Photoplay (Jul - Dec 1919)

prize-tishter hy profession ami a licbauche by prefiTfUce, he was known and feared throughout the neighburhuod. Lucy hail come to her strange foster ither thirteen years before. Her mother, hysterically muttiTing something oi in urpent need for fleeing her p;>reatal alxnie. had put the infant in Burrows' arms and then Photoplay Magazine 5? ing, Lucy had wandered from the abode and passed Chenij Huan s shop. In her face the Chink recognized signs of unhappmess. and all ol the goodness in his heart swelle.l into a longmg to l)e ol comfort and a.»urance to the child The drowsmess of the dry poppy-blood still within him curiously painted her into a background that was exquisitely oriental' in the mmd of Huan White Blossom In-came a Chinese child-^ clad in wondrous oriental silks, lathed with e.\(|uisite perfumes—and protected by Huans overwhelming reverence. . _ . . Following her. he wandered out of his idyllic dream and when a chink lurched against her on the curb the wrath of her idolator was poorly restrained when he only threw the fellow to the ground. Later that afternoon, the Battler came storming back home He hati just tinished another session with his man ager who had Ix-en particularly insi>tant that he give up hi> hquor-love during the proce.ss of training for his next tight. Finding Lucy at home, he roared for his lea and when she spilled .some on his hand, fell on her unmercifully, lashing her into unconsciousness. Some hours later the child awoke. Staggering slowly to her feet, she groaned uniler the wiight of pain and misery. Further residence in the hou.sc of the Battler was impossible, she decided. A great desire to get away came over her— a wish to put behind her the den of torture, the low lit room of Battling Burrows, in which every corner suggested abysmal lury and unreasoning cruelty. She sneaked out of the house and went, following I hi shadows, away from this place of horror. Finallv she came f?-,! T^ .. : .r.,ugh perhaps the same magic chemistry by evolve in the mud of the ages. Lucy had --^ o' fourteen and still lived, and dreamed — and s.-niied. Onnkine with slatternly women was the Battler's weakness. Bet^rt-n r^ies he fought. When he lost, which was seldom. hr> manjj r would attribute it to physical unfitness: and when be w. n h :aid off whipping Lucv to receive the plaudits of hi> t-m London $ followers. Also when he lost— his manager raked him over the coals, admonishing his looseness, demandI^ a dec«-nt respect for the pugilists golden rules. And when the :r.ir.j::fr thus berated him. Burrows took it all meeklv enough ir.d then, working himself info a frenzv of wrath, went home and leapt upon his child, senselesslv exploding his t'jry on her. >De day. after the Battler had been particularly persecut to the threshold of Cheng Huans shop and here, tired and exhausted, she crept into the room and collapsed onto the floor. Shortly after this. Cheng Huan returned from his noodles and tea and a pipe of chamlu in a place not far distant and stumbled over the figure of the child. The aroma of the lilied pipe .still m his brain, for a moment the Chinaman tfM)k this for an opium fantasy. But instantly he knew this was not so; that While Blossom— the holv. refining influence of his life, lay prostrate on his floor, herself obvicjuslv in need of comfort and protection. Reverently he lifted the child into his arms as she stirred in her deep sleep, and swiftly took her to the room above. White Blossom received the first kindness she had ever known. Though startled over the vision of a vellow face staring into hers, the dulcet, reassuring manner of Cheng Huan as he told her of his purpose le<l to trust and relaxation She came to smile into his face and Cheng Huan was lifted clear of the insidious depths of Limehouse existence ( heng Huan bathed her wounds, applying lotions the likes of which no white man had ever concocted and then heaped her with soft sijks and oriental garments that he had hoarded in a teak-wood chest— against some nameless future.