Jasper County Democrat, Volume 20, Number 62, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 November 1917 — Page 7

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 1917.

SYNOPSIS. CHAPTER I—J. Montagne Smith, Law'rencevllle bank cashier and society man, receives two letters. One warns him that -a note which he has O. K.’d with consent of Watrous Dunham, the bank’s president, is worthless. The other is a summons from Dunham. He breaks an appointment with Vera Richlander, daughter of the local millionaire, and meets Dunham alone at night In the bank. (TFTAPTER ll—Dunham threatens Smith with the police. Smith becomes aggressive. Dunham draws a pistol and Is floored by a blow that apparently kills him. Smith escapes on an outgoing freight train. CHAPTER lll—Near Brewster, Colo., Dexter Baldwin, president of the Timanyonl Ditch company, gets Smith an office Job at the big dam the company is building. CHAPTER IV—Williams, chief engineer, finds the hobo Smith used to money In big chunks and to making it work. The company is fighting concealed opposition and is near ruin. Smith is Jokingly suggested as a financial doctor. CHAPTER V—Williams talks business to Smith, who will tell nothing of his past. Smith pushes a stalled auto away from an oncoming train and saves the eolonel’s daughter Corona. CHAPTER Vl—While Corona looks on '.he drives oft three bogus mining right 'Claimants from the company’s land. . CHAPTER Vll—The colonel takes Smith to his home and persuades him, iq of Smith’s warning, to undertake ;the financial salvation of the company. CHAPTER Vlll—Crawford Stanton, hired by eastern interests to kill off the ditch company, sets his spies to work to find out who Smith is. CHAPTER X. The Rocket and the Stick. For a full fortnight after the preliminary visit to the Brewster City National bank Smith was easily the busiest man in Timanyoni county. Establishing himself in the Hophra House, and discarding -the, working khaki only because he was shrewd enough to dress the new part become ingly, he flung himself into what Colonel Baldwin called the “miracleworking” campaign with a zest that knew no flagging moment. Within the fourteen-day period new town offices were occupied on the second floor of the Brewster City National building; Stillings, most efficient of corporation counsels, had secured the new charter; and the stock-books of Timanyoni High Line had been opened, with the Brewster City National named as the company’s depository and official fiduciary agent. At the dam the building activities had been generously doubled. An electric light plant had been installed, and Williams was working day and night shifts both in the quarries and on the forms. Past this, the new financial manager, himself broadening rapidly as his field broadened, was branching out in other directions. After a brief conference with a few of his principal stockholders he had instructed Stillings to include the words “Pow’er and Light” in the cataloguing of the new’ company’s possible and probable charter activities, and by«the end of the fortnight the foundations of a powerhouse were going in below the dam, and negotiations were already on foot with the Brewster city council looking toward the sale of electric current to the city for lighting and other purposes. Smith had made the planting of his financial anchor securely to windward his first care. Furnished with a selected list by Colonel Baldwin, he had made a thorough canvas of possible investors, and by the time the new stock was printed and ready for delivery through Kinzie’s bank, an ironclad pool of the majority of the original Timanyoni Ditch stock had been organized, and Smith had sold to Maxwell, Starbuck, and other local capitalists a sufficient amount of the new treasury stock to give him a fighting chance; this, with a promise of more if It should be needed. Not to Maxwell or to any of the new Investors had Smith revealed the full dimensions of-the prize for w’hlch Timanyoni High Line was entering the race. Colonel .Baldwin and one William Starbuck, Maxwell’s brother-in-law, by courtesy, and his partner in the Little Alice mine, alone knew the w’heel within the wheel; how’ the great . eastern utility corporation represented by Stanton had spent a million or more in the acquisition of the Escalante grant, w’hich w’ould be practically worthless as agricultural land without the water which could be obtained only by means of the Timanyoni dam and canal system. With all these strenuous stirrings in the business field, it may say itself that Smith found little time for social indulgences during the crowded fortnight. Day after day the colonel begged him to take a night off at the ranch, and it was even more difficult to refuse the proffered hospitality at the weekend. But Smith did rgfuse it. It was not until after Miss Corona — driving to town with her father, as she frequently did —had thrice visited the new offices that Smith began to congratulate himself, rather bitterly, to be sure, upon his wisdom in staying away from Hillcrest. For one thing, he was learning that Corona Baldwin was able to make him see rose-colored.

The Real Man

when she was not with him, ne was aman in daily peril of meeting the sheriff. But when she was present, calm sanity had a way of losing its grip. Miss Corona’s fourth visit to the handsome 1 suite of offices over the Brewster City National chanced to fall upon a Saturday. Her father, president of the new company, as he had been of the old, had a private office of his own, but Miss Corona soon

drifted out to the ralled-off end of the larger- room, where the financial secretary had his desk. “Colonel-daddy tells me that you are coming out to Hillcrest for the weekend,” was the way in which she interrupted the financial secretary’s brow-knittings over a new material contract. “I have just wagered him a nice fat little round iron dollar of my allowance that you won’t. How about it?” Smith looked up with his best-na-tured grin. “You win,” he said shortly. “Thank you,” she laughed. “In a minute or so I’ll go back to the president’s office and collect.” Then: “One dinner, lodging and breakfast of us was about all you could stand, wasn’t it? I thought maybe it would be that way.” “What made you think so?” She had seated herself in the chair reserved for inquiring investors. There was a little interval of glove-smooth-ing silence, and then, like a flash out of a clear sky, she smiled across the desk end at him and said: “Will you forgive me if I ask you a perfectly ridiculous question?” “Certainly. Other people ask them every day.” “Is —is your name really and truly John Smith?” “Why should you doubt it?” / It was just here that Smith was given to see another one of Miss Corona’s many moods —or tenses —and It was a new one to him. She was visibly embarrassed. “I— l don’t want to tell you,” sho stammered. “All right; you needn’t.” “If you’re going to take it that easy, I will tell you.” she retorted. “Mr. Williams thought your name was an alias; and I’m not sure that he doesn’t still think so.” “The Smiths never have to have aliases. It’s like John Doe or Richard Roe, you know.” “Haven’t you. any middle name?” “I have a middle initial. It is *M.’ ” He was looking her fairly in the eyes as he said it. and the light in the new offices was excellent. Thanks to her horseback riding, Miss Corona’s small oval face had a touch of healthy outdoor tan; but under the tan there came, for just a flitting instant, a flush of deep color, and at the back of ti e gray eyes there was something Smith had never seen there before. “It’s —it’s just an initial?” she queried. “Yes; it’s just an initial, and I don’t use it ordinarily. I’m not ashamed of the plain ‘John.’ ” “I don’t know why you should be,” she commented, half absently, he thought. And then: “How many ‘John M. Smiths’ do you suppose there are in the United States?” “Oh, I don’t know; a million or so, I guess.” “I should think you would be rather glad of that,” she told him. But whfn he tried to make her say why he should be glad, she talked pointedly of other things and presently went back to her father’s office, There were fine little headings of perspiration standing on the fugitive’s forehead when she.Jeft him. After the other members of the office force had taken their departure, he still sat at his desk striving to bring himself back with some degree of clearheadedness to the pressing demands of his job. Just as he was about to give it up and go across to the Hophra House for his dinner, William Starbuck

By Francis Lynde

"How About It?”

drifted in to open the railing gate and to come and plant himself in the chair of privilege at Smith’s desk end. “Well, son; you’ve got the animals stirred up good and plenty, at last,” he said, when he had found the “makings” and was deftly rolling a cigarette —his one overlapping habit reaching back to his range-riding youth. “Dick Maxwell got a wire today from his kiddie’s grandpaw —and my own respected daddy-in-law—Mr. Hiram Fairbairn; you know him —the lumber king.” “I’m listening,” said Smith. “Dick’s wire was an order; instructions from headquarters to keep hands off of your new company and to work strictly in cahoots —‘harmony’ was the word he used —with Crawford Stanton. ’ flow does that fit you?” The financial secretary’s smile was the self-congratulatory face-wrinkling of the quarry foreman who has seen his tackle hitch hold to land the big stone safely at the top of the pit. “What is Maxwell going to do about it?” he asked. “Dick is all wool and a yard wide; and what he signs bls name to is what he is going to stand by. You won’t lose him, but the wire shows us just about where we’re aiming to put our leg into the gopher hole and break It, doesn’t ’it?” “I'm not borrowing any trouble. Mr. I Fairbairn and his colleagues are just ; a few minutes too late, Starbuck. We’ve got our footing—inside of the corral.” The ex-cowpuncher, who was now well up on the middle rounds of fortune’s ladder, shook his head doubtfully. “Don’t you make any brash breaks, John. Mr. Hiram Fairbairn and his crowd can swing twenty millions to your one little old dollar anp a half, and they’re not going to leave any of the pebbles unturned when it comes to saving their Investment in the Escalante. That’s all; I just thought I’d drop in and tell you.” Smith went to his rooms in the hotel a few minutes later to change for dinner. He found the linen drawer in hlsb dressing-case overflowing. Opening another, he began to arrange the overflow methodically. *The empty drawer was lined with a newspaper, and a single headline on the upturned page sprang at him like a thing living and venomous. He bent lower and read the underrunning paragraph with a dull rage mounting to his eyes and serving for the moment to make the gray of the printed lines turfi red. Lawrenceville, May 19.—The grand jury has found a true bill against Montague Smith, the absconding cashier of the Lawrenceville Bank and Trust, charged with embezzling the bank’s funds. The crime would have been merely a breach of trust and not actionable but for the fact that Smith, by owning stock in the bankrupt Westfall industries lately taken over by the Richlander company, had so made himself amenable to the law. Smith disappeared on the night of the 14th and is still at large. He Is also wanted on another criminal count. It will be remembered that he brutally assaulted President Dunham on the night of his disappear- _ ance. The reward of SI,OOO for his apprehension and arrest has been increased to $2,000 by the bank directors. (TO BE CONTINUED.) Use Alien’s Foot-Ease The antiseptic powder to be shaken into the shoes and sprinkled into the foot-bath. If you want rest and comfort for tired, aching, swollen, sweating feet, use Allen’s Foot-Ease. It relieves corns and bunions of all pain and prevents blisters, sore and callous spots. Sold everywhere, 25c. Try it today.—Advt. Try one of those copy clip inder ible pencils on sale in The Democrat’s fancy stationery and office supply department. Have nickel top, point protector and vest pocket holder —only 10 cents.

WAR TALKS

By UNCLE DAN

Number Six

Billie and Jimmie Will Take Military Training. “I am mighty sorry, Uncle Dan, that this is your last night with us. Can’t you stay longer? We boys are having a peach of a ttffie,” said Billie. “Well, if you get more out of it in the way of pleasure than I,” said Uncle Dan, “you are going some.” “Billie,. I have been talking seriously with your father and mother about sending you to a military academy and they asked me to talk with you about it.” “Whoopee!” Billie screamed, like a wild Indian. “Now, hold your horses,” said Uncle Dan, “and listen to me. You know I sent my boy, Howard, to one of these schools for a year w hen he was about your age. He was narrow cl <ed, stoop shouldered, rather loose jointed; he had the big head and needed discipline and physical development. He was growing fast and I wanted him to be strong physically.” “Say, Uncle Dan,” said Billie, ‘T believe your description of Howard fits me pretty well, eh?” “Well,” said Uncle Dan, “to be frank I think it does; you need the same thing. Howard did not like it at first. I am told for a few weeks he had ‘rough sledding? but after he found that the only way was to obey orders, he caught the spirit of the institution and liked it. We did not see him for about six months, then he came home for a few days. We were astonished at his appearance. He had gained about 20 pounds in weight, his muscles were as hard as nails, he stood as straight as an arrow, he was courteous, consider-

THE TWICE-A-WEEK DEMOCRAT

Note the result of six months of military training. Compare lines A-A and B-B in cut.

ate and manly. His awkwardness had disappeared. The change was wonderful and it was all to the good. Here is a photograph showing ‘before and after taking,’ and I am sure no patent medicine advertisement could beat it. “Well, mother and I were delighted. That was ten years ago, and Howard says the year he spent at the military academy was the best year of his life. “Now,” said Uncle Dan, with great earnestness, “when- such training does so much good, makes better citizens and at the same time fits a man to defend his country, why should not Uncle Sam furnish this training at the government’s expense? The government has the right call anyone to iserve in case of war, and without training, a man is worth nothing as a soldier. Un» cle Sam has splendid new training camps that will soon be available for the purpose, therefore, here is double reason why the Chamberlain bill for compulsory military training should be passed at once, so that every boy physically fit may have this training and not leave it fQr his parents to pay for. On account of the expense, not one boy in 50 can take the training now. lam glad that you can do so. These big crops and big prices, I find, make the farmers rather ‘cocky,’ and'that the best is demanded by them.” Billie was up with the lark the next

the dictionary is full of words and none of them can tell the complete story of the Maxwell with the years and brains and dollars concentrated on one chassis and one intention to build the world’s best car a Maxwell can be bought for $745 on terms if desired Main Garage The Shafer Co., Props.. Rensselaer, - - - Indiana

morning, more excited and enthusiastic than ever. He had a plan. He knew Jimmie owned a colt worth $100; that he would make almost another SIOO on his potatoes if they turned out well, and that he had from his previous savings, bought a SIOO Liberty bond. Billie’s plan was to have Jimmie cash in and go with him. He was disappointed to find that Jimmie would still lack about S3OO of having enough to see him through. His lip quivering, he

\ I' \ .A Photo by American Press Association. Major General Leonard Wood.

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said: “I’m mighty sorry to leave Jimmie.” Uncle Dan was silent a moment or two, then he asked Billie to go dova to the orchard and get him some apples to eat on the train. While he was gone, it was arranged that Uncle Dan and Mr. and Mrs. Graham would advance the money necessary so that Jimmie could go. When Billie returned he was told about it. He ran to the ’phone and called Jimmie, “Come on over, run just as fast as can, I’ve got the greatest news JM| ever heard of.” J

A new supply of pads of typewriter paper (8%xll) just made up and on sale in the fancy stationery and office supply department at The Democrat office.

PIONEER Meat Market EIGELBBACH & SON, Props. Beef, Pork, Veal, Mutton, Sausage, Bologna AT LOWEST PRICES The Highest Market Price Paid for Hides and Tallow

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