Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-02-01
THE BREAKING POINT
BY MARY ROBERTS RINEHART

Synopsis of Preceding Chapters
Dick Livingstone, who is in love with
Elizabeth Wheeler, wishes to return to
Wyoming and clear up his hazy past.
His adopted uncle David, who knows
the facts, of which Dick is ignorant, dis !.
Courages the idea. Elizabeth's worldly
sister, Nina, urges Elizabeth to accept
the wealthy Walle Sayre. Dick takes
Elizabeth to the theater to see THE
Valley" in which Beverly Carlysle has
returned after sixteen years absence
from the stage. Beverly's brother,
Gregory, believes he recognizes Dick
as someone connected with a tragic
incident in Beverly's past. Bassett a
newspaper reporter present, believes he
scents 'big story connected with the
JudsOn Clark scandal. DR.. David, wor-
ried lest Dick discover his forgotten
past, consults a psychoanalyst and
learns that the blank in Dicks mind
will remain until he is pushed to \the
breaking point by past environment or
shock. Gregory, fearing trouble for
Beverly, and unaware of Dicks loss of
memory calls on DIR. David to warn
him against Bassett. Go on with the
story.
~ ASSET sat up late that night again,
a
- book. The old story, as he pieced it
out, ran like this:
1t had been eleven years ago, when, &C.
cording to the old files, Clark had financed
Beverly Carylisles first starring venture. He
had apparently, started out in the beginning
only to give her the publicity she needed. In
devising it, however, he had shown a sort
of boyish recklessness and ingenuity that
had caught the interest of the press, and set
newspaper men chuckling whenever they met.
1t was unvicious, young, and highly enter
tanning, and it had cost Judson Clark his
membership in his fathers conservative cid
clubs.
For time it livened the theatrical world
with escapades that were harmless enough
if sensational. Then, after time newspa-
per row began to whisper that young Clark
was in love with the girl
The story went, after while, that Judson
Clark had been refused and was taking his
refusal badly. Reporters saw him, careless
Iy dressed outside the stage door, waiting,
and the story went that the girl had thrown
him over, money and all, for her leading man.
One thing was clear, Clark, not drinker be-
fore, took to drinking hard, and after time,
after some unpleasant scenes probably, &hG
refused to see him any more.
When the play closed in June, 1911, she
married Howard Lucas, her leading man.
his third wife. Lucas had not been a bad
chap, good-looking, rather negligible man,
given to all-day Sunday poker, carefully val
eted not very keen mentally, but amlable.
They had bought a house on East Fifty-sixth
street, and were looking for new play with
Lucas as co-star, when he unaccountably went
to pieces nervously, stopped sleeping, devel-
oped a slight twitch1ng of his handsome,
rather vacuous face.
Judson Clark had taken his yacht and gone
to Europe, and was reported from here and
there not too favorably. But when he came
back in early September, he. had apparently
recovered from his infatuation,( was his old
carefully dressed, self again, and when in
terviewed, declared his intention of<spending
the winter on his Wyoming ranch.
Of course he must have heard of Lucas
breakdown, and equally of course, he must
have seen them both. What happened at that
interview, by what casual attitude he allayed
Lucas probable jealousy and the girls own
nervousness, Bassett had no way OF d1scov-
ering 1t was clear that he convipced them
both of his good faith, for the next note in
the reporters book was simply date, Sep
TENDER IL, 1911"
That was the day they had all started west
together, travelling in Clark's private car,
with Lucas, twitching slightly, smiling and
waving farewell from a window.
The big smash did not come until the mid
die of October.
Basset sat back and considered. He had
a fairly clear idea of the conditions at the
ranch Daily riding, some little reading,
and great deal too much of each other. A
sick man,~too, unhappy in his exile, chat'
ing against his restrictions, lonely and IT.
ritable. The girl early seeing her mistake,
and Clark's jealousy of her husband. me
door into their apartment closing the thou
sand and one unconscious intimacies be-
tween man and wife, the breakfast for two
going I'D the stairs, and below that not
eyed boy, agonized and passionately 1eal-
ous vet meeting them and looking AFTER
them their host and a gentleman.
Lucas took to drinking, after a time, to
allay his sheer boredom. And Jud CLARK
drank with him. III the end of three weeks
they were both drinking heavily ana were
politely quarrelsome.
queer picture, he reflected, the three
of them shut away on the great ranch, ana
every day some new tension, some ne"
strain.
Then, one night at dinner, they quar-
relied, and Beverly left the table. She was
going to pack her things and go back to
New York. She had felt, probably, that
something was bound to snap. And while
she waA upstairs Clark had shot and killed
Howard Lucas, and himself disappeared.
He had run, testimony at the inquest re-
vealed, to the corral and saddled morse.
Although it was only October, 1t was snow.
ing hard, but in spite OF that ne nao
turned his horse toward the mountains
Nv midnight a posse from Norada had
started out, and another up the Dry River
CANYON but the storm turned into Dllz-
gard and they we're obliged to turn DacK.
A few inches more snow, and they cou4o
not have got their horses out. A week or
so later with crust of ice over 1t. Few
of them began again, with no expectation,
however, of finding Clark alive. Ihey
came across his horse on the second oay'
but they did not find him, and there were
some among them who felt that, AFTER all
old Elihu Clark's boy had chosen the DeI-
for way. It was better to lie somewhere
GIaNI IN hn