San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1923-09-02

The conventional playthings OF mil
lionaires did not amuse old man
Angus. He had worked with the big
fist in his time, and now he would
spend with the open hand. But he
wanted space for the golden sowing
he wanted to be monarch of all he
surveyed.
So he engaged a geologic age for
his landscape gardener and bought
himself a Titan's share of the Rocky
Mountains. The water from eternal
SHOWS nad gnawed canons, tornadoes
had turned sculptor forests had
painted bleak slopes with the bless
ing of green--in order that old man
Angus might have his plaything.
Paradise Peaks he called it, hav-
ing a fancy for ALTERATION.
The Manor, set deep in the lodge
pole pine and aspen groves of Clear
water Valley. was the heart Of the
demense. There old man Angus
through the sweet, thrilling months
of the mountain summer played grand
host to his guests.
He supplied all accessories TO ad-
venture, from trout-flies to guns that
would slay an elephant. The fifteen
hunting lodges, scattered over Para
disc Peaks, each had its arsenal, its
library, its store of liquors, its string
of horses and its guides at the dis
posal of guests.
Old man Angus had a plaything
that cannot be matched on this con-
tinent. He also had a daughter,
There the story really begins.
Columbine, aged twenty, had been
everywhere and seen everything
Angus money had taken care of all
that; but her soul belonged to her
native West, and she remained SIM
pie, wholesome and feminine.
OF course this Columbine had her
Pierrot--in plural. That summer
there were two of them. One was
strongly favored by Angus as future
son-in-law. Chandler was what So
ciety reporters call an "eligible
bachelor" which means that he was
nearer forty than thirty. His career
had been devoted exclusively to the
sporting achievements of the unneces-
sarily rich.
The other Pierrot who had follow
ed Columbine TO her mountain habi-
tat fitted into the natural environ.
ment, for he was poet. Columbine
had discovered him at the University
of Chicago. where she had dabbled in
the Pierian spring as a special stu.
dent in English literature the winter
before; and Nhen few dancing par
ties at the Quadrangle Club had
warmed up a casual classroom ac-
quaintance into something more lively
she had invited him out to Papa's
principally for a summers airing.
She had been timid in making the
suggestion, for he, being a faculty
man with some exalted title, moved
on higher academic plane than she
could ever hope to reach.
He had accepted her invitation
and with some fishing tackle, an old
riding-suit, and an anthology of Vic
torian verse in his kit, came to Para
disc Peaks TO worship Nature-and
Columbine. He had not suspected
that be was pursuing a princess of
the Continental Divide.
Client felt at loss in the Para
disc Peaks crowd. Although it was
affa,le enough, and its wives were
pleasantly negative, its talk was not
his talk. They were all like Angus,
impressively rich: and also, like John
Eustace Chandler they we're appar-
ent - adept at every extravagant
amusement. They had been all over
the map; and he, Roderick Client,
had been nowhere in particular, ex-
cept TO Harvard.
Moreover he had not brought along
his dress suit. He gathered that din
ner was a full dress affair at the
Manor, and he would have fled back
TO civilization and simplicity immed-
lately il the railroad station had not
been a hard forty miles of motor
driving way. In panic he rushed
to Columbine for advice, and she
Gained his embarrassment with such
tactful sympathy and resourcefulress
that his alteration of her reached a
new summit of ecstasy. She merely
said with her gentlest smile:
Don't worry. I think / can find
you what you want"
Then she pressed a button and con-
ferred with an austere major domo.
Within a few minutes an equipment
e what young Mr.. Client, in his
lighter moments, called "soup-and-
fish, was laid out in his room, COM
plete from socks to cuff links. What
was more important, the clothes fit
ted him.
"Am in the Wild West or the
Arabian Nights?" he asked himself
as he studied the perfect fit of some
body else's dress coat across his
shoulders.