Polk County itemizer., May 21, 1914, Page 12, Image 22

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H O M E A N D F A R M M A G A Z IN E S E C T IO N
HOME AND FARM MAGAZINE SECTION SERIAL.
BJ
George B u t
McOutcheoa
A Fool and His Money
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 crying the second night we were here
1«
♦ Mr. Smart,” said my secretary nerv­
0
SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS
♦ ously.
€»
INSTALLMENTS.
0
“ And there was smoke coming from
0
In the opening installments o f 0 one o f the back chimney pots this
0 “ A Fool and His Money,” George <3> morning, ’ ' added Britton.
I was thoughtful for a moment.
0 Harr McCutcheon’• charming novel, 0
0 serial rights for which have been <s> "W h a t became o f the rag doll, Brit­
t o n !” I inquired shrewdly.
0 specially obtained for the Home
“ I turned it over to old Schmick, sir'
0 and Farm Magazine Section, we
learn of John Bellamy Smart, the 0 said he. He grinned. “ I thought as
0 young man who is telling the story. <$> maybe it belonged to one o f his boys. ’
t He has just written his first novel, <$> On the aged caretaker's reappearance,
0 and at the same time has fallen <5> I bluntly inquired what had become of
& heir to an immense fortune left 0 the doll baby. He was terribly con
0 him by his uncle. He is 35 years 0 fused.
0 years of age.
0 “ I know nothing, I know nothing,”
he mumbled, aud I could see that he
0
A fter a visit to London Smart
was miserably upset. His sons towered
0 takes a L ip on the river Danube.
and glowered and his wife wrapped and
0 After finding an old-world town,
unwrapped her hands in her apron, all
0 ho discovers an ancieqt castle,
<• which he purchases from its owner, 0 tho time supplicating heaven to be good
0 the Count.
With bis secretary, 0 to the true and the faithful.
From what I could gather, they all
0 Poopendyke,'he takes possession of ♦
«•> the immense structure, which is 0 seemed to be more disturbed over the
0 supposed to be tennanted only by 0 fact that my hallucination included a
0 the caretaker and his family, the 0 dog than by the claim that I bad seen
0 Schmicks. To Smart's amazement, 0 a woman.
“ But, confound you, Schmick,” I
0 the first night, he hears the cry 0
0 of a baby.
0 cried in some beat, “ it barked at me.”
“ Gott in himmell” they all cried,
0
Looking out at a balcony one 0
0 night Smart sees the white figure 0 and, to my surprise, the old woman
0 of a woman silhouetted. He im- 0 burst into tears.
“ It is bad to dream of a dog,” she
0 mediately begins a hunt for 0
0 Schmick, the caretaker, to solve 0 wailed. “ It means evil to all o f us.
0 the mystery of who the woman 0 Evil to— ”
“ Com o!” said I, grabbing the keys
0
0 m ay'be. The story continues:
0
0 from the old man's unresisting hand.
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 “ And, Schmick, if that dog bites me,
I ’ll bold you personally responsible.
(Continued From Last Week.)
Do you understand ? ''
E FOUND the four Schmicks in the
Two abreast we filed through the long,
vast kitchen, watching Britton vaulted halls, Rudolph can-ving a gi
while be pressed my trousers on an gantie lantern and Max a sledge. We
oak tabic so large that the castle must traversed extensive corridors, mounted
have been built around it.
tortuous stairs and came at length to
Herr Schmick was weighted down the sturdy oak door that separated the
with tho keys o f the castle, which never east wing from the west: a huge, for­
left his possession day or night.
midable thing strengthened by many
‘ ‘ Herr Schmick,” said I, ‘ ‘ will you bo eross-piecea and studded with rusty
so good as to inform me who the dickens bolt heads. Padlocks as large as horse
that woman is over in the east wing of sbóes, corroded by rust and rendered
the castle! ”
absolutely impracticable by age, con­
‘ ‘ Woman, mein h errt”
He almost fronted us.
dropped his keys. His big sons said
1 have not the keys.” said old Con
something to each other that I couldn’t rad Schmick sourly. “ This door has
quite catch, but it sounded very much not been opened in my time. It ia no
like ‘ ‘ der duyvil.”
use. ”
‘ ‘ A woman in a white dress,— with
“ It is no use,” repeated his grizzly
• dog.”
sons, leaning against the mouldy walls
‘ ‘ A d o g !” he cried. ‘ ‘ But, mein with weary tolerance.
herr, dogs are not permitted to be in
“ Then how did the woman and her
the castle.”
dog get into thnt part o f the ca stle!” I
‘ ‘ Who is she! How did she get demanded. “ Tell me th a t!'
th ere!”
They shook their heads, almost eom-
‘ ‘ Heaven defend us, sirl
It must ,-asaioiiately, as much as to say: “ It is
have been the ghost o f — ”
always best to humour a mad man.”
‘ ‘ Ghost, your granny!” I eried, re­
“ And the baby,” added Poopendyke,
lapsing into English. “ Please don ’t turning up hia eoat collar to protect his
beat about the bush, Mr. Schmick. She’s thin neck from the draft that smote us
over there in the unused wing, which I from the halla
haven't been allowed, to penetrate in ■ “ Smash those padlocks M ax,” I com­
spite of the fact that it belongs to me. manded resolutely.
You say you ca n ’t find the keys to
Max looked stupidly at his father and
that side of the castle. Will you ex­ the old man looked at his w ife, and
plain how it is that it is open to strange then all four of them looked at me, al
women and— and d o g s !”
most imploringly.
“ You must be mistaken, mein herr,”
“ Why destroy a perfectly good pad
he whined abjectly. “ She cannot be lock, mein h err!” began Max, twirling
there. She — Ah, I have it! It may the sledge in hia hand as if it were a
have been my wife. Gretul! Have you bamboo cane.
“ Hit Look oat there! “ gai«ped Brit-
been in the east— ”
“ Nonsense!” I cried sharply. “ This to*t in tome alarm. “ D on’t let that
won't do, Mr. Schmick. Give me that thing slip! “
••Doesn’t this castle belong to m et”
bunch of keys. We'll investigate. I
can’t have strange women gallivanting . demanded, considerably impressed by
about the place as if they owned it. the ease with which he swung the sledgo.
▼ery dangerous person, I bogan to
This is no trysting place for Juliets,
IterT Schmiek. We II get to the bottom perceive.
••It does, mein herr,** shouted all of
o f this at one«. Here, you Rudolph,
fetch a couple of lanterns. Max, get them gladly, and touched their fore­
a sledge or two from the forge, There locks.
••Everything Is yours,“ added old
is a forge. I saw it yesterday out there
back o f the stables. So doa't try ts tall ('onrad, with a comprehensive sweep ef
me there isn't one. If we can't un his hand that might have put the whole
lock tbs doors, well smash 'am in. universe in my name.
• ‘ Smash that padlock, M ax/* I said
They're mine, and 1T1 knock 'em to
after a second’s hesitation.
smithereens if 1 feel like it.
••I’ll bet he ca n ’t do it ,“ said Brit
The tour Schmicks wrung their hands
and shook their heads, sad, then, re ton, ingeniously.
Very reluctantly Max bared his p^eat
pairing te the scullery, growled and
grumbled for fully tea minutes before arms, spit upon his hands, and, with s
deciding te obey my commands
la pitiful look at his parents, prepared to
tho meantime, I related my axpsaisaae deal the first blow upon the aneient
padlock. The old couple turned their
ts Poopsadyks aad Britts a.
“ That reminds me, air,” said Britton, heads sway and pot their fingers to
“ that 1 found a rag doll ia the court their earn, cringing like things about te
yard yesterday, s i that aids of the
•?»’ tried 1,1
building sir— I should say east la, sir. '
“ 1 am quits aura 1 heard a baby fee ting ax *atb«aU i i d id n 't C m L
W
Copyright, 1IU,
B y Geo. B u t
MeCuteheoo.
The sledge fell upon the padlock and
rebounded with almost equal force. The
sound o f the crash must have disturbed
every bird and bat in the towers of the
grim old pile. But the padlock merely
shed a few scabs of rust and rattled
back into its customary repose.
“ Seel” cried Max, triumphantly. “ It
cannot be broken.“ Rudolph, his broad
face beaming, held the lantern close to
the padlock and showed me that it
hadn’t been dented by the blow.
“ It is a very fine old lock ,“ cried
old Conrad, with a note of pride in his
voice.
I began to feel some pride in the
thing myself. “ It is indeed,“ I said.
‘ Try onoe more, M ax.“
It seemed to me that he struck with a
great deal more confidence than before,
and again they all uttered ejaculations
o f pleasure. I caught Dame Hchmick in
the act of thanking God with her fin ­
gers.
“ Sec here,“ I exclaimed, facing them
angrily, “ what does all this meant You
are deceiving me, all o f you. Now, le t’s
have the truth— every word of it— or out
you go tomorrow, the whole lot of you.
I insist on knowing wh othat woman is,
why she is here in my hou—my castle,
and—everything, do you understandf“
Apparently they didn’t understand,
for they looked at me with all the
stupidity they could command.
“ You try, Mr. Poopendyke,“ I said,
giving it up in despair. He sought to
improve on my German, but I think he
made it worse. They positively refused
to be intelligent.
“ Give me the hammer,“ I said at
last in desperation.
Max surrendered
the dumsp, old-fashioned instrument
with a grin and I motioned for them all
to stand back. Three successive blows
with all the might I had in my body
failed to shatter the lock, whereupon
my choler rose to heights hitherto un­
known, I being a very mild-mannered,
placid person and averse to anything
savouring of the tempestuous. I de­
livered a savage and resounding thwack
upon the broad oak panel o f the door,
regardless of the destructiveness that
might attend the effort. I f any one had
told me that I couldn’t splinter an oak
board with a sledge-hammer at a single
blow I should have laughed in his face.
But as it turned out in this case I
not only failed to split the panel but
broke o ff the sledge handle near the
head, putting it wholly out of commis­
sion for the time being as well as sting­
ing my hands so severely that I doubled
up with \ in and shouted words that
llamo Schmick could not put into her
prayers.
(To bo continued.)
$225,000 Paid to Farmers.
Tho Cashmere, Wash., Fruit Grow­
ers’ Union has just paid to the grow­
ers $15,500, making the total payment
on apples in the 1913 pools up to the
immense sum o f $225,000. Based on
181,217 boxes handled by the union in
its fall pools this amount represents
an average pyament to date o f $1.24
per box. This is a net figure to the
grower.
The union has recently closed three
o f its four unreported pools, leaving
now only the Winesap variety unclosed.
Of this variety the management reports
11 cars are still outstanding, nine being
in cold storage in the East and two
entransit sold already-at good prices f._
o. b. Cashmere. From the present indi­
cations it will be about May I when the
final resutls o f the Winesap pool be­
come known.
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1
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