Newspaper Page Text
6
"THE LI7IIT OT THE LINE”
By Odessa Strickland Payne and Lamar Strickland Payne
SHIRLEY BRYAN, stenographer for a great
Iron Corporation, is the first action on the scene.
The story begins with a suburban train pulling
out from under the marble corridors of a grand
Terminal Station.
Barry Moore, Miss Bryan’s employer, plays
the role of “The Man of Iron.” He is trying to
build a collossal fortune.
Gregory Ford, a Harvard athlete, a Princeton
theologue, a multi-millionaire, is deeply interested
in the question, propounded by the Book of Job,
“If a man die, shall he live again?” because a
specialist has told him, his days are numbered.
Henry Brown, editor of the Water Oaks Ga
zette, is a discovery of Ford’s.' He is a lover of
poetry, psychology, economy. He is an environ
ment-fighter of the best type.
CHAPTER XV.
HIRLEY rode Swiftly through the town,
without consciously seeing any of the *
landscape gardens whose stretch and
effect were enhanced by oak groves, here
and there, along the familiar streets.
The moon shone with fitful brilliance,
slipping in and out of the cloud billows
drifting across the mysterious, mazarine
arch of the spring sky. The girl felt
S
no fear when she reached the open country, white
sandy road led through orchards of bloom, meadows
of emerald green, and brown stretches of broom
sedge. The spirit of the March night crept into
her veins; the wind blowing in wild gusts along
the way, dashed, at intervals, with the colorful
suggestion of crab apple blossoms, and over all the
night sky, and the mystic spring silence, which was
too tender to be dreadful, and yet it was calculated
to make one long for the higher things, which seem
forever out of reach. Brunhilde and Shirley were
old friends; for before her days in the industrial
world had begun, she had loved the horse, conceded
to be the swiftest racer in town. When the road
began to dip down toward the woods, through which
flowed a creek, badly bridged, Shirley leaned over
and patted 'Brunhilde on his long, thoroughbred
neck.
“Brunhilde, it’s the swamp road now, with the
bridge and a bog, and some other things —which
you and I had rather leave out of the program.
But Gregory Ford’s life is a valuable one, Brun
hilde, equipped with more power to bless the world
than I could command in a thousand years. So,”
she went on with a thrill in the proud young voice,
as the horse swung swiftly into the mosaic of moon
mist and willow shadows, “so, we’ll take the risk,
Brunhilde, take the risk.”
“Who knows?” she questioned of her own heart,
“what may hang upon the preservation of young
Ford’s life? Paul Revere did not realize that the
fate of a nation was hanging between the hoof
beats of his horse, on that night which history has
made forever memorable. And I?” But every
thought of a speculative nature left Shirley’s brain,
when she saw a gaunt figure, with a long gun on
his shoulder emerge from out of the shadows, about
twenty yards in front of her and near the bridge.
Instinctively, her hand fell on the brace of pistols
in her holster. She knew perfectly well that she
could turn Brunhilde and race back to the open
country, but Gregory Ford might die, and the conse
quences be upon her young head. Swift as light
she sent up the appeal.
“Heaven help me!” Then she lay almost flat
along Brunhilde’s long, warm neck. She gave his
tender mouth a jerk which made him bolt like a
thing of evil straight ahead to the bridge. As he
thundered over the planks like a thousand furies
were at his heels, Shirley had barely time to see
an old negro, gray haired and owl eyed, with a
possum swinging at the end of a long pole on his
shoulder. She kept her swift gallop up, however,
until she reached the open country again. Then she
rode under the overhanging limbs of a crab-apple
SYNOPSIS
Gregory Ford and his mother rent one-half
of the old colonial Bryan home, and wealth and
poverty are only across the hall from each other.
Mrs. Ford is a woman, “who has never had a
thrill.” Mrs. Bryan is a breeze of sunshine for
Shirley’s sake, and she begins to draw young
Ford’s confidence.
Then there is Little Nell, the child of wis
dom. And, on the horizon looms a girl, a
cousin of the Fords, Ethel, by name, who will
play a dramatic part as the story progresses.
There is a wreck of the Suburban train, of
which Mrs. Bryan has a physic vision. Her daugh
ter, Shirley, who is aboard, escapes unhurt, but
she measures up to her part as a heroine, by her
loving sympathy to those less fortunate.
tree and drew rein, inhaling the delicate intoxica
tion of the perfume, until the spirit of terror which
had gripped her, gradually slipped away from her.
Afterwards, she rode on, alert and graceful, but
scouting both sides of the road, with swift, compre
hensive glances.
Brunhilde climbed the red hill to the white coun
try house which was the end of their destination,
with unabated swiftness. Shirley saw the gleam
of light in one of the front windows, and she rode
straight up to the veranda and knocked with the
butt of her riding whip on the pine floor; while
yard dogs vociferous in their welcome busied them
selves about Brunhilde’s heels. When the farmer,
Mr. Sanders, came to the door, Shirley explained
her errand, and asked for Dr. Bloxham. That
disciple of Esculapus, hearing his name in discus
sion, was not long in making an appearance, and
when Miss Bryan had gravely informed him of
young Ford’s case, he responded, as usual, with a
touch of humor.
“And so, Sanders, the young fellow with tne
grand manners and the store-bought clothes, and
the millions, I reckon we’d better mention ’em,
Sanders, it’s customary, I believe, has to get flat
on his back, like the balance of common folks?
Well, well, well, we will do the best we can for
him; and since there is no time to be lost, I’ll bor
row your saddle, Sanders, and leave my buggy. I
was a surgeon on the firing line, in the ’6o’s. I can
ride on .a saddle. Black Bess will keep somewhere
in the vicinity of Brunhilde, and, when a life is at
stake, that little horse can get up and dust.”
“I expect it will be worth SIO,OOO to you, Doc
tor,” Sanders suggested with a laugh as he walked
towards the big barn, in the rear of the cottage.
On the return trip, Dr. Bloxham and Shirley
broke the record, if record there was on the Flat
Shoals road. Brunhilde and Black Bess, if they
had been capable of realizing the value of the
stake for which they were racing, could not have
done better, so swiftly did they fly over the inter
vening miles. The town clock struck the mellow
half hour’ after ten, as the physician and Shirley
drew rein almost simultaneously before the Bryan
home. Ethel Ford, pale and distrait, met them on
the steps of the lonic-columned porch.
“Hurry!” she exclaimed, with an imperious
gesture, “my cousin is barely alive.”
But Dr. Bloxham stopped deliberately in the
lower hall and removed his gauntlets and top coat.
Then he turned, with an illuminating smile, to his
beautiful escort.
“Lead the way,” he commanded quietly, “and
remember for your own comfort, that all danger
is not death.”
“I have no doubt,” he continued as they all
mounted the stairs, “but that Mr. Ford will rally,
and be out in ten days. He appears so vigorous
and handsome, that he suggests what Queen Eliza
beth said to Sir Nicholas Bacon, ‘that his soul was
well lodged.’ ”
“I think that you are worth forty specialists,”
said Miss Ford impulsively. “I am tired of death
talking doctors. Mr. Ford, because of his great
The Golden Age for April 1, 1909.
wealth, has had a hard fight to get treated as an
ordinary human being.”
She opened the door of Ford’s room, while Shir
ley sat wearily down on the window seat at the
upper end of the hall. She had not removed her
cap, and she still retained, quite unconsciously, her
grasp on the silver handle of her riding whip. The
young girl leaned against the window facing, and
thought that she would rest there, until Dr. Bloxham
came out with his report. At midnight Mrs. Bryan
happened to discover her daughter sleeping pro
foundly, the cold March starlight of the spring night
gleaming through the window panes, revealed the
unspeakable weariness of Shirley’s face and figure.
“Poor little girl!” Mrs. Bryan exclaimed ten
derly. “No wonder she is tired. Get up, Breeze,”
she continued, with a gentle shake. “Dr. Bloxham
says that our Mr. Gregg will live.”
Shirley struggled to her feet, and, leaning on
her mother’s shoulder she walked across the hall
to her own room. Then she turned and kissed her
mother good-night.
“Our Mr. Gregg, Mater,” she said dreamily,
“don’t you think that you violate the use of the
possessive pronoun in this case?”
“No,” Mrs. Bryan answered, “he is ours, dear,
to help care so he gets well.”
“As you like it,” Shirley replied, in a graver
tone, as she shut the door of her bed-room.
Ten days later Ford was well enough to be about
in his den. Henry Brown had been to see him a
number of times during his convalescence. And he
and Dr. Bloxham together furnished Ford with
more than one chapter on the originality of South
ern character.
“Murat,” Ford said to the faithful companion
of his lonely hours, “I hope that Dr. Bloxham’s
theory is true. He says that my attacks are not
caused by a weak heart. Acute indigestion is what
I have now, Murat. I wish you to understand that
it is not quite as aristocratic as heart trouble, but
really I like a change. One means life, because I
get amused at Bloxham, and the other might mean
death, for that specialist gave me a cold and clammy
chill. Os course, I am not up enough on technical
knowledge to decide between the verdict of the
specialist, and the country physician. But at least,”
he went on, his blue eyes darkening as he sat
upright in his great chair, “I can magnify my part,
be it long or short, for the balance of the way.
I suppose a man can be held as responsible for a
month of days, as for many long, drawn-out years.
Life comes to all the same, a grim day at a time.
And now, mon ami,” he placed his hand gently
on Murat’s brown head, “I have got to the Rubicon.
I want to do something else, besides play the part of
the amiable young man, who waits as bravely as he
can to die. I am going to die—at the limit of the
line. But, I am going to drag Harry Brown from
those two dingy, up-stairs rooms, before I even do
that. He needs a friend. He has tried so hard to
win success. He has been full of patience and
industry. Thank God, I have got $100,000,000 a
year. I can drive my boot heel into the face of
Mammon whenever I please. Thank God, also, I
believe that he is billions of times stronger than
all the calves of gold that the nations of the earth
shall set up to worship forever. I am willing to
help red blooded manhood whip gold, whenever I
can. I will do more than any other man of class
to whip the ‘System.’ I can spank it. I can
sit on it. I can send a left to its old jaw, and a
right to its miserable brass solar plexus, that will
make the Stock Exchange tremble from the sugar
pole to the birds’ nests. Get up, Murat, and howl
the lion howl! ’ ’
“ If I could only,” he added, as he arose and
began to walk the floor, in long, nervous strides,
“find out if Aunt Dilsey’s story, about Miss Shir
ley’s ‘jumpin’ dat five-barred gate, sub, lak a bird,
suh, dat night she rode eight miles to save yer
life, suh,’ was the gospel truth. And yet it must
be so. Ethel and the governess will not answer,
when questioned, and Mrs. Bryan, in her sincere
(Continued on Page 7.)
