Produced by Clare Graham and Marc D'Hooghe at Free Literature (Images generously made available by the Internet Archive.) THE CLIFF-DWELLERS A Novel BY HENRY B. FULLER ILLUSTRATED BY T. DE THULSTRUP THE GREGG PRESS / RIDGEWOOD, N. J. 1898 [Illustration: Cecilia Ingles] ILLUSTRATIONS CECILIA INGLES. "'WE ARE LIVING UP ON PINE STREET'" "TWO YOUNG GIRLS ENTERED" "'I SHALL MARRY RUSSELL,' SHE DECLARED" "A DOOR OPENED SUDDENLY, AND HER BROTHER BURT CAME IN" "HE FOUND A PLACE IN A QUIET CORNER" "'WE HAVE COME TO TAKE OUR GIRL BACK HOME'" "'ISN'T IT PRETTY LATE FOR DOLLY?'" "'HOW'S THIS, JO?' ASKED OGDEN" "SHE LAID HER HAND TREMBLINGLY UPON THE OLD MAN'S ARM" "HE LOOKED STEADILY ON VIBERT FROM UNDER HIS HAND" "THE GIRL GATE HIM A GLANCE WILD AND TIMID" "THE MATTER WAS ADJUSTED IN A SMALL AND COMPACT COURT-ROOM" "'HERE WE GO,' SHE CRIED, 'SUNDAY OR NO SUNDAY. I HATE TO POKE'" "THEY SAT OUT NOW ONLY AFTER DARK" "HE SAT WITH HIS EYES FIXED ON THE BOTTOM OF THE BOAT" "BURT LED CORNELIA DOWN THE AISLE" "'HOW WELL IT'S DONE!' SHE SAID TO HIM" "'GOODNESS, GEORGE, DON'T KNOCK THE FIRE ALL TO PIECES'" "'IS HE DEAD?'" "THEN SHE FELL BACK WEAKLY AND COUGHED LONG AND VIOLENTLY" "'STOP!' CRIED OGDEN" "'THREE TO ONE,' PANTED MARCUS" "SHE PRESSED HIM BACK INTO THE DEPTHS OF HIS GREAT EASY-CHAIR" THE CLIFF-DWELLERS INTRODUCTION Between the former site of old Fort Dearborn and the present site of our newest Board of Trade there lies a restricted yet tumultuous territory through which, during the course of the last fifty years, the rushing streams of commerce have worn many a deep and rugged chasm. These great canons--conduits, in fact, for the leaping volume of an ever-increasing prosperity--cross each other with a sort of systematic rectangularity, and in deference to the practical directness of local requirements they are in general called simply--streets. Each of these canons is closed in by a long frontage of towering cliffs, and these soaring walls of brick and limestone and granite rise higher and higher with each succeeding year, according as the work of erosion at their bases goes onward--the work of that seething flood of carts, carriages, omnibuses, cabs, cars, messengers, shoppers, clerks, and capitalists, which surges with increasing violence for every passing day. This erosion, proceeding with a sort of fateful regularity, has come to be a matter of constant and growing interest. Means have been found to measure its progress--just as a scale has been arranged to measure the rising of the Nile or to gauge the draught of an ocean liner. In this case the unit of measurement is called the "story." Ten years ago the most rushing and irrepressible of the torrents which devastate Chicago had not worn its bed to a greater depth than that indicated seven of these "stories." This depth has since increased to eight--to ten--to fourteen--to sixteen, until some of the leading avenues of activity