Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 February 1912 — THE GIRL from HIS TOWN [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE GIRL from HIS TOWN

By MARIE VAN VORST

Illustrations by M. G. KETTNER

(Copy right, 1910, by The Bobba-Merrill OoJ M SYNOPSIS. Dan Blair, the 22-year-old son of the flfty-mlinon-dollar copper king of Blairtown, Mont., is a guest at the English home of Lady Galorey. Dan’s father had been courteous to Lord Galorey during his visit to the United States and the courtesy is now being returned to the young man. The youth has an ideal girl in his mind. He meets Lily, Duchess of ' Breakwater, a beautiful widow, who is attracted by his 'immense fortune stnd takes a liking to her. When Dan was a boy, a girl sang a solo at a church, and he had never forgotten her. The Galoreys, Lily and Dan attend a London theater where one Letty Land is the star. Dan recognizes her as the girl from his town, and going behind the scenes introduces hitnself and she remembers him. He leatns that Prince Ponlotowsky is suitor and escort to Letty. Lord Galorey and a friend named Ruggles determine to protect the westerner from Lily and other fortune hunters. Young Blair goes to see Lily: he can talk of nothing but Letty and this angers the Duchess. The westerner finds Letty ill from hard work, but she recovers and Ruggles and Dan invite her to supper. She asks Dan to build a home for disappointed theatrical people.

CHAPTER Xl.—-Continued. She did not appear to bear him. Indeed' she was not looking at him, and Dan saw Prince Ponlotowsky making bls way toward their table across the room. Letty Lane rose. Dan put her cloak about her shoulders/ and glancing toward Ruggles and toward the boy as indifferently as she had considered the new-comers, who formed a small group around the brilliant figure of the actress, she nodded good night to both Ruggles and Blair and went up to the Hungarian as though he were her husband, who had come to take her home, however, at the door she sufficiently shoqk off her mood, to smile slightly at Dan: “I have had Tots of fun,’ and the Scotch broth was great! Thank you both so much.” Until they were up In their sittingroom her-bests did not exchange a word. Then Ruggles took a book up from the table and sat down with his cigar. "I am going to read a little Dan. Slept all day; feel as wideawake as an owl.” Dan showed no desire to be communicative, however, to Ruggles* disappointment, but he exclaimed abruptly:

“I’ll be darned, Ruggles, if I can guess what you asked her for!” “Well, it did turn out to be a pretty expensive party for you, Dannie, didn’t It?" Riggles returned humor-, ously. a l’ll let you off from any more —Supper And Dan fumed as he turned nis back. “Expensive! There you are again, Ruggles, with your infernal Intrusion of money into everything I do." When the elder man found himself alone, he read a little and then put his book down to muse. And his meditations were on the tide of life and the beds It runs over; the living whirlpool as Ruggles himself had seen it coursing through London under fog and mist. It seemed now to surge up in the dark to his very windows, and the flow mysteriously passed under his windows In these silent hours over which the waters go. Out of the sound, as it flowed on, the cries rose, he thought, kindly to his ears: "God bless her—God bless Letty Lane!” And with this sound he closed his meditations, thinking of a more peaceful stream, the brighter, sweeter waters of the boy’s nature, translucent and clear. The vision wae happier, and with it Ruggles rose and yawned, and shut his book.

CHAPTER XII. The Green Knight The Duchess of Breakwater had made Dan promise at Osdene the day he went back to London that he would take her over to her own place, Stainer Court, and with her see the beauty, ruins and traditions of the place. When Dan got up well on in the morning, Ruggles had gone to the bank. Dan’s thoughts turned from everything to Letty |ane. 'With irritation he put her out of his mind. There had come up between himself and the girl he had known slightly in his own town two years ago a wall of partition. Every time he saw her Poniotowsky was there, condescending, arrogant, rude and proud. The prince the night before had given the tips of his fingers to Dan, podded to Ruggles as if the Westerner had been his tailor, and had appropriated Letty Lane, and she had gone ..away under ‘ his shadow. The simplicity life, his decent bringing up, his immaculate youth, for such it was, his aloofness from the world, made him naive, but he was not dull He watted

—not like a skeptic whowould fit every one into his pigeonholes—on the contrary, he waited to find every one as perfect as he knew they must be, and every time he tried to think of Letty Lane, Ponlotowsky troubled him horribly and seemed to rise before him, and sardonically look at him through his eye-glass, making the boy’s belief in good things ridiculous. He wrote a note to Ruggles, saying that he would be back late and not to wait for him, and set out in his own car for Blankshire, where the duchess was to meet him at Stainer Court at noon. On his way out he decided that he had been a fool to discuss Letty Lane with the Duchess of Breakwater, and that it had been none of his business to put her duty before her, and that he had judged her quickly and unfairly. He fell inwove with the lovely English country over which his motor took him, and it . made him more affectionate toward the English woman. He sat back in his car, looking over the fine shooting land, the misty golden forests, as through the misty country his motor took its way. The breath ot England was on his cheeks, he breathed in its odors fresh and sweet, the wildness air was cool and fragrant. His cheeks grew red, his eyes shone like stars, and he was content with his youth and his • lot. When they stopped at Castelen, the property belonging to Stainer Court, he felt something of proprietorship stir In him, and at Stainer Arms ordered a drink, bought petroleum, and then pushed up the avenue under the leafless giant trees, whose roots were older than his father’s name or than any state of the Union. And he felt admiration and something like emotion as he saw the first tgwers of Stainer Court finally appear. The duchess waited for-him in the room known as the “Green Knight’s Room,” because of a figure in tapestry on the walls. The legend In wool

had been woven in Spain, somewhere about-the time when Isabelle was kind, and when in turn a continent loomed up for the world in general out of the mist. The subject of the Green Knight’s tapestry was simple and convincing. On a sheer-cut village of low ferns, where daisies stood up like trees, a slender lady poised her dark sandaled feet on the pin-like turf. Her figure . was all swathed round with a spotless dress of woolly white, softened by age into a golden misty tone, and a pair of friendly and confidential rabbits sat close to her golden slippers. The lady’s face was candid and mild; her eyes were soft, and around her head was wound a fillet of woven threads, mellow In tone, a red, no doubt, originally, but softened to a coral pink by time. This lady in all her grace and virginal sweetness was only half of the woven story To her right stood a youth in forest green, his sword drawn, and his intention evidently to kill a creature wh|eh, near to the gentle rabbits, out of the daisied grass lifted its cruel snakelike head. For nearly five hundred years the serpent’s venom had been poised, and if the serpent should start the Green Knight strike, too, at the same magic moment Close to the tapestry a fire had been laid in the broad fireplace, and the duchess hp.d ordered the luncheon table for Dan and herself spread with the cold things England knows how to combine into a delectable feast The room was full of mediaeval furnishings, but the Green Knight was the best or all. Ine juucness oi urea*water took him for granted. She had known him all her life, and she had only been struck by his expensive beauty when the offer came to her from the National Museum to buy him, and she wondered how long she could afford to stick to her price. When Dan came in he found her in a short tweed skirt a mannish blouse, looking boyish and wholly charming, and she mixed him a cocktail unde* the Green Knight’s very nose and offered It with the wisdom of the serpent Itself, and the duchess didn’t in the least suggest the white-robed, milk-white lady. The friends drank their cocktails in good spirits, and Dan presented the lady with the flowers he had brought

her, and he felt a strong sentiment stir at the sight of her in this old room, alone and waiting for him. The servants left them, the duchess put her hands on the boy's broad shoulders. Nearly as tall as he, she was a good example of the best-looking English woman, straight and strong, and her eyes were level, and Dan met them with his own. - * I am so glad you came,” she murmured. “I’ve been ragging myself every minute since you went from Osdene." "You have? What for?” “Because I was such a perfect prig. I’ll do anything you like for Miss Lane. I mean to say, I’ll arrange tor a musicale and ask her to sing.” The color rushed Into Dan’s face. How bully of her! What a brick this showed her to be! He said: “Yoji are as sweet as a peach!” —: The duchess' hands were still on his shoulders. She could feel his rapid breath. “I don’t make you think of a box of candy now?” she murmured, and the boy covered her hand with his own. “I don't know what you make me think of—itls bully, whatever ft is! ’’ If the Spanish tapestry could only have reversed its idea, and if tne immaculate lady, or even ope of the rabbits, could have drawn a sword to protect the Green Knight, it would have been passing well. But the woven work, when it first had been embroidered, was done for ever; it was irrevocable In Its mistaken Idea, that it is only the woman who needs protection!

CHAPTER XIII. \\ r The Face of Letty Lane. As. Dan went through the halls of the Carlton on his way to his rooms that same evening, the porter gave him two notes, which Dan went down Into the smoking-room to

read. He tore open the note bearing the Hotel Savoyon the envetope. and read: ■■ ‘ "Dear Boy : AjVlll you"conje around tonight and see me about five o’clock? Don’t let anything keep you." (Letty Lane had the habit of scratching out phrases to Insert others, and there was something scratched out.) "I want to talk to you about something very important. Come sure. L. L." Dan looked at the clock; it was after nine; and she would be at the Galety going on with her performance. The other note, which he opened more slowly, was from feuggles, and it began in just the same way as the dancer’s had begun:

“Dear Boy: I have been suddenly called back to the United States'. Ab I didn’t know how to get at you, I couldn’t I had a cable that takes me right back. I get the Lusitania at Liverpool and you can send me a Marconi. Better make the first boat yOu can and come over. "Joshua RuggleS.**

Ruggles left no word of advice, and unconscious of this master stroke on the part of the old man, whose heart yearned for him as for his'own son, Dan folded the note up and thought no more about Ruggles. When ah hour later he came out of the Carlton he was prepared for the life of the evening. . He stopped at thetelephone desk and sent a telegram to Ruggles on the Lusitania:

"Can’t come yet awhile; am engaged to be married to the Duchess of Breakwater.” He wrote this out in full and the man at the Marconi "sat up” and smiled as he wrote. With Letty Lane’s badly written note in his pocket, and wondering very much at her summons of him, Dan drove to the Gaiety, and at the end of the third act went back of the scenes. There were several people in hen dressing-room. Higgins was lacing her into a white bodice and Mias Lane, before her glass, waa put* ing the rouge on her lips. .. * (TO BE CONTINUED.) ' I I - - s '=■’

Prince Poniotowsky Making His Way Toward Their Table Across the Room.