The Adventures of Kathlyn

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The Adventures of Kathlyn

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MacGrath
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Title: The Adventures of Kathlyn
Author: Harold MacGrath

Release Date: December 27, 2005 [eBook #17402]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
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THE ADVENTURES OF KATHLYN
by
HAROLD MACGRATH
Author of The Man on the Box, The Goose Girl, Half a Rogue, etc.

[Frontispiece: It will be a hard trek.]

Indianapolis The Bobbs-Merrill Company Publishers Copyright 1914
Harold MacGrath

TO W. N. SELIG

CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I
THE GOLDEN GIRL II THE UNWELCOME THRONE III THE
TWO ORDEALS IV HOW TIME MOVES V THE COURT OF THE
LION VI THE TEMPLE VII QUICKSANDS VIII THE SLAVE
MART IX THE COLONEL IN CHAINS X WAITING XI THE
WHITE ELEPHANT XII THE PLAN OF RAMABAI XIII LOVE XIV

THE VEILED CANDIDATES XV THE SEVEN LEOPARDS XVI
THE RED WOLF XVII LORD OF THE WORLD XVIII PATIENCE
XIX MAGIC XX BATTLE, BATTLE, BATTLE XXI THE WHITE
GODDESS XXII BEHIND THE CURTAINS XXIII REMORSE
XXIV THE INVINCIBLE WILL XXV ON THE SLOOP XXVI THE
THIRD BAR

ILLUSTRATIONS
It will be a hard trek (Frontispiece)
Where did you get this medal?
Ahmed salaamed deeply.
So they comforted each other.
You'll know how to soothe him.
My arm pains me badly.
And thus Umballa found them.
Kathyln turned the tide.

THE ADVENTURES OF KATHLYN
CHAPTER I
THE GOLDEN GIRL
Under a canopied platform stood a young girl, modeling in clay. The
glare of the California sunshine, filtering through the canvas, became
mellowed, warm and golden. Above the girl's head--yellow like the
stalk of wheat--there hovered a kind of aureola, as if there had risen
above it a haze of impalpable gold dust.

A poet I know might have cried out that here ended his quest of the
Golden Girl. Straight she stood at this moment, lovely of face, rounded
of form, with an indescribable suggestion of latent physical power or
magnetism. On her temples there were little daubs of clay, caused
doubtless by impatient fingers sweeping back occasional wind blown
locks of hair. There was even a daub on the side of her handsome
sensitive nose.
Her hand, still filled with clay, dropped to her side, and a tableau
endured for a minute or two, suggesting a remote period, a Persian idyl,
mayhap. With a smile on her lips she stared at the living model. The
chatoyant eyes of the leopard stared back, a flicker of restlessness in
their brilliant yellow deeps. The tip of the tail twitched.
"You beautiful thing!" she said.
She began kneading the clay again, and with deft fingers added bits
here and there to the creature which had grown up under her strong
supple fingers.
"Kathlyn! Oh, Kit!"
The sculptress paused, the pucker left her brow, and she turned, her
face beaming, for her sister Winnie was the apple of her eye, and she
brooded over her as the mother would have done had the mother lived.
For Winnie, dark as Kathlyn was light, was as careless and aimless as
thistledown in the wind.
A collie leaped upon the platform and began pawing Kathlyn, and
shortly after the younger sister followed. Neither of the girls noted the
stiffening mustaches of the leopard. The animal rose, and his nostrils
palpitated. He hated the dog with a hatred not unmixed with fear.
Treachery is in the marrow of all cats. To breed them in captivity does
not matter. Sooner or later they will strike. Never before had the
leopard been so close to his enemy, free of the leash.
"Kit, it is just wonderful. However can you do it? Some day we'll make
dad take us to Paris, where you can exhibit them."

A snarl from the leopard, answered by a growl from the collie, brought
Kathlyn's head about. The cat leaped, but toward Winnie, not the collie.
With a cry of terror Winnie turned and ran in the direction of the
bungalow. Kathlyn, seizing the leash, followed like the wind, hampered
though she was by the apron. The cat loped after the fleeing girl,
gaining at each bound. The yelping of the collie brought forth from
various points low rumbling sounds, which presently developed into
roars.
Winnie