Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-03-03
THE BREAKING POINT
BY MARY ROBERTS RINEHART

to reconstruct the life of the cabin. Jud
would have had the lower bunk, David the
upper. The skeleton of cot bed in the lean.
to would have been Maggie's. But none OF
them yielded anything.
Now then, having accepted that they lived
here, it was from here that the escape was
made. They would have started the moment,
the snow was melted enough to let them get
out, and they would have taken, not the trail
toward the town, but some other and circuit
out route toward the railroad. But there
had been things to do before they left. They,
would have cleared the cabin of every trace
of occupancy; the tin cans, Clark's clothing,
such bedding as they could not carry. The
cans must have been problem; the clothes, .
of course, could have been burned. But there
were things, like the buttons, that did not
burn easily Clarks watch, if he wore one, Z
his cuff links -
Tt occurred to him that they might have =
disposed Of some of the unburnable articles
under the floor, and he lifted rough board
or two. But to pursue the search systemat- )
ically he would have needed p1ckax and
reluctantly he gave vt up and turned MIS-
attention to the lean-to and the buried stove:
The stove lay in a shallow pit, lined with
ancient ashes and crumbled bits OF wood from
the roof. 1t lay on it's side, its sheet-lronef
sides collapsed, its long chimney d1slntegrat-.t
ed. He was in heavy sweat before ne had1
uncovered it, and was able to remove 1T from
it's bed of ashes and pine needles. This done,
he brought his candle-1anteern and settled
himself cross-legged on the ground
HIS nrSC casual inspection OIL Inc dSuSS Ao~t
vealed nothing. He set to work more care
fully then, picking them up by handtuls ex-
aiming and discarding. Within ten minutes
he had in a pile beside him some burned and
blackened metal buttons, the eyelets ana a.
piece of leather from a shoe, and the Almost
unrecognizable nib of fountain pen. I,
He sat with them in the palm of his hand.e
Taken alone, each one was insignificant,
proved nothing whatever. Taken all together'9
fthey assumed vast proportions, became con-
Vincing, became evidence.
Late that night he descended stiffly at the
livery stable, and turned his weary horse over.
to stable man.
Looks dead beat" said the stable man,
cycling. the animal. ~
!. "He's got nothing me:' Bassett respond
ed cheerfully. Better give him a hot bath
and put him to bed. That's what I'm going
to do"
He walked back to the hotel, glad to stretch
his aching muscles. -
"You look as though you'd struck OIL" said
the night clerk.
coil! I'll tell you what I have struck. I,
I've struck a livery stable saddle two million
times in the last two days"
The clerk grinned, and Bassett idly pulled,
the register toward him, and scanned Fne,7
pages. a
~! Smith, Minneapolis he read Then
he stopped and stared. Richard Livingstone
was registered on the next line above. q =
~ lex had found it, hard to leave Eliza
beth, for she chung to him in her grief
d. with pathetic wistfulness. He found
too that the family depended on him rather
than on Leslie Ward for moral support 1t
was to him that Walter Wheeler looked for
assurance that the father had had no indirect
responsibility for the sons DEATH and 1t was
to him that Jim's mother lying gfay-faced
and listless in her bed on her couch,
brought her anxious questionings. Had Jim
suffered? Could they have avoided it? And
an insstent demand to know who and wl1et
had been the girl who had been with him.. Il
In spite of his own feelings that he would
have to go to Norada quickly before David
became impatient over his exile. he took a.
few hours to find the answer to that question.
But when he found it he could not tell thenl.ss
The girl had been dweller in the shady by
ways of life, had played her small immoral
part and gone on, perhaps to some place
where men were kinder and less urgent
He secured her former address from the
police, three-story brick rooming house in
the local tenderloin, and waited rather I'M,
comfortably for the mistress of the place to
see him. She came at last, big woman, vast
and shapeless, and with an amiable loose
smile, and she came in with the light step of
the over-fleshed, only to pause in the doorway
and stare at him.
''My Cod" she said, "I thought you were
dead" z
Continued Tuesday. Renew your subscrip-
harL