Williams news., 1922-12-22

MBW
 Her Coat and Hat Lay on the Bed, but
 There Was No Linda to Stretch Her
 Arms to Him.
 culation of the rifle shells in his pock- ct. The gun held six. He had perhaps fifteen others in his pockets, and he hadn't stopped to replenish them from the supply Elmira had brought. He hadn't brought Dave's rife with him. but had left it with the remainder of his pack. He knew that the lighter hs travelled the greater would be his chance of success.
 Obviously the girl had written when the clan was closing about the house. and finding her in the front room. there had been no occasion to search the other rooms and thus discover it. The girl had kept her head even in that moment Of crisis. A wave of ad- miration for her passed over him.
 And the little action had set an ex- ample for him. He knew that only rigid self-control and cool-headed strategy could achieve the thing he had set out to do. His impulse was to storm the door, to pour his lead through the lighted windows; but such things could never take Linda out Of Simon's hands. Only stealth and eau tion, not blind courage and frenzy. could serve her now. Such blind killing as his heart prompted had to wait for another time.
 He knew only the general direction of the Ross house where Simon lived Linda had told him it rested upon the crest of a small hill, beyond ridge of timber The moonlight showed him a well-beaten trail, and he strode swiftly along it.
 He had a vague sense of familiarity with this winding trail. Perhaps he had toddled down it as a baby, per haps his mother had carried him along it on a neighborly visit to the Rosses- He went over the hill and pushed his way to the edge of the timber. All at once the moon showed him the house.
 He couldn't mistake it, even at this distance. And to Bruce it had singu- lar effect of unreality. The mountain men did not ordinarily build homes Of such dimensions. They were usually merely log cabins of two or three low CT rooms and a garret to be reached with ladder. The ancestral home or the ROSSeS. however, had fully dozen rooms. and it loomed to an incredible size in the mystery of the moonlight He saw quaint gabled roofs and far spreading wings. And 1t seemed more like a house of enchantment, a struc- ture raised by the rubbing of a magic lamp than the work of carpenters and maSons.
 Probably it's wild surroundings had a great deal to do with this erect There were no roads leading to Trails End Material could not be carried over it's winding trails except on pack animals. He had a realization of tre- mendous difficulties that had been con- quered by tireless effort, of long months of amending toll, of exhaust less patience, and at the end-a dream come true. All of its lumber had to be hewed from the forests about. It's stone had been quarried from the rock cliffs and hauled with infinite labor over the steep trails.
 He understood now why the Turn CTS had coveted it. It seemed the acme of luxury to them. And more clearly than ever he understood why the Rosses had died, sooner than re- Iinquish it, and why its usurpation by the Turner's had left such debt of
 
 the love of home is one of the few great impulses that has made toward civilization, but by the same token 1t has been the cause of many wars. Per haps the day is coming when this love will die in the land, but with it will die the strength to repel the heather from our walls, and the land will not be worth living in, anyway. But It was not dead to the mountain people No really primitive emotion ever is.
 The Rosses had known this instinct very we'll. As all men who are strong thewed and of real natural virtue, they had known pride of race and name, and it had been task worth while to build this stately house on their far lying acres. They had given their fiber to it freely; no man who beheld the structure could doubt that fact They had simply conSecrated their lives to it their one Work by which they could show to all who came after that by their own hands they had earned their right to live.
 (Continued next week. s