Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1924-06-17

him and tainted him with fear!
This was fear In a different sense.
IL was a fear of the intangible, OF
what he could not reach. or see, Oh
what he could not materaiize INTO
actual form. 1t was the fear Oh the
unknown.
SHADOW varne. Who was the fool
who dared to challenge SHADOW
Earnei
He was smiling now-but his lips
were thin and merciiess.
It could no longer be held at
tributable to some crazeds IRE
sponsible act. that shot on ship
board, which chance had elected
should be fired through his state
room window rather than through
any other. Logic now denied that:
The man who fired that shot, and
the man who had screamed out In
/ haunting mockery at him last night,
we're one and the same. Well. VINO
was it, then, who had been on the
liner, and was now ON Manwa
Island?
There were only two. Runnells
and Locke.
Had Runnells had time to change
his shoes, or. granting the time
had cunning enough to have thought
Oh OOluS 50 wv tn0 ShonSSo
a thousand to one against 1t. Locke.
then? But Runnells had said that
Locke hadn't left the Talofa. Were
Runnells and Locke in cahoots to-
gether? They had been extremely
friendly on the way down. But
Locke-it was preposterous! He
knew who Locke was-a young
American business man of good
| family. 1t was curious, though, that
Polly should have made that remark
| today-about a trip like this on
such short acquaintance. No; there
| was nothing in that. 1t had hap
pened too naturally. Locke had a
! good many pairs Of shoes. Like
Runnells'. none of them had been
wet; but he was not sure he had
| found all OF them in the darkness
in the cabin with Locke-sup-
| opposite bunk. Locke could easily
have hidden a tell-tale pair; and
| Locke was decidedly the kind of
man who would have had in
| telligence to do so.
But now could Locke know him
| as Shadow Varne?
Well, there was Runnells!
His jaws set with a snap. Was 1t
| Runnells? There was one way to
| find out-within the next ten
ininutes-with his hands at Run
| nells' throat! No; that would not
do-not yet-save as a last resort
If it were not Runnells, then any
act like that on his part would dis
close his hand, arouse Runnells'
suspicious that this trip to Manwa
Island was perhaps, after all, not en-
tirely holiday jaunt! 81
Wall <haxy ,Yyo1,Jd
play with Shadow Varne. would
they? Fools! Did they think he
was one, too-that he could not see
| Something was holding them back
here on the island from shot as
on the liner; here, for some reason
an attempt to inspire fear was
| evidently being resorted to instead
Something kept them from coming
out into the open; something neces-
| STATED this cat-and-mouse game
Something, IL exposure were actually
| within their power, prevented them
| from exposing him.
That was it! That was 1t exactly
the one point on which he would
stake everything and play out the
game. Curse them and their child
ish tricks to brighten him. Ex-
| posture was the only thing he feared
because that would ruin every
| chance Of success here; but il he
! was safe from exposure. or il eX-
| posture were only delayed long
enough-and 1t need not be very
/ long delayed, at that-he would
have got as he meant to get, in spite
| of God or man or the devil, what he
had come for. -r
|