The Ordway new era., 1921-01-21
CHARTER Gov tinued.

uful VIII leFEflSn
'I've lived twenty years without the
world. I'll not go back to it now"
'f6ut. mother. If We just keep on this
way. youll-you1l"-he hesitated al
the next word; finall, let 1t fall-"dle."
'Diel" she seemed to fondle the
word. "a small thing-to die"
She sat musipg as If she found
melancholy comfort in the thought.
But / shan't die" she continued,
with has,y glance up at his face.
My cough is worse today because my
medicine is gone"
The young man started.
your elecampane gone!"
~ took the last OF 1t yesterday"
''Motherl''
He went to .he cook stove and lifted
the saucer from a small jar in which
the roots were usually stepped. 1t was
empty and dry. There was great ten
derness In his voice as he came hack
and bent over her chair.
you shall have your elecamrsne
tea." he said "if the roots are to be
found in the Fiatwoods; and you shall
sleep tonight in the old cabin up there
under the cool trees"
"A ripple of pleased expectation, Of
half-awakened interest, broke the
drear surface of the weary face-like
a faint glow back of a curtain that
never raises.
He refilled the cup with cool water,
rummaged spade out of the locker
under the forward deck, and was just
on the point OF leaping to the bank
when he heard her speaking. He
poked his head back inside the cur
tains, and she repeated what she had
Just said:
isn't the Flatwoods where the Wild
Man lives? Seems to me once heard
that there Is such man In these
woods"
He felt carelessly along the rusty bit
Of the spade with his thumb.
"I believe this is the woods"
Maybe he's-l mean-he's not dan
gerous?'
Dangerous A gray gnost of
man with a pitiful face. They say he
goes through the woods as still as
smoke, and leaves as little trail"
A minute later he had leaped ashore.
climbed the bluffs and plunged into
the deep woods.
The root Of the elecampane was
much esteemed as remedy for
coughs, but 1t was by no means abun-
dant. No one knew this fact better
than the Pearlhunter.
The small stream that feeds the wa
terfall at Fallen Rock is known as
Wolf run. Following up along It's
course the Pearlhunter presently came
to tiny thread of water that Joined it
from the west-probably the outlet of
some small pond tucked away among
the hills. 1t is along the open margins
Of swamps and ponds, and never in
he thick woods, that the elecampane
grows. Believing from the warmth
and dullness of its water that the tiny
stream came from pond, rather than
from a spring. the Pearlhunter fol-
lowed 1T.
1t had grown SO small that the
Pea-lhunter began to fear it would
disappear altogether, when there came
break in The forest line just ahead.
A scramble. through a dense fringe of
hazel, and there it lay-a little pond
In the midst of narrow glade In a
pocket of the hills, delicate inlay In
the forest.
The man glanced at the sun
turned. and hurriedly looked about for
the elecampane. Along the east edge
Of the glade, not far out from the
fringe of hazel, he found it--a clump
OF some dozen stalks. three or four of
them ready to bloom. The rusty spade
was soon at their roots-probabIy the
first ground ever broken on the mar
gin Of that pond. Three plants he
digged. cut their stems close to the
ground, shook the dirt from their clus-
ters Of fieshy roots, and hurried down
the tiny outlet back to Wolf run.
1t was upon the gravelly margin of
pool that the Pearlhunter stopped to
wash the elecampane roots, and cut
them loose from the clusters In which
be had been carrying them. Ee had
finished ths task and was storing
them away IN the pockets of his blouse
when the aouK. Of thrush from some
where up the stream gradually worked
xsolf acrpss NJ consciousness.
The song puzzled him. There were
nctes certain little foreign fights;
oespet witchsEy that he could not
have believes possibles to thrush's
sthfoat. The Pkarihunter hnd nice
ear fof ths 44ll6 Of the woods. He
ktsee c4gt1eea up the bank. The