Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 219, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 September 1914 — The HONEYMOONS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

The HONEYMOONS

by HAROLD MAC GRATH

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SYNOPSIS. Eleanora de Toscana was singing in Paris, which, perhaps, accounted for Edward Courtlandt’s appearance there. Multimillionaire, he wandered about where fancy dictated. He might be Jn Paris one day and Kamchatka the ne; J. Following the opera he goes to a and is accosted by a pretty young' woman. She gives him the address of Flora Desimone, vocal rival of Toscana, and Flora gives him the address of Eleanora. whom he is determined to see. CHAPTER lll—Continued. Oh, stubborn Dutchman that he had been! Blind fool! To have run away instead of fighting to the last ditch for his happiness! The Desimone woman •was right; it had taken him a long time to come to the conclusion that she done him ah ill turn. His jaw set, and the pressure of his lips broke the sweep of hie mustache, converting it Into bristling tufts, warlike and resolute. What of the pretty woman in the Tavern e Roy die? What about her? At whose bidding had she followed him? One or the other of them had not told the truth, and he was inclined to believe that tiie prevarication had its source in the pomegranate lips of the Calabrian. To give the old barb one more twist, to learn if its venomous point still held and hurt; nothing would have afforded the diva more delight When the taxicab joined the long line of carriages and automobiles opposite the Austrian ambassador’s, Courtlandt awoke to the dismal and disquieting fact that he had formulated no plan of action. He had done no more than to give the driver his directions; and now that he had arrived, he had the choice of two alternatives. He could wait to see her come out or return at once to his hotel, which, as subsequent events affirmed, would have been the more sensible course. He would have been confronted with small difficulty in gaining admission to the house. He knew enough of these general receptions; the announcing of his name would have conveyed nothing to the host, who knew perhaps a third of his guests, and many of these but slightly. But such an adventure was distasteful to Courtlandt. He could not everstep certain recognized boundaries of convention, and to enter a man’s house unasked was colossal impudence. Beyond this, he realized that he could have accomplished nothing; the advantage would have been hers. Nor could he meet her as she came out, for again the odds would have been largely in her favor. No, the encounter must be when they two were alone. She must be surprised. She must have no time to use her ready wit An idea presented itself. It appealed to him at that moment as quite clever and feasible. "Wait!” he called to the driver. He dived among the carriages and cars, and presently he found what he sought—her limousine. He had taken the number into his mind too keenly to be mistaken. He saw the end of his difficulties; and La went about the affair with his usual directness. It was only at rare times that he ran his head - into a cul-de-sac. If her chauffeur was regularly employed in her service, he would have to return to the hotel; but if he came from the garage, there was hope. Every man is said to have his price, and a French chauffeur might prove no notable exception to the rule. "Are you driver for Madame da Toscana?” Courtlandt asked of the man lounging in the forward seat The chauffeur looked hard at his questioner, and on finding that he satisfied the requirements of a gentleman, grumbled an affirmative. The limousine „ was well knowd in Paris, and he was growing weary of these endless inquiries. "Are you in her employ directly, or do*you come from the garage?" "I am from the garage, but I drive mademoiselle’s car most of the time, especially at night It is not madame but mademoiselle/ monsieur." "My mistake." A slight pause. It was rather a difficult moment for Courtlandt. The chauffeur waited wonderlngly. “Would you like to make five hundred francs?" “How, monsieur?” Courtlandt should have been warned by the tone, which contained no unusual interest or eagerness. “Permit me to remain in mademoiselle's car till she cornea. I wish to ride with her to her apartment” The chauffeur laughed. He stretched his legs. “Thanks, monsieur. It is very dull waiting. Monsieur knows a good joke." Atd to Courtlandt’s dismay he realised that his proposal bad truly been gece, ted as a jest ”1 am not joking. lam in earnest

Five hundred francs. On the word of a gentleman I mean mademoiselle no harm. I am known to her. All she has to do is to appeal to you, and you can stop the car and summon the po-< lice.” The chauffeur drew in his legs and leaned toward his tempter. "Monsieur, if you are not jestjng, then you are a madman. -Who are you? -What do I know about you? I never saw you before, and for two seasons I have driven mademoiselle in Paris. She wear's beautiful jewels tonight. HoW do I know that you are not a gentlemanly thief? Ride home with mademoiselle! You are crazy. Make yourself scarce, monsieur; in one minute 1 shall call the police.” "Blockhead!” <* English of this order the Frenchman perfectly understood. _ “La, la!” he cried, rising to execute his threat Courtlandt was furious, but his fury was directed at himself as much as at the trustworthy young man getting down from the limousine. His eagerness had led him to mistake stupidity for cleverness. He had gone about the affair with all the clumsiness of a boy who was making his first appearance at the stage entrance. It was mightily disconcerting, too, to have found an honest man when he was in desperate need of a dishonest one. He had faced with fine courage all sorts of dangerous wild animals; but at this moment he hadn’t the courage to face a policeman and. endeavor to explain, in a foreign tongue, a situation at once so delicate and so singularly open to misconstruction. So, for the second time in his life he took to his heels. Of the first time, more anon. He scrambled back to his own car, slammed the door, and told the driver to drop him at the Grand. However, he did not return to the hotel. Mademoiselle da Toscana’s chauffeur scratched his chin In perplexity. In frightening off his tempter he recognized that now he would never be able to find out who he was. He should have played with him until mademoiselle came out. She would have known Instantly. That would have been the time for the police. To hide in the car! What the devil! Only a madman would have offered such a proposition. The man had been either an American or ah Englishman, for all his accuracy in the tongue. Bah! Perhaps he had heard her sing that night, and had come away from the Opera, moonstruck. It was 1 not an isolated case. The fools were always pestering him, but no one had ever offered so uncommon a bribe; five hundred francs. Mademoiselle might not believe that part of the tale. Mademoiselle was clever. There was a standing agreement between them that she would always give him half of whatever was offered him in the way of bribes. It paid. It was easier to sell his loyalty to her for two hundred and .fifty francs than to betray her for five hundred. She had yet to find him untruthful, and tonight he would be as frank as he had always been. But who was this fellow in the Bavarian hat, who patrolled the sidewalk? He had been watching him when the madman approached. For an hour or more he had walked up and down, never going twenty feet beyond the limousine. He couldn’t see the face. The long dark coat had a military cut about the hips and shoulders. From time to time he saw him glance up at the lighted windows. Eh, well; there were other women in the world besides mademoiselle, several others.

He had to wait only half an hour for her appearance. He opened the door and saw to it that she was comfortably seated; then he paused by the window, touching his cap. “What is it, Francois?” “A gentleman offered me five hundred francs, mademoiselle, if I would permit hlta to hide in the car.” “Five hundred francs? To hide in the car? Why didn’t you call the police?” “I started to, mademoiselle, but he ran away.” “Oh! What was he like?" The prima donna dropped the bunch of roses on the seat beside her. “Oh, he looked well enough. He had the air of a gentleman. He was tall, with light hair and mustache. But as I had never seen him before, and as mademoiselle wore some fine jewels, I bade him be off.” “Would you know Jiim again?” “Surely mademoiselle.” “The next time anyone bothers you, call the police. You have done well, and 1 shall remeipber it. Home.” The man in the Bavarian hat hurried back to the third cgr from the limousine, and followed at a reasonably safe distance. * She shut off the light and closed her eyes. She reclined against the cushion once more, striving not to think. Once, her hands shut tightly. Never, never, never! She pressed down the burning thoughts by recalling the bright scenes at the ambassador’s, the real generous applause that had followed her two songs. Ah, how that man Paderewski played! They two had cost the ambassador eight thousand francs. Fame and fortune! Fortune she could understand; but fame! What was it? Upon a time she believed she had known what fame was; but that had been when she was striving for it. A gjpwing article in a newspaper, a portrait in a magazine, rows upon rows of curious eyes and a patter of hands upon hands; that was all; and for this she had given the best of her life, and she was only twenty-five. The limousine stopped at last The man in the Bavarian hat saw her alight. His car turned and disappeared. It had taken him a week to discover where she lived. His lodgings were on the other side of the Seine. After reaching them he gave crisp orders to the driver, who set his machine off at top speed. The man in the Bavarian hat entered his room and lighted the

gas. The room was bare and cheaply' fumiehed. He took off his coat but retained his hat, pulling it down still farther over his eyes. His face was always in shadow. A round chin, two full red lips, scantily covered by a blond mustache were all that could be seed. He began to walk the floor impatiently, stopping and listening whenever h,e heard a sound. He waited less than an hour for the return of the car. It brought two men. They were well-dressed, smoothly-shaven, with keen eyes and intelligent faces. Their host, who had never seen either of his guests before, carelessly waved his hand toward the table where there were two chairs. He' himself took his stand by the window and looked out as he talked. In another hour the room was dark and the street deserved.

In the meantime the, prima donna gave a sigh of relief. She was home. It was nearly two o’clock. She would sleep till noon, and Saturday and Sunday would be hers. She went up the stairs instead of taking the lift, and though the hall was dark, she knew her way. She unlocked the door of the apartment and entered, swinging the door behind her. As the act was mechanical, her thoughts being otherwise engaged, she did not notice that the lock failed to click. The ferrule of a cane had prevented that." She flung her wraps on the divan and put the roses in an empty bowl. The door opened softly, without noise. Next, she stopped before the mirror over the mantel, touched her hair lightly, detached the tiara of emeralds

. . . and became as inanimate as marble. She saw another face. She never knew how long the interval of silence was. She turned slowly. “Yes, it is I!” said the man. Instantly she turned again to the mantel and picked up a magazine revolver. She leveled it at him. “Leave this room, or I will shoot” Courtlandt ’ advanced toward her slowly. “Do so,” he said. “I should much prefer a bullet to that look.” “I am in earnest.” She was very white, but her hand was steady. He continued to advance. There followed a crash. The smell of burning powder filled the room. The Burmese gong clanged shrilly and whirled wildly. Courtlandt felt his hair stir in terror.

“You must hate me indeed,” he said quietly, as the sense, of terror died away. He folded his arms. “Try again; there ought to be half a dozen bullets left. No? Then, good-by!” He left the apartment without another word or look, and as the door closed behind him there was a kind of finality in the clicking of the latch.* The revolver clattered to the floor, and the woman who had fired it leaned heavily against the mantel, covering her eyes. “Nora, Nora!” cried,a startled voice from a bedroom adjoining. “What has happened? Mon Dieu, what is it?” A pretty, sleepy-eyed young woman, in a night-dress, rushed into the room. She flung her arms about the singer. “Nora, my dear, my dear!" “He forced his way in. I thought to frighten him. It went off accidentally. Oh, Celeste, Celeste, I might have killed him!"

The other drew her head down on her shoulder, and listened. She could hear voices in the lower hall, a shout of warning, a patter of steps; then the hall door slammed. After that, silence, save for the faint mellowing vibrations of the Burmese gong. (TO BE CONTINUED.)