Picture Show (May-Oct 1920)

Picture Show, October dtli, 1920. CHARMING COMPLETE STORY OF AN OLD LOVE AND THE NEW. tvMizzoufi Special to the " Picture Show." _m_k n__ *i_ 1Z TJ W WHEN pretty Kate Vernon returned from a fashionable young ladies' finishing school at St. Louis to her native village in Pike County, Missouri, and entered her humble home, her heart tank vithin her. Everything about thd bouse seemed so coarse and degrading. Her lather, t lie village blacksmith, was washing himself in. a bowl at the kitchen sink, splashing all over the place, and when be bad finished he reached tor the first thing lie could find, which would act as a towel. It happened to be his wife's kitchen apron. Having used it be threw it on the floor as he turned to his daughter with a cheerful grin. " Well, Katie glad to be home again ? " " Of course I am, father," replied the girl, but (here was no enthusiasm in her voice. Kate went upstairs to change her dress as hcr mother (whom she bad already seen) came bustling in to tell her dinner vas ready. Mrs. Vernon was a pleasant-faced woman with a heart of cold, but she was a bit carelessin her appearance. Kate loved her mother very dearly, but just now, in the first impressions of her homecoming, she could only notice her mother's untidiness. Having changed her dress, Kate opened a trunk and took out a photograph of a \ >iing man. He was very stylishly dressed and good looking, but it was in a cold and sinister way. He .vns not exactly the kind of man men would have trusted very far, but to Kate Vernon be was Romance. Xie had met him by accident in St. Louis, and they had met many times secretly, despite the rigid super\ ision of the head mistress of the school. " He would never marry me if he saw my home," I bought Kate despondently. Could the man whose face she was looking at have heard hcr he would have smiled sarcastically, liobert Travcrs had never had any intention of marrying Kate. There were many reasons for this — the chief one being that he had a wife already whom be had callously deserted. An insistent call from her mother brought Kate to dinner. It was served in the kitchen, and though the food was good Kate had no appetite for it owing to the way it was served and eaten. Her father and mother preferred a knife to a fork when they were transferring vegetables to their mouths, and her sister Lisbeth dutifully followed t heir example. The meal over, Kate went to the sink to help to wash up, and shuddered when she saw the niece of rag her mother lianded her to wipe the dishes. As soon as she had made the kitchen a bit tidier, and was sitting down by the fire, mentally contrasting her home with the school, a shadow fell across the stone tloor. Kate looked up and saw a tall man with a strong clean-cut face looking at her smilingly from a pair of deep grey eyes. The girl's face lighted up in response, and she ran to meet film. " Are you glad to see me, Jim ? " she said. " No need to ask that, Kate. I reckon there ain't nobody more pleased to sec you than Jim Radburn, Ycpt your dad and mam, of course." Jim Itadburn was the Sheriff of Pike County and be had just entered on bis fourth year of olllce with I be reputation of never having killed a man, though he bad risked bis own life many times In the cause oi duty. He had grown up with Kate and before she had left for school I bey had been recognised by the village as sweethearts. But with the coming of Robert Travels, Kate had forgotten all about Jim Uadburn In the light of a lover, though she regarded him as a staunch friend. The man was quick to s?e the difference in her greeting to the way she had parted from him. Uc looked down at her kindly and tenderly. " Two years' school has made a big change in you, Kate," he said. " I suppose it has, Jim," replied the gill. She gave a comprehensive glance round the kitchen. " Everything Is so dillerent here from what I got used to at the college." •tadbnrn nodded undcrstandingly and changed the subject. " I've bad a blow to-day, Kate. You know Sam Fowler, that's engaged to my sister Kmily ? He's teen arrested on a charge of being an accomplice in a train robbery. You know Sam is an express guard. \ our dad just showed me the paper, and I'm going down to the police-station to see what I can do." " I don't believe Sam would do such a thing," said Kate. H I'm sure he wouldn't," replied the sheriff quietly " but he's not the first innocent man that has been put in a guilty fellow's place. Well, so long. QueS3 I'd better be moving." When Jim Kadburn returned that night he at once sought out Joe Vernon. ' Well, what's the news about Sam ? " asked the blacksmith. " I think we shall be able to get the Governor to release him," replied the Sheriff. " This is Sam's story, and I may sav right here I believe every word of it. Just as the train steamed out of the station a stranger jumped on his car and showed him a note signed by the managing director of the line on which was written : ' Pass bearer on to your car.' Sam took the note to be genuine, and went about his work. The stranger offered to help him, and while Sam was bending down arranging the registered mail packets, the stranger took the revolver out of Sam's holster, and hit him a clip over the head with it. Sam got up feeling mighty dazed, but he put up some sort of a fight, till the stranger again bit him over the bead and Sam remembers no more, The fact that Sam was found unconscious with two wounds in his head bears out bis story, and from inside knowledge I think I can say that he will soon be released. Sam says he can recognise the strangei again, and from what I have been able to make out, the guy has not been able to get away. I'm on the look-out for him, and I have wired all the sheriffs in the district Ins description. He's a good-looking fellow, bnt the worst of it is, from my point of view, that his description would fit almost any good-looker. But sav, Joe, there's another thing I want to talk to you about. You ain't by any chance told Kate that I paid for hcr schooling, have von ? " " Never a won!," replied the blacksmith. " What makes you. ask ? " " Nothing in particular," replied the sheriff, " but I sort of thought that she looked at me kind of strange when I saw her to-day. She has changed, hasn't she, in the two years ? " t " I should think she has," replied Joe Vernon. Seems to me that she thinks we ain't good enough for her now. I was mighty keen on giving hcr a good education, but. I'm not so sure we were right, Jim. She don't say nothing wrong, if vou get me, hut you can see by the way she looks at all of us, that she sort of despises us. She says to me to-day, after you'd gone, ' I do hope, dad, that when vou get in the legislature, we shall have a different kind of home.' I says to her : ' Don't you go count ing vour chickens before they're hatched, it ain't certain that I'll be elected.' By the way Jim I heard that they were going to ask you to put up." The sheriff' nodded. " That's so, but I haven't decided yet. I'm not very keen on polities." Joe Vernon was about to reply when a piece ol coal flew from the smithy fire. " Drat that Bill Sarber," he exclaimed, " I paid him for the best coal, and he's mixed it with clinker." The sheriff picked up the niece of hard stone that had flown out of the fire and looked at it closely. " There's a fortune in this, Joe," he said. That bit of land we have between us Is choked with this ftuff. Look at It. Hard as steel. Just the thing for ballast for that new railroad they're going to put down. Don't say a word about this to anybody." The sheriff left the smithy and strolled round to the. house. Kate was in the kitchen alone, and as he walked In she came up to him. " Jim," she said, "I want you to do mc a favour. Don't stand against father for the legislature." " You can consider my nomination withdrawn, Kate," said Kadburn. 'There ain't nothing I wouldn't do for you, Kate. I only wish you were as bapny as you used to be before you went to school. What's the matter ? Can I help ? " No, Jim, I'd ask you if you could. It's something private. Don't ask me." " Well, you know that you've only got to put up your finger when you need mc, Kate," said the sheriff. " I'm going down town now. See you to-morrow." • . The Coming of Travers. JIM KADUCUN was very much worried about Kate Vernon In the days that followed. Ho would have given his life to save the girl pain, yet he lelt that lie could do nothing to help. He knew that Kate no longer loved him, and though his own love was stronger than ever, he did not mention it. It was not pride that kept him from speaking, but the certain knowledge that it he asked her to lie his wife, it would hurt Kate to have to refuse him. Matters were in this state when Robert Travcrs turned up in the village and railed at the Vernons. Kate did not know whether to be pleased or displeased at the visit. She introduced him to her family, and from the scarcely concealed sneer that passed over his face as he acknowledged the introductions she knew be despised her family. As for the Vernons. they took no pains to hide the fact that they did not like Travers. Mrs. Vernon had grave misgivings about the handsome stranger, but she was an easy-going woman and made no objection to him calling on Kate and taking her for walks, but one night when Kate returned she spoke to hcr. " You been out with that Travers, Kate ? " she said. " Yes, mother," replied her daughter. Hcr pretty face was flushed, and there was a defiant note iu hcr voice as' she added : " Why do you ask ? " " Because, I don't think that young man means any good to you, my girl," retorted her mother tartly. " He's above you in station, and I don't hold with girls going about with men above them." " Then you shouldn't have sent mc to school," said Kate. " Mr. Travers is just in the same closs as all the people I met at school, and now that I have been educated it Is the only class I care about. None ol you like him, I know, but that's because he's a gentleman. I suppose Jim Radburn has been talking about him to you. He's jealous of Mr. Travcrs. But he need not be, because in any caso I would not marry Jim Radburn." " Jim Radburn is too much of what I should cull a gentleman by nature to say anything nbout anybody unless he said it to their face," replied Mrs. \ernon calmly. " Before you went to sciionl you thought he was nice, but since you've come back nobody in the village is good enough for you — not even your own family. Jim IUdburn has always been kind to you." " I kno_w he has, and if he has not told you anything you might as well learn from mc," said Kate. Sine* 1 have been back he has done something for me because he loves me, but 1 told him wc could never he more than friends. I learned things at school," retorted Kate. " What never seems to strike any of you is, that it wouldn't hurt you to sec things' my way." She dashed upstairs as she finished speaking, and Mrs. Vernon sat down with a sigh. The next day Kate saw Jim Radburn. and stopped him as he was passing the gate. She had a grmiinw regard for the young sheriff, and before she met. Travers had derided tint It he asked her she would marry him. Deep In her heart she knew Kadburn was a man anv girl might be proud to marry, but v