South Bend News-Times, Volume 36, Number 232, South Bend, St. Joseph County, 20 August 1919 — Page 8

The End Of the LüSt DailCe By Abner Anthony :,;5 . SggMMgflgfliVglgHEMgHgtgVMiiVSlMi'IHBS),lllIBMSMl'','s'a'B "''''''''''''''M'''iMBBBUl MSMMgMEISMMgWENMgSaMSaSHlSBHSHHgSSNgMBEMSaEMaBMSSMSaMSBB

Cw i , pi rner.a. lr you nave V'vfj r.v-r seen San R"-

rr.o in the sprlnjtirr.e. your life is as ye: incomplete. Ii 1s thrn that '.vc of 'fy ' i really fiiv. Dio: L..r., Vv) it !s nulte futile to describ it or.rt can orlv live lt. It Ii uffcce, however, vhn I ay th Mediterranean is n'-ver as blue a3 It i then, "air 1 never ?o s.fr, so sweet or th flowers f-o brill ant. It is Paradise, ray friend, a garden of lore wher birds sins from dawn to twilight. Mario Sfefani playtd nr3t violin In the orchestra of the Hotel BHla Vifa. He was a thin, undersized joisth. with a profusion of black, rurhair and pale, oval fare of the musician and student. He was born, I believe, near Naples, and like the majority of yo';n Italians of the preaent iay, an excellent :iu.-ician. Muiic to Mario was like th love of a beautiful woman -he iived for it alone, at first. Ah. but you should have heard him play his v'rdin solo to the supper crowd at the LiHla Vista. Dlo mio! the bow between his thin, white fingers held them spellbound. And when he finished, my friend, the applause was deafening. Farly In May, Sipnore Rodolfo, the tout and amiable proprietor of the hotel, sent to Paris for two or three cabaret performers. He did this very much against his will and at the earnest request of his foreign guests, American an! English, who were unhappy tmler's they had a vaudeville entertainment to give zest to thir ttkp.Is. My friend. It was an evil day wheu Ilodoifo Iktcnd to them. I will tMl jou why. There was sent to San Reno, Sonla Riberia. a dancer from the Palais Malic Hall in Paris, which had closed its H. John, darlint, that will not be the way to the hotel! Coom this way, this minute, you with the two feet av ye like ruud cakes. for cause you wouldn't be after mindin your Maria at the creek!" Maria Malier, a gray haired, slender woman in black, seized the chubby hand of John Hartwell Nusent, Jr., but tte five-year-old poked out a cunningly impudent red lip. and. twistirfg loose from her tinkers, ran down the little street In front of the resort town's railroad station. One end of the porch of the third unpainfed hous on th next narrow gtre-.t was crowded with rustic ware "lo cabin" bird houses, hexagon shaped hanging baskets, cases and chairs. In a hanging basket, depending from the celling, some red brown leaves of shamrock rrew thrifty, and from its handle a bit of faded green ribbon dangled, fluttering in the breeze. The child ran up the steps. "What-chu-makin'?" he demanded in his soft

Changes

HAT appeared to have once been a magnificent old mansion had, through the reaches of commercialism, been turned into a busy little mart. The o'd house had beconie a candy shop. Beside the door dwelt a blkck and gilt sign. 'Ye Olde Colonial Candy S'uopfo." Nothing more or less. More was not needed, for everybody m the old coast town knew the quality of the candy LrLlnd that sign. Much of the candy was made In the rooms behind the shop by an old candyiüaker and his wife, who also lived there. Mary Gamer and her mother occupied the rooms upstairs. Mrs. Garner was almost an invalid, but she managed to get the meals and do a little dusting, and sometimes when Mary had to go ou she came down and sat behind the conn', er. Mary tended 6hop and a great mcny times people who did not care much fcr candy went In there Just to see her. Net b"ji3s ghe was beautiful were they

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doors fcr the grason. Mademoiselle Kiberia was exceedingly ;crd to lock i'.pm. Her skjn was bo different from that of the girls of Genoi and Nice. Her lips you can see I well remember were z vivid scarlet. ?.nd wonderfully curved. When rhe danced, I can never forget It, her lithe, young body swayed to- the melody of the strings like a joy-intoxicated fairy dancing in th moonlight. Ah. but she was exquisite, peerless! There were many who quickly realized this, and Mario was one cf them. The young man from Naples in all of his twenty-four year had never sen anyone like her. The nr?t night rhe appeared, costumed for her dance, he sat staring at her, over his musicrack, with parted lips. It was as 1( he were gazing upon a beautiful vision, and when she danced, his subjuration was complete. That night, high up under the roof of the great, hotel, he fell asleep with her name on his lips. Sonia craved admiration. When sh saw the violinist of the Bella Vista's orchestra was casting adoring eyes t:pon her, she responded with'heavylidd'd glances and demure little fcmiles that acted like champagne upon his romantic imagination. The dancer missed her Paris and anything in the way of a flirtation she welcomed at the moment. Mario, poor lad, did not know this. How could he? He thourht his passion was being returned, and when i kissed her for the first time, one afternoon In the Roman Cardens. back of the hotel, all the worship in his Iatin blood flared up. "Adorata!" he murmured madly. "You will love me, always as I love you! You will love me forever itrnamente! Say it, swear It, piccina mia!" Snnia. a little frightened. but thrilled by his ardor, laughed lightly.

The Cal

treble of the man who sat working at a bench, a cunningly put together thing of laurel and rhodendron branches, and gnarled and twisted roots. "Oh. John, darlint!' protested the panting Maria. "You will be after pardonin' his impudence, sor 'tis many a day he is from a man yet!" The worker, an alert little man of sixty, with limpid blue eyes, turned. "Sure," he protested, with an engaging smile, "is ut that I look like a body that does not know a child from a grown-up?' ' When Maria returned in the dusk, with her charge, to the Mountain View, where on their way home frcm Florida little John's parents had stopped for the month of March, td play golf and bridge, she had tucked in her belt a Lit of shamrock anc' ; er eyes were brighter than the stars beginning to come out over the mountain. It had been so long since she had talked with any one of her own a?e from the "old sod," and old Michael Bowers, the niftic furniture maker, understood and appreciated the things of her youth. Very early the next morning after curious concerning her although she had looks that many a woman who owned a yacht and a limousine and a summer place might have envied but because she who had once been rich and a belle and had 'come of one cf the oldest families in the state was now presiding over a candy shop in the very town where her haughty ancestors lived. Mary knew this, but she sold them candy as calmly as If she did not. Nothing could undo her composure. She had made one swift step from the past to the present in Ye Olde Colonial Candy Shbppe. Misfortune had overtaken her in a night. She had been in the ht'ght of her happiness; her debut still a topic of conversation; her engagement to Nicholas French Just announced, when her father shot himself and precipitated the ruin cf his affairs. The shock nearly killed Mnry's mother, but Mary herself wes braver. When he fcund that everything they had In the wer Id belonged to semcbedy elca and thtt the rr.cn she believed In had forsaken her and that her own hc-d end hands must 'provide every bit of bread she ate In the future aa well as

W

"Saperlotte!" she answered, "of courre. Have I not said it already, m'sleu? Have I not proved It?" For the five weeks that followed, the youth lived in a heaven of his own making. Sonia, flattered at the worship and dcvo'.;on that wag berg, returned his love-making with all the acting she could conjure up for the occasion. When he clasped her to him and held against hig heart, she even thrilled a little, and the kisses he snatched from her were flavored with the sunshine of the Riviera and as earnest as she could possibly make them. Ah, those moon-silvered nights of San Renio! They are made only for love, my friend, and no one knew this better thn Mario. They were the happiest he had ever known or could know. Then the inevitable occurred. Little by little glamour of It all faded away and Sonia failed to respond. The kisses she gave him were hurried. When he held her. she freed herself, gently but deftly. Poor Mario, none of this did he realize. To him she was still the exquisite creature his first love adored by him and adoring in turn. Too soon, alaa, was he to awaken from his dream. There came to the Bella Vista the wealthy Barone Anton! Scotti, from Pvorae, a short, stout Italian nobleman, bronzed by fhe sun of two continents and living only for the pleasure and enjoynint life yielded hira. It chanced he had let the Riberia in Paris, the season jefore and his delight In seeing her again was touching. After her dance, that evening, at his table in a secluded corner of the din-ing-hall they resumed their acquaintance over a hottle of champagne, while Mario waited in the fragrant gloom of the gardens below and wondered why she did not appear. "Well, mia cara," the Barone said.

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their visit to the rustic furniture man little John reminded her, "The stick man said I could go on the mountain with him when he went for moro sticks this morning, Maria!" To his surprise Maria needed no urging. The little company had climbed more than two miles up the mountain road, past groves of laurel and patches of rhodendron before Bowers began to cut out his sticks and roots. "Sure, there be plinty of ehrubbery all along." Maria wondered. "Why not get the timber closer by the town?" Bowers laughed. "Flinty, indade, frind, but the clo3eby mountain sides belong to the man that ownse the hotel where ye and the child's people do be stopping. And these rich wans won't let you get a twig off their lands; no. not even if they have no use for it theirse'fs at all at all! So I gather my wood aff a f rind's lands up here." " 'Tis the way they do things in Ireland, too," remarked Maria. Bowers smiled grimly. "There were lakes close where I were born and lived to my twintieth year, with many a meal o fish in 'em, and my father and my mother livin' on pitaturs the year

ght

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every necessity for her feeble mother., she stood up and squared her shoulders to the burden. The candy shop was an inspiration. She rented the old Doubleday house, whose situation made it desirable, and opened her business. A single season made her candy famous. One day a most beautiful yacht came into the harbor. From the narrow street that twisted pa3t Ye Olden Colonial Candy Shoppe Mary saw the funnel and spars and snapping pennon of the ves3el. Somehow she thought of Nicholas French; he had almost passed from her mind at ffom her existence. The lasf she had heard cf him he had gone yachting round the world. She was not disconcertingly surprised when that afternoon she turned from her shelves to gee him standinc at her counter, the tarra courtly gentleman with the same selfish heart. "Hew do you do, Mary?" ho said, and held out his hand. Shi gave hlrn her finger bricCy. "Fine llttio place you have herd You're lor king well. How is your mother's health?" lie was cmb&rraaisd. Mary smiled t little.

filling her glass, himself, "we meet again in San Rrnio after many months. It is well. I had expected to remain here but one week then Monte Carlo" "Qui: And now?" He leaned across the tsble. "And now," he answered. "I shall stay until until ;ou leave!" "It has been very nice here, Sonia said pensively, "but I shall be glad to go. Dleu! one wearies of a place, after, a time, does one not?" . The Barone inclined his heavy head. "Certamente!" he answered heartily. "In your case, the case of one ao charming. I would advise Venice . . . A gondolier on a moonlight night . . . you and I ... eh. Stgnorina! !" It did not take very long for Mario to understand how matters atood. How could he help It? Scotti tagged at her heels like a fat and faithful watch-dVg and his infatuation was common talk along the broad, white verandas of the Bella Vista. Indeed. Signore Rodolfo had to take the Riberia aside and caution her to be more discreet. It did not look good, he said, to conduct a flirtation with a guest so openly. She laughed and promised. My friend, when a woman has two strings to her bow, and when these same two trlngs.come in contact, there Is sure to be, a discord. Is that not true? It was this way with the Barone and Mario, who, innocent of women's wiles, suspected nothing of Sonia and thought Scotti was trying to steal her from him. , He went to the Baror.e's suite, one morning and confronted him. "The love of Sonia Riberia is mine he declared quietly. "Sh is not for you, sua altezza. Be advised, please, of this fact." The Barone looking up from his morning paper stared in amazement, unable to credit what his ears had

Old Erin

round! The landlord were kapin thtm lakes for his sportln frinds. Sure, didn't I pass part o' me time in prison fer flshin' an thim lakes!' "Tis the fine bold lad ye must ha' been!" commented Maria. Bowers laid dowa his grubbing hoe and looked at her with a whimsical smile. "Sure, Michael Flanagan Bowers is the fine, bold lad yet, and ye know him well, and when the loneliness is not pressln on him! Since I'm mot young any more, and can't travel alsy from place to place, from wan state to another, I've got me a home to stay in, but eometlraes I'm the lonely wan!" " Tis me that's tired of the travelin'!" commented Maria. "But a noorse must go with thim shVs workin' fer. an the rich ones must be eternally ehaain' the warrum in winter and the cool in summer. You'd think they lived in prison houses, the little time they kape to their homes. Sure, I think 'tis fine to have a home to stay in, and had I a pot of gold I'd buy me one!' "There's a crock of gold behint a deep pool in Donegal,' observed Bowers, "that'd buy many'a home!"

lisfortune

"Mother is frail, but cheerful, thank you." "Quaint Idea, this shop!" French ent on. "Mary " Another customer entered and then another. He had no chance to say more. So he bought a box of salted almonds and went away. But Mary knew that he would come again. 8he did not want him to come again. He was not changed, but she was materially. She wondered how ehe had ever come to engage herself to him. It was not because ho.w-as rich, for then she had no need to covet riches. It could not have been because she loved h!a. "Girls are such fools." ihe thought. "He was romance Itself to mo. Dut ho hadn't a spark of hercism In him. When troublo came he failed mo. He went away and then he vrote tbat litter, go carefully worded, and yet I know what he meant. He wished me to fre him. And I did. I was more disgusted than heartbroken. No. I certainly did not lovo him, end I lovo h?a lets now, because I see him moro plainly. I would not trado my candy ghop and prfent gecurlty for all ht pcsseiftci. But, then. I shall

heard. Then, at last when he finally did understand, the room shook vrlth his mirth. "Insect," he said, wiping the tears from his eyes, "report at once to Rodolfo and tell him I say your salary is to be doubled. You have given me the be laugh I have had in twelre years !" Mario's fact whitened and his voice, when he spoke, trembled. "You have heard! If you persist I shall be compelled to to " "Continue, by all means," Scotti said, as the young man hesitated to moisten his dry lips. "Your conversation is enjoyable." Mario looked at hira gravely. "You see fit to Jest. Very well if you force your unwelcome attentions on Signorina Riberia, in the future, I shall have to kill you!" When he closed the door the Barone was still laughing. Later, Mario met Sonia in the pergola at the water's edge and told her what he had informed the Barone. "And," he concluded, "if he troubles you, I shall do what I hare said." "Mon Dieu!" the dancer cried, aagrify. "Why did you say such a thing? He is ray friend, my food friend! I knew him in Parle before I knew you! You have insulted him!" Mario silenced her wilh a gesture. "That is true, but you have heard what they are saying," he replied. Indicating the hotel back of them, with a motion of his hand. "I can not s.1low such talk." Bonla Jumped up. "You can not allow it!" she said harshly, emphasizing her words with a stamp of her foot, "and who are you to prevent mo from continuing my friendship with him!" Mario steadied himself against the balcony rail. "But but they say he loves you!"

Maria sighed. "Don't I wish that crock of gold were in these two hands of mine "I'll go get the crock of gold fer you, Maria," little John made generous offer. "But the water in the pool its deep, deep down, little man," objected Bowers. "Not over Maria's head?" persisted John. "She could wade and get it herself." "It's over Maria's head, an' beyont the pool's a great make, a hundred feet long, ths.t lies by the crock day and night." "I don't want the old snake, to get Maria!" wailed John. "Hush, mavourneen, there 13 no snake and no gold! You must have been a fennachle in Ireland, the way you tell tales here," she said to Bowers. "Would you believe me. an' I told you a tale that you might some day get a home, an' ye wanted it, without money and without pnee?" he asked. That evening when Maria's chargo was asleep she bent over him with wistful tenderness. "For all you're b. ttrror the times," she whispered, "this never have the. chance." That evening after the shop was closed and her mother had retired and the old candy workers had pone to sit beside their lamp, Mary went into the garden of the old Doubleday house to sit alone and breathe the air. It was a neglected garden, yet lovely still with its fringes of hollyhocks and mats of feverfew, columbine and love-in-the-mist. Mary sat down on the bench under the dwarfed sumac, with her face toward th haroui wnich glittered with lights. The sound of a band playing there and the bells of the yachts came to her on the salt breeze. She clasped her hand behind her head and leaned back resting and dreaming. Presently she turned her head and law a man standing within ten feet of where she gat. looking wistfully at her. He was very till and dark and strong looking. Ills head wag bare, and his negligee shirt showed his magnificent threat. "Fairyland, isn't it, over there?" he ta'd and p9lr.l-i with hU pip?. "Don't you wish you were there, Mary, whrre they're daneinj and laughins? You

She laughed cruelly. "What of Itr He looked at her, silent and stunned. "What of it?" she repeated in a cool, level voice. "Am I compelled to care only for you? Dieu! We mlßht Just as well come to an understanding here now. To be frank, monsieur, all is over between us. I thought you knew that, but it seems I must enlighten you." The youth taggered and clutched the rail for support, gazing at her wildly. "What are you saying!" he whispered hoarsely. "Do you know what you have said! You can't mean you doubt P She gave him an amused glance. "I do. Sapristl! You are a nice boy, but young. Some day you will learn, m'sieur, that a woman's love is the most fickle thing In all the world. Au revoir, and take it not to haart." Dimly he heard the click of her high heels on the stone flagging. When he looked up she was gone. His head sank down on his arms, and when he finally raised ft, minutes later, his dry eyes burned with a queer light. II. Sonla had Introduced a new Spanish dance to the guesU. Costumed as a cigarette irl in a gaudy shawl, and In her hlgh-laced shoes, she danced a Castilian refrain to the music of castanets, a red rose between her lips. It was & languorous sort of dance, filled with the dreamy rhythm of Madrid and in It the Riberia was at her best. It was her custom to glide to the table of the Barone, pause there, pirouette and then drop the rose from between her lips on his table, bow and run quickly off, followed by the rattling applause from the diners. On the same evening that Mario's dream castle had tumbled down about his ears, there was a peculiar sort of tenseness in the air, preceding the

By Elsie Irish fool's a lovin you, and she'd hate to give you up, but " Tis the best cookin' I've ate since I left the old sod,' Bowers declared wistfully the next time Maria and little John were out with him, and Maria produced a picnic lunch she had prepared herself. "When you are gone to the north, mavorneen, I'll get no more picnic dinners like these." "For three words I'd not go to the north," burnt d in Marias heart. "For the love of Mike, say thin, man!" she thought. At the end of the week Mrs. Nugent informed Maria that in answer to a telegram in two days they would start for New England. That nlgbt there vas no sleep for Maria, but it was near dusk the next evening before her mind was made up. Just before sunset she led little John past Bowers' Louse. His face lighted at sight of her. "Is there anywhere I could be speaking to you without the whole town to be listening to, what we'd be saying?" she asked him. High up on the mountainside Bowers stooped to gather a spray of the pink arbutus. " Tis the pink ar it

By Phil Moore

J belong there." "Oh, no. Dan. I belong here." Mary said. "Sit down." She made room for him beside her. He crouched forward with his pipe beween is hands, letting it trail Its smoke Into the air unnoticed. Every night he came up the steps from the house below and they sat together talking. They had done It for three years, and yet somehow to-night was not like all the other evenings they had passed together. "That's French's yacht where all those lights are," he eaM. Mary did not answer. "Mother said see saw him going Into your shop today." "Yes." "Mary! He didn't want Just candy. He wanted to see you. They say he'g wild over you, and that's why he's come back. I heard hin: talking rcygelf today on the wharf to Bert Msrr;thew. I gaw her,' he said. 'Heavens, Bert, what a fool I was to give her up. She's worth all the women I ever knew. And I'm going to have her now,' Those were his worda." Mary put out her hand ar.d !s!d it ever o lightly on the big shouldtr'

Spanish dance. You could only s-cns-It, ray friend. It wm vague and etaoV owy but nevertheless, enrioua as It night seem, tt wag felt by alL The usual opera selection competed, the orchestra began, pi r ilea. to, the melody of the dance, and Sonia, strppe4 gayly out and Into the center cf tl floor, the enstomary red rose betweea her Hps. Never did she dance as eha danced that night! Dlo! It was E3Anlficent Incomparable! She vu dancing for Scotti alone, aad all kaew It Round, round fh whirled, accenting every other beat cf the mtalo with, a stamp of her little foot and clackirxj her castanets in rapturous abandon. At length she reached the xtotrteman's table. In a moment tho daac would be over. Already yon wer) pushing your plate aside eo u to ba ready to applaud. The TOS ft fell frcm her lips on the table and the Deroaa smiled up in her face. Dut she did not turn and rcn on &a urual. Instead she stood thers mruylng. Then before one could catch a breath, she, collapsed in a little heaj at Scout's feet. III. Over the room had fallen a hnsh. It was ao still you could have heard a pin fall. This silence was suddenly broken by a voice from the musician's stand. It wag Mario. leanlDg over, the same queer light blazing In his sunken eyes. "Feel not her heart." he said calmly, "it is quite useleps. It was poison concealed in the stem of the rose. My compliments en your success, Barone. As she is. you may have her!" Something glittered in his hand. There was a shout and th rush cf many feet. But it was too late. Thcrß came he sound of a pistol shot, a

sharp swift crack and acrid smoke. tlio drift of Endicoti you've in your cheeks the day,' he said to her. "I want to tell you something, Michael," she quavered, unnoticlng. "I there was once a nurse gcttin' old. She agreed on a paper shed stay with a pair until their child was 12, if then they'd give her 52,000 above regular wage. If she left before that time she'd not get the money. But kLc met a man she loved, and sh" she thought the man loved her but ho has not spoke. She she has to go away. What ought she to do, Michael. Michael's blue eyes twinkled. He took hold of her arms and looked into her troubled eyes. "An' I was the man she was lovin', I'd say, 'Tear up the paper and take mo, mavourneen. My home down there is ächin' fcr tha all the time touch o' your feet. Take me, and ye'll never have sorrow la satisfaction for it." The glory of happiness filled and lifted Maria. The sun had gone down, but on the far side of the river there was still a streak of gold on the tops of the mountains. She drew the paper from her bosom and, tearing It In bits, scattered them among the shining galax leaves. nearest her. "Dan! Dan!" she chided gently. He burled his face in his bands, "He'll win," he said. "I've aJway been afraid of him. He's got everything to win with. I bavent. Im onix the harbormaster a fisherman's sen to begin with. Love Is about all I got to give you ' "Love Is enough," Interrupted Mar. "Mary!" "Dan!" For a moment they looked Üito eich other's eyes And then she was fci Lis arms. "But I can't give up my candy hop even for you, Dan," Mary said presently. "You must take me, candy ahep and all. Pm awfully attached to tie candy shop." He laughed. "God love the caadj shop," he cried, "sinee It brought yoa within my reach!" O Too Sogeitlre, Sandy Pike You didn't rerr.ain at d? wayiide cottege lor.,;? öritty Gerrse ", de lady wa teo poetical. She poir.ted er to ::.',t and vaid de cl;.;d-i r-::ii:.ueil her of vi Med. I thought it tiir.c to beat it."