"MOVING PICTURE STORIES"
A Weekly Magazine Devoted to Photoplays and Players
PRICE SEVEN CENTS PER COPY
Each number contains Four Stories of the Best Films on the Screens—Elegant Half-tone Scenes from the Plays—Interesting Articles About Prominent People in the Films—Doings of Actors and Actresses in the Studios and Lessons In Scenario Writing.
HARRY E. WOLFF, Pub., 166 W. 23rd St., N. Y.
[THE RENEGADE'S FATE.]
By Kit Clyde.
"Then you will not listen to me?"
"No. I believe you to be a wicked man, and I will never consent to sacrifice my child to such as you."
"But if she loves me?"
"She does not—she cannot! She knows your evil reputation, and her heart is another's."
"I will wait. She loves me, and will be mine. I am sure of it."
"Never! And now, as we have already prolonged this meeting beyond reason, go, and never speak to me on the subject again."
"Very well, Giles Raynor, I shall not. I shall speak to your daughter instead."
"Do so at your peril, Tom Walden! Now go!"
"Good-morning, Farmer Raynor, and a better temper to you when we meet again."
The man whose suit had been refused went away with a smile upon his dark face, and without the least threat against his rival, or the man who had given him his dismissal, nor the least suggestion that he meant otherwise than to honestly win the girl whom he professed to love.
Giles Raynor was a settler in the far Northwest, and a man of importance in the little town which he had founded.
Tom Walden had come among the settlers within a year, and had affected a great liking for Grace Raynor, the farmer's daughter, and had asked for her hand in marriage.
Walden claimed to be a lumberman, but there were those who said that he had come into this lonely region to get ahead of an evil reputation, and although he might be what he avowed, he was no honest man seeking to make a living in these wilds.
It was said, although not too openly, that Tom Walden was a gambler and a thief; that he had fled to escape punishment for his crimes, and that even now, in his new home, he was not above suspicion, and that many had been made victims of his unscrupulous methods.
Grace Raynor had expressed an open dislike to him, and was reported to be engaged to marry Jack Woodson, an honest young fellow at work in the sawmill in town, the only support of a widowed mother, and as free-hearted, generous-handed a young man as one could meet.
No one knew definitely if the young people were engaged, for they kept their own counsel, and when slyly questioned about the matter replied that people would know all about it as soon as it became necessary for them to do so.
Tom Walden left the farmer's house, ostensibly to go to work in the woods, and Giles Raynor gave little thought to him, having other matters to occupy his mind.
He left his daughter to look after the house, as usual, when he went into the fields, saying nothing to her about Walden's proposal, not deeming it necessary to worry her.
When he came home at noon his wife said that Grace had gone to another town to make some purchases, being unable to obtain what she wanted in their own village, expecting to return by the middle of the afternoon.
When evening came she had not returned, and the farmer began to feel a vague alarm concerning her, although Walden had uttered no threats against her, or any one in whom she was interested.
At nightfall a boy brought a note to the farmer, saying that it had been given him by a woman closely veiled, an hour before, on the extreme verge of the town.
The note read as follows:
"Dear Father: I have gone away with the man I love—Tom Walden. Do not pursue us, for we will not be brought back alive. By the time you receive this we will be married.
"GRACE."
The farmer handed the note to his wife, his face expressing the astonishment he felt.
"It is not true," said Mrs. Raynor. "Grace told me only this noon that she loved Jack Woodson, and that they intended to be married in the fall, but that they did not want it generally known just yet."
"Then this scoundrel Walden has carried her off!" cried the farmer.
"Grace never wrote that letter," said the wife. "She is a truthful girl, and has told me often that she never loved any one but Jack, and to-day, as I told you, she said that she and Jack had fixed on the day for their wedding."
The farmer took the note, put on his glasses, and read it again, more carefully.
"It's her handwriting, as sure as I sit here," he said; "but that scoundrel has made her write it, and has carried her off."
"Grace would die sooner than write a lie," said the mother.
At that moment Jack Woodson entered the room.
"Where is Grace? What is this story I hear?" he asked excitedly.
The farmer handed him the note, which he read hurriedly and then tossed upon the floor.
"It's a lie! a false, cruel lie!" he cried. "My darling never wrote that—never could write it. It's the work of that villain, Walden. Do you know what I have just heard? Tom Walden was arrested on a charge of forgery in Chicago—would have gone to prison, for his conviction was certain, but jumped his bail, and fled. His name is not Walden at all. There is a man at the hotel who knows all about him, and described him this very hour. More than that, there is an old indictment against him in New York for murder. The plea was self-defence, and the case never came to trial. Now they have new evidence that he deliberately murdered the man. He was then known as Tom Walden. My Grace run away with a man like that! Never! He has carried her off, and has written this note himself to deceive us. He has stolen her, but I will pursue him and bring her back, if I have to kill him to do it!"
Then, without further words, he rushed from the house into the darkness.
The next morning he had disappeared, and no one knew where he had gone, nor for months did the settlers hear tidings of him or of Grace or of Tom Walden.
In one of the wildest parts of the Northwest woods an Indian village had been built.
There were no white settlers within many miles, and the tribe was said to be a peaceful one, never going on the warpath, and always treating with kindness the few straggling whites who made their way into this wilderness.
In one of the larger lodges of the village, one pleasant afternoon in the late autumn, were a man of about forty and a girl not much over twenty.
The girl's complexion was fair, and she had none of the characteristics of the Indian, although dressed like one.
The man was tall and swarthy, with long, black hair, which hung straight down upon his broad shoulders, his face was cruel and crafty, and his every look was evil.
He was dressed in half-savage, half-civilized style, wearing a fur cap, an embroidered hunting-shirt of buckskin, woolen trousers, heavy boots, and a red sash in which were thrust a brace of pistols and a knife.
"See here, Grace," he said to the girl who sat before him on a low couch of skins, "I haven't brought you here for nothing, and you must be my wife."
"Never, Tom Walden, or whatever your evil name is," said the girl. "Far from home and friends, among these wild and savage men, less pitiless than you are, I can still defy you. I will never be your wife!"
"These people are my allies," said Walden. "I have inflamed them against the whites, and they are ready to go on the warpath if I bid them. They will kill you as soon as any one, if I give the word, and I will if you do not consent to——"
"Never!" cried Grace, springing to her feet. "I doubt not that you have told many lies to account for my disappearance, since you dragged me from my home by your baseness. You are false enough to make war against your own people, but I do not fear you, no matter what you threaten. Kill me, if you will, and release me from my misery!"
"I've a mind to take you at your word!" cried Walden, seizing the girl by the wrist and raising his knife as if to strike.
The maiden never flinched; but at that moment an Indian youth sprang into the lodge and threw himself between the renegade and the girl.
"White man no strike the white flower!" he cried.
"Who are you?" growled the man, looking fixedly at the youth.
"Me Young Elk. Me live far off, me come to village, me have friend."
"Well, Mr. Young Elk, this is my squaw, and you will take yourself off and mind your——"
"Paleface lie! The white flower is not his squaw!" the young Indian replied.
"Get out of here!" hissed the renegade.
"No! Young Elk stay. White flower need friend. Me be her friend."
"Blame you!" hissed Walden. "We'll see if any mere boy can defy me! Out of the way, dog!"
"No," said the Indian. "Not while white flower stay. Young Elk be friend to white woman; bad paleface shall not strike."
"Thank you, my friend, but I fear him not," said Grace.
"I will conquer you yet!" hissed the renegade, as he rushed from the lodge, the Indian boy having stepped aside.
As soon as Walden had gone, Grace left the lodge and hurried into the forest, where she ran on till she reached a pool of water which made its way swiftly into a cave amid the great ledges of rock.
The spot was at some distance from the village, the trees grew thick and high, and the path between them was narrow and winding, and easily lost; but the girl had evidently been there before, for when she reached the opening in front of the pool she looked around her with an air of security.
Walden, leaving the lodge, went to the chiefs, whom he found gathered in council.
"Who is Young Elk?" demanded Walden.
"He is my kinsman," said one of the chiefs.
"He is a meddler!" snarled the renegade. "I will kill him if he does not take care!"
"No, False Heart will not!" cried the old chief. "False Heart lies, he has told crooked tales of the paleface, he is a bad man. He would make us go on the warpath when the whites have not wronged us. It is he who will have to take care lest Young Elk kill him!"
Inflamed with rage, Walden left the council and hurried into the forest. As he hurried along the narrow path he was followed by Young Elk.
Reaching the opening, Walden found Grace upon her knees at the edge of the pool. "I cannot bear to leave this bright world," she murmured, "but I could not bear the disgrace, the shame of being that man's wife! Oh! why is there no one to help me?"
"Die, if you will have it so!" cried the renegade, raising his hand to strike.
Upon the instant, the young Indian who had been trailing him, sprang forward, seized the renegade by the throat and hurled him into the pool.
"Grace, my darling!" he cried, taking the girl in his strong grasp and drawing her away.
"Jack! You!" she cried. "Then you are Young Elk?"
"No; he is my friend. He it was who found you here in the village, and told me, and none too soon. I have sought you in many places. The Indian boy who gave your father the letter forged by Walden confessed that the villain had taken you to some tribe far away, and I began my search. I went from tribe to tribe, finding you not, and at last met Young Elk, whose life I saved. He went with me from village to village, making inquiries, and here at last he found you. But what has become of that scoundrel?"
"The strong current must have carried him into yonder cave," said Grace. "The Indians say the stream never issues forth after leaving the light."
"Then the scoundrel has met his just reward for all his crimes," said Jack. "Come, I have found you, and now we will return, never to be parted again."
It is needless to say that Grace's parents were overjoyed at her safe return, and on the appointed day Jack and Grace became man and wife.