The plaintiff could see now where the course he had taken would lead, as Beatty had already seen it. He, the rich and famous author, was about to cast his poor, obscure brother-in-law into prison. Kipling knew the witches' Sabbath reporters would: hold over such an incident He offered to furnish bail. Beatly refused it, and was at length released en his own recognizance to appear in court again on Tuesday The next hearing was all Kipling had feared and Beatty had hoped. Reporters had arrived by the dozen. The audience that for four years had suffered thwarted curiosity saw the famous author writhe on the witness stand, and were thrilled by the intimate details of the family row. Beatty was heving a fine time, Under the goading cross-examination, Kipling found himself assuming an implausibly greatrhearted pose. He claimed that he had promised Wolcott Balestier to watch over his younger brother, end he had moved to America mainly for that purpose.
"Then," asked the. cross-examiner, "taking care of Mr. Balestier has been your chief occupation "I have also," the witn answerd, "written a thing or two.
When the hearing ended, Beatty was held in $400 bail for the grand jury, and was bound over in $400 more to keep the peace.
Heretofore most of Kiplings in-traders had been worshipful pilgrims. Now everyone was laughing. Even in s study g} Naulohka, more fiercely warded (han ever, he could hear the distant, derisive, galling mirth.
The grand jury was to meet in September. In Angust~the Kiplings left suddenly for Europe. So headlong was their flight that they took only their most personal belongings Vermont never saw Kipling again In 1899, when the Kiplings returned to New York, Beatty's diaical mind conceived a blighting pian of vengeance. On y 12 papers announced that Ly; Rudyard Kipling for $50,000 damages, alleging "malicious persecution, false arrest and defamation of character."
Actually, no suit-ever was brought, luff, but it worked. "By wasn't coming back into my again, said Beatty. The Kiplings stayed away from Vermont, and after the death of the little girl Josephine, and the author's own illness, they went back to England.
For a few years after his flight, Naulahka was kept ready for Kipling's return. Then it was sold. Indian draperies that Caroline Kipling hung still adorn the windows. In the study still stands the desk on which Kipling scratched the sentence his Greek galley slave cut on his oar: "Ott, was I weary as I toiled at thee."
Quiet and retiring, hesitating to offer a dogmatic opinion even about those problems of design he had studied so closely, Mr. Mitchell was in the truest sense a supreme artist it aircraft. His aeroplanes bore his signature in their external shape and' io-day's Spitfire shows at once its relationship to yesterday's Schneider Trophy winners.
At the time.of the Schneider Trophy contest in Italy ard at Calshot, where I went to report the races for the "Morning Post," I met Mr. Mitchell almost daily ard watched him during a period which must have been as trying to the nerves as any it is possible to imagine.
Fair-haired, rather squarely built, he would smile when he was questioned about the speed capabilities of his aeroplanes and would refuse even to express confidence in their ability to win the Trophy.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.