Image provided by: Hood River County Library District; Hood River, OR
About The Maupin times. (Maupin, Or.) 1914-1930 | View Entire Issue (May 19, 1916)
The RedMirage A Story of the French Legion in Algiers By I. A. R.WYLIE (All right! reserved. Th 8YNOP8I3. . 6 "When Sylvia Omney, a beautiful Enst llsh girl, returns from a search in Algiers for her missing brother, her lover, Men ard Farquhar, finds she has fallen In love with Captain Arnaud of the Foreign Leftion. In Captain Sower's room l'ar quhar gets deliberately drunk, but when young Preston loses all hla money to Lowe, a shady character, Farquhar forces Sower to have Preston's I. O. U's re turned to him. Farquhar Is helped to his rooms by Oabrlelle Smith. Sower demands an apology, Refused, lie forces Farquhar to resign his commission in return for possession of Farquhar's father's writ ten confession that he had murdered Sow er's father. Gabrlelle saves Farquhar from suicide. Farquhar tells his mother that he Is going to find his father if the latter Is alive. To shield Arnaud, Sylvia's fiance, he professes to have stolen war Slans and tells the real culprit why he id so. As Richard Nameless he Joins the Foreign Legion and sees Sylvia, now Mme. Arnaud, meet Colonel Destinn. Farquhar meets Sylvia and Gabrlelle, and learns from Corporal Goets of the col onel's cruelty. Arnaud becomes a drunk ard and opium smoker. Sylvia becomes friendly with Colonel Destinn. Arnaud becomes Jealous of Farquhar. Why should Richard Name less refrain from telling Sylvia the blunt truth about his great honor sacrifice for her sake? She Is a shallow woman who ruthlessly threw him over for another. Do such women de serve the fine consideration the world owes Its best women? CHAPTER VI Continued. Richard Nameless turned back to the desert The Arabs bad risen and an elder was praying aloud, his aged, tremulous voice leading the richer uni son of the worshipers behind him. "With my face to Mecca and with a sincere heart I offer my prayers to Allah" Mirage! For those dark-faced desert children Mecca opened the gates of Paradise; for this dream of unknown happiness they waited and prayed, and when their time came passed through the great shadow with fearless, trium phant confidence. He went back to his work. With fierce, dogged energy he pulled away the deep-rooted weeds and brought a pathetic look of care and order Into his corner of the wilderness. For a mo ment he lingered over the grave which Goetz had tended. The bald yet elo quent Inscription ; touched him. He wondered vaguely who Philip Grey bad been; If he, too, had paid a price and In the last hours of horror had still been satisfied. Two women had entered the ceme tery. Their white-clad figures flashed gayly in between the dark graves, and a clear, silvery laugh mingled with the final Arab prayer "La Haha ilia 'llahu!" The younger woman stopped on ln tant and pointed with the tip of her parasol at the broken remnant of a cross. "Look at these beads! Aren't they ridiculous? And the inscription just a number, like a convict's." She glanced back over her shoulder at her companion. "Miss Smith, I believe you are frightened. Do you think there are ghosts here? Well, perhaps there are, but I don't mind." As yet the man standing Immobile, bidden amid the forest of crosses, had escaped her notice. But he had heard her now, and, shadowy and ghostlike nough in the dying light, awaited her approach. At the foot of the English man's grave she hesitated. The Inscrip tion attracted her. With puckered brows she spelled out the badly cut letters, her soft voice touched with Just the faintest ironical Interest "Philip Grey No. 3112 Foreign Le lon." Then she looked up involuntarily and saw the man who watched her, his band gripping the head of the cross. It was very quiet now. The Arab prayer was silenced, and the white figures of the worshipers had vanished in the long olive grove leading back to Sldi-bel-Abbes. Sylvia Arnaud's voice, when she spoke at last sounded strained and harsh In the absolute quiet "Richard!" and then again, "Richard Farquhar!" He shook his head. "Not Richard Farquhar now," he answered. "Rich ard Nameless." She seemed not to understand. Her Hps were a little parted in the ex pression that he remembered. She looked plteously frightened and incred ulous. "I am sorry to have frightened you," he said gently. "I did not mean that 70a should ever see me but you came so suddenly, and out in this desolate place you were the last person I ex pected. Forgive me." 'Tes yes, it Is a desolate place it makes me frightened. But I was told it was something I ought to see and few minutes ago I wasn't frightened t all. Now I see ghosts every where." . "I am one of them." he said. She brushed her hand over her fore bead as though Indeed trying to dispel some terrifying specter. Her feeble effort to regain ber previous laughing courage failed. She was white and trembling. Bobbi-Merrill Co.) "I am No. 4005 of the Foreign Le gion," be Bald. "Is there anything else that you need understand?" "Yes I must. I feel as though one of us two were mad. The Foreign Le gion Is Just the last resort for all the riffraff of the world criminals, gam blers, cheats " "I am one of them." She was silent a moment, looking at him with large, thoughtful eyes, out of which the fear had paHscd. When she spoke again her voice was full of a smothered tenderness. "I have thought of you so much late ly, Richard. I couldn't understand why It was. You haunted me. It was as though something In the place made me think of you. I remembered all your little movements, the way you looked. I seemed to see you in others. I grew almost how shall I say? homesick for you." "You should have forgotten," he In. terrupted roughly. "I hnve gone out of your life. Look upon me now as what I am now a mere shadow." "Richard, what have you done?" The tenderness had deepened. He clenched his hands In a movement of uncontrollable pain. "Hasn't your husband told you?" "No. We never mention your name. To me it is sacred." "For God's sake, Sylvia" He straightened up, his black brows mark ing a straight line across his face. "I was turned out of the army for be traying my country's secrets." "You a traitor! Why?" The monosyllable was like the stab of a knife In the silence. "For a woman." She drew back. Her eyes were dark pools in which he saw no expression. "What woman?" He bowed gravely. "Madame Arnaud, I have still honor enough left to remember the discre tion imposed upon honorable men." ' She turned away from him. He could see nothing but her profile, the "You a Traitor! Why?" exquisite, almost flawless profile, cut against a background of mingling gold and emerald. Her hands rested crossed on the handle of ber parasol. She had grown suddenly very calm and delib erate. I told you that I had thought of you, Richard," she said quietly. "I did not tell you how I thought of you. Do you remember our last meeting, or has that ben eclipsed by other more lovely memories?" "Silvia, be silent! I dare not listen to you. You don't know what you are saying " "I know what I am saying, and yon must listen. When a man destroys something, it Is no more than Just that be should see what be has done. You have destroyed something an Ideal, a dream, my faith In honesty and good ness. You were the one man I be lieved and trusted. And now you are like the rest nothing nothing." She turned away. "I wish to God I had not met you, Richard." He did not attempt to detain her. He stood there like a man struck to death by a treacherous blow, and she went on down the path to the gate where her companion waited for her. There she paused for a moment "I want you to go back to that man," she said carelessly. "He is an old acquaintance who went wrong, and It might be rather unpleasant for my husband if be grew Importunate. Tell bin that oa no account must be speak to me again. It Is very regrettable, but mistakes of that sort bring their own punishment You understand, Miss Smith?" "Yes, Madame Arnaud." "Thank you. I will wait for you outside the public cemetery. It is get ting dark" Miss Smith went slowly back along the narrow gravel path. The man had not moved. He was gazing out on to I the fiery waste now dying beneath the extinguishing ninntlo of the night, and neither heard nor saw. She touched li 1 111 on the arm. "Mr. Farquhar!" lie turned slowly and stared at ber. Though he recognized her, his face was blank and bard and terrible, "Miss Smith?" "Yes, Gabrlelle Smith. You see, after all.we have met again. Won't you shake bands?" Ills eyes wandered past her down the path. "No. You ought not to be speaking, to mo. A respectuble woman does not speak to a common soldier of the Legion. "Doesn't she? How Interesting! One Is always learning In this wonder ful civilization of ours. Only as It happens I am not respectable. I told you that once before." Her cool irony brought a flash of lnsune laughter to his eyes. "Who the devil are you, then?" he asked savagely. "Dear me, you have quite lost your nice English indifference, Mr. Far quhar. I'm not sure it Isn't an im provement. Who I am? Well, you know my name, and at the present mo ment I am companion to Madame Ar naud helping her to forget that she Isn't English any more. English peo ple think it's wrong to admire for eigners. It's their idea of patriotism. Madame Arnaud assures me she must have a bit of dear old England about her, and I am the bit. That's all." "Why did you come?" He was looking at her again. Through the dusk she saw the white, tortured suspense on the hard face. She wore a rose in the severe corsage of ber dress. She took It and banded It to him. "She sent you this In token of re membrance." He took her band and kissed it. "You bave come like an angel Into my life," he said. He watched ber nntll her small, en ergetic figure had disappeared among the shadows. In the distance a bugle called a mel ancholy retreat. He lifted the rose reverently to his lips. CHAPTER VII. A Meeting. In SIdl-bel-Abbes there is a pleasant avenue, shaded by silver birch and red olent of all the sweet perfumes of the East where the local potentates gather In a select exclusive circle. In the courtyard of one such of these houses Colonel Destinn sat and smoked an after-tea cigarette. His kepi lay on the broad balustrade beside him, and his head was thrown back in an atti tude of easy contentment. "You pour out tea charmingly, mauarne, ne said. A second cup would stifle the last regret that I should have gone so far against my principles as to drink a first." She looked up at him. The soft re flection from the low, white walls around them enhanced her ethereal beauty and added the subtle glamour with which the eastern light surrounds the least and most lovely object. Very delicately she obeyed his request, the soft, rich lace sleeve of her teagown slipping back to reveal the rounded arm and slender over-fragile wrist. "Do your principles compel you to live only for your soldiers?" she asked lightly. He laughed. "'Living for them is perhaps too much of a euphemism," he said. "They would be more grateful If I did the other thing. But otherwise it is true I haVe not put my foot under a bos. pitable roof for twenty years." "Had you no one who" She hesl- tated, a sudden color in her cheeks, and be leaned forward, his hands loosely interlocked between his knees, his handsome, ruthless face grave and Intent. "No, I hadn't anyone, Madame Ar naud." Her gaze faltered under his steady, piercing eyes. "What is your country, Colonel De stlnn?" ' "I do not know, madame. I have forgotten." There was a little silence, in which the fountain played a silvery intermezzo, and then be went on in an altered tone: "You are the first per son who has made wish to remember, She was looking up at him again with a studied frankness, behind which there lurked something hypnotized, fas clnated. He turned carelessly from her. "Ah, Arnaud, you there? You see, I have been breaking up the principles of years to entertain your wife. If you leave her too much alone you will find these English roses fade very quickly in this dreary place. Man, don't look as If you bad seen the devil." The young officer, hesitating on the edge of the low veranda, recovered himself with an effort. "My colonel I was taken aback. I had not expected but I am delighted and most honored. I beg of you to let me enjoy the pleasure " "No, no, Arnaud. We see enough of each other elsewhere, and, moreover, I have a pressing engagement with three deserters from the Eleventh com pany. Au revolr, madame and thank you!" f ! How soon do you think that Sylvia's flirting with Colonel Destinn will cause Tragedy to stalk abroad In the Foreign Le gion. It seems plain that Mme. Arnaud knows she Is playing with fire. t (TO BE CONTIIfUJED.) msMi . 1 1 Uaasaagaasc "ftliaTifii Indian Curr AMONG all the historic spots in the Southwest none is quite so thrilling and entrancing as that along the old Santa Fe trail. Among those towering granite hills, burled In the silence of the Rockies, are to be found the ruins of Spanish palaces spacious and stately in their day. Here lie the bones of daring ecoute like Kit Carson. Here lingering tribes cling to pueblos and till the fer tile valleys In the most primitive fashion. Here live the cliff-dwellers a remnant, still wandering through rough-hewn granite halls deserted by their fathers In the long ago. Pages might be filled with the stories of the pioneers and frontiers men of the mighty Southwest. No more picturesque character ever trav ersed this wilderness than Augustlnl ani the Hermit of Old Baldy. John Mary Augustinlanl was a her mit because of pious inclination. A nobleman by birth the product of Italian aristocracy he was born of the nobility in SIzzarlo, Lombardy, Italy, in 1801. Under the impulse of religious zeal, he turned his back upon all the wealth and luxury of his Ital ian home, only to become a wanderer in strange and distant lands. Of this there is a legend, common in some fashion to the beginning of every re former's life. One day he was strolling In the garden of the estate. Suddenly he saw an apparition the finger of the Virgin pointing toward regions far away. He must therefore lead a soli tary life in life far from his native home. No cave-dweller in the Orient ever more certainly followed the path of destiny. After three years of earnest medita tion, and at the age of twenty, with only staff in hand, he sot out on foot to Rome. Seven long years he dwelt in the caves of Italy, and for five more years he wandered on foot all over Eu- rope. About this time his thought turned toward a new continent, and he landed on the shores of Venezuela, Here, still afoot, he traversed the Bra zilian, Chilean and Argentine coun tries. He then sought out his abode near the dangerous Orizaba volcano in Old Mexico. In all these wanderings he became famous as a doctor and a priest among the wildest Indian tribes Banished to Cuba. While doing his priestly work around the city of Orizaba, he was ar rested by the civil authorities. A charge was trumped up against him and conviction followed. He was ban ished to the Island of Cuba. From these shores he set sail for New York, He reached St. Louis in the opening of the sixties. These were the opening days when the intrepid pioneer blazed out the Santa Fe trail. Augustinlanl began to dream of priesthood among the Indians in the diBtant West, He walked to Kansas City and on to Westport. By invitation of Gonzales, a wagon-traln king of the historic trail, he found his way to Las Vegas, N. M. On reaching Las Vegas, he found a cave-home in Kearney's Gap, west of town. The people thought him super human, but their coming broke the quietude he so much longed for. With only his bag of meal, his books and his staff, he began his long Journey toward the Owl mountains. There is a well- worn path on the very summit of Old Baldy about which there gathers a le gend of the hermit priest. From breast to breaBt the story has passed land to this day they say this is the path of the pious patriarch as he walked to and fro in his devout medi tations. Amidst the snows of this im mense altitude Augustlnlana lived in pious solitude until the last tragic hour of his life In the summer of 1867. About the base of this famous peak lay the trading station of the Santa Fe trail. Old Baldy overlooked the vast outstretching leagues of the Baublen- Maxwell land grant, equal to three states the size of Rhode Island. In the very shadow of these heights, piled In such wondrous beauty, stood the Max well place, where frontiersmen like Kit Carson, Dick Wootton, Don Jesus Abreau, Colonel St. Vraln and ex-Gov ernor Boggs made their rendezvous for years. Amidst Old Baldy's fastnesses were the famous hiding places of such desperate outlaws as Grlego, Poncha, Clay Allison, Chunk, Coal Oil Jimmy "Long" Taylor, and scores of other bandits equally wild and fierce. Thus was Augustinlanl environed by a mot ley and reckless citizenship. 8tory of the Hermit. Near the summit of Old Baldy there Is a perennial spring whose cold and voarkllng waters leap from beneath DwlllinG5 Its very crown. About these gushing mountain waters there lingers the story of the hermit. It is said that when be first reached the summit, searching for a cave in which to live, he was almost famished on account of thirst. With his staff he smote a rock and from It sprang this beautiful stream that has not ceased to flow since that day. Though many thousands of feet above the valley, numbers sought his cave. Augustinlanl erected fourteen huge crosses, the ruins of which still stand as silent monuments of his de votion and zeal. From among hia curi ous and devout visitors he formed a society called the Brotherhood of the Holy Cross. His only exaction was a pilgrimage In May and September. They must ascend the peak and say prayer around these crosses. In the May pilgrimage of 1867, he made a farewell speech that crushed the heartB of his followers. It was then he revealed to them the hand ol destiny in hlB call to the land of Old Mexico. Before his departure he vis ited Father Baca of Las Cruces, who presented him with gold for his long journey. He sought meditation for the night in the Oregon mountains. Taking his farewell of Father Baca, he said: "Tonight I will be In my cave and will build my last fire on the peak to toll you good-by. I will pray the rosary and I want you to do likewise with your people on the roofs of your houses. If you do not see the fire you may know that I am dead and ma; come tomorrow and get my books and property." No fire was kindled on the peak thai night. The next day a company as cended the heights. Amid the verj clouds they found the body of the good old hermit, stricken through with many an arrow flung from the bows ol the bloody Navajos. APPLAUSE OF VARIOUS KINDS Always Easy to Distinguish the Gen ulne From the Perfunctory or the Manufactured. With nearly every successful ad dress applause plays a leading part There are several varieties of ap plause. The common variety Is tht perfunctory handclap a poor, weak contribution which makes a butterfly look long-lived In comparison. A sec ond variety Is the charity offering oi an audience to the oratorial beggar. The speaker ends a profound decla ration with a pause which is next dooi to an open declaration of war If the audience doesn't come acrosB. Or h works himBelf up in a series of men tal paroxysms which impels the audi tors to rush to his rescue before it le too late. All spellbinders pocket this variety of applause as real coin. Ol course it Is nothing of the kind. The genuine Issue in laudation is a spontaneous and volcanic eruption ol approval and delight. It blows out violently from the subterranean fires of folk, and when it has reached its climax there comes, suddenly and gorgeously from the mldBt of it second and more terrific explosion, and a! this is reaching Its highest point a third and seismic spasm rockets up through bedlam and overwhelms every thing and everybody. This Is the real thing.- It canuot be made to ordei and it cannot be counterfeited. Th prearranged outbursts at national po litical conventions following the nomi nations are pitiable attempts to manu facture It. Claques and coteries of de votees try occasionally to produce It mechanically. They never do success fully. Victor Murdock In Collier's Weekly. Followed Instructions. Now, said the lawyer to a rag picker who had been arrested for steal ing some fruit of a vender, "they have a sure case on you, and we must play safe. Have you any money?" "Ten dollars, bosB." "That's good. I will get you out ol this. To every question, mind, every one, they ask you, simply answer 'Spoons.' " The, pilferer complied perfectly, and as a result the Judge angrily ordered the supposed fool released. Of course the lawyer eagerly followed him from the courtroom. "My man, you played It fine. But for my smartness you'd be In the works. Where's that ten dollars V "Spoons," said the thief, and hur ried away. R. H. Martin, Ohio. All Sorts of Contrivances to Stop Soldiers. Simple Barbed Wire Is Not Considered Sufficient for the Purpose Some of the Mare Modern Methods. The chevaux-defriso is sometimes known as the "knife-rest," and con sists simply ct a long pole, resting at each end on two pieces of wood con structed In the form of a St. Andrew's cross. To this framework the wire is attached, and the chevaux-de-friBe Is then thrown ovor the parapet by two men. When the garrison of the trench have not the necessary frame work, the wire is distributed In loose rolls in front of the position, forming rough cylinders three or four feet in diameter and eight to twelve feet in length. Used even in this impromptu way barbed wire has proved Itself to be-of the greatest assistance to a de fending party. The erection of wire entanglements, even when the trenches are some dis- Chevaux-de-frlse. tance apart, Is at all times dangerous (300 yards is thought a considerable distance in the western front I have . been In firing trenches only 60 yards from the Germans). The men slip over the parapet and in the first case knock in the supports with mallets, Russian Trip. having previously carefully wrapped cloth round the beads of the latter so that the sound may be deadened. Two other men carry the wire drum a wooden cylinder around which the wire is rolled with a long pole through the center for carrying pur poses, while a comrade attaches the wire to its supports.' The work Is Blow and nerve-straining, as Btar-shells burst often and oblige the men to Drum on Which Barbed Wire Is Car ried. crouch low, romaluing motionless un til the flare burns out. To each soldier who takes part in modern warfare thick gloves for grip ping wire and strong pliers for cutting It are as essential as the rifle and bayonet. Before an assault by his own regiment the soldier cutB his own wire, and he must then endeavor as best he may to cut and hack his way through Loose Rolls. the enemy's, pulling down a support here, cutting the wires while the machine-gun batteries rap out their mes sage of death towards him. Thus barbed wire, so simple in itself, so deadly when used lit the various ways I have described, enters into every phase of operations in the firing zone. London Exchange. Only Hero Husbands for Breton Girls, The young girls in Brittany have formed themselves Into an association which forbids its members marrying any young man who has not taken his part in the war. This does not only refer to the de serters and those who fled their duty, but to the "Blackers" who found the means, through influence or lying; without reason of ill health or for oth er Just cause, to keep safe In the rear and leave their comrades to do the fighting. The rallying cry of these patriotic young Breton girls is: "Better a crip ple than a slacker!" One member of the association ex pressed thus her thought: "I would rather love a man who had no arm than one who had no heart." Rather Dull. "Any activity in real estate about here?" asked the tourist "None whatever," answered the dis consolate citizen of an Arizona town, "except when a puff of wind comes along and shifts a little sand." 8uch Ignorance! "Why didn't you call my street?" asked the Irate passenger. "Beg pardon," answered the polite conductor, "but I didn't know It was yours." True to Life. He And how did the novel end? She Oh, in the usual manner. The duke married the American heiress, and they lived unhappy ever after. t