White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1930-06-13

James Oliver Curwood
wNU Service
e., 1899, Doubleday Doran q Co., Ine.)
CHAPTER VIII-Continued
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He swung himself out, thrusting
against the rock, and when the ogres
of the water pit dragged at their vic
tins Carla was in bis arms. His
brain was keenly alive again, and he
knew that teams of oxen could have
pulled but futilely against the under
currents, which, one after another,
were transporting them trresistibly
and yet without great haste through
watery space. Thought of physical
salvation scarcely filtered in ray of
hope through his mind. and his senses
were unterritied by the suffocating
presence of death. In Carla were his
strength and courage. He locked his
arms about her closely. He could
feel her clinging to him with the
same desire to remain inseparable
when the end came. Strange. a king.
dom of Micomicon-a land Of AL.
naschar-a place of fairies-a world
of dreams They we're going to 1t
all. Between the walls where no man
had ever looked. Deathl A magni6-
cent adventure, with Carla in his
armsl A roaring filled his ears. They
were travelling swiftly now. His
senses grew less distinct, like colors
merging one into another in sunset
sky. Queer, why it should end like
this, after years of life-he-and Carla
-together-as 1t must have been in
tended from the beginning. A glori-
GUS graciousness Of Fate, an immortal
symphony of fulfilment-to pass on
like this with Carla, no matter how
many hundred centuries had gone be-
fore! And some one-his wife-had
said-that seconds meant more than
years hen-like this
The roaring was an enormity of
sound. Its waiting was like the wind
in the cave of Aeolus, its thunder like
Stentor's blasts rumbling through the
empty bowels of the earth. They
numbed and anesthetized, yet left him
with shred Of living, thinking cells
which told him they were tearing
through the gullet Of the gorge, and
which, at the same time, held his arms
unyielding as bands of steel about
Carla's body.
Although close to the edge of an
abyss of utter darkness, consciousness
did not quite leave him. Vaguely he
experienced the thrill of being trans
ported out of a hell of tumultuous
sound into soft and gently drifting
sea which was without noise or VIC.
lence. For an interval he fancied his
arms were wings and that he was try
Ing to fly, making rather bad mess
of It because one side of him refused
to coordinate with the other. This
was the arm. only one arm now, which
held CarIa. With the other, after
little, he found himself clawing and
digging into something. man may
live hundred years, but when he is
ready to die and looks back over the
path he has travelled, 1t seems very
short. and the hundred years no more
than few hours. Paul had reflected
upon the illusory and baseless fabric
of time, its inadequacy and the hol-
lowness of its human measurement.
zone who is happy has but leeting
vision of life" Carla had said to him
once. ITO live long and terribly. one
must be unhappy-in prison" 1t was
odd why he should be thinking of this
as he continued to claw and dig. But
time had fastened itself upon him like
a leech, and If each second of his
wide-awake life had been as long as
these few seconds he would have lived
q thousand years. During this cycle
of his existence he slowly and tedi
ously progressed. until. with air filling
his lungs again, and the snlOtherins
folds of near-insensibility breaking
away from him. he knew that he was
no longer In water that his fingers
were clutclling at soft sand, and that
the burden which he had dragged with
him was t'arla.
There was scarcely breath be
tween this knowledge and the full and
poignant possession Of every facut!
with viii h his brain was capable OF
being inspired But darkness, mys
terry, the defeat OF death, and the fact
of his own physical salvation were
submerged all at once In an agonized
appeal to the limp, lead form which
he clasped in his arms The spirits
of the sable blackness about him lis
tened to his voice calling CarIas name
as he struggled to bring life back into
her body. Once he had worked over
q little girl who had heen taken from
the water and now memory came to
him wildly of the first gentle beating
Of the heart again. the slow returning
of the soul into the tender body. until
the child lived and brpathed once
more. But Carlas soft breast gave no
response. Her lips were cold and life
less. and. at last. believing her surely
dead, he held her face close to him
and kissed her mouth and eyes. us the
father of the little girl had kissed his
child when she was returning to him.
When the first whispe, Of breath came
from Carla's lips he was holding her
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