Jasper County Democrat, Volume 10, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 May 1907 — THE CONQUEST of CANAAN [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE CONQUEST of CANAAN

By BOOTH TARKINGTON.

Author of "Cborrr," “Mon»ieur BoueaireEtc. I • - - ■ ' - Mi— Uf l - 1 'IU COPYRIGHT. IGO3. BY HARPBR

•TKOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS. Chapter I—Eugene Bantry. a Canaan (Ind.,) you dr man, who haa been east to college, retains home and astounds the natives by the corgeousness of his raiment His stepbrother. Joe Loudlo. is characterized by the aged male gossips who daily assemble at the National House for argument as the good for nothing associate of doubtful characters. II Sngene's appearance haa a pronounced effect upon Mamie Pike, whose father. Judge Flke, Is the wealthiest and most prominent citizen of Canaan. Joe worships Mamie from •fir. Eugene interferes in a snow fight between Joe and bis holdenish and very poor girt friend, Ariel Taber, who U worsted. Arbi hotly resents the interference and slaps Eugene, who sends her home. Ill—Ariel, unbecomingly attired, attends Mamie Pike's ball. IV—Joe. concealed behind some plants «Mt the Pike veranda, watches hungrily for a glimpse of Minnie. Ariel is Ignored by most SI the guests. Ariel discovers Joe, sut shortly afterward, learning that her uncle, Jonas Tabor, has died suddenly, leaves. The Dally Tocsin oi the next day tells of Joe's discovery on the Pike veranda and of hla pursuit and escape therefrom. It also refers to wounds in the head of himself and of Norbert mitcroft, who detected him. Joe retires to the “Beach," a low resort kept by his friend, Mike Sheehan, who dreasea nls wound. VI Joe leaves Mike’s place. He viaita Ariel Tabor, who, by the death of her UDcle Jonas, haa become rich. She wishes Joe to accompany her and her grandfather to Paris. Joe refuses and leaves Canaan to avoid arrest for the trouble at Judge Pike’s. Vll—Joe is heard from two years later as a ticket seller for a aide show. Eugene Bantry also meets him seven years later in a low resort in New York, but wisely refrains from advertising it. VIII—Joe returns to Canaan a full-fledged lawyer. Even bis father ignores klm. and he la refused accommodations at the National house. IX—Joe Is welcomed at the “Besch," and “Happy Fear," oDe of Joe'a admirers, neriously assqalts Nashville Cory, a detractor. At the end of Happy’s term in prison he visits Joe, who now has a law office on the square, with a living room adjoining. Joe has a large practice, principally among the lower classes, and Is frequently attacked by the Tocsin. Joe begins, in hit lonliness, to yield to the seductions ot the bottle, Bantry’s engagment to Mamie Pike la announced. Bantry is now associate editor of the Tocsin, owned by Jndge Pike. X—Joe awakens after a “bad night" with the words, “Remember, across the Main street bridge at noon," ringing in his cars. He goes there and it presently joined by. the moat beautifully dressed girl he has ever Men. Xl—Bhe turns out to be Ariel Tabor, arrived in Canaan the night before from her long sojourn in Paris, She has seen Joe as ahe alighted from the train and, realizing his condition, had escorted him home after exacting from him a promise to meet her the next day (Sunday) acrosa'Jhe Main street bridge at noon. Joe leaftMfthat Ariel is stoppings! Jndge Pike’s home, the judge having entire charge of her money, etc. XII— Kngene Bantry, although engaged to Mamie, da much smitten with Ariel’s charms. Judge Pike tries his usual blustering tactics with Ariel, but subsides When she tells him that she shall ask him to turn over the care of her estate to Joe Louden. Xlll—Ariel holds a sort of informal reception at Judge Pike'sand learns that the “tough element" is talking of running Joe for mayor. XlV—Happy Fear and Nashville Cory have more trouble. Joe •corners Happy and sends Claudlne (Mrs. Vtear) to meet him. XV—Ariel visits Joe’s office to put her affairs In his hands. While there Happy Fear ruahes fb and announces that he has killed Nashville in self defense. Joe makea Happy give himself up. XVI— Mamie Pike admits to Ariel that she, too. haa begun to believe in Joe Louden. XVII— The Tocsin makea virulent attacks on Joe Louden and Happy Fear. Mike Sheehan hints that he may shortly have some interesting secrets to divulge In connection With Judge Pike’s affairs.

The voices of the fathers fell to the pitch of ordinary discourse; the drowsy town was quiet again; the whine of the grianlng mllf boring its way through the •baling air to every wakening ear. Far «way on a quiet street it sounded faintly, like the hum of a bee across a creek, •ad was drowned in the noise of men at work on the old Tabor house. It aeemed the only busy place in Canaan that day, the shade of the big beech trees which surrounded /it affording some shelter from the destroying sun to the dripping laborers who were sawing, hammering, painting, plumbing, papering and ripping open old and new packing boxes. There were many changes in the old house—pleasantly in keeping with its simple character—airy enlargements now almost completed so that some of the rooms were already finished and stood, furnished and immaculate, ready for tenancy. In that which had been Roger Tabor’s studio sat Ariel, alone. She had caused some chests and cases stored there to be opened and had taken out o t them a few of Roger's canvasses and set them along the wall. Tears Ailed

tier eyes as she looked at them, seeing the tragedy of labor the old man had expended upon them, but she felt the > recompense. Hard, tight, literal as they were, he had had his moment of joy In each of them before he saw them coldly and knew the truth. And he bad been given his years of Paris at last and had seen “how the other fellows did it." j - A heavy foot strode through the hall.

coming abruptly to a bait In the doorway, and, turning, ehg discovered Martin Pike, his big Henry VIII, face flushed more with anger than with the heat. His bat was upon bis head and remained there, nor did he offer any token or word of greeting whatever, but demanded to know when the work upon the bouse had been begun. “The second morning after my return,” she answered. “I want to know,” he pursued, “why It was kept secret from me, and I want to know quick.” “Secret?” she echoed, with a wave of her hand to Indicate the noise which the workmen were making. “Upon whose authority was it begun?” "Mine. Who else could give It?” “Look here,” he said, advancing toward her, "don’t try to fool me! You haven’t done all this bv yourself. hired these workmen ?’ Remembering her first Interview with him, she rose quickly before he could come near her. “Mr. Louden made most of the arrangements for me,” she replied quietly, “before he went away. He will. %tke charge of everything when he returns. You haven't forgotten that I told you I intended to place my affairs in his hands?” He had started forward, but at this he stopped and stared at her inarticulately. “You remember?” she said, her hands resting negligently upon the back of the chair, “Surely you remember?” She was not in the least afraid of him, but coolly watchful of him. This had been her habit with him since her return. She had seen little of him except at table, when he jvas usually grimly laconic, though now and then she Would hear him joking heavily with Sam Warden in the yard, or, with evidently humorous Intent, groaning at Mamie over Eugene’s health; but It had not escaped Ariel that he was on his part watchful of herself and upon his guard. He did not answer her question, and It seemed to her as she continued steadily to meet his hot eyes that he was trying to hold himself under some measure of control, and a vain effort It proved. “You go back to my house!” he burst out, shouting hoarsely. “You get back there! You stay there!” “No,” she said, moving between him and the door. “Mamie and I are going for a drive.” “Yoh go back to my house!” He followed her, waving an arm fiercely at her. “Don’t you come around here trying to run over me! You talk about your ‘affairs P All you’ve got on earth is this two for a nickel old shack over your bead and a bushel basket of distillery stock that you can sell by the pound for old paper!” He threw the words In her face, the bnll bass voice seamed and cracked with falsetto. “Old paper, old .rags, old Iron, hottles, old clothes! You talk about your affairs! Who are you? Rothschild? You haveh't got any affairs!” Not a look, not a word, not a motion of Ijis escaped her In all the fury of sound and gesture In which he seemed fairly to envelop himself. Least of all did that shaking of his—the quivering of jaw and temple, the tumultuous agitation of his hands—evade her watchfulness. “When did you find 'this out?” she said very quickly. “After you became administrator?”

He struck the the chair she had vacated a vicious blow with his open hand. "No, you spendthrift! All there was to your grandfather when you burled him was a basketful of dia tillery stock, I tell you! Old paper! Can’t you hear me? Old paper, old rags”— "You have sent me the same Income,” she lifted her voice to interrupt. “You have made the same quarterly payments since his death that you made before. If you knew, why did you do that?” He had been shouting at her with the frantic and incredulous exasperation of an intolerant man utterly unused to opposition, his face empurpled, his forehead dripping and his hands ruthlessly pounding the back of the chair, but this straight question stripped him suddenly of gesture and left him standing limp and still before her, pale splotches beginning to show on his hot cheeks. “If you knew, why did you do it?” she repeated. “You wrote me that my Income was from dividends, and I knew and thought nothing about it, but if the stock which came to me was worthless how could it pay dividends?” “It did not,” he answered huskily. “That distillery stock, I tell you, isn’t worth the matches to burn It” “But there has been no. difference in my income,” she persisted steadily. “Why? Can you explain that to me?” .“Yes; I can," he replied. And tt seemed to her that he spoke with fl pallid and bitter desperation, like a man driven to the wall. “I can if you think you tv ant to know.” “I do." “I sent ltT “Do you mean from your own”— “I mean it was my own money.” She had not taken her eyes front bis, which met hers straightly and angrily, and at this she leaned forward, gastng

at him with profound scrutiny. “Why did you send it?” she asked. "Charity,” he Answered after palpable hesitation. Her eyes widened, and she leaded back against the lintel of the door, staring at him Incredulously. “Charity!” she echoed in a whisper. Perhaps be mistook her amazement at bis performance for dismay caused by the sense of her own position* for as she seemed to weaken before him the strength of his own habit of dominance came back to him. “Charity, madam r* he broke ont, shouting intolerably. “Charity, d’ye hear? I was-a friend of the man that made the money you and your grandfather squandered; I was a friend of Jonas Tabor, I sayl That’s why I was willing to support you for a year and over rather than let a niece of his suffer.” “ ‘Suffer!’ ” she cried. “ ‘Support!* You sent me a hundred thousand francs!" v The ‘tohlte splotches which had mottled Martin Pike’s face disappeared as if they had been suddenly splashed with hot red. “You go back to my house,” he said. “What I sent you only shows the extent of my"— “Effrontery!” The word rang through the whole house, so loudly and clearly did she strike it—rang in his ears- till It stung like a castigation. It was ominous, portentous of justice and of disaster. There was more than doubt of him in it—there was conviction. He fell back from this word, and when be aga^A advanced Ariel had left the house. 4P e had turned the next corner before'he came out <of the gate, and as he passed his own home on his way downtown he saw her white dress mingling his daughter’s near the horse block beside the firs, where the two, with their arms about each other, stood waiting for Sam Warden and the opeh summer carriage. Judge Pike walked on, the white splotches reappearing like a pale rash upon his face. A yellow butterfly zigzagged before him, knee high, across the sidewalk. He raised his foot and half kicked at it. iTO BE CONTINUED.!

“I want to know,” he pursued. “ why it was kept secret from me."