The Coolidge examiner., 1932-01-08

a woodSman of the region but had a
heavy ulster with its great collar
turned up. That and his soft hat
pulled down in front almost con-
cealed his face.
He went to the nearest window Of
the lodge and looked in. He walked
on around the corner. His actions
were peculiar in that he seemingly
had no intention of entering the
place and apparently was indiffer-
ent to being discovered in the
strange behavior of walking about
it in snow storm and looking in
windows. Presently he returned to
the car, shook the snow from his
ulster and hat as well as he could,
and let himself back into his seat
beside the driver.
Thereafter the men remained In
the automobile for an hour. Then
the man in the ulster got out again
and went to the lodge, looking in
window as he had done before.
At the first glance he turned and
ran back to the car. Several men
came hurriedly out of the lodge.
One was the stranger who had come
in the Buick. He went to his car.
entered it and drove out of the
grounds, turning south. The men in
the Cadillac backed out from the
covert of balsam and drove out, also
turning south. The other men from
the lodge ran to the caretakers' cot
tages and presently were running
back with two women. all much agi-
tated.
The Menominee Indian met the
women at the steps.
He's dead" he said. He then
got his car out of the long shed used
as a summer garage and departed
for the reservation. The travelling
meat salesman got his car and
drove away toward Watersmeet TO
the north, on the way to Hurley.
The caretakers and their wives and
the guides were left dismayed with
the consequences of the afternoons
rough hilarity: the dead body of
Preston Brown, the club member.
He had been impaled on a hunting
knife.
The man in the Buick was driving
at forty miles an hour. The man
driving the Cadillac followed at
that speed until it was certain that
the Buick was taking the main trav-
eled road south. Then the speed of
the Cadillac was increased to sixty
miles. AS it passed the Buick it
swerved in so closely as to sug-
gest either a peculiar Indifference to
safety or an intent TO force the 9TH
er car into the ditch, but before the
Buick driver could be really aware
of that the Cadillac had swung well
into the other lane, passed without
sounding the horn and disappeared
around bend in the road.
1t was now nearing dusk, and the
snow was no longer falling.
Thirty miles from Little Butte des
MOrts on the main Travelled road
south a wooden bridge over a thor
oughfare between two lakes and the
marshes through which ii flowed,
had been taken out The concrete
posts of the new bridge were in and
there was detour by an extern
porized plank road The approach
from the north was by a sharp
curve over a small hill.
The snow storm had sent the men
home from the construction work
October 3, but late in the afternoon
an employee had put red lanterns
along the approaches as warning of
the dangerous road conditions. The
snowfall stopped; the wind died
down, and at sundown there was
burst of dark red in the west. AS ii
faded out a Cadillac was driven
from the north to within a hundred
yards of the warning lanterns. A
man in an ulster got out of the car
and set about taking up the lights
quickly. The driver of the car
turned it into the brush by an old
trail. When the man in the ulster
had taken up all the lanterns on the
north side of the bridge construc-
tion he carried them into the brush
and hid them and himself where he
could keep the road in view.
The dusk, cupped in the encircle-
ment of balsam, oak. spruce, pine
and scrub brush, deepened and dark
ened. There was then what always
must seem miracle dropped from
easement of Heaven, the song of
white-throat sparrow singing in
this waste of growing and forbid
ding darkness in which he was so
bold a midge.
The white-throat stopped his song
at the sound of a motor coming
from the north. The car was a
Ford. The driver knew his road.
He swore as he came up slowly, evil
| IDENTIFY at the carelessness which had
neglected to put up the lights, but
he took his way across the plank
detour.