University of South Carolina Libraries
QUJD DOM/ rfo. Novelized from the ] Picture Play of tht name by George Klei Ctfnfhi, 1916, bjr M. Huf Waa SYNOPSIS. Plerpont Stafford, banker and rnllroA* ftlfilfnil tn h I a alvtoon.x'Anr.oM ilo mrVi. t?*r. (Jlori.%., is wintering at 1'alm Reach, Gloria is a vivacious, but willful youns i lady who clfttfes under the restraining hand of a governess from whom she re* peatedly escapes. Her childish capers, cause young: Doctor Royee to fall In lovf with her. She steals from her room at night and in an auto plunges into the urf where she leaves the cur. SECOND EPISODE I ' Little Miss Stafford wandering In m silk frock through the Jungle ol the everglades at midnight did not even know that she was lost. The terrors that were in store for her she was not imagining. She was still 1 giggling over her imaginations of the excitement nt Palm Peach when her governess discovered thai she had run Avnv Miss Sidney wok? as Gloria expected. sprawled as well as Gloria hoped, her feet on high and the rug waving in air. She knew who played the trick and ran into Gloria's room. She saw that the bod was empty, the sleeping suit tossed aside, the dinner gown gone. She flung into her bathrobe and ran to give the alarm to Gloria's lather. Her costume made a sensation even among the sensational costumes of Palm Peach. She found Pierpont playing cards with young Dr. Royce. What she told them sent them runing in opposite directions, frightening the dancers and the loiterers about the tables in the gardcim and various couples surprised in loving embraces among the inviting nooks. On the lawn the two men came together and shook their heads in signal of failure. They saw David and Lois. David mentioned the less of hi? automobile. Neither he nor Pierpont thought of Gloria as the thief. They continued the search among the crannies of the enormous ' ol n n/1 o or 4 P 1 * -- i fifc&v* auiung tilO VUUUUt'B UL IIIUIT -^rjj i frkiide. ^ - ' || Rut Dr. Rovce had been speaking of t G.oria's rebellious heart only that afternoon. He ran at once to a parking space where automobiles where kept. The chauffeurs were not about and he did not pause to haggle. IIo threw away a "For Hire" card and, leaping into the saddle, so to speak, of a six cylinder thoroughbred, dug his I spurs into its side and piicd the lash. ' The car broke into such a run that its own chauffeur did not recognize it as it shot into the main road. Itoyce checked his speed only when he met occasional saunterers along the roads. : 1 ' - J She Did Not Like the Manner of the Boy. Prom most of these ho got no information. From one negro on a bicycle chair he had the comforting answer: ! "Yassa, 1 done seen a bar'headed . young missy in a auterbile licketty ! split?yassa. She turned sothe at the j next corner. If I hadn't a throwed j this year wheel over mighty peart i Id a " Royce was not interested in the Negro's might-have-been. He was already at the next corner, and he turned south, too. Now and then a red light ahead cheered Royce on, hut when he overtook it it was never on the oar that carried Gloria. In ona or two of the villages he found someone awake who had seen ? young girl or a comet shoot through. Jble had about decided to turn back IAS ^CEr ; same and endure the laughter that would greet him. Long ago, no doubt, Gloria had reappeared and been resentenced to bed. But even as he slowed up for the turn he caught sight of tiro tracks swerving wildly and turning off hito the sand between two dunes. He 6hut off his power and set his brakes, drew into the side of the road, and Jumped out. ? He passed the barrier of the dunes and caught sight of Davids racing car in the waves. The billows flaming with moonlight were sweeping over the little machine with terrifying ruthlessness, now tossing up spray which the moon turned to jewelry, now smothering it all from view. Rovce gazed aghast. He tore his hair at the vision. He could almost see Gloria caught in the wheel and held fast while sho drowned, slowly choking. He was about to dash into the s^a and fight it for the body of the little runaway when he saw footprints in the wet sand. With a cry of relief Dr. Royce followed them across the sand to tho highway. Hut Gloria had not turned north in the road. She had been wooed into the dense, lush foliage. The doctor regarded it with dread. He could not imagine how tempting it had been to Gloria's truant heart. He was afraid that she might have lost her mind with fear. He had hardly plunged into the thicket when he lost track of her. lie ran Lack, hoping that ho might find some courier with news. In-' stead lie met a boy from a pineapple plantation. Royce hailed him and learned that he was going for a doctor. He had hoard and seen exactly nothing of Gloria. lie was about to lit the boy go when It occurred tw hun that Gloria's father would be frantic for some word of her whereabouts, lie found a prescription I>au in his pocket and a bit of pencil and he wrote a note. Pierpont Stafford, Royal Poinciana: I found Gloria's car in the surf and her footprints leading Into the everglades. I am following them, but think you had better organize searching parties to beat the whole district. STEPHEN ROYCE. Ha gave this to the boy and a bill from the small roll he found in his pockets. He made the boy promise to go to the nearest telephone and transmit the message to the hotel. Royce returned again to the chase, increasingly applied at the thought of Gloria alone there. Now and then ho found some hint of her, a shrctfl of silk from her Paris frock torn away by a clutching thorn. Wfi AYWXfjB* < ?r_? u y. -* <1 Gloria had not been long in finding out that there can be too much liberty as well as too little. No calm wandering in a dream through nightmareland could have seen a more fantastic world than that Florida entanglement. She was entranced at first, but at , length she had had enough. She had read of people who walked in circles till they died of exhaustion. She felt ready to die so already. Put mainly she was yawning her pretty head off. She beat about the bush and said "Shoo!" to any crocodiles or boa constrictors that might bo in hiding. Then she stretched herself out and began a little prayer. She could not keep awake to finish it. In her sleep she dreamed herself back in the beautiful bed she had foolishly left. She dreamed that she was asleep in her o*'ii room. Meanwhile Dr. Royce stumbled and groped through the jungle in search of her, and her father and brother were in conference with the Palua lieach police. The message that Royce had given to the boy from Colohatcliee reached them a little before dawn. It only Increased their alarm, but it gave them something to do. They made no further secret of Gloria's disappearance. They called on everybody for help. Cara went scurrying along the little railroad that puehca a short distance Into the forest; boats of every sort glided along the draiimge canal; motor boats, canocs, skiffs, dugouts were spinning hither and yon among the thousands of waterways. David forgot I^ols Freeman and the engagement he had to play golf with her that mornings He and his father had anticipated the dawn in the bayous. Frenoau, strolling across the law* to open the office of the New York brokers he represented, fownd Lois Freeman and her father rending the 1 morning pupers. They spoke of the THE HOJtUY HEX ? - - - loss of Gloria and the $5,000 offer ! for hor restoration to teer father. Preneau meditated. He could use $5,000 or less to great advantage. When Lois invited him to play golf he said that he had another engagement. Whatever motive it was that moved Freneau, he resolved to forego his opportunity to eonrt Lois without the disturbing presence of his wealthy rival. He bade her good-by, .but he did not go to his office. He sauntered to the water's edge and chartered a motor boat. Almost everybody in Florida .must have been aware of Gloria's disappearance except the family of .shiftless paupers named Sipe Gloria had lain down to tfleap dost about where the Sipo fence would have been if there had been a fence. She had not seen their shack beyond the heavy growth. When she awoke and yawned and rubbed her eyes and looked about she decided that she must have fallen asleep In the horticultural building at Bronx park. She rose to her fed ami limped aimlessly. She caught sigtot of t*e Sipe hovel. It was a tumbledown hut. but it looked like the Royal Polnciana to her. The pigs and the mangy dogs might have been gazelles in a park and the ragged man and woman and boy migrft ha* a been a group of royal blood. She ran toward them for shelter. They received her with stupid wonder and with no hospitality. Tho woman upbraided Gloria for being out in such rags and Gloria offered to buy anything they had. Mrs. Sipe refused to sell what she had on, which was all she had. The only extra covering was a new suit she was making for the boy out of some hemp sacking. Gloria did not want a boy's clothes, but Mrs. Sine snoornri they were more decent than what she had on. Also that she might pass some rough characters or even some Seminole Indians on her way back and that she would be safer as a boy than as a girl. This convinced Gloria. She paid for the clothes with the ring and went into the shack to change. When Gloria was dressed the Sipo hoy was ordered to take her to a path which would eventH^illy lead her to the main road. It was easier walking in breeches than the skirts she had worn. But she did not like the manner of the boy. Me began to pay her crude compliments and finally grew so impudent that she boxed his ears. He took hi# She Paid for the Clot revenge by pointing her in the wrong direction. He turned back arid laughed. Ho had an ill-nourished sense of humor. Gloria pushed on and on. growing more and more doubtful of the way and dismally footsore. Suddenly a turn in the path revealed what she took to be an answer to her prayers?a horse! It. was a doleful looking anlnml, yet it was a horse. She ran forward and spoke to it soothingly. Rut it harked ar. t roared. It was not a white man's horse and it hated the whites even as its red master had hated theia. fi hereby hung a tale. * The family known as tho "Cypress Wolves" was the sole remnant of one of the fiercest tribes the paleface had met In the Seminole wars. If Gloria Stafford, who was strolling slowly into tho very heart of the Cypress Wolf region, Had come among them? as a young girl in distress, they would have treated her with chivalry. Rut her first action outraged their most sacred Iveliefs. The old chief Ilitakee of the Cypress Wolf tribe had more dignity than , wealth. Put ho owned a horse. It XrftQ on atiAlmit niiotnn* ?/* I*.. u%> ? > uuvyiv.ii diuDiutij uii.i un man* iters were bad; but it was at most the only horse owned by an everglade , Indian. \t the very time that Gloria had been helped to solve her algebra prob> letns by I>r. Royoe old Hitakee was i solving all his problems with the aid | of the medicine man of his tribe. Hs i d!?*d with grout dignity. The young brave Katcalani was the , logical successor to the chiefship. H? | had his eye on that horse arid dreamed of himself astride it. The widow or Hitakee had another idoa. Shonolakeo was her name. She dlu I r^t intend that her dead husband i should walk all the way to the happT LALD, CONWAY. S O. _ _ bunting grounds. In her youth when the chiefs had horses and rode them, they rode also to the far-off paradise. Each chiefs squaw saw to that, for she cut the throat of his horse and sent its ghost after Its master's spirit. Katcclani tried to save Hitakee's horse from sacrifice, but Shonolakee ( so' fierce and the other squaws so fierce that he felt his election in danger. Just about the time that Gloria Stafford was feeling her way through the thickets about the Cypress Wolf village Shonolakee led the old horse; out to slaughter. She was weeping i so bitterly that she did not heed when j the sacrificial knife fell from her belt. I She tied the horse, said her prayer.! and reached for the blade. It was ion. She turned back to look for it. She had not gone far when Gloria Stafford parted the palmetto leaves and saw before her the steed she had prayed for. | She approached with coaxing words and untied the halter. The pony shied and tried to caress her with its heels. Gloria had been well schooled In horsemanship from childhood. and she soon had her hands in the mane of the unvrllling mustang and vaulted to its back. She had no sooner set her heels into its ribs than the old squaw returned with the recovered knife. She saw the sanctified charger being carried off?and by a ragamuffin evidently from one of the white trash families that even the Seminoles despised. She gave a wild cry of alarm, the fierce "Yo-ho-ee-hee!" that had one? made the Indian-hunters' blood ran cold. The tribe answered in wondering haste. She pointed to Gloria and the vanishing horse. It was not vanishing very fast, for the wilderness was thick and Gloria did not know tho way. The Seminoles divided and ran in various directions to head her olY. In a few moments the rrrnig chief himself leaped from ambush, and caught the horse by the nose and ear. The old squaw was not far behind and Gloria was dragged to the ground and threatened with the death of a thief? a sacrilegious thief. Old Shonolnkee raised her knife and was about to plunge it into the heart of the shivering captive when something about the captive made her pause. She saw that tdie lad was a lass. Her rage was forgotten in amazement for a moment. She grunted: "The boy is one squaw." :hcs With Her Ring. The other Indiana starea at Gloria and the pallor of her horror was red- ! dened with shame. The blush was rrry becoming to her. The young chief stepped forward for a closer look at it. Thinking him a possible rescuer Gloria turned on him one of her ninety candlepowor smiles. The effect was greater than she had ex pected. Katcalani was dazzled. He blinked, then turned his eyes on the smoky Indian maidens clustered about. Each of them had ambitious dreamt of being his wife. But shabbily at Gloria was dressed she was a tearing beauty in any company. Compared to the unkempt daughters cf the everglades she was a goddess. Katcalani's heart beat with a new kind of excitement. IIo resolved to begin his new chieftainship with aa act of courage. He would defy not only the m?n, but even the women! He seized Gloria's hand and shouted: ' "If boy is squaw ho is my squaw." Gloria did not understand the mean* ing of this. Put she saw that it had not endeared her to the Indian women. They murmured their wrath and would have struck her down if Katcalanl had not protected her. She drew closer to him and he took that for consent. They led her into the village, a huddled group of palmetto leaves. Shonolakee first went aside and1 sent the dead chief's horse on the long road to the happy pastures. Then she returned to prepare Gloria for the honor of becoming the wife of the chief. She led her into her own hut and gave her the habMlments of an hor est squaw in place of the boy's diegraceful togs. Seminole ladles are modest. Then she showed Gloria a little sewing machine. She had bought it with the proceeds of rattlesnake skins she bad sold to tourists In the village along the railroad. She promised Gloria that some day if she g" * 1 Her First Duty Was ta Gc were good she might be allowed to play on the machine. The squaw's idea of being good consisted largely .of doing heavy labor. The first duty , of a wife was to gather wood for the fire. She set Gloria to work. * * * * Royce was not the only one in the everglades hunting the estray. Fro- 1 nenu had gone as far as his motor ! boat would carry liiin. Then he had found a native Indian with a dugont, | a cypress log hollowed. The Indian drove it with a pole, lie nad heard nothtng of Gloria's presence in the thicket, but he promised to guido Frenenu to some of the scattered villages. Meanwhile Dr. Rovce, hunting in ( every direction, had happened upon | i he home of the Sipes, and had asked j about Gloria. Fearing that he had come to demand the return of Gloria's j jewels they pretended not to have f s?on her. I Tut Royce caught a ( glimpse of Gloria's evening dress, ( which Mrs. Sipe was trying to hide, j He charged the Sipes with deception, probably with murder. They hastened fo confess that they ) had seen her and helped her on her \ way i 11 the clothes of a boy. They i sent young Sine to show Royce which \ way Gloria U^d gone. Young Sipe, ^ still angry at Gloria and his parents, t s?!it Rovce in a false direction, too. lie laughed as ho saw the crazy f stranger in that tattered evening dress ^ ploying his blind man's buff, not, i knowing that rivals were searching i the wilderness, and knowing that { Gloria was now in Indian servitude. ! ; The young chief. Katcalnnl, kept t watching Gloria. Her whiteness, her t delicacy, the unconscious daintiness i with which she lifted the crooked faggot from the brushwood, and the < luxurious aureole of her hnlr in the 1 Florida sun, made him frantic to call 1 her his own. He beckoned her to fol- ] low him and led her to a distance / v here the shambling, dusky women 1 - ? l.J_ A -M. - 1 -1 A ?- I ' ? <ji mis inuu cuuiu nui see n:m now j his turbaned head to the chalk-faced < squaw. ] Gloria hoped that the peculiar per- I son was going to help her to escape, i and she followed him with only a i little fear. But he paused and began i to declare his passion with all an In- 1 dian's eloquence. His dialect was crude, hut his emo- 1 tion was fierce. He compared her with the most graceful palm, with 1 the rarest orchids. He said that the 1 sunrise was in her hair and the stars in her eyes. He compared himself with the great warrior Osceola, who 1 had slain so many whites. He offered to kill all the white men in Florida to please her. He spoke of his wealth. His turban had a sliver band made out of four silver dollars. He had a i gold watch, sixteen handkerchiefs, and eighteen shirts. He had six of them, on. Gloria should have his grandmother's forty pounds of beads to wear?she should be a queen and she would not have to plow. Gloria had often dreamed of her first proposal of marriage. This was it. It did not accord with her dreams, j f?lie was disgusted, aghast, afraid, j She could think of nothing to do. She caught sight of the dagger that Katcalani wore in his belt. In! a sick horror of her fato she snatched It from him. She had not the courage! to kill herself, or him, but she gave Wrrt tha Unlfn nnrl litm tn i plunge It Into her heart. Katcalani glared at her In a frenzy of humiliation and wrath. Then the child woman wavered on her tired feet and, suddenly dropped to the ground in a dead faint. Isaloalani's rolling eyes made out a startling vision. Dick Freneau wae standing before him. The Indian guide had put him ashore near the village and was waiting for him to make In pulrios. Preneau had pushed through the palmettos just In time to set Gloria swoon. He recognised hei by her fair skin and her bright hair. He approached Katcalanl to olaim her and the reward. * Hut the young chief was in no mood for a parley. Ho gnashed his teeth and threatened Froneau with such blood thirsty fury, that Froneau fell back. Ho felt bis hair rise and his scalp al-. ready going. Ho retreated in sncb haste that Katcalanl did not pursue hkn far. He stood watching for him to reappear. Meanwhile, by another roundabout IH 4S&SjW??^^^tt^EjE^:-::::'::-.v.-' \ . mi ^M \^KBfal 1^1 Bith?r Wood for the Fire. I I land path, Dr. Hoyco had found tlie I I Seminole village. He Raw Gloria I I whore she lay on the ground. lie I I thought hor some young Indian I H maiden asleep. He paused to Make I I her and ask if she had seen Gloria. I Before he could stoop to lift her he Itaw Katealani turn and stare, 'i he He dodged the blade, clutched the lie Indian was agiie aB a panther, and le rolled over. Then Hoyee was on op, thon the Indian hroke free. Then ho men circled and feinted and finally dinched again, went to earth again, oiled, broke, rose, and clinched, cursng and grunting in mortal hatred. Freneau from the thicket where he lid witnessed the fight; watched it in ascination a moment. At length, seeing that the battle had carried he two warriors away from Gloria's ricinfty, he made so bold as to run o where she lay, and pick her up. Her eyes opened. She found herself in his arms. She stared, then 'ecognized him. He was like a escuing nngcl. She embraced him with a little wall of gratitude and tdoration. She had not seen Royce it all. Freneau led her away from he struggle down a twisting path to ho landing place, where the SemiioIc guide waited for him. He helped Gloria into the canoe and ordered the guide to push out into the bayou. If he felt any impulse to go back to the aid of Royce, he suppressed It, for Gloria's Hake. He neglected even to mention that Royce was even then in a death grapple with Kat'-alnnl. It would only have excited the trembling child still further. Indeed, when Gloria poured forth her gratitude to Freneau for his fearless- i ???? 1.. 1- V. -1 lo X -1 1 1 ' ? I iivo? in u*:i lit; BMruggcu I is | 3ho\iklers and smiled. He was too much the gentleman to contradict a lady. The Indian pulled his dugout along the tortuous channels, until finally it was hailed from the shore. Gloria's father and brother had caught sight \ of them. When Gloria was landed and in her father's arms, she told what hideous danger Mr. Freneau had saved her from. Then Pierpont embraced the young man. and David wrung his hands, forgetting that they had lately been jealous rivals for Lois Freeman's < Bmiles. ***** Rovee and Katealani fought on without thought of truce. Katealani could have brought help by crying out, hut he had the knife and he would not bring his people to see him worsted by an empty handed white man. Iioyee had the skill of a college wrestler, the coolness of a surgeon, and the determination of a lover. Put he was dulled with fatigue and wearing down rapidly. At last, however, lie broke free and stood off for a moment's breath. Katealani, dripping with sweat, and a little dizzy with the struggle, went at him to finish him. He ran like a wolf and leaped like a wolf. But he ran straight Into a moat beautiful uppercut. Before the point of his knife could rear-h Dr. Royce, the point of his Jaw met Royce's fiat. The world went to pieces in an earthquake, {jnd it was some minutes before Katcalanl found himself lying flat on hia back with no enemy In sight. Royce had picked up the knife and turned to Gloria. Sbe was not there. He nearly fell down with amazement. Then he caught sight of something moving near the water's edge. He staggered as Cast as he conld through the underbrush He reached the shore in time to see Gloria and Freneau In the dugout Just rounding a barrier of saw grass. He ran along the shore, trying to get near. He was glad that she was sate, and It cheered him no little to feel that he had been able to do something to earn a place in her heart He hurried on and on. At last he came to a clearing and found the StafTords holding a family reunion.