The Trumpeter Swan By TEMPLE BAILEY Author of "The Tin Soldier" "Contrary Mary" "Mistress Anne" "Glory of Youth" Sonus ex nubibus te revocabit a mundo A sound from the clouds shall call thee from this earth Illustrated by ALICE BARBER STEPHENS THE PENN PUBLISHING COMPANY PHILADELPHIA 1920 COPYRIGHT 1920 BY THE PENN PUBLISHING COMPANY

THE TRUMPETER SWAN

CHAPTER I

A MAJOR AND TWO MINORS

I

It had rained all night, one of the summer rains that, beginning in a thunder-storm in Washington, had continued in a steaming drizzle until morning.

There were only four passengers in the sleeper, men all of them—two in adjoining sections in the middle of the car, a third in the drawing-room, a fourth an intermittent occupant of a berth at the end. They had gone to bed unaware of the estate or circumstance of their fellow-travellers, and had waked to find the train delayed by washouts, and side-tracked until more could be learned of the condition of the road.

The man in the drawing-room shone, in the few glimpses that the others had of him, with an effulgence which was dazzling. His valet, the intermittent sleeper in the end berth, was a smug little soul, with a small nose which pointed to the stars. When the door of the compartment opened to admit break

fast there was the radiance of a brocade dressing-gown, the shine of a sleek head, the staccato of an imperious voice.

Randy Paine, long and lank, in faded khaki, rose, leaned over the seat of the section in front of him and drawled, "'It is not raining rain to me—it's raining roses—down——'"

A pleasant laugh, and a deep voice, "Come around here and talk to me. You're a Virginian, aren't you?"

"By the grace of