The Project Gutenberg EBook of People of Position, by Stanley Portal Hyatt

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Title: People of Position

Author: Stanley Portal Hyatt

Illustrator: H. Richard Boehm

Release Date: June 30, 2009 [EBook #29274]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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PEOPLE OF POSITION

[Illustration: LALAGE]

PEOPLE OF POSITION

BY

STANLEY PORTAL HYATT

Author of "Little Brown Brother," "End of the Road," etc.

_With a Frontispiece by H. RICHARD BOEHM_

NEW YORK
WESSELS & BISSELL CO.
1910

COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY

WESSELS & BISSELL CO.

_September_

THE PREMIER PRESS
NEW YORK

PROLOGUE

Grierson refilled the magazine of his rifle carefully--when you are
dealing with South American patriots it is better to take no chances,
even though the enemy has retreated--then he wiped a couple of
half-dried blood spots off his cheek, and, after that, went over to
where lay the body of the man from whom that same blood had spurted.

For a full minute he stood very still, gazing with sombre eyes at the
kindly face which seemed to be smiling back at him even in death; then
he knelt down, and, with infinite gentleness, smoothed the ruffled hair,
arranged the collar so as to hide the bullet hole in the bronzed throat,
and crossed the hands on the breast. When he got up again his face was
twitching strangely, seeing which, the American officer, who had come up
behind him, suddenly became busy with his men.

It was one of those stories which seldom get into the newspapers,
possibly because they are so utterly unimportant in themselves--a ragged
band of half-breeds robbing and murdering in the name of liberty; a
landing party of marines from the nearest warship, which happened to be
American; and a futile little fight ending, as usual, in the defeat of
the brigands. Only this time, an Englishman, who had gone out with the
marines, had been killed; and now Grierson, his friend, was trying to
realise the fact.

"He was awfully good to me, the whites