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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Times-Advocate, 1932-03-24, Page 3THE EXETER TIMES-ADVOCATE “The Silver Hawk 9! BY WILLIAM BYRON MOWERY SYNOPSIS James Dorn, aerial map maker, as­ signed to a territory in the north­ ern Canadian Rockies lives alone In his camp on Titan Island. Kansas Eby, his friend for the past six years was stationed at Eagle east? night were • platform. When the train pulled in he seen a girl come out and glance hurriedly around and then disappear into the darkness. Kansas followed ‘ hurriedly but failed to find any - trace " ................... ’ ■ Dorn • Per© Tiyed The girl, Auror.e McNain, asks . Dorn to go to a lonely lake in •earch of her father and she wish­ es to accompany him where she Temains in hiding and Dorn car­ ries supplies to her Jby aeroplane. Carter-Snowdon arrives, and with the help of some ’breeds is trying io locate her. iOn account of the danger and mystery surrounding her he has promised not to see her any more. That day iCarter-Snowdon located Aurore and demanded that she leave with him for Quesnal Lodge. toward the waiting plane, In a seconds he aroused himself, and lowed. t CHAPTER XXVIII Enlightineut During those two hours of few fol- away, out the told me you for her. You’ll Kansas? This my things to­ planes back to the Nest, two hundred miles Kansas came over * one to a dance that the Indians having on the station midnight of her, He told his friend about it and the same night Bergelot, a trusty metis ar- with the girl.I. CHAPTER XXVII Sure of liis bludgeon, he went ion, crushing all the fight out of Aurore:. “What would any man in my place flo? . . , him stealing you away from me, bringing you here,1 half living here; besides that, (trying to kill me, dynamiting our camp; I held off till I could find you;, but to-night, when lie’s there in his tent . . . You can run away fi'om Ques- nal, you can spread lies and damage me, but how much is that going to help him?” ■ Aurore went deathly white of face, and her eyes were wild with terror. The ghastly threat to murder Jim j5orn brought her world down upon her. She could that .Dorn had deliberately Sier from all knowledge of emiies; that he had been crasliing see now shielded her eh- figliting them lone-handed all these weeks; that yesterday those planes had been enemy planes . . . As if echoing her very thoughts, Carter-Snowdon spoke: “AV-e intended to get him yester7 day. But you were in his We let him go because of ko-night------” Aurore cried out, “Can machine, you. But Aurore cried out, ‘‘Can you stop that—stop that to-niglit?" She,clasp­ ed hi® arm and in broken sobs she begged of him1: “I brought this on Jim . . . He—we’re guilty of noth­ ing—nothing . . .He must no|t . . . You’ll stop that . . . You’ll not let them ..." ’ In those moments following, Car- ter-Bnowdon was uncertain whether «or not he would kill the cartograph­ er, Dorn; for in Aurore’s naked eyes in her cry that Dorn and she were guiltless, there was something.jvhinjx.. ^ave the lie He bpvjtvetf Tiov/tfiat she had sent ,^'orn away and they would never see one anc|ther again, and he real­ ized why Aurore had done that. And the belief of Aurore’s innocence grew on him till it was a certainty an his mind, an anodyne to his fever, and he was no longer obsessed with the deside to punish her. Moved by her abjectness, by her clinging to him, he promised: “D'own there at Tt/ton Pass they're waiting on my word, my order. I’ll not send it. You’ll go down to Quesnal; you’ll not try to get away or to damage me. So long as you (Io that . . .” Aurore’s hand dropped from his arm and she looked away, now that she knew the ultimatum. After several moments her eyes came back to Carter-Snowdon and she met his' gaze squarely, and she asked an hon­ est, a deliberate and deadly ques­ tion of him: i “What—at Quesnal?” Carter-Snowdon did not reply to that. It was a question which de­ manded that he pronounce judgment upon himself. He knew what the answer inevitably would be, it was answered already in his possessive and tumultuous impulses toward Aurore; but he could not face lief and say whalt was in his heart or even admit it to his own self. His eyes shifted front her; lie took a miserable refuge behind a threat. “Get out to the plane—if you want to stop tlm(t from 'happening to-night. I’ve given you your chance; right now you’re deciding— whether he’s to live or die.” Watching her, C'arter-iSnowCloh saw that with Aurore ithere was no struggle at all. ’She went past him to the door, and opened it; and he saw her glance back from the thresh ■h'old and look for a' last time alt (everything in the cabin, but not at Silm; and then start down the path dark­ ness after he left Aurore, Dorn flew down across the mountains toward Titan Pass, Now and then lie would glance at the misfty ranges under keel and swing a little further west; in those three weeks lie had built up the habit never to come home out of the north. He was jtired ana 'fight-weary—so tired that 'lie flew mechanically and the instruments blurred in front of liis eyes, but the weariness could thoughts 'or give It was during that Dorn for the able to 'keep his mind away from the question of Aurore’s relations with Henry Carter-Snowdon. More than once since Iris discovery had been intimate and personal, this question had c'Oiled and struck at him in an unguarded ■moment; he had been able to push it away until now; and even now w'lien he could no longer, evade it, he denied, with hot anger alt himself, the one explanation which was indicated by the meagre details he knew of Aurore’s trouble and by all she had told him of her­ self. When the gray dawn broke, Dorn was eighty miles west of Titan Pass, and as he swung east, following tho Canadian National thoughts wen# ahead at Eaux Mortes, and steps for that day. that with old Luke ambushed along the mesa trail, Aurore was safe from these ‘breeds; and with Aur­ ore warned againsit exposing her­ self, she was safe from those two machines discovering her refuge. He had built up the best defence'Th his power; and he felt that only ny some crushing accident would Car- ter-Snowdon ever find Aurore. iDorn planned to closo cut his camp at Titan Pass and fly across to Eagle Nest by noon, and tell Kan­ sas that n'ow he wag to take over the personal guardianship of Aurore McNain. He thought: “Kansas ough^ to have niy plane in case any troiFJi’ey breaks on him some day. I’ll give him the Silver Hawk ana use liis machine—what time I’m still here.” He hoped that Kansas, who usually visited him over the week-end, would not be waiting for him at Titan Pass; if Kansas kept outside the pale of suspicion, could come and go to Aurore’s unwa tolled.' „ A further plan came to Dcrn; though It was vague, a mere line, he immediately recognized it as something which he would event­ ually do. He decided— olution: “I’ll wait till stopped those ’breeds, visits Aurore everything’s all right between them; then I’ll go over to Ontario and take that Red Deer offer.” His own jiching need to- get away from these mountains with their haunting memories was only a small part of Dorn’s reason tor deciding to go. If his presence would have helped Aurore in any manner, he would not have thought of going. But there was nothing more he could do for her here; on the contrary, his very presence endangered her. He felt that by leaving he could do her a last service, his best service of all. He thought: “Wherever I am, there .Carter- Snowdon will believe Aurore They’ve been closing in for three weeks, and my being here hasn’t stopped that. But I’ll draw the and not just gut the country till a hunt two thousand miles away from [man can’t live in it. Same prin- her! They’ll be lookiiig clear across (ciple applies to mine, fisheries, all the continent from where she really the natural resourices.” is!” When the touching /the Titan Maj'or, in out of the west and sank to a throttled rumble in the glide, and looking down oil his island, Dorn saw Kansas’ plane at anchor on the lake and knew his partner had un­ luckily come to visit him. At the landing Kansas inquired: “Where've you been, Jim; I was beginning to think—-anything hap­ pened?” Dorn shook his head; lie knew that Kansas meant with the enemy. He explained: “Aurore was with me yesterday. It was when wo got back, about trail here.” They walked on and with Kansas sitting on the cot­ end brewing coffee for his partner, Dorn told him the whole story of Aurore’s coming to him, of his Eld- ntoiiton. trip, of CarteriSnowdon’s closing in uboii Aurore over since. And then he told Kansas, in a man’s plain words, what had happened last night between Aurore and him­ self. He added, in a strange voice that not dull his him any rest, this lonely flight first time was un- home, his to his enemies he planned his He reasoned lie lake and out­ -a bitter res- Luke has till Kansas again and I know IS. made Kansas glance flop-front: “Aurore said you’d look out do that, won’t you, morning we’ll rake gather and fly these Eagle Nest, I’m giving you Silver Hawk. It’s fast, and carries u machine gun,” Kansas ground a cigarette under his heel and swore: “Jim, that big­ barrelled plutegewump, hounding a girl with his ’breeds and hired, snoop­ ers , . , that day you knocked him down, if it’d been me, I’d kicked his face off. If it wasn’t for hurting Aurore, I’d tell some people what 1 know and they'd fight him off his feet, they’d make a beautiful hash out ’of him——” “What you know?” Dorn inter­ rupted. It was his first intimation that Aurore had told Kansas any­ thing about herself. He demanded: “They—who?" Kansas thought for a moment. He said: “I don't believe Aurore would mind my telling you this; you may­ be kn'ow most .of it already, told me a little about it; and after I got ba(ck to Eagle Nest . . . Bur­ ton there, he’s posted on all the po­ litical manoeuvres of the province— his dad’s in the Legislature; that’s how Burt get Ithis cartograph'ing job—I pumped him and found our the rest of it, Did you know that Carter-Smowdon’s running for elec­ tion down in the Koot’nys?” “Yes. East Kootenay.” Dorn had learned that in his hunt for facts about Carter-Snowdon; he had at­ tached little importance to a politi­ cal contest in a minor riding, but now his interest quickened as, Kan­ sas wen# on: “Do you know any details about his campaign, Jim—I mean, what don’t come out ,in Here’s what Burt says. He says Car­ ter-Snowdon isn’t' only running, for election himself, but he’s supplying the money for other candidates, he’s leading a powerful faction, he’s try­ ing to sweep his men, with himsei? of course at the head, into power. If he wins he’ll be boss of the whole works.” There, in liis partner’s words, Dorn suddenly had the explanation of one riddle at least. All. along he had felt, Though with no substan­ tial reason, that something besides the personal element was bound up with Carter-Snowdon’s hunt for Aurore, and now he knew that in some way she was connected wi#n this political battle between war­ ring factions. He concluded: “From the money and time he’s spent, from his crazed desire to get her, she must hold .some power over him I know nothing about.” He was grop­ ing to reason out what that power could be, when Kansas spoke again; ‘‘But says lie’s running on a ’Damn-Yank’ platform. He says that when a politician up here has­ n’t any other planks to stand on or wants to befog the real issues, he begins beating the big boombetoo about the damn’ Yanks.’Gees round barking at the States. Pulls that old, worn-out ‘annexation’ bogey out of the bandbox. And it gets votes— it gets votes! Lord, if we didn’t have Some things down there as bad or worse, I wouldn’t believe it------” Dorn interrupted: “What’s this battle about; what’s the real issues? Does Burton know any personal de­ tains?” .‘‘He says tlie real Carter-Snowdon’s camp fog, is the quetion of This reform faction that’s fighting him ,they want to make 'the big timber companies cut their limits clear, dispose of slash, re-iforestate, help bear the fire-prevention cost-— ‘She newspapers? issue, which wants to be- conversation. I I To Dorn those .issues were a vivid morning sun was just reality. He had flown over ’the districts He had seen steadily to seize wilaer- Nation- leadership inter- lofty dolomites of old the (Silver I-Iawk came late at night I took a round- up to the tent; He had flown fire-swept, mine-gutted down near the Borde' that desolation creeping northward till it threatened and deflower this beautiful ness north of the Canadian al. Unless wise vened, it was only a question of time till the most magnificent for­ ests on the continent would vanish. He said: “I understad. That fight’s been brewing ever since I was born. Up here we’ve got the benefit of your example down there, Kansas; wo‘re waking up before it is all gone. God help ’em plough Carter-Snowdon under in that fight? iStill groping to explain Aurora's connection with this battle, he swung back to a remark Kansas had made a few minutes ago; and he asked; “You said you knew some­ thing to sweep Carter-Snowdon off his feet, You said ‘If it wasn’(t for hutting Aurore.’ Kansas, she -ykitt something—about herself, would never speak of it to me. had reasons, a girl’s reasons, that. But she told Bergelot; she’d tell you told She She for and a hundred (thnas quicker because you’re my partner and you’re the one* to look out tor her n'ow. Kansas, what did Aui’ere tell you?” Since the evening when he dipped down non that wilderness Jake and' sat all night talking with Aurore McNain, Kansas had expected and dreaded ’this question from Jinr Dorn, and had debated how he would answer Jt when it came, He did not reply at once; he looked away, thro* the flap-front, staring at the slope of Titan Major where a dozen small snow-slides were loosening under the morning sun and slowly con­ verging into a huge central couloir. He remembered how he had drop­ ped down on 'her island out of mere euriousity and gone ashore and met Aurore, and the start he gave iier when he related seeing her that night when she got off me Transcon­ tinental and eluded him in the cedar shadows. He remembered his sup­ per with Aurore; how he had look­ ed across a bouquet of flowers at her brpwn eyes, and listened to her golden voice, and told himself that Jim Dorn was luicky among men, and wondered where she came from, Then the tragedy “crept in, during their long talk on the jutting boul­ der when the moon, was white on Aurore’s face and the tree toads croaking; when Aurore, lonely and distracted, had turned tio the part­ ner of the man she loved and bared all her trouble; and they had talk­ ed about Jim Dorn till the morning sun was afire on the high mesa. To Kansas it was a 'tragic, irony that Jim fall upon thought: like this; around, it'd be just what’,s coming to me. But Jim ...” More stern­ ly than any man he had ever known Dorn always had held certain ideals precious1. It had never been his habit to take week-end trips into the city. Now Kansas knew that he had met 'the girl he must have been waiting tor; he know Dorn loved Aurora iMlaNain with all the passion of his profound and silent nature. Dorn had spoken her name with rev- erence. There had been a strange, mystical note in his words about Aurore—as though tor him she were, clothed in fragrance and purity, in* the mysteries and elusive wildness* of nature. At the time Kansas had thought it* the best for Jim Darn to tell him nothing, and he had said so to Aur* ore; but that was his first instinct­ ive and natural reaction to a job he shrank from, and since then lie had debated whether it was better to let Dorn go on indefinitely in this sus­ pense which must be agonizing, or have the worst of it over with at a stroke. Now this morning two new factors had sprung up, and they de­ cided the debate. One -of them was Dorn’s resolve to go away; about that Kansas was thinking: “He can go away, he can think he's given Aurore up; but he never will—jk# till he knows definitely.” The other was his promise to Aurore—not to Dorn, of all men, should this evil luck. He had “I’d deserve something the way I’ve gallivanted z X tell Dorn the truth until such, time* as Dorn would not he coming back to her again, for slid never WAnfted. to face him after he knew. time had come now. Kansas said; “Jim, she told nie." lie tried to keep his voice steady. “She told me the whole thing * •« . about her tour years Outside, about Cuifter-Snowdon, about his political battle, about her marriage—" “Her marriage!” Dorn was nn his feet, all his mountain-born de­ liberateness swept away by those cataclysmic words. “Her marriage . . . 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