The Argosy, Vol. 82 No. 2 — page 124: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

306 The girl’s joy was infectious, and ‘his face reflected the same brightness that filled hers. “Go right ahead and tell me about it. I don’t know of anything else in this world that I’d rather hear.” “Vl have to begin this like a fairy tale,” said Lady Ann gaily, ‘‘but it is one of the really true fairy tales, I’m sure. “Once upon a time Judge Brand was a prospector in the West. That was long ago when the judge was a much younger man than he is now, and the West he knew was the Old West. He had a partner named Hugh Adams’”—the musical voice softened on the name—‘‘and the judge loved Hugh Adams as a brother. They prospected to- gether, and starved and thirsted together, and then—they struck it rich together. “Vou understand, Marty? Judge Brand and Hugh Adams found a mine and sold it for two fortunes; then the judge went East, but his partner stayed West. Hugh Adams couldn’t tear himself away from the country he loved and that had been so good to him, but the judge had a sister in York State and felt that she needed him.” Lady Ann paused to note the effect of the recital on her companion. “You are right, mujercita,’ remarked Reeves, ‘“‘this does sound like a fairy tale.” “Why, I haven’t come to that part of it yet!” she exclaimed. ‘Now, listen. After years and years, the judge got a letter from his old partner. Hugh Adams had married, and had lived at a place called Moccasin, in Utah. “His wife’—again the soft voice dropped tenderly—“‘had_ died. Broken hearted, Hugh Adams left his baby girl with an old friend and his wife and had gone to San Francisco, and from there in a boat to the South Seas. Two or three years later he came back to Utah, but the friends with whom he had left the little girl had died, and some one else had taken her. Hugh Adams couldn’t find out who these people were, or where they had gone. ‘““Not much was left of the town of Moc- casin, Marty, when Hugh Adams came back to it. I reckon it was a good deal like Rattlesnake City before we got here. Hugh Adams had been hurt, and he could not live. So he wrote his old partner, the judge, and asked him to do what he could to find the little girl, Lorena Adams, and to hold in trust for her a fortune of—of—oh, several hundred thousand dollars, Judge Brand says. And, Marty,” here Lady THE ARGOSY. Ann’s voice quivered with excitement, “‘it seems that I am Lorena Adams and—and that all the money is mine!” Reeves was dazed, almost staggered. The girl got up, faced him, put both her hands on his shoulders and looked into his eyes. ‘“Aren’t you glad for me, Marty?” she whispered. ‘I can’t begin to tell you how I felt when I was blind to all this, when I didn’t know who my people were, or what _had happened to them, or how I came to be Liddy Ann Bobbett. But now can’t you see how different everything is?” “fT can hold up my head, Marty, with any of them! I feel as though I had passed through a long, dreadful night and had wakened to the most beautiful day that ever was! You said that nothing made any difference to you but’—and her eyes re- flected a love that was deep and abiding— “this must make a difference, a big differ- ence! Why, the Girl of Castle’s Forty- Nine Camp has become an heiress, just like you read in a book! Marty! Why don’t you say something?”’ He sprang up suddenly. “What can I say,” he answered, ‘“‘except that I am happier for you, I think, than you are for yourself. The penniless Ten- derfoot of the Camp, Lady Ann, would be a pretty poor stick if he could not rejoice with you in your. good fortune.” A gulf, however, seemed to have opened suddenly at his feet. And on one side of the gulf he stood; and on the other side was Miss Lorena Adams. Martin Reeves had pride, and he wanted to work with his own hands for the woman he loved. Without a stiver to his name, how was he to play the rdle which meant so much to his happiness and peace of mind? Nevertheless, he took Lady Ann in his arms and, while she clung to him, he kissed her, and, at last, seated her on the rock again. “Now,” he went on, as he dropped at her side, “‘proceed with the fairy tale. Tell me about the chain of nuggets.” ‘That is another strange part of it, Mar- ty,” went on the girl. “I never saw that chain until just before we went to El Rio Rey last evening. Ezra Bobbett had had it stowed away somewhere. He brought it out, told me it had been about my neck when I was passed on to him and Ma Bob- bett by Hugh Adams’s friends in Mocca- sin, Utah. Go 0)(0\0) AMUN SS (C@)