Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 150, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 June 1919 — Page 2

PIECES OF EIGHT

THE POCK-MARKED MAN.

Synopsie—The man who tells this story—call him the hero, for shortla visiting hie friend John Saunders, British official in Nassau, Bahama Islands. Charlie Webster, a local merchant, completes the trio of friends. Conversation turning upon buried pirate treasure, Saunders produces a written document purporting to be the death-bed statement of Henry P. Tobias, a successful pirate, made by him In 1859. It gives two spots where two millions and a half of treasure were buried by him and his cimpanTone. The conversation of the three friends is overheard by a stranger, whose face is deeply pitted by small pox.

CHAPTER HI. I Charter the “Maggie Darling." As luck would have it, the loss, or rather the theft of Henry P. Tobias’ narrative was not so serious as It at first seemed, for it fortunately chanced that John Saunders had had it copied; but the theft remained jione the less WysfefTbusr ~ ' ■ However, leaving that mystery for later solution, John Saunders, Charlie Webster and I spent the next evening in a general and particular criticism of the narrative, itself. There were several obvious objections to be made against its authenticity. To start with, Tobias, at the time of his deposition, was an old man —seventy-five years old —and it was more than probable that his experiences as a pirate would date from his early manhood; they were hardly likely to have taken place as late as his fortieth year. The narrative, indeed, suggested their taking place much earlier, and there would (thus be a space of at least forty years 'between the burial of the treasure and his deathbed revelation. It was natural to ask: Why during all those years did he not return and retrieve the treasure for himself? Various circumstances, may have prevented him, the Inability from lack 1 of means to make the journey, or what not; but certainly one would need to imagine circumstances of peculiar power that should be strong enough to keep a man with so valuable a secret in his possession so many years from taking advantage of it • For a long while, too, the names given to the purported sites of the treasure caches puzzled us. Modern maps give no such places as “Head Men’s Shoes” and “Short Shrift Island,” but at last. In a map dating back to 1763, we came upon one of the two names. So far the veracity

Then Tom Came Up With My Breakfast

of Tobias was supported. “Dead Men’s Shoes” proved to be the old name for a certain cay some twenty miles long, about a day and a half's sail from Nassau, one of the long string of coral Islands now known as the “Exuma Cays.” But of “Short Shrift island” we sought in vain fori a trace. “Al) the same,” said I, “the adventure calls me; the adventure and that million and. a half - dollars —and those ‘Dead Men’s Shoes’ —and I intepd to undertake it. I am not going to let your middle-aged skepticism discourage me. Treasure or ho treasure, there will be the excitement of the quest, and all the fun of the sea.” “And some duck perhaps,” added Charlie. “And some shark fishing for cei> tain,” said John. The next thing was to set about <etting a boat and a crew. After looking over much likely and unlikely craft we "finally decided on a two-masted schooner of trim but solid build, the Maggie Darling, 42 feet over all and 13 beam; something,

BEING THE AUTHENTIC NARRATIVE OF A TREASURE DISCOVERED IN THE BAHAMA ISLANDS IN THE YEAR iQOS. NOW FIRST GIVEN TO THE PUBLIC

By RICHARD LE GALLIENNE

under twenty tons, with an auxiliary gasoline engine of 24 horse power, and an alleged speed of ten knots. Next, the crew. “You will need a captain, a cook, an engineer and a deckhand," said Charlie, “and I have the captain and the cook all ready for you.” That afternoon we rqunded them all up. including the engineer and the deckhand, and we arranged to start, weather permitting, with the morning tide, which set east at six o’clock on July 13, 1903. Ship’s stores were the next detail, and these, including fifty gallons of gasoline, over and above the tanks and three barrels of water, being duly got aboard, on the evening of July 12 all was ready for the start; an evening which was naturally spent in a parting conclave in John Saunders' snuggery. .“Why, one important thing you’ve forgotten.” said Charlie. “Machetes—and spades and pickaxes. And Td take a few sticks of dyn'ftffiite along with you too. I can let you have the lot- We’ll get them , aboard toniglit," “It’s a pity you have to give it away that it’s a treasure hunt” said John, “but then you can’t keep the crew from knowing. And they’re a queer lot on the subject of treasure, have some of the rummiest superstitions. I hope you won’t have any trouble with them.” “Had any experience In handling niggers?” asked Charlie. “Not the least.” “That.makes me wish I were coming with you. They are rum beggars. Awful cowards, and just like a pack of children. You know about sailing anyhow. That’s a good thing. You can captain your own boat, if need be. That’s all to the good. Particularly if you strike any dirty weather. But let me give you one word of advice: Be kind, of course, with them—but keep your distance all the same. And be careful about losing your temper. You get more out of them by coaxing—hard as it is, at times. And, by the way, how would you like to take old ‘Sailor’ with you?” “Sailor” was a great Labrador retriever, who at that moment turned up his big head with a devoted sigh from behind his master’s chair. “Rather.’’ I said. So “Sailor” was thereupon enrolled as a further addition to the crew. “Old Tom,” the cook, was first on hand next morning. I took to him at once. A simple, kindly old “darky” of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” type, with faithfulness written all over him, and a certain sad wisdom in his old face. . “You'll find Tom a great cook,” said Charlie, patting the old man on the shoulder. “Many a trip we’ve taken together after duck, haven’t we, Tom?” “That’s right, suh. That’s right,” said the old man, his eyes twinkling with pleasure. Then came the captain—Capt. Jabez Williams —a younger man, with an Intelligent, self-respecting manner, somewhat noncommittal, businesslike, evidently not particularly anxious as to whether he pleased or not, but looking competent and civil enough. Nest came the. engineer, a young hulking bronze giant, a splendid physical specimen, but rather heavy and sullen ahd not oyer-intelligent to look at. The deckhand , proved to be a shackly, rather silly, effeminate fellow, suggesting idiocy, but doubtless wiry and good enough for the purpose. While they were busy getting up the anchor of the Maggie Darling I went down into my cabin to arrange various odds and ends, and presently came the captain, touching his hat. “There’s a party;” he said, “outside here wants to know if you’ll take him passenger to Spanish Wells.” “We’re not taking passengers,” I answered. “but I will look him over.” A man was standing up in a rowboat, leaning against the ship’s side. “You’d do me a great favor, sir,” he began to say in a soft, ingratiating voice.

I looked at him with a start of recognition. He was my pockmarkedfriend, who had made such an unpleasant impression on me at John Saunders’ office. He was rather more gentlemanly looking than he had seemed at the first vie'*?, and I saw that, i though he was a halfbreed the white blood predominated. “I don't want to intrude,,” he said, “but I have urgent heed of getting to Spanish 'tVells Js .and there’s no boat going that way "for a week. I’ve just, missed the mail." “I didn’t think of taking any passengers,” I said. “I know,” he said. “I know it’s a great favor I ask.” He spoke with a certain cultivation of manner. “But I am willing of course to pay anything you think well for my food and my passage.”, I waived that suggestion aside and stood irresolutely looking at him, with no very hospitable expression in my eyes, I dare say. But really my distaste for him was an unreasoning prejudice, and Charlie Webster’s phrase came to iny mind —“His face is against the poor devil I” It certainly was. Then at last I said, surely not over-

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND,

graciously: “Very well. Get aboard. You can help work .the boatand with that I turned away to my cabin.

CHAPTER IV. In Which Tom Catches an Enchanted Fish, and Discourses of the Dangers of Treasure Hunting; The.morning was a little overcast, but a brisk northeast wind soon set the clouds moving as it went humming in our sails, and the sun. coming out Jn Its glory over the crystalline waters, made a fine -flashing world of It, full of exhilaration and the very breath of youth and adventure, very uplifting to the heart. Nassau looked very pretty in the morning sunlight, with its pink and white houses nestling among palm trees and the masts of its sponging schooners, and soon we w r ere abreast of the picturesque low-lying fort, Fort Montague, that Major Bruce, nearly two hundred years ago, had such a time building as a protection against pirates entering from |he east end of the hjarbor.. It looked like a veritable piece of the past, and set the imagination dreaming of those old days of Spanish galleons and the black flag, and brought my thoughts eagerly

“Tom and You and I.”

back to the object of my trip, those doubloons and pieces of eight that lay in glittering heaps somewhere out in those island wildernesses. Then Tom came up with my breakfast. The old fellow stood by to serve me as I ate, with a pathetic touch of the old slavery days in his deferential, half-fatherly manner, dropping a quaint remark every now and again; as, when drawing my attention to the sun bursting through the clouds, he said, “The poor man’s blanket is coming out, sah” —phrases in which there seemed a whole lot of pathos to me. Presently, when breakfast was over, and I stood looking over the side into the incredibly clear water, in which it seems hardly possible that a boat can go on floating, suspended as she seems over gleaming gulfs of liquid i space, down through which at every moment it seems she must dizzily fall. As Tom and I gazed down, lost in those rainbow’ deeps, I heard a voice at my elbow saying with peculiarly sickening unction: “The wonderful works of God.” It was my unwelcome passenger, who had silently edged up to where we stood. I looked at him, with the question very clear in my eyes as to what kind of disagreeable animal he was.

“Precisely,” I said, and moved away. I had been trying to feel more kindly toward him, wondering Whether I could summon up the decency to offer him a cigar, but “the wonderful works of God” finished me. “Hello! captain,” I said presently, pointing to some sails coming up rapidly behind us. “What’s this? I thought we’d got the fastest boat in’ the harbor.” “It’s the Susan 8., sponger,” said the captain. The captain was a man of few words. The Susan B. was a rakish-looking craft with a black hull, and she certainly could sail. No doubt it was pure imagination, but I did fancy that I noticed our passenger signal to them in a peculiar way. ' I corftess that his presence was beginning to get on my nerves, and I was ready to get “edgy” at anything or nothing'—an irritated state of mind, which I presfently took out on George the engineer, who did not belle his hulking appearance, and who was forever letting the engine stop and taking forever to get it going again. One could almost have sworn he did it on purpose. ‘

My language was more forcible than classical—had quite a piratical flavor, in fact; and my friend of “the wonderful works of God" looked up with a deprecating air. Its effeqt on George was nil, except perhaps to further deepen hls sulk s. And this I did notice, after a while, that my remarks to George seemed to have set up a certain sympathetic acquaintance between him and my passenger, the shackly deckhand being apparently taken in as an humble third. Thqy sat for’ard, talking together, and my passenger read to them, on one occasion, from a piece of printed paper that fluttered in the wind. The captain was occupied with his helm, and the, thoughts he didn’t seem to feel the necessity of sharing; a quiet, poised, probably stupid man, for whom I could not deny the respect we nqpt always give to content, however simple. He was a sailor, and I don’t know what better to say of a man.v So for companionship I was thrown back upon Tom. I felt, too, that he was my only friend on board, and a vague feeling had come over me that within the next few hours I might need a friend. . “Are we going too fast for fishing, Tom?” I asked. “Not too fast for a barracoota,” said Tom; so we put out lines and watched the stretched strings, and listened to the sea. After a while Tom’s line grew taut, and we hauled in a flve-foot barracoota. “Look !” said Tom, as he pointed to a little writhing eel-like shape, about nine inches long, attached to the belly of the barracontn. “A sucking fish I” said Tom. ‘-‘That’s good Jttdk and he proceeded to. turn over the poor creature and cut from his back, Immediately below his head, a flat inch and a half of skin lined and stamped like a rubber sole —the device by which he held on to the belly of the barracouta much as the circle of wet leather holds the stone in a schoolboy’s sling. “Now,” he said, when he had it clean and neat in his fingers, “we must hang this up and dry it in the northeast wind; the wind Is just right—-nor’-nor’east —and there Is no mascot like it, specially when —” Old Tom hesitated, with a slyly innocent smile in his eyes.

“What is it, Tom?” I asked. “Well, sir, I meant to say that this particular part of a sucking fish, properly dried In the northeast wind, is a wonderful mascot —when you’re going after treasure.” “Who said I was going after treasure?” I asked. “Aren’t you, sah?” replied Tom, “asking your pardon.” “Let’s talk it over later on, when you bring me my dinner, Tom.” Later, as Tom stood, serving my coffee, I took it up with him again. “What was that you were saying about treasure, Tom?” I asked. “Well, sar, what I meant was this: that going after treasure is a dangerous business . . . it’s not only the living you’re to think of —” Here Tom threw a careful eye for’ard. “The crew, you mean?" He nodded. “But it’s the dead too.” “The dead, Tom?” “Well, sar, there was never a buried treasure yet that didn’t claim its victim. Not one or two either. Six or eight of them, to my knowledge—and the treasure just where it was for all that. I das’say it sounds all foolishness, but it’s true for all that. Something or* other’ll come, mark my word —just when they think they’ve got their hands on it: a hurricane or a tidal wave or an earthquake. And — well, the ghost laughs, but the treasure stays there all the same.” “The ghost laughs?” I asked. “Eh! of course; didn’t you know every treasure is guarded by a ghost? He’s got to keep watch there till the next fellow comes along, to relieve sentry duty, so to speak. He doesn’t give it away. My ho I He xlassn’t do that. But the minute someone else is killed, coming looking for it, then he’s free —and the new ghost has got to go on sitting there, waiting for ever so long till someone else comes looking for it.” “But what has this sucking fish got to do with it?” And I pointed to the red membrane already drying in Tom’s hand. “Well, the man who carries this in his pocket won’t be the next ghost,” he answered. “Take good care of it for me, then, Tom,” I said, “and when it’s properly dried let me have it. For I’ve a sort of idea I may have need of it, after all.” And just then old Sailor, the quietest member of the crew, put up his head into my hands, as though to say that he had been unfairly lost slgiit of. - “Yes, and you too, old chap—that's right. Tom and you and I.’’ And then I turned in for the night

The pockmarked man proves an interesting passenger and the voyage is far from monotonous

(TO BE CONTINUED.)

Statement That Counts.

Do not let the man, who says, “This is the year when I am going to show you how to farm it,” think that he will have all clear sailing. He will meet wildcats and bears,at every turn, and he may consider nimself lucky if he gets off with a whole hide. The big thing -is to stand on the far end of the field when the harvest Is gathered in and be able to say. "I did what I said I would J” —Exchange. . v

NEW FOULARDS TO HOLD HIGH FAVOR

, ■ . ; '■■■■■—-y ■ ■ L.ZZZ Fabric Resplendent in Sprawling Designs Which Almost Cover Surface; SPANISH VOGUE GAINS HOLD Wide and Bouffant Skirts With Rather Tight Bodices Are to Evidence— Silken Gowns Are Beruffled. After all is said and done, for the perfect summer wardrobe no gown ever gives quite as much satisfaction as does the one of some soft and clinging silk of a quiet color which permits it to be worn on any and all occasions. -For this reason, observes a prominent' fashion correspondent, the lovely foulards never seem to lose their popularity and year after year find their faithful friends who exploit them with undying devotion.. The newest weaves and designs in thl| sort of silk are resplendent in their huge sprawling effects which almost entirely cover the silken suf ace of the blue. White is usually preferred to all other tones though the sand and champagne shades are coming a good deal into favor especially for a combination of foulard and georgette. One of the most satisfactory combinations. indeed, is achieved when these two fabrics are placed together. Since the smock is so important this summer and the chemise blouse is

An Attractive Dress of Crepe de Chine, and a Favorite of Foulard With Organdie Vestee and Sash.

equally as much in demand, some excellent results are obtained by combining a georgette jacket with short French sleeves tipped with foulard and a belt of the silk slipped over a skirt of the foulard Silk. To further enhance the beauty of the simple Jacket or ovefblouse a deep hem of the foulard may be placed along the bottom edge. One of the happiest results in summer things is the effect of smart simplicity for one wants to get away from the heavier and elaborate affairs of other seasons —the sort of dress just described is enchanting because of its (extreme simplicity. It has been well developed in a gray foulard with a round cherry colored figure scattered Over the surface, the silk being used for the skirt and a gray georgette of the exact shade being employed for the soft loose blouse. A preference fop very narrow belts is noted and in this Instance a "mere ribbon string of cherry color is entwined about the waist with one of gray. The Spanish Vogue. Just who is responsible for the Spanish vogue no one seems to know, but’that there is such a vogue no one can deny. Even in the matter of skirts one finds again and again the wide and bouffant models with rather tight bodices which are so often observed in Spanish paintings. The effect is achieved often by. t ,the addition of wide and very full ruffles placed along the bottom of the skirt which standing out give the desired effect of extra fullness. . Black taffetas and henna-colored chiffon have been happily placed together In a dress of the Spanish type. The taffeta is embroidered in henna silk and used to form a rather tight petticoat, over which fall wide side draperies from under a long pointed “basque.” Down the~ front of the petticoat are placed henna silk tassels, which give a most unusual effect, while the crossed pieces of the waist, which end in the deep point in front, recafi portraits of long ago. Henna chiffon Is used to form the upper part of the waist, the sleeves of which are longer than the French sleeves, but still are merely elbow length. It has been rather interesting to note to just what extent the bebe sleeves would be adopted for street wear, and as yet one finds little disposition to leave off the lower part <rf

the sleeve when the dress is intended for more or less general service. The French frocks which came over earlier were frankly short as to sleeve and skirt, but later models arriving have added length to both.* The fancy for ostrich trimming continues at such a pace that an imported model of black taffetas is ornamented down, the sides of the skirt with huge round disks of ostrich fronds' held in place tvith rhinestone buckles. The tiny sleeves of chiffon are edged with the bright blue feather trimming placed almost like a fringe around the armhole and down the front of the bodice also. This is intended to Illustrate the novel way in which the feather trimming can be employed, for the result is certainly striking enough for only the most daring to aJopt. The summer silken gown is finding itself beruffled in a way we have not seen in many years. A particularly youthful model in a ruffled skirt is a black taffeta with the same tight little narrow skirt wunen have been wearing for some time. Tiny frills of black net placed yrty close and from the top to the bottom of the skirt relieve the effect of skimpiness and make the whole very soft and light. We need not attempt to deny the sash? ion of the black taffetas gown—everything that clever makers and designers can do to take away its old and stiff look Jjas been done —as is seen in trfis charming model. The bodiee ls not quite so befrilled as the skirt, but reproduces the tiny ne> frills in small dusters down the front in a vestee

shape. The sleeves are likewise finished with the frills and a wide flowing sash of the net finishes the dress prettily. Of course, in the demand for a dress of service for summer wear, such as a shopping expedition into the city from one’s country place may demand, the darker tones are given preference and the trlcolette, georgette and voile rank in favor with the foulards. We see less of the veiled foulards than last season displayed though they were such pleasing frocks with the big sprawling surfaces softly hidden under voile or georgette that possibly there may be a revival later on. uu Challis Popular. Strange to say, challis is having a rage such as no other fabric, not even trlcolette can boast. The soft woolen material is esteemed for the utility dress as developed in the silks. The darker tones are likewise chosen in this, and collars, cuffs and sashes of crisp white .organdie added for morning wear. Challis were popular 25 years ago, but for spme reason they have not been much used except for little girls* dresses and dainty boudoir gowns. Now, however, one’s possession of a challis frock stamps one as being well aware of fashion’s latest whim. Hats and parasols made of the same material as the dress are much seen. The challis hats, like the -dresses, have organdie trimmings put on either in little flutings along the edge or that are tied in a wide bow in front The parasols also repeat the organdie ruffles. There is a certain demureness and quaintness about this old-time material which suggests quiet country towns and restful rural life, for though people in large cities have for so long forgotten challis, those who live in less hurried and crowded places seem always to keep a/‘best” challis for "occasions.” The shirt waist type of dress lends itself well to the soft woolen fabric and embellished organdie makes the whole pleasing. There is no material which will answer better for a hurried morning’s motor trip into the city or informal wear in the country, for challis will not crush and rumple, and if one selects the colors carefully, frock will go through a supuner satlsfac* tori ly..