The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1922-09-16

It happened while l was rad1rS | alongside the winding woods. A man | in the road asked me for the time | of day. But it was only an excuse to | stop me. for the next thing was to beg for @ job on the farm.
 His tone was so queer gave him a close look. He wasn't a workman at ala we'll budlt, good-1ooking fe1- Low. but with all kinds of passions scanned into his face. I shook my when he breaks into a boisterous laugh, He seemed all excited.
 "It wouldn't do, would it. Mir Rrixton Havens." he cried. "for man like me to work for the likes of you-you-" and he shot out an ugly name at me. while his eyes gleamed with sudden hate.
 It flashed through me that he must be one of those vicious fellows from the mines. He seemed to have a grudge against me. Probably he'd been run off the farm, and since he'd gone to the trouble of finding out my name he must be wanting to revenge himself on me. The thought filled me with rage, and I slashed him across the face with my riding-whip
 I know what you're going to say. It was 9 cruel thing to do, but felt I had to teach the fellow les son.
 That whip-lash changed him into raging fiend. A flaming welt showed on his face and he clapped his hand to it, yelling:
 "He hit me like a yellow dog!"
 never saw such fury before or since.
 elf I only had a gun!' he shrieked, and, jumping, he tried to grab my reins, still beating him on the head o,,1 riV,cr 10 r~i6 I,;, down.
 Anybody in sight would have taken us for crazy men. My horse showed him into the ditch, and picking himself up, he yelled at me:
 ''To-day's your day, Ravens, but mine will come yet!''
 Then he turns. climbs the bank. and ducks it into the woods without another word.
 I turned my horses head ana rode back home, pretty uneasy in mind, I can tell you. I was ashamed of what l had done, but I couldn't af- ford to let a wild man like that hang about our neighborhood. And all the time I had a feeling that he wasn't what he seemed to be. For why should he be hating me so?
 I armed myself with revolver, and without saying anything to my little girl. I went back to the farm and saw our foreman, washburn. But he swore he'd not had any row with a stranger, so together we rode back to the woods.
 we started at the place where we could still see the mans footprints, and rode off through the trees. No snow had fallen for a week or more, and only slight drifts here and there to the sandy soil. Still, once and asPain NVQ'5 a 1ipn x1-hara body had lately passed. Each of us chose separate path, and so we went along, our eyes searching the thickets and c1umps of trees behind which our man might be hiding.
 The short day began to close The thin woods darkened and a cheerless wind swept up. And suddenly I heard sound that chilled me to the bone. It was a shuddering kind of cry, scarcely human in tone.
 Washburn was some distance ahead and I took a cross-path that brought me to his side. The sound had hit him as badly as 1t had me-
 He stopped his horse.
 What was that, anyway?" he asked.
 And then it came to us once more mournfu1ly, though the wide-stretch- ing wood. The thing was enough to make ones blood run cold. and we quickened our horses. The sound stopped, and sti11 we went on through the paths. Finally we came to a bank, half-covered with thin snow. on which a man was lying, face down ward
 I dismounted and ran to raise | him.
 ''Morehardl'' cried; for it was my | father-in-law. He didn't answer, and his eyes were closed. It must have been his dying cry that reached us, I thought. And then I saw that the sntrw under meath him was stained with blood.
 Here's his shotgun!'' e-xclaim ed | Washburn as he picked it up. My | God, he must have slipped down the Snowbank-his gun went eff, and | shot him in the chest'' Was this true? It certainly looked | it. But I kept thinking of .he man | who had run into the woesis Did he know Morehard. and had the two men met and struggled, the younger one grabbing the gun rum the weaker and shooting him7
 "Morehard- -Morehard-how did ii | happen?" I cried
 At the sound of my voice his eves opened. And then washbuEn and l saw there was an awful terror 1n l them and that his face was con- vulsed with fear
 | He graaned, and as put my ear to his moving lips, heard him re- beating in an aimless- way, 'ft1mma- hmma-Emma,' as If he was think ing only of his daughter. Ar last his eyes met mine, and he recognized me because he said weakly: 'Havens- keep away-keep away-frpm the lake-death in the tracks-tear them I-up."
 He was struggling to make his | words comprehensible Yes. felt he was trying to warm me.
 speak up, Morehard, 'T said
 Make 1t plainer. 'Ts some danger 1 threatening?" He tried again ''Danger-to you hoth-sirsroith- ] the lizard-'
 But now he got quite incoherent. In a minute he subsided altogether, and I felt his hands grow cold. He must have died then or while washburn