Beverly banner. [volume] (Beverly, N.J.) 1877-1964, 1925-06-26


begun to drive his nerves into gallop.
He who had conserved so carefully his
precious health, now undertook a new
burden.
Brena came down one morning when
the rain of a wild March day was
/ beating on the windows. The wind,
| tearing up the leaves Of the autumn
that had lain all winter beneath the
snow and ice of the mournful, drip
ping garden, but was now released by
thaw, was slapping wet refuse
against the great window panes be-
hind the menacing iron bars. 1t cast
rotten vegetation at this house as If
1t were throwing riff-raff into the face
of an accursed personality.
Parmalee did not answer her call.
He was not at the breakfast table.
The servants could not find him in
his rooms. He was discovered finally
by his voice, which came in family
with the sound of the wind. Brena
without protection from the driving
rain ran out the great front door,
down the path which cut a diameter
in the circle Of the driveway, to the
massive iron gate.
| Parmalee was there with his little
white hands grasping the upright bars
swaying backward and forward like
Gagged animal, staring out with wild,
red eyes, at the high shores Of the
distant river bank seen through the
| haze, his bare head wet and DISNEY
eled.
"Come and get me, On your eyes"
he screamed. you've been waiting
| long enough. Come and get me. I'm
not afraid of you all"
Brena looked over his shoulder up
and down the road beyond the gate.
Water was standing in the shallow
ruts and the shrubbery, whipped by
the wind, danced like 1.-THE devils
along the crest of the palisade. But
no living creature was in sight.
"You better come into the house.
| Compton," she said with a tone Of
authority.
She realized afterward that she had
Ieaped rather joyfully toward the con-
cltsion that this moment explained
! the menace which had hung over
them so long and that 1t promised a
definite end of her obligations. She
remembered of thinking how like an
angry, impotent little dog he was,
coward at heart, but barking behind
gate at an empty road. She be-
lieved he had lost his mind.
fCome into the house, she repeated.
:. He looked at her stupidity, his lower
Wv limp and hanging, his eyes watery
I'D looking into her face with the
diPubled expression Of anafr t tiTia 4 loss
ofFcoyerI5hsness.
''All right" he said hoarsely; 'Tm
all right Brena."
He appeared weak, unable to carry
| himself erect, and his breath wheezed
unpleasantly as he followed her feebly
up the walk and the wet granite
| steps of the frowning house.
"Go upstairs and lie down." she
commanded.
lHe stopped with his hands on the
black walnut newell post of the stairs
and leaned toward her confidentially.
| Footprints" said he, grinning like
a lfend. Footprints"
| Brena, opening the door of his
library, walked rapidly toward the
telephone on his desk. At last she
had been driven to summon the aid,
counsel and authority of the world
| bfyond the doors of this damned
! Yme. Parmalee was mad. But as
n ne put out her hand toward the tele-
n aone instrument it knocked over an
4 npty glass. She raised this glass to
ner nose. The supports of her heart
suddenly crumbled, for she knew then
! that her husband was not mad, not
changed permanently from the crafty,
! secretive, self-isolated and haunted
man that he had been, but was only
at the end of long night of trying
to drink himself into the freedom of
insensibility.
AT this moment she wondered why
she did not feel a marked increase of
the old loathing and disgust that she
had been unable to weed out as it had
! sprung up like some rank growth. At
this moment she remembered his first
| appear " hSAt HOW lie udu DSSScu u6T
to help him win back the clean spirit
Of his boyhood, how she had once
seen the CLINT of that treasured some
thing, which men forget to keep, shin
! ing dimly in the midst of decay, how,
having tasted the bitterness of sue
cess, he had built new hope. Now he
was grotesque failure, pounding to
| l.
the surface of the waters He was
paying the account of lifetime, per-
haps; perhaps the reckoning of one
mistake. There surged up to the brim
in her heart great pity.
To Brena the cause of his panic. his
terror, his suspicious, his isolation.
the horrid exiled days he led, the
sleepless nights he spent now APP
peared of less Importance than the
| fact that no man was suffering more