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Title: The Silent Barrier
Author: Louis Tracy
Illustrator: J. V. McFall
A. W. Parsons
Release date: March 14, 2010 [eBook #31635]
Most recently updated: January 6, 2021
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31635
Credits: Produced by D Alexander and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
produced from images generously made available by The
Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SILENT BARRIER ***
Produced by D Alexander and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
produced from images generously made available by The
Internet Archive)
The
Silent Barrier
BY
LOUIS TRACY
AUTHOR OF
CYNTHIA'S CHAUFFEUR, A SON OF THE
IMMORTALS, THE WINGS OF THE MORNING, ETC.
ILLUSTRATIONS BY
J. V. McFALL
Page decorations by A. W. PARSONS from
photographs by THE ENGADINE PRESS
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1908, 1911, BY
EDWARD J. CLODE
Entered at Stationers' Hall
[Illustration: "Spare me one moment, Miss Wynton," he said.
_Frontispiece_]
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE WISH 1
II. THE FULFILLMENT OF THE WISH 19
III. WHEREIN TWO PEOPLE BECOME BETTER
ACQUAINTED 41
IV. HOW HELEN CAME TO MALOJA 64
V. AN INTERLUDE 84
VI. THE BATTLEFIELD 103
VII. SOME SKIRMISHING 122
VIII. SHADOWS 144
IX. "ETTA'S FATHER" 167
X. ON THE GLACIER 189
XI. WHEREIN HELEN LIVES A CROWDED
HOUR 212
XII. THE ALLIES 232
XIII. THE COMPACT 253
XIV. WHEREIN MILLICENT ARMS FOR THE
FRAY 275
XV. A COWARD'S VICTORY 298
XVI. SPENCER EXPLAINS 321
XVII. THE SETTLEMENT 337
Ich muss--Das ist die Schrank, in welcher mich die Welt
Von einer, die Natur von andrer Seite hält.
FR. RÜCKERT: _Die Weisheit des Brahmenen._
[I must--That is the Barrier within which I am pent by the World on
the one hand and Nature on the other.]
THE SILENT BARRIER
CHAPTER I
THE WISH
"Mail in?"
"Yes, sir; just arrived. What name?"
"Charles K. Spencer."
The letter clerk seized a batch of correspondence and sorted it with
nimble fingers. The form of the question told him that Spencer was
interested in letters stamped for the greater part with bland
presentments of bygone Presidents of the United States. In any event,
he would have known, by long experience of the type, that the well
dressed, straight limbed, strong faced young man on the other side of
the counter was an American. He withdrew four missives from the
bundle. His quick eyes saw that three bore the Denver postmark, and
the fourth hailed from Leadville.
"That is all at present, sir," he said. "Would you like your mail sent
to your room in future, or shall I keep it here?"
"Right here, please, in No. 20 slot. I could receive a reply by cable
while I was going and coming along my corridor."
The clerk smiled deferentially. He appreciated not only the length of
the corridor, but the price paid by the tenant of a second floor suite
overlooking the river.
"Very well, sir," he said, glancing again at Spencer, "I will
attend to it;" and he took a mental portrait of the man who could
afford to hire apartments that ranked among the most expensive in
the hotel. Obviously, the American was a recent arrival. His suite
had been vacated by a Frankfort banker only three days earlier,
and this was the first time he had asked for letters. Even the
disillusioned official was amused by the difference between the two
latest occupants of No. 20,--Herr Bamberger, a tub of a man, bald
headed and bespectacled, and this alert, sinewy youngster, with the
cleancut features of a Greek statue, and the brilliant, deep set,
earnest eyes of one to whom thought and action were alike familiar.
Spencer, fully aware that he was posing for a necessary picture,
examined the dates on his letters, nipped the end off a green cigar,
helped himself to a match from a box tendered by a watchful boy,
crossed the entrance hall, and descended a few steps leading to the
inner foyer and restaurant. At the foot of the stairs he looked about
for a quiet corner. The luncheon hour was almost ended. Groups of
smokers and coffee drinkers were scattered throughout the larger room,
which widened out below a second short flight of carpeted steps. The
smaller anteroom in which he stood was empty, save for a few people
passing that way from the restaurant, and he decided that a nook near
a palm shaded balcony offered the retreat he sought.
He little dreamed that he was choosing the starting point of the most
thrilling adventure in a life already adventurous; that the soft
carpet of the Embankment Hotel might waft him to scenes not within the
common scope. That is ever the way of true romance. Your knight errant
may wander in the forest for a day or a year,--he never knows the
moment when the enchanted glade shall open before his eyes; nay, he
scarce has seen the weeping maiden bound to a tree ere he is called in
to couch his lance and ride a-tilt at the fire breathing dragon. It
was so when men and maids dwelt in a young world; it is so now; and it
will be so till the crack of doom. Manners may change, and costume;
but hearts filled with the wine of life are not to be altered. They
are fashioned that way, and the world does not vary, else Eve might
regain Paradise, and all the fret and fume have an end.
Charles K. Spencer, then, would certainly have been the most
astonished, though perhaps the most self possessed, man in London had
some guardian sprite whispered low in his ear what strange hazard lay
in his choice of a chair. If such whisper were vouchsafed to him he
paid no heed. Perhaps his occupancy of that particular corner was
preordained. It was inviting, secluded, an upholstered backwash in the
stream of fashion; so he sat there, nearly stunned a waiter by asking
for a glass of water, and composed himself to read his letters.
The waiter hesitated. He was a Frenchman, and feared he had not heard
aright.
"What sort of water, sir," he asked,--"Vichy, St. Galmier,
Apollinaris?"
Spencer looked up. He thought the man had gone. "No, none of those,"
he said. "Just plain, unemotional water,--_eau naturelle_,--straight
from the pipe,--the microbe laden fluid that runs off London tiles
most days. I haven't been outside the hotel during the last hour; but
if you happen to pass the door I guess you'll see the kind of essence
I mean dripping off umbrellas. If you don't keep it in the house, try
to borrow a policeman's cape and s Next |