Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-11-06
R.ELAMINGM
- JEWEL;:9f
Ms ROBERT W CHAMPHpS
AW q 1000 eropcz II popAN coAlAfrY
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Dump, rifle in hand, listening, Tight
ing the creeping dread that touched
her slender body at times-seemed
to touch her very heart with frost.
Clinch's men had gone on 10
Ghost Lake with their wounded and
dead, where there was filter shelter
for both. All had gone n NOBODY
remained to await Clinch's nome
coming except Eve Strayer.
1t was not yet dawn. u the girl
could endure the strain no longer.
With electric torch and rifle she
started for the forest, almost run
ming at first; then. among the first
trees, moving with caution and IN
silence along the trail over which
Clinch should long since have jour
neyed homeward.
But nowhere could she discover
any impression resembling her step
father's-that great, firm stride and
solid imprint which so often she had
tracked through moss and swale
and which she knew so well.
Once when she got UP from her
knees after close examination of the
muddy trail. she became aware of
the slightest faint in the night air
stood with delicate nostrils CULVER
ing-advanced, still conscious of the
faint, listening, wary, every stealthy
instinct alert.
She had not been mistaken; some
where in the forest there was smoke
Somewhere q fire was burning. 1t
might not be very far away; it
might be distant. Whose fire? Her
fathers? Would a hunter of men
build a fire?
The girl stood ~shivering in the
darkness. There was not a sound.
Now, keeping her cautious feet
in the trail by sense of touch alone,
she moved on. Gradually. as she
advanced, the odor of smoke be-
came more distinct. She heard
nothing, saw nothing; but there was
a near reek of smoke in her nostrils
and she stopped short.
In the faint, pale luster she saw
a tiny rivulet flowing westward
from a spring, and, beside it. in the
mud, imprints of a mans feet.
The tracks were small, narrow,
Simmer than imprints made by any
she could think of. Under the
glimmer of her torch they seemed
quite fresh; contours were still
sharp, some ready to crumble, and
stood in the heels
AS she stole along, dimly shining
the tracks, lifting her head inces-
to listen and peer into the
darkness, her quick eye caught
something ahead-something very
different from the wall of
black obscurity-a vague hint of
color-the very vaguest tint scarce
ly p~erceptible at all.
But she knew it vas freight
touching the trunk of an unseen
Now, soundless over damp pine
needles she crept. The scent of
smoke grew strong in nostril and
throat; the pale tint became palely
reddish. All about her the blackness
palpable-seemed to touch
her body with it's weight; but, ahead
rudy glow stained two huge
pines. And presently she saw the
fire, burning low, but redly alive.
And, after a long, long while. she
a man.
He had left the fire circle. His
pack and belted mackinaw still lay
there at the foot of a great tree.
But when, finally, she discovered
MIN, he vas scarcely visible where
lie crouched in the shadow of a
ree-trunk, with his rife half low
red at a ready.
She strained her eyes,; out dis |
and obscurity made recogni-
ion impossible. And yet, somehow,
very quivering instinct within her
5as telling her that the crouched
nd shadowy watcher beyond the
re was Quintana.
And every concentrated instinct
vas telling her that he'd kill her If
lie caught sight OF her; her heart
lamored it; her pulses thumped it
n her ears.
Had the girl been capable of 1t
he could have killed him where he
rouched. She thought of it. but
it was not in her to do it.
md yet Quintana had boosted that
le meant to kill her father. That
vas what terribly concerned her.
md there must be a way to stop
hat danger-some way to stop it
hort of murder-a way to render
man harmless to her and hers.
No, she could not kill him this
yay. Except in extremes she could
lot bring herself to fire upon any |
luman creature. And yet this man
must be rendered harmless-some-
AS the problem presented itself
is solution flashed into her mind.
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