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3Cn The Valiants if Virginia u Oopy***?? 1911? bj UoMm-MotUI Ou fit was looking at a square, uncom* promising wall-safe, with a rouml f fl? ared disk of white metal on Its face. He knelt before it and tried its knc b. After a moment it turned easily. But fTHed the Numbere Carefully, Fin* RlSht, Then Left: 17-28 ?I 0. The Heavy Door Opened. the resolute eteel door would not open, though he tried every combination that came Into hie mind. "No use," he ssld disgustedly. "One must have the right numbere." Then be lifted his fretted frame and emote hie grimy hsnda together. "Con? found HI" he ssld with a eh >rt laugh. "Here I in, a bankrupt, with all thla outfit --clear to the very finger bowls handed to me on a silver tray, and I'm mad as scat because I can't open the first locked thing 1 And!" He ran upstairs and donned a rough corduroy Jscket axd high leather leg? gings "We re going to climb the hill today, Chum." he announced, "and no more moccasins need apply." in the lower ha I. however, he sud? denly atoppad stock-still. "The slip of paper that waa In the china dog!" he sidelined. "What a chump I am not to have thought of it!" He found it In Ita pigeonhole, and. kneeling down before the safe, tried tue numberi carefully, first right, then left: 17? .28?M?0. The heavy door opened. "I was right!" he exulted. "It's the plate." He drew It out. pleco by piece. Kach was bagged In dark red Canton flannel. Ha broke the tape of one bag and as posed a great silver pitcher, tarniahed purple-blue like a raven's wing?then a ?ea-servico. Each piece, large and small, was marked with the greyhound rampant and the motto. "And to think," he said, "that my greet great grandfather burled you with his own bsnds under the stablea when Tarleton's raiders swept the val? ley before the surrender at Yorktown! Only wait till Aunt Daphne gets you polished up, and on the sideboard! You're the one thing the place has needed!" With the dog for comrade he tra? versed the garden and plunged across the valley below, humming as he went. The place waa pathless and over? grown with paw-paw buaho and sassa? fras. Great treee stood so thickly In places as to make a twilight and tho sunnier spots were masses of pink laurel, polson-lvy, flaming purple rho? dodendron and wine-rod tendrils of in terbralded briers. This waa the for eat land of whose possibilities he had thought, in the heart of the woods he came upon a great limb that had been wrenched off by atorm. The broken wood was of a deep rich brown, shading ?o black. He broke off his song, snap-' >ed a twig and smelled It lta sharp acrid odor was unmistakable. He sud? denly remembered the walnut tree at lose wood aud what Shirley had said: I know a girl who had two In her yard, and ehe went to Europe on them* He looked shout him; ss far as he (onld aee the treea reared, hardy and perfect, untouched for a generation. He selected one of medium aize and lulling a creeper, measured Its cir? cumference and gaging thla measure i.lth hla eye, made a panelled calcula? tion on the back of an envelope. "Greet Scott'" he said Jubilantly to th#? dog; "that would cut enough to vain scot the Damory Court library build twenty sideboards!" Hh sat down on a mossed boul t< r breathless, hla eyes sparkling, lie hud thought himself almost a beggar, and kers In hla hand was a small fortune! "Talk about engagement rings!" he muttered. "Why, a dozen of tl.? ? ought to buy a whole tiara!" At length he rose and climbed on, presently turning at a right angle to tlaect the strip to ha br und.iry before paused to rest "I'm no timber crolier," ho laid to himself an ho ? ,ed hla brow, 1 but I ealeoletc there are sll of three hundred Irani big e tough to cut Why. suppose I key are north on an average onlv | hundred apiece. That would make -Good lord!" he muttered, "and I've T>een mooning about poverty!" The growth was smaller and sparser now and before long he came, on the bill's very crest, to the edge of a ragged clearing. It held a squalid set? tlement, perhaps a seore of dirt-daubed cabins little better than hovels, some of them mere mud-walled lean tos, with sod roofs and window-panes of flour-sacking. Fences and outhouses there was none. Littered paths ram? bled aimlessly hither and thither from chip strewn yards to starved patches of corn, under cultivated and blighted. Over the whole place hung an inde? scribable atmosphere of disconsolate filth, of unredeemed squalor and vile ness. With one hand on the dog's collar, hushing him to silence, Valiant, un? seen, looked at the wretched place with a shiver. He had glimpsed many wretched purlieus in the slums of great cities, but this, in the open sun? light, with the clean woods about it and the sweet clear blue above, stood out with an unrelieved boldness and contrast that was doubly sinister and forbidding. He knew Instantly that the tawdry corner was the community known as HeH's-Half-Acre, the place to which Shirley had made her night ride to rescue Rickey Snyder. A quick glad realization of her cour? age rushed through him. On its heels came a feeling of shame that a spot like this could exist, a foul blot on such a landscape. It was on his own land! Ita denizens held place bv squatter sovereignty, but he was, nevertheless, their landlord. The thought bred a new sense of responsi? bility. Something should be done for them, too. As ho gazed, an uproar in a cabin reached a climax. A red-bearded fig? ure In nondescript garments shot from the door and collapsed in a heap in the dirt. He got up with a dreadful oath?a jug thrown at him grazing his temple aa he did to?and shaking his fist behind him, staggered into a near by lean-to. Valiant turned away with a feeling almost of nausea, and plunged back down the forest hillside. - < CHAPTER XX The Gardensrs. He saw them coming through the gate on the Red Road?the major and Shirley in a lilac muslin by his sjde? and strode to meet them. Behind them Ranston propelled a hand cart filled with paper bundlea from each of which protruded a bunch of flowering stems. There was a flush In Shirley's cheek as her hind lay In Valiant's. At for him, h's eyes, like a wilful drunkards, returned again and again, between the major's compliments, to her face. "You have accomplished wonders, sah! I had no idea so much could be done In such a limited time. You have certainly primped the old place up. I could almost think I was look? ing at Damory Court in the sixties, sah!" "That's quite the nicest thing you could have said, Major," responded Valiant. "But It needs the flowers." He looked at Shirley with sparkling eyes. "How splendid of you to bring them! I feel like a robber." "With our bushel9 of them? We shall never miss th ?m at all. Hav.e you set out the others?" "I have, indeed. Every one has rooted, too. You shall see them." He led the way up the drive till they stood before the porch. "Gad!" chuckled the major. "Who would think It had been unoccupied for three decades? At this rate, you'U soon be giving dances, sah." "Ah," said Valiant. "That's the very thing I want to suggest. The tourna? ment comes off next week, I under? stand, and it's been the custom to have a ball that night. The tourney ground Is on this estate, and Damory Court is handier than the Country Club. Why wouldn't it be appropriate to hold the dance here? The ground floor rooms are In order, and if the young people would put up with it, It would be a groat pleasure to me, I as? sure you." "Oh!" breathed Shirley. "That would be too wonderful!" Tho major seised his hand and shook it heartily. "I can answer for the committee," he said. 'They'll Jump at It. Why, sah, the new gener? ation has never set eyes Inside the house. It's a golden legend to them." "Then 1 11 go ahead with arrange? ments." He led them around the house and down the terraces of the formal gar? den, and here the major's encomiums broke forth again. "You are going to tako us old folks back, sah," he said with real feeling. 'This gyarden in its original lines was unique. It had a piquancy and a plcturcsquenecs that thank God, are to bo restored! Ono can understand the owner of an es? tate like this having no desire to spend his life philandering abroad. Wo all hope, sah, that you will recur to the habit of your ancestors and count Damory Court home." Valiant smiled slowly. "I don't dream of anything else," he said. "My life, as I map It out, seems to begin here. The rest doesn't count?only the years when I was little and had my father." Thi major carefully adjusted his ? n s glasses. His head was turned a* ay. "Ah, yes." he said. "The last twenty years," continued the other, "from my present view? point, are valuaV.^ mainly for con? trast" "As a consistent regimen of Dttc (Is foie gras." said Shirley quizzically, makes on value bread and butter?" Ha shook I is lo ad at h< r "As star ritloi nines one appreciate plenty. nail twenty years arg to he here, bul th%| hold side-trips, too. Now tnd then there's a Jaunt back to the city" "Contrast again?" she asked inter? estedly. "Yes and no. Yen. because no one who has ever known that blazing clanging life can really understand tho peace and blessedness of a place like this. No, because there are somethings which are to be found only there. There are the galleries and tho opera. I need a breath of them both." "And semi-occasional longer flights, too," the major reflected. "A lock-see abroad once in a blue moon. Why not?" "Yes. For mental photographs?Im? pressions one can't get from between book-covers. There's an old cloister garden I know in Italy and a particu? lar river-bank In Japan in the cherry blossom season, and a tiny island with a Greek castle on It In the Aegean. Little colored memories for me to bring away to dream over. But al? ways I come back here to Damory Court. For this is?home!" They walked beneath the pergola to the lake, where Shirley gave a cry of delight at sight of Its feathered population. "Where did you get them from?" she asked. "Washington. In crates." "That explains It," she exclaimed. "One day last week the little darkies In the village all insisted a circus was coming. They must have seen these being hauled here. They watched the whole afternoon for the elephants." "Poor youngsters!" he said. "It's a shame to fool them. But I've had all the circus I want getting the live stock installed." "They won't Buffer," said the major. "Rickey Snyder'll get them up a three ringed show at tho drop of a hat and drop it herself. Besides, there's tourn? ament day coming, and they can live on that. I seo you've dredged out some of the lilies." "Yea I take my dip here every morning." "We used to have a diving-board when we were little shavers," pursued the major. "I remember once, your father?" He cleared his throat and stopped dead. "Please," said John Valiant, "I?I liko to hear about him." "It was only that I struck my head I on a rock on the bottom and?stayed down. The others were frightened, but he?he dove down again and again till he brought me out. It was a nar? row squeak, I reckon.** ? silence fell. Looking at the tall muscular form beside her. Shirley had a sudden vision of a determined little body cleaving the dark water, over and over, now rising panting for breath, now plunging again, never giv? ing up. And she told herself that the sou waa the same sort. That hard set of the jaw, those firm Hps, would know no flinching. He might suffer, but he would be strong. Half unconsciously she spoke her thought aloud: "You look like your father, do you not?" "Yea," he replied, "there's a strong likeness. I have a photograph which I'll show you sometime. But how did you know?" "Perhaps I only guessed," she said in some confusion. To cover this she stooped by the pebbly marge and held out her hand to the bronze ducks that pushed and gobbled about her fingers. "What have you named them?" she asked. "Nothing. You christen them." "Very well. The light one shall be Peezletree and the dark one Pllgar lie. I got the names from John Jasper ??he was Virginia's famous negro preacher. I once heard bim hold forth when he read from one of the Psalms ?the one about the harp and. the psaltery?and he called it peezletree." Valiant's laugh rang out over the lake?to be answered by a sudden sharp screech from the terrace, where the peacock strutted, a blaze of span? gled purple and gold. They turned :o see Aunt Daphne issue from the kitchen, twig-broom in hand. "Hoah!" she exclaimed. "What fo* yo' kyahin' on like er wil* gyraff we'n He Leaned Slightly Toward Her, One Hand on the Dial's Time-Notched Rim. wo got comp'ny, yo' trlflin' ol* fan tail, yo! QU outen heah!" She waved her weapon and tho bird, with a raucous shriek of deflanco, retired hi ruffled disorder. Tho master of Damory Court looked at Shirley. "What shall we name him?" "Id call him FiroCracker if he goes off like that," she said. And Fire Cracker the bird was christened forth? with. "And now," said Shirley, "lot's set out the ramblers." The major had brought a rough plan, sketched from memory, of the old ar? rangement of the formal Karden. "I'll Just go ov?r the lines of tho beds with Unc', Jefferson," be proposed, "while you two potter over these roses." So Valiant aud Shirley vuuked back up the elop? beneath the pergola to- I gether. With Ranaton, puffing and blowing ! like a black porpoise over his creak? ing go-cart, they planted the ramblers ?crimson and pink and white?Va? liant much of the time on his knees, his hands plunging deep into the biack spongy earth, and Shirley with broad hat flung on the grase, her fingers separating the clinging tnread-llke roots and her small arched foot tamp? ing down the soil about them. Her hair?the color of wet raw wood in the sunlight?was very near the brown head and sometimes their fingers touched over the work. Once, as they stood up, flushed with the exercise, a great black and orange butterfly, dazed with the sun-glow, alighted on Valiant's rolled-up sleeve. He held his arm perfectly still and blew gently on the wavering pinions till it swam away. When a redbird flirted by, to his delight she whistled its call eo perfectly that it wheeled in mid-flight and tilted inquiringly back toward them. j As they descended the terrace again to the pergola, he said, "There's only j one thing lacking at Damory Court? a sun-dial." I "Then you haven't found it?" she cried delightedly. "Come and let me show you." She led the way through the maze , of beds at one side till they reached ! a hedge laced thickly with Virginia creeper. He parted this leafy screen, bending back the springing fronds that thrust against the flimsy muslin of her gown and threatened to spear the pink-rosed hat that cast an ador? able warm tint over her creamy face, thinking that never had the old place seen such a picture as she made framed in the deep green. Some such thought was in the ma? jor's mind, too, as he came slowly up the terrace below. He paused, to take off his hat and wipe his brow. "With the place all fixed up this way," he sighed to himself, "I could believe It was only last week that I Beauty Valiant and Southall and I were boys, loafing around this gyar den. And to think that now it's Va? liant's son and Judith's daughter! 1 Why, it seems like yesterday that Shir? ley there was only knee-high to a grasshopper?and I used to tell her her hair was that color because she ran through hell bareheaded. I'm about a thousand years old, I reckon!" Meanwhile the two figures above had pushed through the tangle into a circular sunny space where stood a short round pillar of red onyx. It was a sun-dial, its vine-clad disk cut of gray polished stone in which its metal tongue was socketed. Round the outer edge of the disk ran an inscription in archaic lettering. Valiant pulled away the clustering Ivy leaves and read: "I count no hours but the hap? py ones." "If that had only been true!" he said. "It is true. See how the vines hid the sun from it. It ceased to mark the time after the Court was de? serted." "I'll put moonflowers at its base and where you ore standing, Madonna lilies. The outer part of the circle shall have bridal-wreath and white irises, and they shall shade out Into pastel colors?mauves and grays and heliotropes. Oh, I shall love this spot! ?perhaps sometime the best of all." "Which do you love the most now?" He leaned slightly toward hor, one hand on the dial's time-notched rim. "Don't you know?" he said in a lower voice. "Could any other spot mean to mc what that acre under the hemlocks means?" Her face was turned from him, her fingers pulling at the drifting vine, and j a splinter of sunlight tangled In her hair like a lace of fireflies. "I could never forget It/' he con? tinued. "The thing that spoiled my father's life happened there, yet there I we two first talked, and there you?" ; "Don't!" she said, facing him. I "Don't!" "Ah. let me speak! I want to tell ' you that I ?hall carry the memory ot j that afternoon, and of your brave kind? ness, always, always! If I were never ' to see you again in this life, I should always treasure it. If I died of thirst in some Sahara, it would be the last thing; I should remember?your face would bo the last thing I should see! If I?" In the silence- there was the sound of a slow foot-fall on the gravel walk, and at the same moment he saw a magical change. Shirley drew back. The soft gentian blue of her eyes darkened. The lips that an instant before had been tremulous, parted in a low delicious laugh. She swept him a deep curtsey. "I am beholden to you, sir," she said gaily, "for a most knightly com? pliment. There's the major. Come and let us show him where we've j planted the ramblers." CHAPTER XXI. Tournament Day. The noon sun of tournament day shone brilliantly over the village, drowsy no longer, for many vehicles were hitched at the curb, or moved leisurely along the leafy street: big, canvas-topped country wagons drawn by shaggy-hoofed horses and sot with Chain that bumped and jostled their holiday loads from outlying tobacco plantation and atud-farm; sober, black covered buggies, long narrow, spring less buckboards, frivolous sidebar run about! and antique shays resurrected from the primeval depths of cob webbed stables, relics of tarnished grandeur and faded fortune. At midday vehicles resolved them? selves Into lunchoon-DOOtha?hampers stowed away beneath tho scats, dis? closing all manner of picnic edibles? the court house yard was an array of grase-spread table-cloths, and an alr of plenty reigned. Within Mrs. Merryweather Mason's brown house hospitality sat enthroned and the generous dining-rocm was held by a regiment of feminine out of town acquaintances. The yard, an hour later, was an ac? tive encampment of rocking-chairs, and a din of conversation floated out over the pink oleanders whose tubs had achieved a fresh coat of bright green paint for the occasion. Mrs. Poly Glfford?a guest of the day? here shone resplendent. "The young folks are counting mightily on the dance tonight," ob? served Mrs. Livy Stowe of Seven Oaks. "Even the Buckner girls have got new ball dresses." "Improvident, I call it," uaid Mrs. Gifford. "They can't afford such things, with Park Hill mortgaged up to the roof the way It is." (To be Continued.) EXECUTIVE SESSIONS CONTINUE. Senate Defeats Resolution for Open Discussions by One Vote. Washington, April 7.?By a vote of :!1 to 30 the senate today defeated the resolution proposing that the execu? tive session be opened to the pub lie. I WAREHOUSE SYSTEM IX STATE. T. B. Stack house, or Co In in hi a Dis? cusses. Cotton Situation. T. H. BtackhoUSS of Columbia, president of the Standard Warehouse company, of Columbia, has prepared the following for the Manufacturers Record, "The Standard Warehouse company of this city was organized in 1905, with a paid-in capital stock of $347, 900, and since the organization has operated warehouses for the storage of cotton at Columbia, Greenville. Anderson, Greenwood, Xewberry and Orangeburg, all of South Carolina. "The company has warehoused more than 100,000 bale-; of cotton each year, issuing the owner its receipts, which Is acceptable as collateral by banks in all of the money centres of this country at the very lowest pre? vailing rates of interest. "In the handling of about 1,000,000 bales of cotton there has not been a ? single loss of cotton, or of money ad , vanced against the cotton. The banks located In the cotton States have not been able to finance any considerable portion of the cotton crop and at the same time finance the growing of another crop, and thus enable the farmer to distribute the sale of his cotton throughout the year,; instead of forcing it on the market j i i in about three months, as was done a ?few years ago. "By storing the cotton with a strong i warehouse company the grower, buy-j er and manufacturer arc enabled to finance it with hanks in all of the ! money centres, thus securing the best interest rate, which relieves the local [banks and enables them to furnish the money necessary to grow another crop. . "The general adoption of such a warehousing plan by the cotton pro? ducing States would, in any opinion, result in the grower securing better j prices for his cotton and in insuring a more stable price, thus helping the j buyer and manufacturer, as well as i the grower." Yellow poplar, or tulip tree, the largest hroadleaf tree in America, has been known to reach nearly 200 feet j in height and 10 feet In diameter. MEN Cured Forever Hy a true Spe? zialist w h o possesses the experience of years. The right kind of experience ? doing the name thing the rlsmt way hundreds and perhaps thou? sands of tittles, with unfailing perms neu l re bUltS. I Jon t you think it tlmo to get tho r i a ii t treatment'' If you desire to consult a reliable loug-estuhllfched specialist of vast experience, come to me sad learn what can be accomplished with skillful, scientific treatment. I hold two medical diplomat! and certificates by exam nation and other requirements from tho l>oards of medical examiners of 14 states in tho U^loil. together with over 2\) years' ex perlenes la specialty practice. I luccesa fully treat blood Poison. Varicose Veins, Ulcers. Kidney and Madder Diseases. UlieutiiattsDi, uall Btones, Peralysia IHs rtiiirges, Piles and Rectual Trouble. Stricture and all Nervous. Chronic and private llsessesof Men and a/omen, Examination free and strictly confl dental. Hours; lam. to 7 p.m. Han days, to 3, Call or Write DR. REGISTER, Specialist, 506 UNION NA(I0\AL BANK BUILDING, COR. MAIN AND BEiVAII SIS.. Columbia, S. C. INDICTMENTS CHARGE LARCENY. Eleven Now BUM Returned RgMMM Bieget and Cooper. New York, April 7.?Eleven new in? dictments charging larceny were to? day returned against Henry Siegel and Prank Vogel. It is asserted that they obtained large sums of money from local banks by fraudulent state? ments regarding the financial condi? tion of their enterprises, it is alleged that. :hey secured two and a half mil? lion on false statements in 1913 alone. PRESIDENT <)E CENTRAL OF GA. \V. A. Winburn Elected to Succeed C. S. Mnrkham. Savannah, April 8.?\V. A. Win burn was today elected president of the Central of Georgia Railroad, suc? ceeding C. S. Markham. Mr. Mark ham retains the presidency of the Illinois Central. STRIKERS STOP TRAIN. Little Railroad Having a Rig Disturb? ance. Savannah, April 9.?Strike sympa , thlaers stopped a passenger train on I the Savannah and Northwestern (Brinspn) Railroad early this morning at St. Claire, near Augusta. The , sheriff has been appealed to for aid. The management today appealed to 1 the federal government for protection j to run mail trains. The line seems to , be completely tied up. HEARINGS BEGIN APRIL 9TIL Senate Committee to Hear Tolls Re? peal Discussed. Washington, April 7.?The senate interoceanic canals committee today agreed to hold the hearings on the tolls repeal clause bill beginning April 9th and continuing not later than April 24th. The Horse Show next spring is a certainty. Women who suffer from the weaknesses peculiar to their sex need a vitalizing tontc and 1 purifying remedy. This is furnished in the harmless and yet very effective com? pound that for i years has assisted and had the npproval ot thousands of women in the ?'aroiinus. Iis action is. first, to remove all blood impurities, the n to energize and regu? late all functions of the digestive system; then to feed all nerve centers. With this process the bodily functions become nor? mal, pain disappears, nerves are steadied and life becomes worth the living. Many of your neighbors have been helped by it. Try It FOWlMlf. Sad learn how they benefited. Your druggist probably has it. If not send his name and one dollar for a big bottle to REMEDY SALES CORPORATION, CHARLOTTE. N. C. Mrs. Joe Person's Wash sDeho^a in connection wiih the Remedy for the cure of sores and the relief of inflamed and congested surfaces. It is especially valuable to women, and shoild always be used for ulcerstions. \ BRIDGE TEETH ! By this work the den? tist: is able to fix per? manently between the teeth left to you artific? ial ones that are perfect in appearance and use? fulness. See Dr. Court? ney. He makes this work his specialty. H a v e an inspection. Get his opinion. 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