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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Huron Expositor, 1923-09-21, Page 7O ' ' — mar•- 0 • 0 GEORGE BAR MCCUTCREON O O Dodd, Mead Is Company. 0 0004400,S'.4,000 (Continued frm' Seet weer.) Just before, leaving the -castle for the ferry trip across the river that evening; I was considerably sufprised to have at least a dozep brand new trunks dellveeed at my landing stage. It is needlese to say that they turned out to ?be the property of Mrs. Titus, expressed -'by grande vitesse from some vague City in the north of Ger- many. They_ all bore the name, "Smart, U. S. A.," painted in large white letters on each end, and I was given to understand that they be- longed to my own dear mother, who at that moment, I am convinced, was sitting down to luncheon in the Adirondacks, provided her habits were as regular as I ' remembered them to be. I set forth with Britton at nine o'clock, in a drizzling rain. There had been no rain for a month. The farmers, the fruit raisers, the grow- ers of grapes and all the birds and beasts of the field had been begging for rain for weeks. No doubt they rejoiced in the steady downpour that came at half -past nine, but what must have been their joy at ten when the very floodgates of heaven opened wide and let loose all the dammed waters of July and August (and perhaps some that was being saved up for the approaching Sep, temlber!) I have never known it to rain so hard as it did on that Thurs- day night in August, nor have I ever ceased reviling the fate that institut- ed, on the very next day, a second season of drought that lasted for nearly six weeks. But we went bravely through that terrible storm, Britton and I, and the vehement Mercedes, up hill and. down, over ruts and rocks, across bridges and under them, sozzling and swish- ing and splashing in the path of great white lights that rushed ahead of us through the gloom. At half -past eleven o'clock we were skidding over the cobblestones of the darkest streets I have ever known,careening like a drunken sailor but not half as surely, headed for the Staatsbahnholf to which we had been directed by an object in a raincoat who must have been a policeman but who looked more like a hydrant. "Britton," said I, wearily, "have you ever seen anything like it?" "Once before, sir," said he. "Niag- ara Falls, air." WRIGLEY After Every ileal Nave a packet in your pocket for ever -ready refreshment Aids digestion. Allays thirst. Soothes the throat For Quality, Flavor sad the Sealed Package, get N t � r -P .,t r zff- f TH E `\I /� FLAVOR LASTS -00 far. cotton aunt IIE1INANTe al. a lbs. U. 10 lbs Si. as Its. es. 1 Ik silk or velvet patches 51.50. I Its. {t. 1 its cotters remnante pod lengths for children'. dresses. .aeon.. shirts, sic. 51.55. 1 !h legafnt yarn s1! shades. $1. A. YA�BY a CO , omATHA d. oat. "Wonder what an idle Telephone thinks about?" T STAND here idle for hours at a time I Ho-hum She forgets that she hires me to help her. " She complains of novel having time enough, yet I've watched her for over an hour trying to write one letter to Springville. " For a few cents I'd put her in Springville, and for 5 minutes the music of her voice would make somebody happy. " When she picks up a pen she gets so self-conscious that her letters—well, honest, they don't do her justice. " No pen helps a woman to express her real self, at her best, as I do—no postage stamp travels so fast. " I sometimes think her hus- band appreciates me mire. THE McKILLOP MUTUAL WIRE INSURANCE COT. HEAD OFFICE—SEAFORTH, ONT. OFFICERS: J. Connolly, Goderich - - President Jas. Evans, Beechwood, vice-president D. F. McGregor, Seaforth, Sec.-Treas. AGENTS: W. E. Hinchley, Seaforth; John Mur- ray, Egmondville; J. W. Yeo, Gode- rich; R. G. Jarmuth, Brodhagen. William Rinn, No. 2, Seaforth; John Bennewiea, Brodhagen; James Evans, Beechwood; M. MeEwen, Clin- ton; James Connolly, Goderich; Alex. Broadfoot, No. 8, Seaforth; G. Grieve, No. 4, Walton,• Robert Ferris, Harlock; George McCartney, No. 8, Seaforth; Murray Gibson, Brucefield. CHAPTER XV I Traverse The Night. We were drenched to the akin and bespattered with mud, cold and cheerless but full of a grim excite- ment. Across the street from the small, poorly lighted railway station there was an eating -house. Leaving the car in the shelter of a freight shed, we sloshed through the shiny rivulet that raced between the curbs and entered the clean, unpretentious little restaurant. There was a rousing smell of roast- ed coffee pervade* the place. A sleepy German waiter first came up and glanced sullenly at the mud -tracks we left upon the floor; then he al- lowed his insulting gaze to trail our progress to the lunch counter , by means of a perfect torrent of rain- water drippings. He went out of the room grumbling, to return a mom- ent later with a huge mop. Thereup- on he ordered us out of the place, standing ready with the mop to be- gin the cleansing procesS the instant we vacated the stools. It was quite clear to both of us that he wanted to begin operations at the exact spot where we were standing. "Coffee for two,' said I, in German. To me anything uttered in the Ger- man language sounds gruff and bel- ligerent, no matter how gentle itS meaning. That amiable sentence— "Ich liebe dich" is no exception; to me it sounds relethless. I am confi- dent that I asked for coffee in a very mild and ingratiating tone, in direct contrast‘to his• command to get out, and wa some what ruffled by his stare of speechless rage. "Zwei," said Britton, pointing to the big coffee urn. The fellow began mopping around my feet—in fact, he went so far as to mop the tops of them and a little way up my left leg in his efforts to make a good, clean job of it. "Stop that!" I growled, kicking at the mop. Before I could get my foot back on the floor he skilfully swab- bed the spot where it had been rest- ing, a feat of celerity that I have never seen surpassed. "Damn it, don't(" I roared, backing away. The resolute mop followed me like the spectre of want. Fascinated, I found myself retreating to the doorway. Britton, resourceful fellow, put an end to his endeavours by jumping up- on the mop and pinning it to the floor very much as he would have stamped upon a wounded rat. The fellow celled out lustily to some one in%he kitchen, at the same time giving the mop handle a mighty jerk. If you are expecting me to say that Britton came to woe, you are doomed to disappointment. It WAS Piet the other way about. Just as the prodigious yank took place, my valet hopped nimbly from the mop and the waiter sat down with a stun- ning thud. I do not knovi what might have ensued had not the proprietress of the place appeared at that instant, coming from the kitchen. She was the cook as well, and she was large Clauses ses arilIk,oira ti ' enough, to occupy the :apace of at least three Britton. She was huge beyond description. "Wises, las?" she demanded, paus- ing .aghast. Her voice was a high, belying 'treble. I shall. net attempt to describe in detail tall /that followed. It is only necessary to state that she removed the mop from the hands of the quak- ing menial and fairly swabbed him out into the'thick of the rainstorm. While we were drinking our hot, steaming coffee and gorging ourselves with frankfurters, the poor wretch atood'under the eaves with his face glued to the window, looking in at us with mournful eyes while the drip- pings from the tiles poured upon his shoulders and ran in rivulets down his neck. I felt so sorry for him that I prevailed upoq the muttering, apologetic hostess to •take him in a- gain. She called him in as she might have called a dog, and he edged his way past her with the same scared, alert look in his eyes that one always sees in those 'of an animal that has its tail between its legs. She explained that he was her nephew, just off thq farm. Her sis- ter's son, she said, and naturally not as intelligent as he ought to be. While we were sitting there at the counter, a train roared past the lit- tle station. We rushed to the door in alarm. But it shot through at the rate of fifty miles an hour. I looked at my watch. It still wanted half -an -hour Of train time, according to the schedule. "It was the express, mein herr," explained the women. "It never stops. We are too small yet. Some time we may be big enough." I no- ticed that her eyes were fixed in some 'perplexity on the old clock a- bove the pie shelves. "Ach! But it has never been so far head of time as to -night. -It is not due for fifteen minutes yet, and here it Is kone yet." "Perhaps your clock is slow," I said. "My watch says four minutes to twelve." s Whereupon she heaped a tirade of abuse upon the shrinking Hans for letting the clock lose ten minutes of her valuable time. To make sure, Hans set it forward nearly half an hour while she was looking the other way. Then he began mopping the floor again. At half -past twelve the train from Munich drew up at the station, pant- ed awhile in evident disdain, and then moved on. A single passenger alighted: a man with a bass viol. There was no sign of the Tituses. We made a careful and extensive search of the station, the platform and even the surrounding neighbor- hood, but it was quite evident that they had not left the train. Here was a pretty pass! Britton, however, had the rather preposterous idea that there might be• another train a little linter on. It did not seem at all like- ly, but we made inquiries of toe sta- tion agent. To my surprise—and to Britton's infernal British delight— there was 'a fast train, with connec- tions from the north, arriving in half an hour.. It was,• however, an hour late, owing to the storm. "Do you mean that it will arrive at two- o'clock?" I demanded in dis- may. "No, no," said the guard; "it will arrive at one but not until two. It is tate, mein herr." We dozed in the little waiting room for what I consider to be the longest hour I've ever known and then hunt- ed up the guard once more. He blandly informed me that it was still an hour late. "An hour from now?"I asked. "An hour from two," said he, pity- ingly. What ignorant lummixes we were! Just ten minutes before three the obliging guard came in and roused me from a mild sleep. "The train is coming, mein herr." "Thank.God!" "But I neglected to mention that it is an express and never stops here." My right hand was still in a band- age, but it was so nearly healed that I could have used it without discom- fort—(note my ability to drive a motor car) --+and it was with the greatest difficulty that I restrained a mad, devilish impulse to strike that guard full upon the nose, from which the raindrops coursed in an inter- rupted descent from the visor of his cap. The shrill, childish whistle of the locomotive reached us at that instant, A look of wonder sprang into the eyes of the guard. "It—it is going to stop, mein herr." he cried. "Gott in himmel! It has never stopped before," He II -wiled out upon the platform in a great state of agitation, and we trailed a- long- behind him, even more excited than he. It was still raining, but not so hard. The glare of the headlight was upon us for an instant and then, passing, left us in blinding darkness. The brakes creaked, the wheels grated and at last the train came to a stand- still. For one horrible moment i thought it was going on through in spite of its promissory signal. Brit- ton went one way and I t,he other, with our umbrellas ready. Up and Send for free Heel! glv lug full partic- ulars of Tronch's world-famous prep - oration for Epilepsy and Fits—simple home treatment. Over SO years, mama Tostimnnlaht from an parte of the wor/d; over 1000 In one pm. WrIto 0n0000. TRENCH'S REMEDIES LI MITED 2601 at.James•Obatubers. 79 AdelsidaSt.EL Toronto. Ontario e. flat Case' leatened 'up' "Perluit'liter". aside. y; A portly lady s vestibule and fel, down the .etepa. hs ad anto 444kte IoI$ldaa>pL be elbowltfg blur nlore;�le(;atble'tide Niewt. ed thron tit l'lon tared:b me way carefully snce!+ din starting red her Was a sltrallish, bevibiskey r man, trying td raise an umbreil(t ill+ lye the narrow corrjdorr' a serf mall, lmposaible feat She came down' ntO my arms. with ffi a e k,, ter cranking for nearly` half all I was so consumed by wr$b over t; . f scurvy trick she had played upon OS'. that I swore she should not outer my' • castle if I could prevent le; moreover, I would take fiendish delight in dura -' the limpness of onasIeffus is accustom- ed to such •attentig And then wheel. ed instantly upon, Of futile individ- ual on the steps. elteve. "Quick!' My ; hettS Heaven pre- serve us, how it ralrlol" she cried, in a deep, wheezy voice and—in Ger- man! ( - "Moth—" I began, insinuatingly, but the sacred word died unfinished on my lips. The next instant I was scurrying down the platform to where I saw Britton standing. "Have you seen them?" I shouted wildly. "No, sir. Not a sign, sir. Ah! See!" He pointed excitedly down the platform. "No!" I rasped out, "By no pos- sible stretch of the imagination can that be Mrs. Titus. Come! We must ask the conductor. That wo- man? Good Lord, Britton, she wad- dles!" The large lady and the smallish man passed us on the way to shelter, the latter holding an srnlrella over her hat with one hand and lugging a heavy hamper in the other. They were both exclaiming its German. The station guard and the conductor were bowing and scraping in their wake, both carrying boxes and bundles. No one else had descended from the train. I grabbed the conductor by the arm. "Any one else getting off here?" I demanded in English and at once re- peated it in German. He shook himself loose, dropped the bags in 'the shelter of the station house, doffed his cap to the imper- ious backs of his late passengers, and scuttled back to the car. A moment later the train was under way. "Can you not see for yourself?" he shouted from the steps as he passed me by. Once more I swooped down upon the guard. He was stuff ng the large German lady into a small, lopsided carriage, the driver of which was tak- ing off his cap and . putting it on again after the manner of a. mechan- ical toy. "Go away," hissed the guard an- grily. "This is the Mayor and the Mayoress. Stand. aside! Can't you see?" Presently the Mayor and the Ma- yoress were snugly stowed away in the creaking hack, and- it rattled a- way over the cobblestones. "When does the next train get in?" I asked for the third time. He was still bowing after the departing hack. . "Eh? The next? ,.Qhs iasis herr~, is it you?" "Yes, it is still 1. Ls .there another train soon?" "That was Mayor Berg and his wife," he said, taking off his cap a- gain in a sort of ecstasy. "The ex- press stops for him, eh? Ha! It stops for no one else but our good Mayor. When he commands it to stop it stops—" "Answer my question," I thunder- ed, "or I shall report you to the May- or!" "Ach, Gott!" he gasped. Collect- ing his thoughts, he said: "There is no train until nine o'clock in the morning. Nine, mein herr," "Ach, Gott!" I groaned. "Are you sure?" "Jah! You can go home now and go to bed, sir. There will be no train until nine and I will not be on duty then. Good night!" Britton led me into the waiting room, where I sat down and glared at him as if he were to blame for everything connected with our pres- ent plight. "I daresay we'd better be starting 'ome, sir," said he timidly. "Some- thing 'as gone wrong with the plans, I fear. They did not come, sir." "Do you think I am blind?" I roared. "Not at all, sir," he said in haste, taking a step or two backward. • Inquiries at the little eating house only served to verify the report of the station -guard. 'There would he no train before nine o'clock, and that was a very slow one; what we would call a "local" in the States. Some- times, according to the proprietress, it was so slow that it didn't get in at all. It had been known to amble in as late as one in the afternoon, but when it happened to he later than that it ceased to have an'ident- ity of its own and ennne„in as a part of the two o'clock train, Moreover, it carried nothing 1,111 third classe•car- riages and more erten than not it had as many as a d,.zen freight cars attached. There was not. the slightest pro- bability that the fo<'idious Mrs. Tit- us would travel by -uch a train, so we were forced lo the conclusion that something list cone wrong with the plans. Very di orally we prepar- ed for the long drive home. What could have happened to up- set the well -arranged plan? Were Tnrnowwy's spies hot upon the trail that it was necessary for her to abandon the attempt to enter my castle? In that rase. she must have sent some sort of a message to her daughter, apprising her of the unex- pected change; a m" -sage which, un- happily for me, arrived after my de- parture. It was not likely that she would have altered her plans without letting us know, and yet I could not shake off an exasperating sense of doubt. If I were to believe all that Bangs said about the excellent lady, it would not be unlike her to do quite as she pleased in the premises without pausing to consider the comfort or the convenience of any one else inter- ested it: the undertaking. A selfish desire to spend the day in Lucerne might have overtaken her en peasant, lug her confounded luggfige into th Danube. I confided my views to Britton who was laboriously cranking the machine and telling me between grants that the "bloody water 'ad get into it," and we both resorted to painful bet profound excoriations without in the least departing from ;our relative pos- itions as master and man: he swore about one abomination and I another, but the gender was undeviatingly the same. We also had trouble with the lamps. At last we were off, Britton at the wheel. I shall not describe that dia- bolical trip home. It is only neces- sary to say that we first lost our way and went ten or twelve kilometers in the wrong direction; then we had a blow-out, and no quick -detachable rim; subsequently something went wrong with the mud -caked machinery and my unfortunate valet had to lie on his back In a puddle for, half an hour; eventually we sneaked into the garage vrith''our trembling Mercedes, and quarrelled manfully with the men who had to wash her. "Great heaven, Britton!" I groan- ed, stopping short in my slushy pro- gress down the narrow street that led to the ferry. He looked at me in astonishment. I admit that the ejaculation must have sounded weak and effeminate to him after what had gone before. ' "What is it, Sir?" he asked, at once resuming his status as a servant after a splendid hiatus of five hours or more in which he had enjoyed all of the by-products of eqality. "Poopendykel" I exclaimed, agast. "I have just thought of him. The poor devil has been waiting for us three miles up the river since mid- night' What do you think of that!" "No such luck, Sir," said he, gram - pity. "Luck! You heartless rascal! What do you mean by that?" "I beg pardon, air,. I mean to say, he could sit in the boat 'ouse and twiddle 'is thumbs at the elements, sir. Trust Mr. Poopendyke to keep out of the rain." "In any event, he is still waiting there for us, wet or dry. He and the two' big Schmicks." I took a moment for thought. "We must telephone to the castle and have Hawkes send Con- rad out with word to them." I looked at my watch. It was twenty minutes past seven. "I supposeno one in the castle went to bed last night. Good Lord, what a scene for a farce!" We retraced our steps to the garage where Britton went to the telephone. l stood in the doorway of -the building staring gloomily, hollow-eyed at the —well, at nothing, now that I stop to think of it. The manager of the place, an amiable, jocund descendant of Lazarus, approached are. "Quite a storm last night, Mr. Schmarck," he said, rubbing his hands on an oil -rag. I gruffly agreed with him in a monosyllable. "But it is Iovely to -day, air. Heavenly, sir." "Heavenly," I gasped. "Ah, but look at the glorious sun," he cried, waving the oil -rag in all di- rections at once. The sun! Upon my word, the sun was shining fiercely. I hadn't noticed it before. The tops of the little red - tiled houses down the street glistened in the glare of sunshine that met my gaze as I looked up at them. Sud- denly I remembered that I had wit- nessed the sunrise, a most doleful, dreary phenomenon that overtook us ten miles down the valley. I had seen it but it had made no impression on my tortured mind. The great god of day had sprung up out of the earth to smile upon me—or at me— and I had let him go unnoticed, so black and desolate was the memory of the night he destroyed! I had only a vague recollection of the dawn. The thing that caused me the most concern was the discovery that we had run the last half of our journey in broad day- light with our acetylene lamps going full blast. I stared at the tiles, blink- ing and unbelieving. "W@11, I'm—dashed," I said, with a silly grin. "The moon will shine to -night, Mr. Schmarck—" he began insinuatingly. "Smart, if you please," I snapped. "Ah." he sighed, rolling his eyes, "it is fine to he in love." A full minute passed before I grasp- ed the meaning of that soft answer, and then it was tem late. He had gone about his business without wait- ing to see whether my wrath had been turned away. I had been joy -riding! The excitement in Britton's usually imperturbable countenance as he earns running up to me from the tele- phone closet prepared me in a way for the startling news that was to come. "I-ias anything serious happened?" I cried, my heart sinking a little lower. "I had Mr. Poopendyke himself on the wire, sir. What do you think, sir•?" A premonition! "She --she has ar- rived?" I demanded, dully. —your mother, sir, is in your midst." The proximity of the inquisitive man- ager explains this extraordinary re- mark on the part of my valet. We both glared at the manager and he had the delicacy to move away. "She arrived by a special train at twelve lawst night., sir." i was speechless, The brilliant sun- shine seemed to be turning into som- bre night before my eyes; everything was going black, "She's asleep, he says, and doesn't want to be disturbed till noon, so he says he can't say anything snore just now over the telephone because he's afraid of waking 'er." (Britton drops I them when excited). 1 I pQr pack@t 805. ib:tir‘ "He dosen't have to shout so loud that he can be heard on the top floor," said I, still a trifle dazed. "She 'spans to be sleeping in your bed, sir, he says." 'In my 'bed? Good heavens, Brit- ton! What's to become of me?" "Don't take it so 'ard, sir," he made haste to say. "Blatchford 'as fixed a place for you on the couch In your study, air. It's all very snug, sir." "But, Britton," I said in horror, "suppose that I should have come home last night. Don't you see?" "I daresay she 'ad the door locked, sir," he said. "By special train," I mumbled. A light broke in upon my reviving in- tellect. "Why, it was the train that went through at a mile a minute while we were in the coffee house. No wonder we didn't meet her!" "I shudder to think of wot would 'ave 'appened if we had, sir," said he meaning no doubt to placate me. "Mr; Poopendyke says the Countess 'as been up all night worrying about you, sir. She has been distracted. She wanted 'im to go outand search for you at four o'clock this morning, but he says he assured 'er you'd turn up all right. He says Mrs.— the elderly lady,' begging your par- don, sir,—thought she was doing for the best when she toelk a special. She wanted to save us all the trouble she could. Re says she was very much distressed by our failure to 'ave some one meet her with a launch when she got here last night, sir. As it was, she didn't reach the castle un- til nearly one, and she looked like a drowned rat when she got there, be- ing hex—exposed to a beastly rain- storm. See wot I mea T She went to bed in a dreadful ,tate, he says, but he thinks she'll j more pleasant before the day's I burst into a of laughter. "Hur- ray!" I shout.c1 exultantly. "So she was out in it too, eh?. Well, by Jove, I. don't feel half as badly as I did five minutes ago. Come! Let us be off." We started briskly down the street. My spirits were beginning to rebound. Poopendyke had said that she worried all night about me! She had been distracted; Poor little wo- man! Still I was glad to know that she had the grace to sit up and worry instead of going to sleep as she might have done. I was just mean enough to be happy over it. Poopendyke met us on the town side of the river. He seemed a trifle haggard, I thought. He was not slow, on the other hand, to announce in horror-struck tones that I looked like a ghost. "You must get those wet clothes off at once, Mr. Smart, and go to bed• with a hot water bottle and ten grains of quinine. You'll be very ill if you don't. Put a lot more elbow grease, into those oars, Max. Get a move on you. Do you want Mr. Smart to die of pneumonia?" While we were crossing the muddy river, my secretary, his teeth chat- tering with cold and excitement com- bined, related the story of the night. "We were just starting off for the boat -house up the river, according ti, plans, Max and Rudolph and I with the two boats, when the Countess came down in a mackintosh and a pair of gum boots and insisted upon going along with us. She said it wasn't fair to make you do all the work, and all that sort of thing, and I was. having the devil's own time to induce her to eo back to the castle with Mr. Bangs. While we were arguing with her,—and it was getting.so late that I feared wa..,wouldu!t.be in time to meet you,—we heard some one shout- ing on the opposite side of the river. The voice sounded something like Britton's, and the Countess insisted - that there had been an accident and that you were hurt, Mr. Smart, and nothing would du but we must send Max and Rudolph over to see what the ("rouble was. It was raining cats and dogs, and I realized that it would be impossible for you to get a boatman on that side at that hour of the night, —it was nearly one,—so I sent the two Schmicks across. I've never seen a night as dark as it was. The two little lanterns bobbing in the boat could hardly be seen through the torrents of rain, and it was next to impossible to see the lights on the opposite' landing stage—just a dull, misty glow. (Continued next week.) In a new egg beater a coiled spring that moves up and down a shaft within a jar strikes the con- tents eight times with each revolu- tion of the 'handle. England has been celebrating what is claimed to be the 40th anniversary of the first railway operated by hydro electric power. Internal and Extern:Al Pains are promptly relievewby De THOMAS' ECLECTRIC 01 L THAT IT HAS BEEN SOLD FOR NEARLY FIFTY YEARS AND 13 TO -DAY A GREATER SELLER THAN EVER BEFORE IS A TESTIMONIAL THAT SPEAKS FOR /TB NUMEROUS CURATIVE GUALITIES.