Merwell

“ They made Dave shiver as if with ague, and, all in a blaze he could not curb, he sprang towards Link Merwell. Out shot first one fist and then the other, the blows landing on the eye and chin of the tall youth. They made him stagger back against the ice-boat. ”

“ They felt that, no matter who won, they were going to see something worth while. Many secretly hoped that the boxing match would degenerate into a regular fight, for they knew that Dave and Merwell were bitter enemies, and the majority wanted to see the big bully soundly whipped. ”

“ And then the other girls joined in the call for assistance.
"You shut up!" exclaimed Merwell, sullenly. "We are not hurting you. If you don't shut up we'll land you on one of the islands and leave you there."
"Oh!" exclaimed the third girl, whose name was Sadie Fillmore, and then she nearly fainted from fright.
The motor boat was rounding a point of the cove when there came an unexpected scraping on the bottom. Then suddenly the craft slid up on a sandbar and careened to one side, almost tumbling some of the occupants into the water. ”

“ Again Del Norte rushed, but this time his wrist was seized and given a wrench that brought him, with a gasping groan of pain, to his knees.
"Fight done now!" muttered Red Ben, as he saw Merriwell lift his blood-stained blade.
"You're at my mercy, Del Norte," said Merry. "I [Pg 81] can kill you with a single stroke. I'll spare you if you speak the truth. Where is Inza Bur——"
Out of the shadows behind Merriwell darted a figure. A heavy club crashed on Frank's head.
Thus treacherously struck down, the brave youth dropped his knife and fell senseless to the ground. ”

“ Inza felt that Frank heartily disliked Del Norte, and she saw in Merry’s manner a trace of suspicion and doubt. He glanced searchingly at her, and then once more turned to survey the suave, smiling Mexican.
“You’re a very interesting person, Señor del Norte,” he said, in a cold tone of voice. “From what I have seen of you I fancy you are a great admirer of the ladies.”
Del Norte laughed softly and pleasantly.
“My dear Merriwell,” he said, with a touch of polite familiarity, “all the men of my country admire the ladies. It’s as natural for them as it is to breathe.” ”

“ Merwyn said to himself, as he walked through the deserted streets; "but I fear it was only the kindness of pitiful toleration. It is plainer than ever that she adores heroic action, that her ardor in behalf of the North is scarcely less than that of my mother for the South, and yet she thinks I am not brave enough to face a musket What a figure I make beside the men of whom we have heard to-night! Well, to get away, to be constantly employed, is my only hope. I believe I should become insane if I brooded much longer at home." ”

“ Truly you have no lack of conceit.”
“Hath he spoken for all of ye?” demanded the priest calmly, not a whit moved by this outburst. “Do all of ye choose death rather than life?”
“We choose nothing,” retorted Mervyn; “you are in our power. What is to prevent us slaying you?”
An evil grin spread over Nordhu’s features.
“This,” he cried, shaking aloft the ball he held, and at the movement the face of Chenobi grew pale as death; “the thunder-ball. ’Twill shatter you to fragments in a moment, if I but cast it at your feet.”
“Great Heaven!” whispered Mervyn to the baronet, “it’s a dried puff-ball! ”

“ Merriwell knew he was speaking of Juliet Reynolds, the handsome English girl who had captured his heart.
“Merry,” said Diamond, his face lighting for a moment, “she is the fairest creature the sun shines upon! But she has black hair and eyes; so have I. That is fatal. I have known we could never be happy together. I told you the reasons in London, before we went out to Henley that time. I did not mean to go, and I should have remained away. I became her slave at Henley, and I can never love another woman. Oh, but those were happy days on that house-boat, Merriwell! ”

“ Come now with me to Blackborough, the waggonette is waiting up the road at the bridge; we can catch the three o'clock mail at Llanilo. If you come, Mervyn, I will marry you in three days at the registrar's office."
"But," he gasped, half-drunk with her kisses, half-stunned by his remembrances.
She stamped her foot. "You must decide. I cannot stop here all night, some one may come. Oh! Mervyn! Mervyn! do you not feel that you were not made for this narrow life? You--you are no worse than others, and you have brains. You can make money if you will in the world, but not here." ”

“ The fortunate presence on the voyage of Mervale—who really seemed a very decent, quiet, generous sort of fellow—enabled George, when he could no longer keep up the pretence of good temper, to leave Miss Betterton in the care of the man from South Africa, returning when his equanimity was temporarily restored. Such was George's thankfulness to Mervale, that he determined to disclose to him the information concerning Miss Betterton's foreign friend in order to place him upon his guard.
"You are dull all at once, Mr. Wraight," complained Miss Betterton. "When we started you were quite bright. ”

“ Stooping over the cot, Merriwell spoke in his gentlest tones.
"How are you, my poor boy?" he said. "They would not let me see you before, saying it was best that you should be quiet and unexcited."
From amid the bandages a soft voice answered:
"They tell me I shall get well, Señor Merriwell, but I shall be horribly scarred during all the rest of the life which I may live. It is good to live, but it is terrible to be hideous." [Pg 247]
"I am sorry for you, Felipe," declared Merry, in a tone that told of the utmost sincerity. ”

“ Then he said:
“I should like to take another view of the house from outside, Mr Mervyn. It’s marvellously picturesque as seen from the road, and now I’ve seen the interior I shall be able to read new beauties into it.”
“Certainly,” assented Mervyn, beginning to think the speaker was a little over enthusiastic, or a little cracked—only he didn’t look the last. “We’ll go up to the road. The path you came down is the shortest.”
They went up, Mervyn contriving that the other should lead. When they gained the sluice, Varne stood expatiating afresh, on gables and old chimney stacks. ”

“ As Frank's only anxiety was in getting Mellor away, he did not attempt to stop the others from going out.
The rumpus attracted the attention of everybody in the main room of the saloon, and by the time the bartender had been sent to the floor a dozen or so others, most of them customers of the place, came crowding up to see what was the matter.
"Letsh not fight, Mer'well," said Mellor, with a tremendous attempt at dignity. "Letsh not get mixed up in a row." ”

“ Mr. Mergleson reflected and decided upon his line. He came up the service staircase, lifted his chin and with an air of meek officiousness went through the green door. There was no one now on the landing, there was nothing remarkable on the landing except a broken tumbler, but half-way up the grand staircase stood the Lord Chancellor. Under one arm the great jurist carried a soda water syphon and he grasped a decanter of whisky in his hand. He turned sharply at the sound of the green baize door and bent upon Mr. Mergleson the most terrible eyebrows that ever, surely! adorned a legal visage. ”

“ Merwyn so haunt me, when I could not give him even respect and friendship, although he sent an army into the field, yet was not brave enough to go himself? Where is he? What is he doing in these supreme hours of his country's history? Everything is at stake at the front, yes, and even here at the North, for I can see that papa dreads unspeakably what each day may bring forth, yet neither this terrible emergency nor the hope of winning my love can brace his timid soul to manly action. There is more manhood in one drop of the blood shed by Captain Lane than in Merwyn's whole shrinking body. ”

“ So brilliant was the glow that it paled the light of the priest’s stone, and, for a few seconds, Mervyn was compelled to veil his eyes with his manacled hands. Presently, as they became accustomed to the glare, he was able to take note of his surroundings.
He was standing in a vast natural amphitheatre in the heart of the mountain range. Around him, ledge upon ledge, terrace after terrace, rose the cliffs, and every cranny of the towering walls was crowded with fungi. Everywhere the luminous growths flourished, the floor of the amphitheatre alone being free from them. ”

“ I can’t say more, Merriwell; but I mean that—I mean it! You were my best friend. I’ve had time to think the old days here at Yale all over and over a hundred times, and I allow I’ve come to see things in their right light. I was an onery coyote, but you were my friend, and you kept me from going to the dogs. You gave me Winnie,” he whispered, “the best and truest little wife a man ever had! I can never repay you for that, Frank!”
“Don’t talk about paying for anything,” said Merriwell. “I am paid a thousand times for anything I did for you by seeing your happiness, old man. ”

“ It must have been an hour later that Mervyn woke, roused by a pebble at his window. He sat up with blurred consciousness, wondering vaguely what it was, until another pebble struck the pane, and a voice cried in a soft whisper, "Mervyn!"
Myfanwy! by all that was strange! Then in a second the whole memory of what had happened came back to him; but it came back to find him, as it were, a giant refreshed with sleep. None of us are really the same for two consecutive hours, and many a man will brave that in the morning, from which he would shrink at night. ”

“ It then became your ambition to make the most and best of men over whom you had influence, if they were worth the effort. Merwyn has been faulty and unmanly, as he fully admits himself, but he has proved apparently that he is not commonplace. You must take your choice, either to resent the past, or to help him carry out his better purposes. He does not ask much, although no doubt he hopes for far more. In granting his request you do not commit yourself to his hopes in the least. ”

“ Mrs. Annandale, commenting on Mervyn, said to herself in pettish despair, watching the tête-à-tête from the window of the commandant’s parlor,—she had promised Arabella to witness her proficiency from this coigne of vantage, for the outer air was too brisk without the off-set of active exercise, “Why doesn’t George Mervyn join them?” For she had observed Mervyn as he had quitted the orderly room, and marked his start of surprise and relaxed pace as his eyes fell upon the two,—then his dogged affectation of indifference as he briskly crossed to the block-house in the bastion. ”

“ I should like to wear my beautiful polo-suit and show her that I am a Pole. Merriwell won’t go. At least, he says he won’t. Now, we’re getting up a sort of combination jack-pot. Every Merriwell enemy is walking around the streets of this great and glorious city with his pockets turned inside out and his hands bulging with great rolls of green-backs, saying that Merriwell won’t go. So we’re collecting a fund for the needy, which is going to say that Merriwell will go, and that his team will knock the tar out of the boasters at New London. ”

“ The last light of the day shone on his smooth brown face, with its steady eyes and strong mouth.
"Yes," he said, and still through his quiet tones she seemed to hear a faint echo of the subdued twang which dwellers in the Far West sometimes acquire. "I, John Merrivale, late of California, beg to render to you, Hilary St. Orme, in addition to my respectful homage, that freedom for which you have not deigned to ask."
She stared at him dumbly, one hand pressed against her breast. The ripple of the river ran softly through the silence. Slowly at last Merrivale turned to go. ”

“ How little we knew of Acton before this week! yet at the beginning he seized the mob by the throat and has not once relaxed his grasp. He has been the one sleepless man in the city, and how he endures the strain is almost beyond mortal comprehension. The man and the hour came together. The same is true of Merwyn in his sphere. He had been preparing for this, hoping that it would give him an opportunity to right himself. Fearless as the best of your friends, he combines with courage the singularly cool, resolute nature inherited from his father. ”

“ Though the surprise must have been great, the man, who was large and strong, wheeled round to resist the attack, and the large dog, which had before been seen, sprang up from the deck and flew at Merriwell's throat. The ready club in the hands of Bart Hodge tumbled the dog over with a howl, and Merry and the big fisherman began to struggle in the growing darkness for the mastery. ”

“ Then these lost heart, and, turning, bounded down the steps.
The first attack had failed.
“Cannot we help?” asked Mervyn, as Chenobi turned round, smiling triumphantly.
“Nay,” returned the king; “spears are but puny weapons against a host. Besides, ye have no shields.”
“But it becomes us ill to stand idle,” persisted the scientist.
“If I should fall your turn will come,” replied Chenobi, and, with that, he faced about to meet a fresh attack.
“God forbid!” cried Mervyn fervently, but his words were drowned in the clamour of the savage horde that came charging up towards the terrace. ”

“ There can be nothing held in reserve now, Starbright—tell everything! It is the only way.”
“All right; but I did not mean to tell—you force it from me.”
“But be careful!” warned Merry. “I shall investigate. Make no charge you cannot back up.”
“It’s not much of a story. When I landed at the Grand Central, I saw Inza there. She did not see me. She was there to meet some one. The one she met was a handsome young man about your age, Merriwell. She ran to him with outstretched hands, and he caught her in his arms. ”

“ Merwyn's eyes came down from the curling smoke to Strahan's face with a flash, and he rose and paced the room for a moment, then said, in his old quiet tones, "They say the child is father of the man."
"Oh well, Merwyn," was the slightly irritable rejoinder, "I have and ever had, you remember, a way of expressing my thoughts. If, while abroad, you have become intolerant of that trait, why, the sooner we understand each other the better. I don't profess to be anything more than an American, and I called to-day with no other motive than the obvious and natural one." ”