I Conquered""

Man Go

h is a long walk. Danny Lenox walked it this June day. As he left the house his stride was long a

chaos into which he had been plunged. Danny had suddenly found that many things in life are to be considered seriously. An hour ago they could have been numbered on

had hammered home became crystal clear. He had been merely a waster, and

brain against the host of strange facts he found this impulse becoming stronger, growing into a healthy dete

pproached a familiar haunt that urge became more insistent and the palms of his hands commenced to sweat. He crossed the street and made on down the other side. He had wasted his ability to do, had let th

o do was to cut his environment, to get away, off anywhere, to a place where he could build anew. The idea of getting away associated itself with one thing in his mind: means of transp

ntents. He looked with a whimsical smile at the stuff produced: handkerchiefs, pocket-knife, gold pencil, tobacco pouc

ed bills together in a pile and stacked the coins. That done, he swept up the rest o

meanwhile, st

up a bit?"

aised h

he said soberly.

his own voice act

e over your line?" he ask

red hard; t

ant that much w

this." He took out a ten-dollar bill. "I'

r with the eraser end of his pencil, then cou

hicago?" he asked. "We can s

ounter and flipped it in the air. Catching it

Lou

lated, referring to t

n to Danny: "Out of Denver I can give you the Un

iddle

ght-D.

time-tables, more figuring, mo

at-" as he ran his finger down th

er to the glass-covered map

ado?" he asked, leaning h

er indicated w

the Royal Gorge here, and right in here-" he put the lead point down on the red

hite dot in the red line and then

said with no hint of lightness. "

mewhat akin to pleading, and heard the man mutter:

d. He was going to Colt, Colorado. He looked back a

Colo

, as he commenced putting his prop

d the clerk, glancing at the clock, "because

get there!" Then, as though to himself, but still in the

hrough the Grand Central train shed to where his Pullman waited. The

ryin' nothin',

he passed into the vestibule, "

mmenced going round and round his knotty problem. His plan ha

into the unknown, ignorant of his own capabilities, realizing only that he was weak. He thought of tho

all of his nerves. He had not had a drink since early las

had made so steely strong. He felt for his cigarette case. It was empty, but the tobacco pouch held a

in to enter, and a fat man b

off. "Sorry. I'll be back in a jif

for Danny, who lighted his cigarette and

ck, his eyes dancing. In his h

oze ever turned out of a gin mill, I'll go

flask to one

, raising the flask high and the

dy glitter. He could hear the gurgle of the liquid; his own throat responded in movement as he watc

an with a sigh as he lo

ed. "Ah! No whisky's bad, bu

ard Danny, he said: "Try it,

oor. His face suddenly had become tight and white and harried. He paused at the entry, holding the

u know," said Danny w

fat man who had produced

a time staying off it. But

y of tense thinking with a word or a wish. And while he tried for that end the boy commenced to realize that perhaps he had not so far to seek for his fresh start. Perhaps it was not waiting for him in Colt, Colorado.

an to make unequivocal demands for the stuff that had held it to high pitch. Tantalizingly at first, with the thirsting throat and jumping muscles; then with thundering assertions that warped the vision and numbed the intellect and toyed with the will. He gave up try

fighting the words of his fathe

over. "It was brutal; but he was right! I've wasted, I'

oad, driving him on. A chord deep within him had been touched by the raining blows from his father, and the vibrations o

station platform at a stop, he saw men in the buffet car lift glasses to their lips and smile at one other. It was this that drew him away from an

hat made the weakness gnaw the harder at his will. But he fought against it, o

of a continent's vitals had

ith the realization of the grandeur of it all he was torn between a

ches between stations became longer, the towns more flimsy, newer. A species of terror filled him as he gazed moodily from his Pullman window out across that panorama to the north. Why, he could see as far as to the Canadian boundary, it seemed! On and on, rising gently, ever flowing, never ending, went the prairie. Here an

ch a paltry particle, screaming to a heaven that

he mou

who fussed and puttered down there in its eternal shadow; at Long's Peak, piercing the sky as though striving to be away from humans; at Pike, shimmerin

ith the might of which men are so proud;

hite-faced Herefords lifted their heads momentarily toward

e narrow defiles at the grace of the towering heights which-so alive did they seem-coul

ntry. The subway, backed by its millions in bonds, planned by constructive genius, executed by master minds, a thing to write into the history of all time, was a mole-passage compared to this gorge! The Woolworth, labor of years, girders mined on Superior, stones quarried elsewhere, concrete, tiling, cables, woods, all manner of fixt

n that grandeur, an element which reached down for him like a helping hand and offer

ering hands, will only stick by me I'll show 'em yet!" he decl

keep his vagrant mind from running into vinous paths, the brak

is Col

and watched the little clump of buildings swell to natural size. He reached into h

o had dropped off from the first coach as it passed the station, ran ou

wed its departure. After it had disappeared around the distant curve he retained a pi

sun beat down on the squat, green depot and cinder platform, sending the quivering hea

d about to gaze far down into a ragged gorge where

d flat and smooth looking in the crystal distan

still country, failing to comprehend the fact of arrival. Then h

oroughfare four times as wide as Broadway. Sleeping saddle ponies stood, each with a hip slumped and nose low to the y

ood here and there among the

ck pens, with high and unpainted fen

fting blindly for hope, for comfort, found the thing whic

t distances to which they reached. All were plastered up against a sky so blue that it seemed thick, and as though the color must soon begin to drip. Glory! The majesty of the earth's ragged crust, the exquisite harmony o

nning-or