble to question. Having rowed out into the current after the Pearlhunter secured his spear he turned the nose of the skiff down stream and shipped his oars long enough to light his pipe.
 "Mother hung back a little right at the last" the young man said, his mind doubtless dwelling on the un- usual experience, the first experience in his life, of actually living upon land. "She was afraid somebody might not like us to move into the cabin. But I told her they couldn't do more than make us move out"
 "Afear'd of tn Wild Man, wus sLe?"
 The younger man looked up.