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About The Sunday Oregonian. (Portland, Ore.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (April 9, 1916)
THE SI7NTAT OTlEGO"YTA??, PORTLAND. APRIIi 9, 191G. NOVELIZED FIZOM. THE PATHE PHOTO PLAOE TEE SAFIE NAME SECOXD EPISODE. The llotme of Unhappincna. ENOCH GOLDEN, with all his mil lions, was a hard man. Those closest to him contended that he had experienced much to make him hard. Without friends or family, he faced that two-fold isolation which in volved both the loneliness ot the fighter who has given all hf time and thought to success and the even more poignant loneliness of a luxurious home with no one to share in its magnificence. Through this home Golden stalked, a grim and embittered man of 50, drugging his advancing years with an ever fiercer struggle for wealth. And the ironic gods of chance, eeeminj to realize that the accumulation of world ly riches only added to the burden al ready weighing down the aged mil lionaire's heart, permitting his ven tures, to prosper; Those closest to him, again, -even vhispered that Golden's feverish ac tivities in the world of finance were not without a well-defined motive. For It had been said that this silent man cculd not afford to remember the past. It was claimed that he studiously llindfolded his unhappy eyes With his uncounted bonds, iike a bandage, and that he had taken to work as weaker mm take to drink, since once in fie years that were gone, it was whis peerd, lie had known the love of a loy al and beautiful wife and had warmed to the affectionate smiles of an even more reautiful child. . But fate, for some tragic reason, had wrested both wife and daughter from him, and the broken man, afraid of hi memories, had immured himself In l-e feverish dust of finance. The one person who stood In cn7 way intimately and personally connect ed with Golden was' his young private secretary, David Maney. For young M:tnley, often enough known to his associates as "Davie," was both incor rigibly youthful and engagingly irre sponsible. Golden, oddly enough, se- cretly liked this youth for his foolish ness, it brought a breath of human ity into his granite world of greed. It marked Manley off from the sycophants who thought only on the millionaire's riches . and schemed for their posses- Eion. This youth was too much of an easy v going idiot. Golden held, ever to think seriously of his own self .interest. He was indolent and his office hours were erratic. He was brazen in his retorts and often enough laugh-provoking in his antics. His demeanor, in fact, was more that of a high-spjrited schoolboy than a confidential secretary to a gray-haired millionaire. Tet with all his levity this same millionaire had found Manley's Judgments were souna and his discernment often startllngly keen. t "That boy keeps the moss off my old bones," Golden admitted, when, con trary to a life-Jong habit of reticence, lie asked young Manley into the gloomy pplendor of his uptown home. Tet into that home this younger man had brought some semblance of a move ment and companionship, and as time went on the mn of silence found him self leaning more and more on this easy-going youth who seemed -quite without one serious aim in the world. Manley, however, was something more than a, court Jester. When peed be he had his lucid Intervals. There were, in fact, rare occasions when Golden even wondered if his young as sociate's antics were not a mask shrouding some ulterior and sterner , design in life. But all such momen tary suspicions 6eemed more and more without reason, and Golden found him self conferring more and more often with this youth who accepted business so light-heartedly and the millionaire himself so off-handedly. The thought had even entered the close-fisted old financier's head that some day Manley might fall heir to his useless millions. If only that disappointingly facetious youth would once become solemn enough to attend strictly to business. "For the boy's fool! There's no doubt of that. And if I don't look after him. heaven knows what may become of him." So Golden smiled a little as he stepped "into his massively furnished library and found young Manley curled up in one of the great leather chairs Intently working over a pocket cam era and quite oblivious to the telephone bell shrilling from the rosewood desk beside him. Golden, as ha seated himself at this desk nd curtly an-r swered the phone call, blinked with mock disapproval at the youth bent over the camera. Then he turne4 to the mail lai4 neatly on the desk be fore him and proceeds to go .through it. It was not until he heard Golden'q great fist smite the rosewood desk top that Manley looked Tbe pia pf millions was frowning over the letter still held in his hand, "The conditions of these tenements la shameful. Times are har4 and many. we find, are out pf work. It you Insist on raising the rents, as you threaten, our settlement workers claim that hun dreds of the poor will have to leave their homes. 60, for the sake o tHJ mothers and children elope, I implore you to reconsider your earlier decision. Sincerely. " AMOS SCHOFIEL.D, D. D.' "The fools!" paid Golden aloud, "They know as much about business, Manley, as you know ebput bond issues! Their inspectors come and order me to put up fire escapes and build wider light wells, and while they ptand ready to split profits with the very Ironworkers who stick up those fire escapes, they expect me me, and it's always ma to take $100,000 out of my own pocket and spend it on that warren of idlers ana incompetents, that warren that's al ready taxed up to the hflt, Ha4 Not raise my own rents! I guess Enoch Golden still knows enough to run his own business!' He stopped and looked at Manley, who was still whistling as he bent cas ually over his ppeket camera, "What's that gim-crack you're wast ing your time on?' he demanded, with the sharp impatience one might use to a child. "Gim-crackT" laughed Manley, "It's the neatest thing in cameras that ever came into America. That's a new Swiss telescopic Jens I ve Just been adjusting to it. Take a PnP St biting your ear 80 paces pway! And ypup in-r come on those tenements, by the way. amounts to an annual return of Just 43 per cent of the capital invested!" "Well, supposing 1 turn them over to you and - see what you could make out of them!" Manley ignored the sneer in the older man's words. "I'd at least try to make decent homes out of them," the younger man said, ' "Young man, I don't hire you to hint that my money is dirty money!" "I don't need to!" "And f you bad the intelligence I once attributed to you you'd show more respect for the man who thought seri ously of making you his beneficiary!" Manley, putting down the camera. Stared at him in amazement. "Yes, young man, I mean' what 1 say. If you could ever show a moment's serious inteerst in my business, you'd become the heir to that business and all that went with It!" i "But I have other things to remem ber," answered the ever-flippant Mau ley. "What other things?" was the older man's curt inquiry, sung by the thought that even his munificence was being contemned. "Well, this gim-crack, for one thing. And for another that letter in your hand there, about your tenements." But Golden's patience was exhausted. "Get out of here!" was his brusque command. "Get down to Grlswold'e bank with these checks, and he quick about it!" Whereupon Manley meekly took his. departure. Two minutes later, how ever, yet another figure was passing through the gloomy silences of Enoch Golden's heme. It was a more purpose ful figure than that of the lazyreyed young secretary. And over h fate of this intruder as he cautiously made his way through the great house as an odd-looking band of yellow cloth, cut in the form of a mask. The center of this, drooping apronlike alomst to hip. upper lip, was marked by an in serted crescent, which at first glanua lent to the partly covered fca the faint suggestion of an ironically laugh ing mouth. Yet the unknown stranger was serious enough as he stopped be fore a door at the end of the second hall a if J pushed on one of a row of mother-of-pearl buttons. The door slid noiselessly tacl at that signal and an electric elevator rose automatically to the level of the floor where he stood. Inside the elevator he touched still another button, whereupon the cage rose noiselesslv. Once it had come to a stop he leaned against the appar ently blank wall of the elevator shaft and studied it closely. His exploring fingers plainly found there a secret 9prjng, for the next mo ment a pane) slipped noiselessly to one gjje anj he stepped Into the room, so artfully firc;proofed with pressed steel flannels and grained to look like oak, which Golden had once used as his bondroom. That room, although not used for years, was at the present moment far from empty. For pacing restlessly back and forth, as the stranger quietly en tered, was a golden-haired woman of little more than 20. Plain as her cloth ing was. It in no way detracted from the singular sweetness of her almost too pallid features and the beauty of her tomorous and troubled eyes. Yet the face under the mask smiled a little at her sudden movement and gasp of surprise as he confronted her. "Are you still afraid of me?" be asked. "N-no!" hesitated the girl. "You can see, now, that I'm only try ing to help you?" Again the girl hesitated. "But I don't even know who pr what you are!" "And you'4 give a good deal to know that?" "I have nothing to give. But still I should like to know," "And I'd give a good deal," declared the other, "to know who you are!" A barricaded look came into the eyes so intently watching him. "I'm I'm afraid I can't help you any, in that," she finally told him. "Why not?" "Because I don't know myself." "But if I paid I wanted to help you find out, would you believe me? Would you do what I asked?" The deeply questioning eyes onca more studied him. "I think you are honest. Tou seem honest," she finally acknowledged, "Then will you trust me?"' "But what must I do?" The man jn the mask hesitated. To make things pjain, apparently, ws ne easy matter. ''I want to take you to man wh may be; Interested in you, who may even prove to be very kjnd to ypu." The pale face with the haunted eyes suddenly hardened. 'I pp longer ask for kindness from men," was her almost passionate retort. "Oh, this old scoundrel won't be too dangerously kind, especially until the tee -is proken. I warrant ypu that much. But with him, rjj also warrant, ypu'U face pone of the affronts that you may have faced in the Owl's Nest,' ''But why should he be interested in me?" "Because you may remind him of a daughter he himself once had." "Then wht pjust I dp?" "Ifou. must put on a dress I have ready, one exactly like the one his own daughter used to wear. And I'd like you to let down ypur hair." ''But this seems so foolish!" 4e- murred the puzzled girl. "Yet it's such wonderful hair! And it may maka an unhappy man lese yn- happy, and at the same time be for yptlr own good-" So the girl, still touched with won- 4er, was cautiously led to another part of the great house, where she let down her hair and dressed herself in a girlish little frock which she found already laid out for her. And the wonder was still in her eyes as. the masked stranger smuggled her quietly down "through" the house, and, as the aged millionaire bent loyr to unlock the bottom dra-wer of his desk, motioned her noiselessly Into the library and Into an armchair facing his desk. By the time Golden had raised his head again the mysterious stranger had slipped out of sight. Golden, as he sat upright, stared for several moments pf silence at the strange figure in the armehalr. "Whe are you?'' the grim-faeed old financier finally demanded. But the girl remained 'silent,. . She scarcely knew whiit was expected of her. Golden, studying her more closely. rose unsteadily to his feet. "How did you set here?" he asked. - -1 & , . .. i r - v.1" - ' 4 - - ) -i:'v" 1 " " 11 11 " "" 1 ' . U I And parsing a hand across his niultt encd brow he usktd still pgaint "Whu are you?" "I don't know," answered the girl. Mechanically th unhappy man """-""( to ms oek ai awur jor I he Pnotograpu whU-h lie fctpt there. Itia brfcth quickened as he etared from the Picture to the figure in the armchair, Then he rose to hi feet, n4 tnr- gniy ai mat mna yet ciouoeq. face, crobsed to her side. He held her face between- his hands, peering into it. Then, with a weary shake of the head, he dropped his hands. "It was too much to expect." he huskily murmured. "Too much to hope for! The grief-furrowed face touched the girl's heart. "Oh. sir, what had you hoped for?" she managed to ask. "Now is the time for all good men" Once on a day you sang: Somebody clattered your shiny keys To get the feel and the hang. Fairly your struck the paper, And played with the chosen word for print springs clean from a new machine. With never a letter blurred. Joy of your job was given. Ipsta.nt you felt the thrill; Ypu shamed the shirk as you chattered work- Old mill! Time and the boys have tamed you. You've written leexues of stuff. Ypur keys are saffron and grimy. Your paint is pitted and rough. Now nobody calls you nifty 'longside of a newer make; YPU grouch with age as you smudge the page. Tremble end stutter and quake. ' jpy of your job was given, Ypn sprang to work with a will; They took your best, nor gave you rest- Old mill! WlO Sire ybu,?"tie Gr-ftt "T hope for nothing," WM the broken niun's reply, "liuf opee I bad S daughter, WHd I lost her' '"How did you )ose her?" "She wee stolen from nie, as a child." "And what became of her" "God only kl"wsf Yet for moment I was mad enough to think to hope. But I have no Jonger any light to hope," he add4 with suddsn passion. "Alt I aaU t that nnce before I die I nieet face to face that oneurmed devil with hie car of ph&mel" "One-armed, 'and with a ecarr cried the startled gir, Jenjng suddenly for ward in her chair. Golden wheeled about at her cry, "What does tht mean to you?" "Why, it wag p. one-armed man with a. ecarred face who kept me a prisoner! It was he, Jyesar, who always told me my parents were dead." e&fczrZ,3ir?pman. It's quiet now The wage they Old JF&??7?h&Jic - e &ezr2art&&sf. "Legar!" repeated the bewildered millionaire. "Legar? But my man's name was Palidori." By this time Golden was or.ra more on hia feet, his excitement increasing every moment. "Vet men have changed their names. And this man bad every reason to change his." Even his quiet-voiced visitor was in fected with that pudden excitemeut. for she rose to her feet as Golden rounded the desk which stood between them. "Girl, let ma see your arm!'' With trembling fingers he thrust up the flimty pleeve, staring breathlessly at the milk-white skin. Then a groan of disappointment broke from his throat, "No, the mark is not there!" "What mark?" asked the wondering girl. "My daughter carried a scar on her In the office I wonder f you recall Thn story you typed for copy Thet Jolted the city ball? I wonder if you remember The scandal that clacked your frame When you caught a breath at threat of death- Then named the grafter's im? Joy of your Job was givenj To distance the olden quill They plied you eore, yet yea waited more -Old mini I wonder it you remember The night that the "Nina" sank? They ordered a front-page flarer. And gave the story to Hank. I doubt if ever he told you The words you rapped on the sheet Cut to the raw till they made a law That must have succored a fleet. Joy of ypur Job was given; Give thanks that it wasn't ill. They fed each note to your willing throat Old mill! Somebody smiled as he cuffed you. And grinned as he pulled the sheet; They laughed that 4ay jn the office They laughe4 again Pn the street. Somebody sighed as he twisted Your carriage and wrote the lod And eyes weii blurred with the printed word That carried a human creed. Joy of your Job was given. Ream upon ream to fill; Tou've written miles in a hundred styles Old mill! Jpve and labor and laughter. And sin and sorrow and crime pu've slammed them all intp copy Many and many the time. They rushed your stuff to the printers, It wakened the presses to roar; The newsboys cried in the street outside That which you knew before. Joy of your job was given; Go forth as junk with a thrill paid was the part you played right arm. My men, when she was a child on Windward Island, caught and killed a shark. The child, when no one watched her, thrust a hand In between the brute's Jaws. ThOde dyinsf'Jawg closed cn the flesh and an iron bar had Ij be used to open them again. And they said that tear would always stay With )ier.x The girl, widu-eyed, dropped back Into the arm.ihair. "Why, I seem to remember," she said, starring before her. "I seem to- remem ber years ago, rows and rows of sharp teeth and the sudden pain as those teeth came together." "But the se,r!" cried Golden. "There is no scar!" "I seem tp remember about that, too. It was long ago, after I,egar had brought me across water, and then miles and miles in a railway train. I remember him taking ma to a man who wore round eyeglasses, end shpwing him my aim. This man gave me some thing tp make me pleep. But when I wakened run jtrrn was eore again, for weeks and weeks. And when it healed the scar was gone. 1 remember " But she stopped suddenly, for the telephone bell close betide Golden shrilled "out a sudden call. Mechanically the man at the desk took up the receiver, his eyes still on the srirl facing him. "This is ICastman, of the central of fice, (.peaking." eaid the voice over the wire, "A Pbort while ago a young woni gn was seen entering your house." "Well, wht pf it?" was the impatient inquiry. ''Our offiee merely wants 10 warn yeu that that girl is Blondie Casey, the come-pn for the Cookson eang. Khe's the smpothest swjndler In the business.. And as long as that baby-eyed she crook is in your house, Uolden, your house will be in danger!" "But who are you?" "I'm Eastman, of the central office, and I've warned you. That's all!" And Golden, notwithstanding his repeated call, could get no further word over the wire. "A come-on for the Cookson gang!" he repeated alond, staring with hardening eyes at the figure confront ing him. . Jfe hung up I1I3 receiver and sat studying his desktop. Then with his grim mouth fixed he crossed to the rear door and opened it, stepping out into the hall and peremptorily called for his butler as lie iid so. Manley, returning from his errand, at the same moment stepped into the room from another door. He stared at the girl as he stopped to pick up his pocket camera. "Who are you?" he pertly inquired, as Golden re-entered the room. But his eyes, the neat moment, were on neither Golden nor the girl. His gase passed beyond those two strange ly diverse figures lo yet a third, the crouching figure of an eavesdropper clinging to the wistaria vines that framed the huge window on the fur side of the room. For that crouching figure confirmed a suspicion which young Mapley had for some time nursed, the suspicion that Uolden and his house were under an enemy's sur veillance. And Jdanlty was determined that this spy, whoever he was, should not escape. But the intruder, realising that he had been seen, had already dropped from his perch. Manley, crossing the room on the run, took the window glass and all, in ope leap. He landed on a hydrangea bush even as the burly eavesdropper dropped to the grass beside him. The next moment the two men clinched. The fight was en. uneven one, but Manley stMck to his man. Ha stuck to him until that worthy, with a sudden blow on the Jaw; sent the lithe-bodied young secretary staggering tp the Manley could recover himself the mysterious eavesdropper broke away, vaulted jn the street and sig naled to a waiting automobile that moyed from the shadow pf the trees Into the open light even as he called for help. To the running-board of this ear he leaped as it swept by. But Manley, bent on running down that unknown interloper, was already close at his heels. Still dazed as he was fromJiU blow. Manley reached the car, awung Himself up on the running- board, and as the driver responded to the repeated shouts for sped. the fight between the burley fugitive and his pursuer was renewed. . It was a brief fight shd a bitter one. But new, Manley saw, it was his strength alone against three of the enemy, all clawing and striking at him as he clung -to the speeding car. And one weu-ptaced Dtow sent him sudden- ly catapulting from his swaying perch, head foremost into a pyramid of dry sand and cement piled there by a gang of street menders, He lay there, stunned and motion less for a second or two, enveloped in a cloud of dust as thick and eruptive as shell smoke. Then his senses came back to him, and rolling pver into the open roadway, he took the camera from his pocket end held it between him and the disappearing touring car. He pressed the spring, knowing that his telescopic lens would carry to the writ ing film the secret of that mysterious car's license number. And with that number he would at least have a clew. For there, were strange movements 'n der way and the sooner their meaning and source could be fathomed the bet ter It would be for the safety of the house of Golden. The Arrows of Conflnsration. Jules Legar. in his role as a master of underworld activities, was both adroit in his engagement of the serv ices of others and painstaking in the preparation of the field wherein they should labor. Like the humble weasel, he held that every warren should have both an exit and an entrance, for when the law descended on its underground enemies, he remembered, it was apt to descend without warning. So when Legar and his scientific friend, Dr. Herman gtein, engaged their triple-floor office suite at the top of the Central Tower building, they in sisted on certain structural alterations In those offices. Not only was one of the largest. windows commandeered for the installation of a strangely complex apparatus used in Stoin's electric wave projector (which was announced to be the latest improvement on wireless), but the upper and lower floors of the suite were connected by a smooth wolled shaft, which, it was explained, would make easier the passage back and forth of chemicals and apparatus needed by the illustrious Dr. Stein in his carefully guarded experiments. Kqually well prepared was Legar's second base of activities, the secret subcellar beneath the Owl's Nest, once used for the storing of spirit kegs and wine casks on which a revenue tax was never too punctiliously paid. This sec ond warren, deep as it stood under ground, was also provided with a secret passageway leading into a water-gate opening on the Kast Kiver itself. It was made habitable by electric lights, a huge brick fireplace in one end and a sprinkling of rough furniture. But with ts gloomy air and its damp walls it was not the type of abode that could ever be designated as comfortable. It was from both of these points that Legar was conducting his campaign against his old-time enenjy, Enoch Golden. And both of these points might have remained as well hidden as their user still dreamed them to be had it not been for the casual agency of a pocket camera. For less than an hour's work in the office of the regis ter Pf automobiles had duly shown Manley that license No. 6248 belonged to one Professor Herman Stein, of 42 Maple avenue, Yet Manley, armed as he was' with the knowledge of this car's Identity, showed no undue haste In interfering with its movements. For still another hour of cautious shadow ing on the part of Golden's private sec retary provided him with the knowl edge that Dr. Stein was in the habit of motoring from Maple avenue to the Central Tower building and from that prosperous skyscraper to a humble point within a block of the Owl's Nest itself. Thirty minutes later found Manley In a telephone booth, talking to hia employer. "Have you received any message from that man Legar?" asked the younger man, after impatiently ex pjulhini? who he was. "I have received a message, but I don't know it came from Legar." "Then how did you get it?" ' "It was thrown through my house window folded up in a beer bottle." "Will you please read me that mes sage. And quickly, for this is impor tant." "Here it is," answered the bewil dered voice over the wire. 'You are keeping Blondie Casey a prisoner in your house. Unless you liberate her within an hour that house will go tip in flames. And after that house, your next house, and the net.' It is signed 'The Cookson Gang.' But what am I to believe? What am I to do? And what is the answer to ail these mysteries?" "That's what I'd like to find out. But, in the meantime, just what 4o you in tend to do about this girl?" "I intend to keep that girl here," was the grim reply, "no matter what happens, no matter what threats may shower on me." "I'm afraid they're going to shower more than threats. But I'm serious for once when I say, whatever you do, don't let them get that young woman away from you!" "Then, for God's sake, Manley, tell me just who and what that young woman is! Is she, can she be, my " There came a break in ihe voice on the wire and the sentence remained unfinished- Faintly the listener could hear the sound of sudden calls, of quick questions and answers and counter questions. Then the voice of Golden was once more frantically calling him over the wire. "Manley, Manley, is that ypu? You've spoken too late. Wilson, my butler, has Just hurried in to me here. Ten min utes ago a stranger claiming to be a meter inspector got entrance to the house. The servants accepted his uni form as authentic. He got tp the room where the girl had been sent to dress. He dragged her down through the halls before he Gould be interfered with. He got her out through the door and into a waiting car, a car without a number, before any fool around here made a step to stop him. Do you 'hear me? They've taken the girl! She's gone!" "Gone?" echoed Manley. "Then I haven't time to stand here talking. For here's where I get busy again!" Yet Enoch Golden, even as Manley himself, had little time for talking over that strange abduction. For two min- utes later his still flurried butler an- nounced the arrival pf James Griswold, the president of the Union Traders' Bank, on urgent business. Golden or dered that his visitor be admitted. "Golden," began that visitor almost as spon e,s he ha4 crpgse4 the threshold, "I. have counted myself among your friends. I have even shut my eves to this absurd newspaper agitation against (Concluded on page 4). "