The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1922-09-18
CHAPTER NV. The Telegraph.


 Not much prospect of these pin- bricks in bit of paper making us rich, thought I. But aloud I said: Don't take it to heart, Em.'' But it'd dreadful, Brix!'' she ex> claimed tearfully. Father must have forgotten"
 What do the little jahs in this paper mean, anyhow?" I asked. "Oh, those." she replied indif- ferent1y- that's only one of the sheets from fathers photograph. That won't tell us anything ''What on earth's photograph, Elm ?" I demanded, for I'd never heard of the instrument at that time.
 Didn't you ever see it, Brix?" she replied, brightening up on sec ing that I wasn't disappointed after all her talk about her fathers legacy.
 Wat, I'll get it for you.' And | what does she do but bring into the room the little box I saw hang ing from her shoulder the evening I first saw her walking around the garden. When I reminded her of this she laughed. "Oh, yes, I used to play with it.'' And she opened the box to show me how it worked. Isn't it cute?" she asked. "You see. it draws the path you're walk ing on."
 I took it into my hands and soon got on to the knack of the thing with my wife's help. Morehard had been an engineer, it seemed, and used this pedograph as n%n of his profession do, on surveying and | prospecting tours. I compared its workings with the chart the en- gineer had left us. Two facts were apparent. Morehard had charted some trip or exploration of his He considered it so important that he hoped to make a fortune out of it. But where had he gone? And what I had he done?
 Emma and I hunted among her | fathers papers. but not a thing could we find bearing on the chart. He hadn't left a line to explain it. She gave up the search at Ia st | with the words: ''It's no use. Erik. | Our fortunes the old pot of gold | under the rainbow"
 But that wasn't my opinion. I'll tell you what, that little map, | pricked into paper. suddenly got 8 powerful grip on my imagination. I | dreamed about it, and the dead en- | gineer's footsteps kept dancing in l front of my eyes.
 I felt at the time there was trouble 1 behind it all, but it was as if I was 1 being dragged against my own will
 into Morehard's past life.' | I studied the photograph and went | on walking-tours with it. I found
 that every jolt of my footstep caused
 a hammer to drop, and this made l a little steel wheel move in the box. | Every time this ratchet wheel made a complete revolution it pricked a small hole in the paper. Twist or
 turn as I might walking to the right
 or left, or to the north or sought the photograph drew a record of my course.
 1 I discovered that the pacing
 machine was adjusted so that each puncture in the chart represented | footsteps or paces Twenty pune lures meant one thousand paces and
 measured exactly one inch on the
 chart. So calculating two thousand paces to the mile every two inches
 of Morehard's chart signified one
 mile of walking, I counted the pune l lures and also applied an incl
 measure, and found that my wife's
 father had left a chart of ten mile
 journey.
 But where had he walked these ter
 miles? Why. suddenly thinks I, the
 winding woods. of course. Hadn't , met him there twice myself, once
 on the day of our quarrel and agair
 on the day of his death? I made copies of Morehard's char
 and spent three days exploring the
 winding woods, trying to fit the criss-crossed pathways to the pune
 tured chart. But nothing doing One night as I was looking over Morehard's papers again I asked my wife if her father had ever spoker on mining topics.
 Father was always talking abou- jack, if you call that mining," an6 1, she laughed because the term strucl her as a funny one.
 II Jack. eb? I'd just found some Inetes on the Uvada mining distric
 among the papers. The jack ninins
 craze was sweeping the West es pecial1y in Uvada Zinc ore was seI
 ling high and the peculiar lookins substance which old gold -diggers used to curse as a nuisance was now wortI , millions. Farmers were leaving thei,